<p>
Not really, bbd. That seems like a very general statement, which I am not making at all. I am speaking, actually, to the fact that a slice of families, somewhere in the middle of the economic ladder and generally with some sort of non-standard situation, are not able to make this work.</p>
<p>sylvan, there’s a large slice of families who can’t make it work, regardless of where they are on the economic ladder. Poor, middle, upper income. Lots of them can’t afford what the financial aid folks tell them is their share. So the solution is not to attend that school. Nobody is withholding a blood transfusion here. You apply, package not doable, don’t send your deposit, it’s pretty simple.</p>
<p>Well said, Blossom^^^ #562, and 564</p>
<p>Tell me an example of something else In America that works that way. You should be paying for it yourself. That way the cost of the schools would be equal to the value of the education. It is precisely this disconnect from value and pricing that has led to the run away tuition problem that has risen as fast as healthcare cost. In reality the tuitions should be half the price for all.</p>
<p>What happened? I went to work, and this thread exploded.</p>
<p>I want to comment on so many posts, but I don’t know where to start. Post #557 does a good job of summing up our public policy. When such great publics exist (not necessarily in our state) I can’t see how we are “entitled” to complain because the bright, shiny private is just out of reach.</p>
<p>I am struggling. My union (college professor) traded away my pension for better benefits for old timers. We just have a glorified IRA that after 25 years has not accrued anywhere near enough money to retire. My good friend, a high school teacher, has a better union and a great pension and will retire way before I do. Unfair? Maybe. Especially when you consider that she has a one year masters, and I have a PhD which was 4 years of coursework plus a very intricate thesis that won a national award.</p>
<p>However, this was my choice. At no time did I consider teaching in high school. My life has meaning to me beyond the financial, although approaching sixty it is daunting to think about teaching for 10 more years, though if I’m fit enough and healthy enough to do it, I’ll be grateful.</p>
<p>The sappy thing I want to say (and I now it’s sappy) is that we can see the glass as half-full or half-empty. Someone will always get a better deal and someone a worse deal.</p>
<p>My students struggle to attend CC. Most of them have parents who earn what my H and I do, but don’t have the values to want to sacrifice to fund their kids’ educations. Just a different philosophy. So these kids work full-time for tuition money and to pay for their cars and live at home and roll up their sleeves and work hard to get an education. They envy kids like mine who have only to work a little (six to eight hours a week) for spending money.</p>
<p>They are not embittered, however, and are committed to making their lives work.</p>
<p>Most families can find a way to enable kids to attend a college that fits with their needs, at least up to a point. The kid at MIT who would be bored at his sister’s state school? Thank goodness he’s at MIT with FA. If that hadn’t been a possibility perhaps Olin or Pratt (free) might have accepted the student or maybe the student would have attended a school like Stony Brook with demanding engineering, science and math courses and a low COA, even for out-of-state students.</p>
<p>If we educate ourselves and our children to look beyond our own entitlement mentality (and I am not pointing fingers at anyone; I can lapse into this myself) we can begin to problem solve and find the best options for our kids. Someone mentioned Curm. His daughter got a full ride to Rhodes, chosen over the iffy aid from Yale. She’s now at Yale medical school.</p>
<p>I had planned to send my kids’ to privates full pay, half from current earnings (living very close to the belt) and half from refinancing our home. Fast forward to 9/11 and the recession. H’s business went belly up and we owed a fortune to creditors. I had to refinance to keep our house, and am essentially paying for the same house twice. </p>
<p>We were fortunate to get just enough FA to enable us to send our kids to their need-blind schools, which was fortunate. Only one SUNY has my son’s major, and although he’d have been accepted there, with extreme shyness and ADD I’m not sure he could have made it there.</p>
<p>And there have been academic ups and downs for both my kids in college, too.</p>
<p>Far more important to success is a resilient kid with confidence and self-esteem who can apply him/herself and withstand compromise and disappointment. Bitterness and regret don’t make good coping strategies.</p>
<p>I wish the kids of each parent on this thread could go to the college of his/her dreams. It’s not always possible for financial reasons, academic reasons, or just the caprice of mysterious fate. Then we need to know that there are many roads to Rome and many ways to skin a cat. (I seem to be enamored of trite sayings of late.) </p>
<p>I don’t think the lower middle class has it better than the upper. I think more money is always an advantage because it means more choices. Yes, there are those students who get an amazing deal without their parents having to barter their own futures, but for every one of those there is a kid attending community college. The system doesn’t work perfectly for all, but I am still pleased that kids whose folks have lower incomes than mine get more FA, no matter how much I have to work or what I have to forego to pay for my own kids.</p>
<p>Whenever a kid who comes from a less than comfortable background succeeds I feel better about the prospects of democracy in the US. No, we don’t live in a meritocracy, but it’s nice to know that at least occasionally merit does win out.</p>
<p>If your family is one that lost the FA sweepstakes I am truly sorry and do empathize with your pain. It’s not fun to feel others get what your kids can’t and that the rules are stacked against you. However, if it’s because you earn too much to get the FA package that would make it all possible, then I am truly happy that your kids probably have other options that get them where they want to be.</p>
