<p>“That does not preclude a discussion of what aspects of their policies do and do not make sense.”</p>
<p>If that discussion is happening, I haven’t seen it on this thread. There’s been exactly one practical suggestion, which is to charge the richest people even more in order to increase the tuition money collected and use the surplus to inch the upper boundary of fin aid higher, and hardly anyone’s paying any attention to that idea. Let’s talk about where the money to cover families making >$150k will come from.</p>
<p>glido, I think you are correct. There is a partnership between the government and colleges now to reallocate educational opportunity along with income. The colleges go along with it for three reasons: (1) they may feel it is the “right” thing to do from a social-engineering perspective; (2) it is very good PR for colleges to be able to boast about all the disadvantaged students they are educating; and (3) for the colleges with very large endowments, it reduces the chances that their endowments may become subject to increased scrutiny or regulation.</p>
QFT. But–is this really wrong? Colleges promise (whether they actually fulfill the promise is arguable but beside the point) that you will be able to “afford” your child’s education. Is it wrong if they define “afford” with the prerequisite of living an adequate frugal lifestyle, with no financial disasters along the way, for 18 years? Consider that if this definition were more favorably revised, the same amount of FA $$$ would enable fewer students to attend–after all, the available grant money doesn’t change.</p>
<p>
My father was also the first in his family to be educated beyond elementary school. For the first half of my life, we lived around the poverty line (I estimate, not knowing what the poverty line was in mid-1990s Canada). And yet, my parents expressed a willingness to spend MORE than financial aid deems us able to afford in order to send me to an elite school, if I were accepted. I know other families, with the same values wrt education, that are doing so as full pay (we are not, having only worked up to middle-middle class).</p>
<p>
Then why not move to Detroit, accepting its uncertain job security and terrible public schools in exchange for lower COL and qualifying for FA? I’m sure others can tell you why not, if you haven’t figured it out yourself already.</p>
<p>
Let’s assume that 150k in NYC = 100k in Omaha. Let’s further assume that the NYC family will not receive FA; the Omaha family will. So why not become the Omaha family, if you want FA? In exchange for giving up the desirability and advantages of an NYC location, you get FA. Seems like a fair deal to me, even if unintentional.</p>
<p>
I disagree. For starters, a two-income family could reduce income (thus increasing FA qualification) and car expenses by having one income and one car (with correspondingly reduced financial security). Any family could decide to take vacations at home, and eat out 5 times a year (only for birthdays and holidays). Any family could decide to change their lifestyle to spend no more than $200 a month on food for a family of 4–the internet provides resources to teach you how, but be prepared to eat lots of beans and rice. Any family could severely reduce discretionary spending on things like clothes (buy from Wal-Mart instead of Macy’s) and heating (learn to wear layers in the winter and keep the house at 65). Any family could decide that any “starter home” is a luxury (because it is) that they can’t afford.</p>
<p>Are these sacrifices “worth it”? Increasingly, and understandably, people decide not. But these are not “unreasonable” changes, IMO. An unreasonable change would be, for example, not paying for heat during an NE winter because you need to save the money. Anyone who can afford a luxury as expensive as private education without lifestyle changes has been immensely lucky in the financial lottery of life.</p>
<p>
Models 1 and 2 have been financially disqualified by colleges. There is a reason why Model 1 only works at CC: compare the resources and luxuries of a CC to any elite private. They are not remotely comparable. As for Model 2–why do you think so few colleges have followed in Harvard’s footsteps? Because they can’t afford it.</p>
<p>Any FA reform would have to cost LESS or EQUAL to what colleges are currently spending. Model 3 is far from a new idea, but even if the favoring-the-rich bias was countered, moving to an all-merit model would encourage direct competition among students–a competition, like high school ranking, that elite colleges try to eliminate by declaring that everyone is special just to be admitted and everyone receives FA according to the same formula (which is a lie, given preferential packaging, but there remains an institutional bias against merit aid for being too overtly competitive).</p>
