Has anyone just said no to kids choice?

Parents Forum
1

<p>tough dilemia
wonderful son : 1450 plus, 4.0, etc....</p>

<p>accepted to:
Vandy: eliminated due to too aggressive social culture by him
Duke: never got the feeling there
State U: still considering, 4k year, but 3rd choice
Other state U: consider finest state U in USA, no financial aid, out of state
Top Non Ivy Private school: rated as one of 5 best college experiences, no financial aid</p>

<p>my feelings is top non ivy may be worth sacrifice as its a life changing place to go, but out of state U, although great school, is trapped in the middle between basically free and top non ivy. and even times i feel top non ivy may not be worth the 35k delta</p>

<p>tough decision. comments?</p>

2

<p>This depends on your families finances and the fit of the college for your son. Put the prestige out the window- does your feel that this is the best place for him?</p>

3

<p>This is off the cuff, your wonderful son will do well where ever he goes. If you have the finances for the expensive school, then open that door. If not, state U will take him where he needs to go. Don't go for prestige.</p>

4

<p>Very limited finances here. Very similar options to yours. DD wanted to go to east coast school very much but needed @ $9000 more. Big State U is free. A very dear/wealthy friend of ours heard of DDs $/choice dilemma and offered to give her the $9000!!!! We are not willing to accept the help from him.....guess where he went to school???????? yes...big state u!!</p>

5

<p>It really depends on your finances. Duke + Vandy are amazing schools but you have to consider your financial situation.</p>

6

<p>IMO- I think it's tough for you to say NO now. We sort of had this discussion with d # 1 a few years back. Though lots of NY kids apply to U Del and U Md, I thought it hard to pay $25,000 to go to schools of this caliber when our state schools were pretty good too. I told her that she could apply to them, but I wasn't guaranteeing I would pay for it. On the other hand, she did apply to UVA & Wm and Mary with our "blessings" as I was more willing to pay the bucks for schools of this caliber. As you didn't show resistance to "The School" at time of application, it may be hard to justify your action now. Also IMO- if the school in question is UVA, U. Mich etc. --schools of that caliber may be worth the extra bucks. I always felt it was a shared responsibility to decide on which schools my girls should apply to. Once we decided the school was ok, I don't think I could have then turned around and said NO. Good luck.</p>

7

<p>66472:</p>

<p>D is at a top state school because of the value, BUT, I would prefer she be at a private without the bureaocracy, so my recommendation would NOT be to pay the premium OOS $ for a big public unless there is a specific overriding consideration as to why THAT very school is the perfect fit. If you are going to pay the big bucks, then enjoy some level of personal attention!!</p>

8

<p>What is your son willing to do to help finance his expensive dream school? Take out loans? Work during the summer or school year?</p>

9

<p>when we started looking at colleges we developed our criteria
the financial outlay was one criteria.
We decided we could afford to pay the EFC- more or less and agreed to that upfront.
D agreed to working during the school year -$2,000+
earning money summers $ 3,000
taking subsidized loans( Perkins and Stafford)$ 3,500
This made the financial portion very transparent- and we could then make decisions depending on offers- rather than looking at the offers and deciding what we wanted to pay for.</p>

<p>If your son isn't eligible for subsidized loans- I would still recommend that he take on a financial obligation and for you to state how much you can fund through savings/loans/income.</p>

<p>I would suggest for your son to look at the message boards for each college as awell as possibly livejournals to get a better idea of what the schools could offer</p>

10

<p>66472:</p>

<p>Having known one situation where parents did say no and now kid is transferring, IMHO you've got to go with where your S has the best fit--academically and otherwise. He's smart, so he'll thrive no matter where he goes, but does saving $$$ outweigh his happiness? That doesn't mean that it should be an uneducated decision and that you have no say at all. But discussion should include non-tangible items such as where he sees hiimself for the next four years, and to what kind of atmosphere is he being drawn?</p>

<p>Good luck with the decision. It's a tough one.</p>

11

<p>Momnipotent, can you please introduce me to your friend? ;)</p>

12

<p>calmom- I may have to bank that offer for one of my 2 DSs so the answer is no. Just kidding.</p>

13

<p>we had the money talk before applying, but we were also applying for certain scholarships and aid as well, so we didnt want to eliminate a school before we got their offer. Vandy offered 20k, but it is not a good fit, so this not all about the money all the time.</p>

14

<p>“As you didn't show resistance to "The School" at time of application, it may be hard to justify your action now.”</p>

<p>I completely disagree with this statement. </p>

<p>There are a number of HS seniors (including my daughter) still making overnight visits, etc. Some students will not have made up their minds until on or about May 1st. Why must parents necessarily decide BY SEPTEMBER which schools they will DEFINITELY fund? Just as students’ opinions of different colleges change throughout the academic year, so do the opinions of their parents about these same schools. If the OP now believes that a particular school is a bad investment, then he is certainly within his rights and RESPONSIBILITIES as a parent to indicate this to his child. </p>

