I'm a Burden on my Parents. Help!

Paying for College
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@nevergiveupp
If your parents are encouraging you to attend lower cost schools, you need to ask yourself, “Why?” You said, “They want lower cost.” Is it bc you think they don’t want to spend the money on your education or do you think they are trying to balance their very real needs of financial security and retirement with your career goals? Will their sending you to your “utopian dream” impact their real daily life?

Our kids don’t have the option. We will not finance “a dream.” They are about as hard-working and talented as young people come. (Reaching 300 college level academics during their jr yr in high school.). They are mature, responsible, and just great kids. But, guess what? We also work hard and have our own futures to secure.

Fwiw, I think the entire concept of “not having the same opportunities” is completely distorted in real life terms and outcomes. Yes, your experiences will be different. The real question is whether or not your future is going to be radically altered in a no way to possibly achieve the same goals. Doubtful.

Our oldest is a chemE working alongside grads from top engineering schools. He has been promoted repeatedly based on his job performance. He was hired in at the same level and pay. Now it is all about what he does.

Our youngest ds is attending Bama on full scholarship. Top school? Obviously not. But, the opportunities he is having there? Absolutely top-notch. As a freshman last yr he was invited to join a research project he enjoyed. He as hired for research this past summer. His research from this past summer offers an opportunity to apply for international research next summer. (His older brother forged the same sort of path for himself at his ug university.)

High performing students can make the most of the opportunities that are available and do amazing things with them. Different than on an elite campus? Yes. But those opportunities do open doors. Their futures are what they make for themselves. (And my kids know that their achievements are from their own hard work and they did not destroy our financial stability in the process (bc paying for top schools would do exactly that.)

You need to know what the different options mean to your family, not just you.

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@GMTplus7 - There is a big difference between being needy and not being able to easily pay $250,000 for four years of college. For schools like MIT or Harvard, they are affordable if your family makes $60,000 or less, or if the family make $300,000+, has plenty of assets and no other kids.

43

Just because you are auto admit to UT and TAMU, don’t act like those opportunities are flawed.

My two kids are in very good in-state programs. They will graduate debt free for UG and will still have a little left over in their bank account - both are looking to pursue graduate degrees but also working in their fields.

We hope that our kids will have as good a life or better of a life than us. H had some student debt that we paid off our first year of marriage - with his family income and 2 and then 3 in college, he came out with minimal debt. There are a lot of parents of current college students that still are paying on their school loans - some is that they went to a really expensive school and didn’t realize how the debt was going to move in with them so to speak instead of get paid off on a budget/short term plan. I know a MD that has been keeping his school loan payments on a really long term plan - wife jokes that they are still paying on his brain - their kids are in college now. Had they lived a little leaner and paid off the debt in early years, they would not be paying now and would be able to have money work for them.

I have attended universities in WI, TX, and AL while living in those states (completing UG in WI). I have worked for two universities.

Your parents probably are allowing you to see in black and white how expensive some of the other school options will be. They are also concerned about making sure their retirement finances are secure.

Some good advice on this thread.

Personal maturity and acceptance - you have a great hand dealt to you even if you don’t believe it. Keep working hard during UG and take advantage of all the opportunities where you land - the sooner you look at things with wisdom, perhaps the less time you will be spending pursuing something that is not realistic. However if you think there is a chance at a ‘match’ financially, you can at least say at the end of the day that you gave it your best shot.

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It sounds like your parents are giving you mixed messages. If they’re “leaning” toward less expensive state schools and “discouraging” your higher priced “dream” schools you really need to run the Net Price Calculators, put the results in front of them, and ask if State U costs $10k/year but Dream Private costs $40k, will you pay the $40k? We’ve heard from students whose parents said in the fall that they’d pay but who changed their minds when financial aid packages started rolling in.

Find out the dollar amount they’re comfortable paying. If you want grad or med school, will they help pay if you attend a less expensive school for undergrad? You need a long range plan. The school isn’t the dream, your future life is.

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"The school isn’t the dream, your future life is. "

Those words should pretty much be tattooed on the forehead of a LOT of kids looking at colleges.

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Rice gives good merit aid. We didn’t qualify for any need based aid at Rice, but they did offer a $24,000 annual scholarship. For us, it was cheaper to send kid to MIT than UT Austin especially since they allow students to use outside scholarships to offset their work study, MIT work and suggested $2500 loan. They also allow a one time use of outside scholarships for a new computer. Princeton does the same and they are the most generous with financial aid.