<p>Is the FA system perfect? Hell no. In some ways, it is extremely messed up. But I see some people–not all, far from all even limited to those who “disagree” with me–on this thread (which I have read in its entirety, painfully) who are complaining from a position of privilege.</p>
<p>"If that discussion is happening, I haven’t seen it on this thread. "</p>
<p>Discussing what policies do not make sense, does not necessarily imply discussing how to implement the policies that do make sense. Obviously if anyone is listening to us and decides to make things more “just” in the way we suggest, someone is going to have to implement it, including financing it. But its pointless to discuss how to say, finance giving more aid to people in high cost of living metro areas, until there is a consensus that cost of living in metro areas is a factor worth considering. </p>
<p>I am curious. Do you really not think colleges are constantly examining their FA policies, looking at what CSS questions are meaningful and what not, etc, etc?</p>
<p>If you are going into that territory, you could also say, it’s such a tender age all infants should be cared for by a nanny at their own home not at a daycare… On and on.</p>
<p>“Do you really not think colleges are constantly examining their FA policies, looking at what CSS questions are meaningful and what not, etc, etc?”</p>
<p>Sure they are. And I guarantee you that anyone in the room who just says “This part isn’t fair!” without suggesting any solutions is going to (rightfully) get fired.</p>
<p>“Let’s assume that 150k in NYC = 100k in Omaha. Let’s further assume that the NYC family will not receive FA; the Omaha family will. So why not become the Omaha family, if you want FA? In exchange for giving up the desirability and advantages of an NYC location, you get FA. Seems like a fair deal to me, even if unintentional.”</p>
<p>perhaps for the same reason I dont chuck a stable job where I have seniority toward a pension, contacts and connections, etc to grab a job elsewhere that pays slightly more. There are TRANSITION costs. Some trivial, some very substantial</p>
<p>Also, of course, there are some occupations or subfields of occupations where there simply is no employment in Omaha (or any other smaller cheaper town). Many would have to change careers to do that. The resulting loss of income would well exceed the cost of living differential. Someone who is an agricultural marketer gets a break that say a Semiconductor research tech does not. </p>
<p>And some have ties to a place other than career. Extended family, friendship, etc. Why should someone who happens to have all their extended family be better off than someone with all their extended family in Omaha? </p>
<p>Again, I do not mean to imply anyone has a RIGHT to financial aid. These are private institutions, with a right to pursue their interests (though of course to the extent these calculations impact federal grants and loans, thats another thing). I would simply suggest that its an element of arbitrariness.</p>
<p>I mean they could give more financial aid to people who drive fords instead of chevies. If someone complained, well you could always tell them to trade in their ford for a chevy. (a much easier change for most of us than chucking a job and moving to a new metro area). But it would still be unfair and arbitrary. And, arguably, serve no institutional interest.</p>
<p>I know colleges are constantly looking at their financial aid policies. But more important than fairness is getting the students that they most want. That is the entire goal of financial aid.</p>
<p>"Sure they are. And I guarantee you that anyone in the room who just says “This part isn’t fair!” without suggesting any solutions is going to (rightfully) get fired. "</p>
<p>I am not expecting someone to put it that way, and if you check my posts you will see I did not word any of mine that way.</p>
<p>“I know colleges are constantly looking at their financial aid policies. But more important than fairness is getting the students that they most want. That is the entire goal of financial aid”</p>
<p>I tend to agree with that, and I have tried to frame my posts in terms of institutional self interest, which I suggest is not served by policies whose impact is arbitrary. </p>
<p>Some people seem to be very emotionally vested in the status quo, and are not comfortable with a discussion about arbitrariness, unless its accompanied by a detailed, revenue neutral, financial plan.</p>
<p>I agree with that you’re saying, Brooklynborndad. It’s not really fair, but it’s not really supposed to be fair. Only the government programs really have to try to be fair; that’s why they have means-testing. It’s not perfect, of course, but there’s at least an attempt. Colleges give money to people they want; they don’t really care to make it affordable to every single person who applies.</p>
