For those looking at elite schools: why do public universities have such a bad rep?

<p>My kids never netted $5k in earnings for any any summer and S was an EE major had great grades and recs. The summer before he began college and 1st summer after he had completed 1 yr of courses, he worked PT for $10/hr. The 2nd summer, he got minimum wage for being a research asst. the 3rd summer he got $5k but had to pay to fly to the internship 2500 miles away and rent a place for the summer. He was offered 3 FT jobs by Feb of his SR year, but $10k is more than most kids I know earn over the summer + school year. </p>

<p>Our D earned significantly less than S with her cinema major, while in school and over summers.</p>

<p>“Beg your pardon?”</p>

<p>I was going to say the same thing but I thought I would make my response equally absurd like your posts about Indians.</p>

<p>texaspg, I am sorry you found my posts ridiculous. Please go ahead and delete my posts.</p>

<p>"I have a number of Indian friends and like any other first generation ethnic group they form a very tight-knit community. Apparently, parents get very competitive and keep close tabs on what each others kids do for college entrance. "</p>

<p>I will try to provide a better response.</p>

<p>It is very hard to compete as parents since where our kids can get into and go to college totally depends on the kids’ interests and capabilities. Even in the same family, different kids have different capabilities and we as parents know it is hard to predict how well they do and where they end up. </p>

<p>So where does it get me to keep tabs on my friends’ kids and where they are going to college? The only reason I want to know where or why is the same reason we are on CC, to find out how to get into a college, followed by how to get into a specific college, followed by how to make the finances work.</p>

<p>So if there is a group of Indian American parents trying to one up each other that your friends are describing to you, I would like to chalk it up to the local weather more than anything else for the lack of a better explanation. </p>

<p>I don’t need anyone’s validation whether I am making any sacrifices so I will ignore that part.</p>

<p>So your classmates laughed at the choice of a public university? Well, do consider that your classmates are high school students. They haven’t been to college yet. </p>

<p>Public schools can be excellent, and they can be great value relative to private institutions. If you do go get involved: join the Honours program, volunteer to work in a lab. There are tons of opportunities at big institutions, particulary for research.</p>

<p>There are subsets of every ethnicity that compete over college acceptances. Around here, the biggest emphasis on elite college admissions is found among the Asian Indians and Chinese. Kids start talking about it from about 5th grade on (when testing for middle school math tracking occurs), such as to brag about where they will get in one day and where a sibling was admitted. However, to the point of this thread, they seem to have a very high bar for what is elite, and below that bar opt to send their kids to the state flagship. Harvard, Stanford, Princeton, Columbia, MIT, Penn Wharton and Cornell are felt to be worth a financial sacrifice, but other privates are not.</p>

<p>UWHuskyDad, I gather that you and your S live in the Seattle area? Do be aware that the number and type of jobs available there are not available elsewhere. We don’t all live in cities or in high-wage areas. To say that most kids can “easily” make $10K per year or more is simply unrealistic. There are very few, if any, non-career jobs paying $20 per hour around here, and certainly not summer jobs or part time jobs. I don’t know what RSOs are, sorry.</p>

<p>RSI – restrictive stock options. </p>

<p>Husky dad- second what consolation said. Not everyone lives in Seattle or San Jose</p>

<p>It’s just social climbing elitism, many of these people will go deeply into debt to pay for a private college just for the name brand, like idiots who lease luxury cars they can’t afford and don’t need. Warren Buffet graduated from the University of Nebraska and it didn’t hurt him one bit. Your talent and work ethic and personality will drive your career, not the name brand of your polo shirt or college.</p>

<p>^ I am afraid you are offending some CC members who borrow money for fancy cars here regardless where their kids go to college.</p>

<p>And I don’t think Indian and Chinese people go in debt to fund college. They pay in cash for houses, business properties, cars, vacations,… They are not idiots.</p>

<p>“They pay in cash for houses, business properties, cars, vacations,…”<br>
-Medical Schools? They pay some $75k (including living expanses) in cash every year for 4 years? Just asking, since I know that many families of these Medcial Students are not that rich. Some a better off than others, but if you consider that at some Med. Schools, Chinese are majority of the class, it is not valid to imagine that all families are that rich and also considering that many parents do not even speak English and/or having driving cars. I just wonder how they pay that much cash every year.</p>

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  • I agree!</p>

<p>"To say that most kids can “easily” make $10K per year or more is simply unrealistic "
-Agree completely. There are no summer jobs in our city, positions are filled by permanent employees becasue of high unemployment rate (the real one, not the imaginary that is reported). The little that they make during school year is barely enough for pocket money.
However, it is very realisitc to work your b—t off to get a full tuition / full ride for Merits. Here they have full control, nobody can deny them credits for the effort here.</p>

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<p>Call on help from extended family for help with tuition expenses. It’s common in many immigrant and ethnic communities who strongly value educating* younger members of the families. </p>

<ul>
<li>Folks who value higher education much more than having nice cars, bags, or other fancy good du jour.</li>
</ul>

<p>Loan for medical schools is a different thing. Students borrow because they can pay back after graduation. Asian parents still help to pay if they can. They don’t like the idea of borrowing.</p>

<p>Lets not make too much of common stereotypes. US Asians may save at a higher rate than “average” Americans, but they still like nice cars and homes. And they’ve been known to send the kids to State U vs. Expensive Private, if the costs warrant it.</p>

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<p>Speaking for myself, I wasn’t strictly speaking for Asian-Americans. A reason why I cited immigrant and ethnic communities as I’ve seen the same tendency among folks from non-Asian-American groups. </p>

<p>It’s more who values higher education to that extent versus those who don’t…and no one racial/ethnic/cultural group has a monopoly on either side.</p>

<p>^ I agree. I know Jewish families who value education for their kids more than any other families I know.</p>

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<p>University of Hawaii, UC Irvine, Cal Poly Pomona, San Jose State, Mission College, …</p>

<p>"Call on help from extended family for help with tuition expenses. "
-$75k received from China every year for 4 years is something I would have hard time believing. </p>

<p>In addition, there are expensive privates that give out great Merit packages to top kids. My D. received Merit awards at every school that she has applied (because she has chosen to apply to apply only to schools that would give her Merit awards. The largest offer came from private UG, but she attended at another school - state public on full tuition Merit award and looking back has admitted many times over that it was a great choice for her.</p>