<p>Going to a top rated school (since one can get a “good” education at all levels of colleges, I am not responding to that) is not worth IMO $40 k in debt. </p>
<p>Ohio also has some of the top colleges in the country. If you stay in state, you have many options of getting an excellent education.</p>
<p>I went to Harvard. Husband went to a second tier LAC. S, 19, is at a second tier LAC. From what I can tell, H got and S is getting better education than I did at Harvard because both my husband and S were taught by faculty whose main interest was teaching, not research. I am floored by the personal interest that faculty took in my husband during his college education. I am floored by the creative teaching that S is getting in his education. I had some of that at Harvard, but it was rare, not routine. I had the opportunity to hear a lot of great lectures. S is having lots of opportunities for fascinating class discussions under the tuteledge of a prof, not TAs, and he has several classes that combine instruction and theory with service learning or other hands-on experiences.</p>
<p>What Harvard had over my husband and S’s experiences was a very large, exceptionally smart group of students who were self motivated to be deeply involved in all sorts of activities ranging from clubs to community activities to academic research. I don’t think, however, that would be worth going $40 k in debt to experience.</p>
<p>If you are smart enough to be considering colleges like Amherst, then you are smart enough to be able to get very nice merit aid from some good Ohio colleges, and to also figure out ways of reducing your college expenses by earning some money through summer and/or school year jobs.</p>