<p>Furthermore, MOST parents are wiser than their children. They realize that attending a particular institution of considerably more expense but questionably more value is not necessarily a good decision. Many high school students do not have any real idea of the value of money. They can easily be wowed by visiting a wonderful school, etc. A difference of $100,000 or $150,000 seems like not a big deal to a HS senior when he has never earned any significant money. I have heard many high school students saying things like “$100,000 in loans is not that bad. I will just get a job paying $50,000 per year and pay it off in two years.” Even if the cost difference will not actually be made up in loans but will simply be paid directly by the parents, many HS seniors have no idea what the actual opportunity cost of this money is (e.g. money that could otherwise help with grad or professional school, with other siblings, significantly affect retirement, etc.)</p>

<p>When my brother’s wife died in a car accident about 15 years ago, I went with him to the funeral parlor to select the casket, etc. The purveyor there was trying to push all of these extremely expensive options at my brother, but fortunately I was there to be the voice of reason. My brother was probably not able to think clearly at the time and would easily have made bad financial decisions. In the same way, HS seniors seem to look at the difference in college costs as analogous to poker chips rather than real money. $100,000 does not seem like real money to them. It is the RESPONSIBILITY of parents to be a voice of financial reason in the college decision-making process.</p>

<p>Some posters on CC seem to be of the opinion that attending a prestigious college is “priceless” or that “you cannot place a value on an excellent college education.” In my opinion, to say that you cannot put a price on a college education is false. Rather, you MUST place a value on a college education. Time has some value. Youth has some value. Prestige has some value. Tuition costs or personal loans also represent some value. Hanging around some more intelligent kids has some value. Hanging around an academically, culturally, and socioeconomically more diverse student body (i.e. a typical state university) has some value. Geographical location has some value. A decision needs to be made that takes all of these factors into account. A parent should help guide his child in making such a tough decision.</p>

<p>I am definitely NOT of the opinion that ALL students are better off at the state university than at an Ivy League institution. This would have to be decided on a case-by-case basis. But a child’s parent can judge this far better than can the child’s friends, relatives, or random posters from CC who have only read about the students stats.</p>

15

<p>OK- I'll reword my sentiment. It was not just "The School"- it was the amount of money we would have to pay for that school. I KNEW, we would pay full freight for Delaware and Maryland as they are not usually too generous for OOS with little financial need. Other schools that she did apply to, like CMU, Rochester, or BU where I figured there might be some merit aid (which there was) she did apply to so we could see what the financial aid package would be. For my kid, it would have cost approx. the same to go to CMU, U of R. I would have considered paying the money for those schools.</p>

16

<p>excellent post Pafather! Says very clearly all the factors/values that must be considered in making the decision and parents' role within that decision.</p>

17

<p>Like several other posters we had the discussion about cost early junior year. By the time spring senior rolled around and it was decision time there was no need to say no to any of the choices he had. Needless to say, the entire college application/acceptance process was stress/dissapointment free in our family.</p>

18

<p>In our case, we are in the process of saying no to choice #1, a 528 member school.<br>
~Financial "need" only aid at #1.<br>
~#1 even reduces aid if outside scholarships are awarded, which are a real possibility in our child's case.<br>
~#1 considers loans to be financial aid and thereby meets its commitment to meet need 100%. (Since when is the privilege to repay a loan "aid"? Definitely not in my book. This little fiction amounts to over $25,000 (!!!!!) in unmet need over 4 years. )<br>
~Large merit awards elsewhere make the cost differential too great. The cost differential between #1 and #2 & #3 is the same as the full price attendance would be at the highly ranked in-state alternative.<br>
~#1 has no chance due to cost, and their lack of early candor about the cost and the true meaning of "demonstrated need" aid has created true agony for our child.
~#1 would have been my first choice, too, but taking out excessive loans is not a possibility.
~#1 total cost would exceed $110,000.
~Sorry #1, we hate to but we will have to move on.</p>

19

<p>*~#1 considers loans to be financial aid and thereby meets its commitment to meet need 100%. (Since when is the privilege to repay a loan "aid"? Definitely not in my book. This little fiction amounts to over $25,000 (!!!!!) in unmet need over 4 years. ) *</p>

<p>most schools do consider student loans to be aid-
many schools offer subsidized loans- ( govt picks up interest during years of attendance) which is a pretty good deal</p>

<p>I don't think it is unreasonable for student to make a financial commitment to their education which includes- earning merit awards- working during the school year- working summers- taking a year or so off if need be to earn school funds- taking out small loans.
We borrowed to purchase our home- we borrow to purchase cars - we agreed that it wasn't unreasonable to borrow to purchase a benefit which will affect the quality of Ds life as much or more as a home or automobile</p>

20

<p>We told our daughter at the outset of the process that we would pay for a State School education period.So she knew from the getgo what the parameters were.Surprisingly of the 5 private schools she applied to,4 came back with a cost similiar to what the State school would have cost.</p>