Grinnell College is my #1 school. I am a recruited athlete, so I got to know whether or not I am “admissable” and what my financial package was earlier than most. I received my merit estimate in the mail today and it did not exceed my estimated need based aid, meaning that the estimated cost of attendance will be around 50k.
My family lives in Connecticut in the NYC metro area. Our family income of about 170k places us in the upper middle class. My family would be able to contribute about 40k a year at most, leaving me to pay the other 10k a year with loans.
My question is, is it really worth it, both practically and morally, to go to Grinnell if it literally costs twice as much as my state school???
Even if you don’t go to grad school, you may want little/no debt. Except for a few schools that are feeders into MC and IB, your starting salary isn’t likely to be too high. Having the post grad flexibility can be huge. Especially in Polly Sci, some of the best entry level jobs have low pay.
Agree with the other posters. Generally, it’s not advisable to take on significant debt for a BA in political science. If you want to stay in the NYC area post grad, UConn may hold more “weight” among employers.
Does UCONN have any living learning communities for freshmen that might go some way to replicating the residential educational experience of a LAC? (Not saying it is the same, but it can be sort of similar-ish). My D took the money at an OOS state school that has a residential liberal arts program, rather than go to the more expensive LAC.
Even though they were all affordable, she has found having extra wiggle room in her budget useful for travel, work wardrobes, internship costs (e.g. housing), sorority and other ECs, etc etc… she is pleased she didn’t max out the budget on the main costs.
D is also majoring in Poli Sci, is graduating in 3 years (thanks AP credits) and is aiming for grad school in the UK - which we can pay for as she kept costs low for UG.
You will have very different experiences at both. If you want a LAC, there are other options that might come down to $40k with merit if you have the stats.
Outlier here – I would work on the numbers at Grinnell a bit more, see if there are ways you can shave the difference. You can only borrow $5500 as a 1st year, so there is a gap. Check to see whether Grinnell’s cost of attendance includes student health insurance, often about $1500 or more. If you are staying on your parents’ health care and it provides out of network care, you may be able to reduce your cost of attendance by declining the student health insurance. What about housing and meal choices, check which plans the COA assumes, maybe there is some savings that can happen there. Find out about student jobs – my D3 athlete worked at the athletic center every week, had no problem fitting in the hours with his schedule. Of course, on the other hand, travel to campus may be pricer than estimated.
Grinnell is a fantastic school, we sometimes joke that we wish we’d had a 3rd kid so that SOMEONE would actually go to Grinnell, since both our kids visited and one was recruited athlete there, but neither went (athlete went for bigger merit elsewhere).
U Conn will set a student up well, but the decision to give up on college athletics at a great school would be a gut wrenching for our recruited athlete. Continuing to be part of a team, to train, compete, all that was important for our D3 kid. Of course, U Conn has great, competitive club teams in sports, so you may be able to continue to compete if that is important to you.
Are there other LACs you are talking to about recruiting, or is it really U Conn vs. Grinnell?
I was also wondering if the 50K is the “official” remaining cost of attendance or is it something the OP calculated based on the merit offer? In other words, are you sure you won’t qualify for any need-based aid? Grinnell doesn’t stack merit and need-based aid but merit doesn’t always cancel out need-based aid entirely either. I know this from our family’s experience this year (our daughter ended up choosing a different LAC, but Grinnell was a strong contender). Of course, each family’s financial situation is different, but it’s worth double checking.
I assume you wouldn’t be able to participate in your sport at UConn. In addition, Grinnell offers both excellent grad school outcomes and career advice for Humanities/Social science majors (something that may be harder to get outside of Engineering/Business at UConn). So, yes, it’d be worth more. But twice more, that’s hard to estimate for you.
Is there a way for you to lower the costs slightly?
Also, compare orange to orange : tuition, room, board, books, transportation, health insurance, local cost of livibg for incidentals/miscellaneous.
For Grinnell, you’d have to take the federal loans (5.5k).
What about work study, did you get that too? It’s typically $3,000 if offered.
Which means that with $2,500 extra you might make it work…???