Difficulty justifying the cost

Colleges and Universities A-Z University of Notre Dame
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Not that my opinion matters but I respect your replies in this thread.

Now if I may be so bold I have a suggestion for your consideration. Forgive me if you’ve already done so.

I think now is a great opportunity to discuss with your kids about life choices. It isn’t just the practical matter about how to spend/utilize the 529 funds.

It’s how we approach making big decisions…big decisions that are not always financial in nature. First, we can address a choice by considering possible outcomes…short and long term. Then we think about the likelihood of said outcomes knowing ourself and our personal circumstances. Lastly once a decision is made we accept the possible disappointment/frustration, knowing we did our best at that time. The future is impossible to predict but keeping an open mind and really reflecting on our own values makes the outcomes (good and/or bad) more palatable in my opinion. Fortunately for us, this approach has worked out for us when dealing with our kids and even with our aging parents.

@bioart I’m aware of the pressure that goes along with valuing education. Many see funding an expensive education as a gift. While I believe it is, I also see modeling good decision-making as a type of education. Choice doesn’t exist in a vacuum.

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I have read most of the replies to your original question, and I have refrained from responding since my kid is not a “full-freight” student. But I have a couple of thoughts from last year when my D22 was choosing between a school that was truly dirt cheap for us and a few that I could swing but would require more sacrifice/stretching of our family budget. Here are my thoughts. I am not suggesting that my musings are the correct way to think about the topic, but you asked how others think about it. My approach reflected my values.

  1. In weighing the various colleges, you are trying to quantify some things that cannot be quantified. Some things are truly intangible and while I understand the impulse to plug them into an equation (my brain works a bit like that as well), I really think it is a false errand.

  2. Note I didn’t use the expression “fool’s errand.” It makes sense that you want to plug her feelings about Notre Dame into the equation that you are creating and balance that against the less expensive price of Wisconsin, Purdue etc. And it makes sense that you want to compare the return on investment of each school. You can do that for some parts of the equation but honestly, things like fit, social life, campus culture, support systems, and so forth are not quantifiable. Nor can you (after she matriculates) know for sure whether one college would have been better at those things than the other. We cannot pretend that the answers to those questions are knowable in a cut and dry way. Personally, I think that means in the end, you just have to decide whether the quantifiable factors are the most important or if you are going to take a leap of faith and assign some weight to her gut feelings or unquantifiable factors. Either way of making the decision is OK as long as you can afford it. However, I would not have allowed my kid to revisit Notre Dame if I wasn’t prepared to pay the tuition.

  3. According to their guidance counselors, my two oldest children claimed that I didn’t care where they went to college as long as it was affordable. That statement was both shocking and gratifying to me. It was shocking because the reality is that I care(d) very much. It was gratifying to me because I’ve made a conscious effort not to let them know that I care because I’ve worried that my kids sometimes choose pleasing me over their own hearts. I really felt like my job was on the front end. With D22, there were a handful of colleges that she expressed initial interest in, but I thought were poor choices. In September, I vetoed those. She was not “allowed” to apply --not sure what I would have done if she pushed back very hard. But once I agreed that she could apply to a school, I was determined to let her make her own choices about where to go (as long as the final price was affordable). She knew my maximum budget.

  4. When she asked my opinion in Apri, I turned it into a conversation about her thoughts and her reactions to the revisits. I tried very hard to stay neutral in those conversations and be mostly a sounding board not a director of the choice. At one point on April 29th, she even asked me outright “What should I do?” And I admitted that I was not expressing much about my own thoughts because in fact I had very strong opinions and at the end of the day, I did not want her to go to a school that I wanted. I wanted her to go to the school that she wanted. Thus I would not be able to take credit if it all went well, but even more importantly, I would not be to blame if she ended up unhappy with her choice. As it turns out, she picked my first choice, and while it was the dirt cheap one, it was probably the worse fit. She even told me at the time that it was the worse fit. She didn’t feel great about the revisit experience, but she had her reasons for choosing it anyway. Flash forward almost a year, and it has turned out fine but we both suspect that she would be happier at one of the other places. Shrug. Personally, I love that she made the choice herself and I didn’t push her into my first choice for her. I would be feeling a lot more guilt right now if I had.

