Not being able to physically afford a school means that you can’t consider it.
Sounds like these are your choices.
UMD (honors college)- 25k
Dayton (honors)-35k
Catholic U (honors)- 26k
Scranton (honors)- 37k
Sounds like UMD is your best option to me, and a mighty fine option it is indeed.
If your parents want to send you to Lehigh for the better fit, they need to find a way to pay. That’s what a lot of parents do.
So there’s no hope for Lehigh, Nova, or Bucknell… oh well I guess the most important thing is how hard I work when hired into the workforce anyway. Thank you to all who replied
You can ask your top three choices to reconsider, explaining the 529 is for both of and your sibling. You can ask for 'professional judgement '.
Umd, Dayton, and Scranton are your only affordable choices (for Dayton and Scranton you have to contribute through work earnings /savings and probably some reasonable loans, around $1,000.)
Say my starting salary was somewhere in the 65-70k range, would going to a 50k/year school and taking on 80k in debt be too much?
Yes. You shouldn’t be taking more than your starting salary MAX. And it’s a good idea to take well less than the amount of your starting salary in loans. Certainly not over. Certainly certainly certainly not for an engineering degree 
Catholic University has a fine engineering program. A relative of ours graduated from there and has an excellent government engineering job.
UMD is a great school.
Dayton and Scranton would be fine too.
Honestly…you applied to ALL of these schools…presumably because you would attend if accepted.
It doesn’t sound like your parents can afford an additional $30,000 per year to send you to college…with the siblings to follow.
Several recent grads who work for me owe that much. They are doing fine, they live with roommates, drive used cars or use public transportation. What can you get for $50K? Would your parents split the loans with you?
Just because you can survive if you scrimp doesn’t mean it’s a good idea. Or necessary (far from it).
@ClassicRockerDad the 50k figure is derived from the final amount obtained after grants from an institution…my parents would cover 30k of that leaving 20k in loans which we would split
I’d also choose form
UMD (honors college)- 25k
Dayton (honors)-35k
Catholic U (honors)- 26k
Scranton (honors)- 37k
…and honestly UMD is highest ranked of these, is it not? I’d think twice about borrowing for Dayton or Scranton, nevermind the higher price ones. If you choose UMD maybe your parents can help you out with the $4k per year you won’t use so you can avoid having to work, or go abroad for a summer or semester, take an unpaid internship, stuff like that?
@college2k17md Sorry, I don’t understand.
Show me exactly how you pay for Lehigh at 67K, because if you’re only borrowing $40K (half of $80K) that’s definitely doable for an engineer.
Did I miss something?
Unless I have it wrong…the family has $30,000 a year put away for this kid to attend college. If he goes to a $67,000 a year college, he will need to fund $37,000 a YEAR of his undergrad education with loans.
That means he will have well over $100,000 in loan debt for undergrad school to attend Villanova, Lehigh, or Bucknell.
OTOH…his college savings will pay for UMD or Catholic University…leaving him with NO debt.
If he takes the Direct Loan, he could go to Dayton or Scranton and have less than $30,000 TOTAL in loans for undergrad.
If his family is willing to take out or cosign those $30,000 a YEAR plus loans…fine. That’s their decision. But he has options that would leave him debt free.
And UMD isn’t exactly a poor choice. It’s actually a good one.
And the family has younger siblings to consider in the mix as well.
@ClassicRockerDad the statement above from @thumper1 is exactly what I meant…now the whole 50k thing was the number that would land me with 80k in debt so that was the most I could do from a school. I am going to call the three schools this week and see if they could meet me at that number (unlikely I know). If they can’t do it then I cannot attend period.
You have a $70,000 EFC. That exceeds the cost of attendance at these schools. You would have to hope for HUGE merit aid…maybe that is possible. Villanova and Lehigh have lready give you their net cost…full pay.
Maybe Bucknell will give you a $30,000 a year merit award…it’s a BIG maybe.
@thumper1 it might sound kind of ridiculous considering that Bucknell’s greatest merit scholarship is valued at 20k per year since the tuition is nearly 70 grand!
That’s what I mean! If you get $20,000 from Bucknell…plus the $30,000 from your parents. PLus the $5500 freshman Direct Loan…you would be about $15,000 short of full coverage. Your loan debt would be the $15,000 plus the $5500…so, yes…$20,000 for that one year only in loans.
But really…you have some good, and affordable choices! And with good engineering programs.
And no debt…or only the federally funded loan debt.
Sigh. This whole chain makes me sad- and makes me wish that the coming year’s crop of applicants were here to see it. Of course, uber-expensive, country club-style environment Bucknell and Lehigh ‘feel’ wonderful and seem like a ‘better fit’ than College Park or CU. Expensive things are often very tempting!
Learn from this for when you go looking to buy your first place: don’t look at property you can’t afford, because it will make the perfectly good options that you can afford look ‘less’. And between you, your parents and your GC you should have been able to figure out before you applied what was affordable and not tormented yourself. Your parents aren’t helping much, either, by making it clear which sticker they would rather have on the back of the car.
As an engineer you have the potential to do very well financially, and you will be able to pay off some amount of debt. But don’t overlook the fact that setting up adult life has a lot of costs, and the more debt you have to service the harder (and less fun) it is. UMd actually has a really, really well respected engineering program. Graduating with little or no debt from a well recognized program- with great contacts for internships during the program and jobs on graduating- is something you will appreciate long after the college sticker on the back of the car is gone.
By all means, call up Bucknell and Lehigh and ask for more money- but be aware that they have heard this story- and much harder ones- many, many times before, so if (more likely, when) they turn you down, don’t take it personally.
I would recommend U of MD, Catholic or Dayton. Though MD has a fantastic program, such a large university is not for everyone. Scranton’s engineering program is extremely limited. At least you have affordable, excellent options. Good luck to you! This is a difficult decision.
@collegemom3717 wow! Thank you so much for your thoughtful reply! You really summed up my mindset about the whole decision making process and I totally agree that I wish that the class of 2022 would look at this.
Just a side note, UMD granted me a spot in the Gemstone Honors Program (my 1st choice) which gives me an unreal research opportunity and 4 years of housing. My ultimate goal in life is to use engineering to better the lives of those who need prosthetics to get around daily. It is through Gemstone that I feel I can obtain the most hands on experience in terms of reaching this goal.
I will be attending an open house at UMD in a few weeks so I will not place the deposit prior to the visit.
Again thanks for your help and God bless!
It’s nice to think about how you would pay off ~$100k of debt once you have an engineering degree. How will you repay it if you get weeded out or decide on a different major?