Acceptance advice- Is debt worth it?

Hi guys, thanks so much for caring enough to read this
I’m going to be a computer science student entering freshman year in the fall of 2017

Currently I will pay $3,500 per year total if I go to University of Alabama, so it is very cheap. However, this school is not very known for computer science
However, I was accepted, but received no money to University of Illinois Champaign (pre engineering, for transfer to engineering college sophmore year if grades are really good), Ohio state University, and University of Wisconsin Madison, all three are really well known for being great in computer science.

My question is- Is it worth incurring a very large amount of debt (at least $80-100,000) in order to go to these fantastic schools, so that the next 30 years of work will get more pay, as opposed to graduating with no debt and having a lower paying job in the future because I graduated from a worse school (assuming I will do the same amount of internships and general learning at either school I go to).
Thanks so much
-Noah

You can’t borrow $80k. You can only borrow ~$5500/year. How much can your parents pay per year without borrowing?

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it worth incurring a very large amount of debt (at least $80-100,000) in order to go to these fantastic schools,


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so that the next 30 years of work will get more pay, as opposed to graduating with no debt and having a lower paying job in the future because I graduated from a worse school (assuming I will do the same amount of internships and general learning at either school I go to). <<<<

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get more pay? You won’t get more pay. Companies do NOT pay a UIUC, UW, or OSU grad more money than a UA grad. They would pay all of these folks THE SAME.

Where did you get the idea that if you graduated from Alabama you’d get a lower paying job???

@mom2collegekids
Thanks for the reply, I appreciate it.
I feel like I will get passed over if I go to a less well known school for a guy with the same credentials but a more “sexy” degree, like one from Ohio State or U of I because they are ranked very highly in computer science. This would be my concern when applying for jobs in a competitive field like Computer Science.

Am I catastrophizing this?

@austinmshauri
In the USA you can take student loans from the government for very high amounts. I know personally people with over $100,000 in student loan debt. Where are you from, if you don’t mind me asking?

Government student loans for undergraduate students are limited to much lower than that (medical and law students can take on much larger amounts of student loan debt, although it is not necessarily a good idea). Undergraduates with $100,000+ in student loans generally have most of it in private student loans which require cosigners.

So $80,000-$100,000 in undergraduate student loans is both a bad idea and not really possible unless you have a cosigner, and it would be a bad idea for both you and the cosigner if the loan is even approved.

In any case, UIUC computer science is very difficult to switch into if you are not directly admitted (competitive admission with minimum 3.67 college GPA and A- grades in CS courses to apply).

@ucbalumnus
Thank you for explaining that to me. @austinmshauri you were right, I’m sorry for the confusion. At the pre-engineering dashboard on the website that appeared on my myIllini account, it said that I need a 3.8 GPA after my first year to have any chance of getting into Computer science or Biomedical engineering. Some of the other majors had a lower requirement, but your right, it’s gonna be hell trying to get in even from pre-engineering at U of I

Go to the college you can afford.

Then starting in October become a regular at the career center. Have them help you craft a resume and cover letter. Go to every event your department puts on - lunch speaker, social event, whatever. Ask every upperclassmen how they got their internships and any department jobs. Ask every faculty member for advice for getting experience and a summer position. Don’t be shy about it. Most people like to talk about themselves and share what they know.

Be sure to go to office hours even if you don’t have a question. Let the prof know what you found interesting in class that week. If they offer a journal article to read, read it and go back to talk about it. You’d be surprised how many people don’t follow up and it will make a good impression.

Internships etc start being advertised in the fall through December.

In any case, it looks like you currently have one affordable choice (Alabama).

Even if you somehow get scholarships to make the others affordable, UIUC would still be a bad choice if you want to major in CS, due to the low probability of being able to major in CS there.

@Snowball City
Thank you so much for your post. My brother is in college but he is not the type to tell me these things. I’ll make it my goal to do those things you said- I’ve written them down and won’t forget them. I’m beginning to realise that how you behave in college is far more important than the college alone.
Your post made me realise that the degree is not all the hiring manager will look at, but the things you mentioned (internships, work experience, recommenders). Thanks again

Alabama is quite a good school. You will not be settling if you choose to go there.

Realistically, the companies that come recruiting at different colleges will differ to some extent. You may have to look for companies hiring new graduates and apply to them directly if they do not come to campus to recruit. There will be some local bias, so (for example) Alabama would likely have regional aerospace and automotive employers in its career center.

@LuckyCharms913
Thanks, the whole reason I started to reconsider going to Alabama was because a lot of my classmates (all smart people mind you) would chuckle when I told them I was going to Alabama (I’m from near Chicago).

@ucbalumnus
I thought about this, and realized that Champaign, Ohio, and Wisconsin (my other choices) aren’t necessarily in tech hubs themselves. If I went to those, I would probably end up moving south, or to either coast when job searching. I was banking on Alabama’s proximity to Texas for employment.Was any of this a mistake?

@memelord1337 Would you like me to send you via private message the 2 page advice for transitioning to college that I wrote for a group I volunteer with? It is a combination of things we told our kids, things we learned from the kids, and things my husband had experienced as a first generation college student?

It depends on your goals. For certain jobs, it may be easier to get with a UIUC or UW CS degree. These schools are very well known in the tech community and have deep industry contacts. You are in-state at Illinois? And have you been admitted directly to their CS program?

Generally, I’m against the idea of taking out large loans for an undergrad degree, but with a CS degree from a top program i’m a little less cautious.

@WildestDream
Thanks for posting,
No not directly for U of I, but directly for UW Madison. For U of I it would be a transfer from within the college through their pre-engineering program depending on me doing exceptionally well freshman year (3.8 GPA). Going to UW Madison would probably means me and my mom trying to pay about $15-20,000 a year and loaning the other ~ $15,000. Would it really make that big of a difference do you think?

@Snowball City
That would be amazing, thanks!

I like Madison but that is too much debt and too much worry about money for the 4 years. Go to Alabama and save up a % of your internship money so that you can have an apartment deposit and moving expenses for your first job.

Another vote for UA. Your future self will be grateful.

Tell your friends proudly that you got a tremendous merit scholarship at Alabama and you are excited to be going there in the fall. If they still chuckle, perhaps they are not friends worth holding onto.