All of this is a long-winded way of saying that I think you can make your opinion known, but mostly you should try to step out of it. If you actually can afford it and you would be prepared to pay the $$$ if that were her only option then I would lean towards letting her make her own decision. It is a different story if it is unaffordable or too much of a stress.

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We were in a very similar situation this time last year. Son was accepted at ND and a couple of other top 25 schools. Full pay for all of them. ND for a number of reasons, rose to the top of these schools. There was also a 2nd grouping of schools that were in the mix, one being our state flagship and he had a full tuition scholarship to another private school. Our spending habits sound much like yours. We’re aggressive savers and don’t live an extravagant life at all. We started our kids’ 529s shortly after their births. This is their pot of money and they can choose to use it as they see fit. If they want to use it all on undergrad, then they’re on their own for grad school. Our son was leaning heavily toward pre-med, but it was not a certainty. The school he received a full-tuition scholarship to had a good pre-med program and a guaranteed admission to the med school deal as well. The issue was, he also had an interest in business (economics in particular). His thoughts were, if I do switch to econ, do I want my degree to come from ND or from this other university (not as highly regarded)? Our discussions leading up to decision day were centered around “fit”. We had visited both schools and went back a 2nd time for admitted student day events. We all really felt strongly that ND was the better fit for him. Now, looking back at his experience with just a month left in his first year at ND, we are 100% convinced that this was the right decision. He’s happy (and I know “happy” has different meanings for different kids) and loves nearly every aspect of his ND experience. He’s declared his major and it’s a perfect mix of his interest in medicine and business. Good luck to you and your daughter! If you have any questions, feel free to reach out!

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That’s wonderful - but I would also note that he may have found the right fit at the other school too. There’s no way to know.

But glad he’s having a wonderful experience.

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The mistake I often see is parents allowing their children to apply to schools the family cannot afford. It is a recipe for frustration and disappointment. There are platforms to find out whether a family is eligible for need based financial aid.

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While that does happen, that is not the case with @bioart and the family. This poster has clearly stated that they can afford Notre Dame, have a very very well funded 529, and this will not affect their retirement or financial well being.

So…I think we can let that part of the discussion go. Because it doesn’t apply to this poster.

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Yes, not applicable here. And families often want to see what merit or FA is offered and don’t want to assume a school will be unaffordable. It’s tough to go through the process stating your heart interested with the hope that it will be affordable then dealing with the fallout when it is just barely so.

For the OP, I would suggest that you look at the cost difference between your #2 choice a ND. Think about the differentiators and how you value them. And then determine if you feel it’s worth that differential. Much like deciding whether to pay $x more to upgrade your flight.

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OP isn’t :slight_smile: but I’m still hung up on both are “retired” not voluntarily and may have a long life ahead.

If you save $160K over four years and invest it at 4% tax free in a muni bond (well it would take four years to invest that savings), that’s $6400 extra a year to live on so no small amount.

Now, they have money in a 529 - but then there’s grad school and where’s that coming from.

It’s just what happened to them is my biggest fear…to me.

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Seems to me it is for the daughter to decide as she was allowed to apply, has visited as an admitted student, and was not restricted in budget (same as an older sibling). She knows what she has to work with and any more large input from the parents will quite possibly sway her, possibly from where she prefers to go.

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Great approach. Thank you for sharing it, and glad it has worked.

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I think as we discuss, should be able to not be too heavy about it. I want it to be her choice, but I like points some other parents have suggested in terms of framing it as what aspects of each program matter most to her, and are these worth the price. She’s a pretty resilient kid and has no trouble defending her views.

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This is a sound point and should be part of any family’s calculation I think. In our case, it won’t hurt if we spend the money, despite leaving the work place sooner than I’d wanted. And we were late bloomers, so I ain’t that young anyway. :wink:

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Agree, though this will be a discussion with my daughter. I want to think through the questions with her.

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The OP has said repeatedly that they have a very well funded 529 that can pay the costs AND that this will not affect their retirement.