<p>I guess I’m never going to get the proof that I asked for earlier, about how many poor kids actually get that amazing, loan-free aid that upper of the middle class kids don’t get. I’m just spitballing here, but I’m guessing that it’s because it almost never happens.</p>
<p>Thinking back 30-some years ago, I remember an overwhelming feeling that there was no point in applying to many private colleges, because it would still be too expensive to attend. I did apply to one nearby private which was my dream school (waitlisted), and another nearby private because I thought they might give me significant National Merit money (they didn’t). Other than that, I didn’t bother with any other “elite” schools because I just knew they were entirely outside my family’s ability to pay. In the flood of glossy brochures, in the info sessions at my high school, there wasn’t anything that said anything different to me. The classmates applying to elite private schools were people who could afford full-pay.</p>
<p>Part of this was that it was the glory days of the UC system, where many people who could afford private went public regardless. But the overarching, ever-present message from privates that yes, there IS financial aid, wasn’t there a few decades back. </p>
<p>In part, it’s a better system now, in that more kids are aware of more opportunities. If I knew then what I knew now, I might have put in more applications in search of merit and FA. Or maybe there was just less FA and merit money back then, and nothing would have changed.</p>
<p>garda, it happens regularly at the most heavily-endowed, need-blind, no-loan schools (HYPSM, etc.) but I don’t think they realize actual figures.</p>
Or perhaps the poor kid does get it, but the school is across the country and he/she can’t come up with the transportation money, or the money to buy winter coats and boots.</p>
<p>“As for Model 2–why do you think so few colleges have followed in Harvard’s footsteps? Because they can’t afford it.”</p>
<p>of course even Harvard didnt follow that model till fairly recently I don’t expect major changes of the type people have asked for, across the board, but I would expect SOME changes to deal with some of these issues, at least at a few institutions.</p>
<p>How many poor kids (kids receiving Pell grants, let’s say) actually go to any of those schools? If your financial aid plan involves, in anyway, the assumption or the hope that you will get into Harvard, Yale, or Princeton then it’s not a “plan”; it’s an aspiration. Sort of like saying that poor kids usually great aid, assuming that they win the Powerball the day after they file the FAFSA.</p>
<p>I’m not saying that middle-class isn’t hit hard by the cost of college. Of course it is, and coming from a high-income home doesn’t mean that you don’t have expenses or can’t manage to hack the skyrocketing tuition and fees. I’m just questioning this ridiculous and annoyingly common assertion that it’s so much easier for poor kids and that being desperately is functionally the same as being fantastically wealthy when it comes to affording college.</p>
<p>To anyone advocating moving to Omaha to get more FA: if everyone did that, then Omaha would be as expensive as the Northeast! Population density drives up the price of housing. Cost of living, salary and location cannot be easily dissociated.</p>
<p>On the larger topic: I don’t think HYPS and their academic equivalents are going to lower their prices or offer more FA so that even more affluent suburban kids can attend these kinds of schools. Perhaps, however, the very expensive and mediocre private universities that have the nerve to charge the same tuition as HYPS will begin to suffer as parents in that 150-250K range begin to wonder why they should pay 200K+ to have their freshmen taught by adjuncts. These schools, which have generally become “hot” very recently, are often located in urban areas and offer extremely poor value for the academic dollar. Their reputations and costs are entirely out of line with what they really offer a student.</p>
<p>“are not comfortable with a discussion about arbitrariness, unless its accompanied by a detailed, revenue neutral, financial plan.”</p>
<p>How about something like “Eliminate smaller majors and direct the money savings to financial aid”? A nice vague description of a concept would be a nice start.</p>
<p>It’s BS that the reason we all don’t move to Tulsa is because of transaction costs. Doctors right out of a GP residency can go anywhere they want. The unsexy areas of the country desperately need doctors. Most of the new grads don’t have families or mortgages yet. But young people with all those options crowd into NY and SF anyway, because those cities are AWESOME. That’s why we live there, regardless of the cost. We think it’s a good deal.</p>
I don’t expect major changes of the type people have asked for, across the board, but I would expect SOME changes to deal with some of these issues, at least at a few institutions.</p>