<p>Life in this highly competitive society is so difficult. If we are not at our other’s throats I honestly believe all the kids have a better chance of succeeding.</p>
<p>College tuition has gone up a lot more than the rate of inflation over the past ten years. That has closed some doors to many middle-class families. (That does not mean that inflation has not affected lower-income and wealthy families. It only means what it says.)</p>
<p>Mythmom, your post made me cry.</p>
<p>Well put on all counts. And your kids have something that all the money in the world can’t buy- a Mom with self-knowledge, empathy, and a desire to pay-it-forward.</p>
<p>Hugs to you.</p>
<p>“Most families can find a way to enable kids to attend a college that fits with their needs”</p>
<p>-Agree. I have mentioned before that there are choice. Our family have used 3 options: we have paid all for one kid out of our paychaecks, various employers paid for our own education all thru MBA and another kid was on full tuition + some R&B Merit scholarhsips. Of course, she could have chosen to go to elite school. But she did not. We are thankful and planning to support her thru Med. School. Ranking has never meant anything to her, she has always wanted to feel comfy and be relatively close to home. This strategy has worked for her so far resulted in few very good choices for her next step. </p>
<p>It seems that some are trying to break thru the locked doors. Let them stay locked, do not waste your resources, at the end it is their loss, find door that is wide open for you and your children.</p>
<p>Thanks so much blossom. Means a lot. I’m always afraid to post so much from my heart.</p>
<p>Momma-three please give the board another example of pricing based on income. The fact is that the parents getting hurt by the college tuition scam are the upper middle class (but not rich). The truly wealthy say incomes over 750k are not the ones on this site. All over America there are husband/wife pharmacists and dentists earning 300k who are expected to pay the full cost of colleges up to millions of dollars for 2-4 kids. Under the current system is makes absolutely no sense to save any money for college. The responsible parents only end up paying more out of pocket. In the current system the colleges make absolutely no attempt to balance the cost of the degree against the value of the degree to the student. Everyone’s tuition should be lower and the people below 60k should get aid. It makes absolutely no sense to charge different tuition to someone making 120k because the wife decided to not work and charge full tuition to the exact family if the wife decides to work and they earn 240k. In essence the social justice police have given the income of the non-working spouse right back and provided an incentive for people not to work or save. These examples are quite real and all of you will know such people.</p>
<p>momma-three:
“her school … seemed to ignore that we had three others in college”</p>
<p>It’s not the school’s job to take into account your three others in college. It’s yours. YOU decided to allow a child attend a pricy LAC. If YOU decide to buy a Mercedes, it’s not Mercedes’ fault that you’re angry because you’re paying more than you’d pay for a Ford. </p>
<p>There ARE options other than 50,000/year schools. No one is MAKING you pay 50,000 if you don’t want to pay 50,000. </p>
<p>This is what I don’t get about this whole thread: this sense of entitlement that somehow pricy LACs and pricy private universities OWE something to the middle class at large.</p>
<p>^^^^</p>
<p>If you are earning 300k and can’t pay for your child’s education,you should take stock of what you are blowing your $$$ on…</p>
<p>
How many years of schooling is that?? Millions of dollars? The most expensive college in the country is somewhere around $55K/year. </p>
<p>SAY, What is your solution to the inequities you perceive?</p>
<p>qdogpa-You need a tutorial about exactly how much of 250-300k a person get to keep. If a family has two or three children in college they simply can’t afford it. Keep in mind such people spend years in college and only get to the higher incomes later in life. In any big city 250k just isn’t close to rich. This is what two nurses can earn.</p>
<p>^^^</p>
<p>We earn less then that figure and footing the entire cost of 55k per year “out of pocket”,
Will have another in college in 2 years,and expect to pay that cost also…</p>
<p>re. SAY 572</p>
<p>I’m not even sure how to respond to your post. I believe you comments about the “social justice police” are off base. Financial aid at the national level is actually quite minimal and this seems to be the level where social justice police would be at work so the social justice police argument fails here … at the state level states provide relatively inexpensive choices and tend to not give the best financial aid so to a large degree they work in the model you prefer so the social justice police arguement fails again … and finially, private schools are just that private, and can choose how to support their students however they wish and families are free to apply to these schools or not (and school’s policies are all over the map so I can not see an argument about the social justice police here either).</p>
<p>My final comment is I have attended 3 of “those” private schools, need blind - pay 100% of need … and every penny I have ever donated has been designated fro undergraduate financial aid … and I am damn proud of all 3 schools and their policies focussing on the students and trying to give ALL their candidates a shot to attend.</p>
<p>FWIW, 2 nurses DO NOT earn 120k per year…(we work in healthcare)</p>
<p>should have read most nurses doesn’t earn 120k,few,very few</p>
<p>Erin’s -Dad. The cost of tuition is currently rising far far above inflation because the cost is not directly related to the value of the degree. The answer is to stop most of the financial aid which artificially hides the true cost of college. Then the schools would be forced to price their product based on the true value of the education.</p>
<p>You are quite wrong about nursing. In many cities it is possible to earn that in nursing jobs. SF or NYC for example.</p>
<p>wrong,very wrong…I state that with 100% certainty…</p>