Can we please move on from that? Yes, this could be an issue for some, but it’s NOT the issue for this poster.

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But it might still be somewhat of an issue for the OP, since he still seems to be hashing the financial angle out in his own mind and still addressing it with his daughter.

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But they have again posted…that this is NOT their issue. My last comment on this…

@bioart can clarify…again if they feel the need to.

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I like this approach very much. Thank you.

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Yes, I do love the way ND handles dorms. Also, as an FYI, my son (high school senior) has been to ND many times because of his sisters. In addition to ND, he’s gotten into Princeton, Cornell, Harvard, and has a full ride at Vanderbilt. For people who haven’t had the ND experience he’s had, they might quickly knock ND off this list, but it’s going to be a tough decision for him, figuring out where to spend the next four years. He may choose ND…we’ll see…in the process of scheduling visits. And, if your daughter goes the economics or finance route, the kids who graduate from ND do very well. Finally, we let our kids know that if we fund undergrad, we’re not going to fund grad. They understood that from the get-go and are fine with it. We have one in med school and one in law school (the law school student did not attend ND). We help them out some, but we don’t pay the tuition. They’re totally cool with that and the undergrad choices they made. Personally, I think your daughter should go to ND. :smiling_face:

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Not really an issue … I’ve just had too much training in finance and economics that my first reaction is trying to determine if the value justifies the price. So in many ways, as many have noted on this tread, value is in the eye of the beholder. Usually, we say the price is set by the market … if enough people willing to pay that price, then that is the market’s valuation of the product. So far, about half the Notre Dame families are willing to pay that $340K. My question was to start a conversation to hear what folks had to say about was behind how they made that call …

In terms of the convo w/my daughtr, she’s old enough we can have these conversations about whether or not ND (or any program let’s say) is worth $250K more than another choice, and consider the benefits/trade-offs. As I’ve seen here, lots of families, for valid reasons, make that call differently.

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Bio- you are the only one who knows your kid.

Colleges are filled with kids who are phoning it in- majoring in Beer Pong, basically enjoying life with three square meals a day that someone else has to pay for, cook and clean up from, with the added advantage of a nice friend group where you never have to look far for a party. And where you never run out of new people to meet. Doesn’t matter if you are full pay, half pay, full ride- every college has these kids. Every college has kids on academic probation because the party life finally catches up with them, and every college has the kids who manage to skate by and graduate without ever taking advantage of the incredible intellectual and academic opportunities in front of them.

You know your kid.

I knew mine- and when our “deal” was that they take advantage of the one time in their lives where their literal job was to learn, explore, challenge themselves, get out of their comfort zone, push their own boundaries intellectually-- I was not worried that they were joining the “party hearty” gang at their colleges. With one kid I was a little worried about routine things like losing the ATM card, getting locked out of the dorm every night without a key, never doing laundry but somehow the kid figured it out. And indeed- pushed the boundaries. Attended cool symposia recommended by a professor, joined a few EC’s where he was blown away by the skills and talents and expertise of his classmates, had leadership roles in volunteer organizations that were meaningful, etc.

We did not care or worry about grades- but we made it clear we were paying for 8 semesters, so flunking a class and needing an extra semester would be on his nickel somehow. And we were a little flabbergasted by the research projects, summer jobs, etc. that came along-- the advantage of being an engaged student is that professors REALLY want to put fantastic opportunities in front of you, and will pick up the phone to an alum, a colleague, someone in industry, etc. to make it happen.

So to me- money well spent-- on this one, and the younger ones. They knew the deal. And they also knew that nobody was going to Cancun on Spring break-- I was paying for a college education, not for my kids to have a lifestyle more luxurious than mine.

But it’s your D, your money, and you need to figure out if this is a kid who is going to soar in college, or someone who really wants to have a good time with the bank of M&D financing it.

I’ve got friends whose kids are on the “bank of Mom and Dad” plan. I personally think it’s insane to watch a kid play video games, blackout from booze a few times a week and lose money on online poker when they’re supposed to be getting a degree in something or other- but not my money, not my kid.

Good luck!

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