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I worked so hard for my dream schools


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We hear this sort of thing a LOT. Usually the words are, “I’ve worked too hard to have to go to a state school…,” but the meaning is the same.

Of course you worked hard, so have a gazillion other students. Guess what? That is what you were supposed to do. Doing that doesn’t entitle you to spend $200k+ of your parents’ money.

My kids also worked very hard in high school. They had top stats. They knew that we weren’t going to pay $200k+ for each of them. They went to U Alabama with nearly all of their costs covered with scholarships (NMF, Presidential, Engineering, corporate award from my husband’s work, etc).

They had amazing opportunities, but had a lot of fun as well. The older one is employed at a top company with a high salary and is in management. The older one is a 3rd year med student.

BTW…do you have any siblings?


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If your parents are encouraging you to attend lower cost schools, you need to ask yourself, "Why?" You said, "They want lower cost." Is it bc you think they don't want to spend the money on your education or do you think they are trying to balance their very real needs of financial security and retirement with your career goals? Will their sending you to your "utopian dream" impact their real daily life?

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Our kids don’t have the option. We will not finance “a dream.” They are about as hard-working and talented as young people come. (


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The above is probably what is describing what is going on. Your parents are likely concerned about how spending $250k+ on your undergrad will affect their retirement. They’re probably asking themselves, “how many years will we have to delay retirement if we spend this much money.” The issue is, that although they may be willing to delay retirement by 10+ years so that they can fund this education, who knows what the future may bring. A health concern or job loss can destroy the ability to recover that money by working longer.

You seem to be putting your parents in a situation where they feel pressured to give you what you want, and doing what’s best for the family overall.

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My college list is centered around biomedical engineering/pre med schools


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And you have a 3.9 UW GPA and a 35 ACT

Well, I can tell you this…it’s insane to spend $250k+ for premed unless your parents can spend that money and never look back. Doing premed at UT, TAMU, or UT-Dallas …or OOS at a school that will give you large merit…will not close any doors for you.

Med schools do NOT care where you went to undergrad. Admissions is about cum GPA and BCMP GPA, MCAT score, LORs, and medically related ECs/research.

If your parents don’t have to spend as much on undergrad, they probably will be more likely to help you with med school costs.

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If you feel badly about your parents having to fork over ~$50k per year for you to go to MIT/JHU (or their ilk), you could offer to pay them back over time. They probably won’t accept your offer, as most able parents seem to be happy to help with college, but you would then be free of any burden you’d put on yourself.

But if you are going to med school, there’s no need to put yourself or them through that financial strain: you are in a state with two very good state schools, Texas and A&M. Go to one of them, finish with a strong GPA, and go to med school with little or no debt.

Even if you changed your mind and followed a different major, you would be at schools with plenty of good options.

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OP- I think you may need to take the bull by the horns and sit your parents down for some straight talk. Be prepared with a spreadsheet which shows a wide range of colleges and what their NPC’s show your out-of-pocket costs to be. For schools where you are a strong candidate (but not a shoe-in) for merit aid, you’ll need two columns- one with a nice merit award, and one without (or with the top award and the more likely “regular” award).

Then it’s time to talk.

Your parents may tell you that they think it’s “worth it” to them to stretch for some of the colleges on your list but not for others. OK- good to know. They may tell you that they were overly optimistic about their financial situation, and so you need either an affordable in-state option or a big merit award to make college doable for you as a family. OK- good to know. Or they may tell you that they need a week or so to digest the summary you’ve prepared for them before they tell you which options are affordable and which ones are not- OK, good to know.

But don’t grind your teeth without getting some facts down on paper. Your parents aren’t the only people in America suffering from sticker shock right now thinking that they can cut and trim a little to make “dream college” a reality for their kid, only to realize that cutting and trimming yields an extra $500 a month (which is great and nothing to sneeze at) but not an extra 5K a month (which few people can do without a LOT of pain).

Time to take some initiative and get the data down on a spreadsheet before you waste a lot of time and money applying to colleges you just won’t be able to afford to attend.

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^
@blossom has shared some good advice. I would also add some schools that would “for sure” give you large merit. Tulane is likely one.

I know that you mentioned USC, but do not go to a Calif univ if you’re premed. That is like adding a ball and chain to yourself. Calif has too many premeds, its too competitive there. You won’t likely get into a Calif med school, so why bother going to school there. It’s a waste.

Even if you made it thru all the intensive weeding that goes on there, your interviews would mostly/all be OOS, so you’d be flying all over with little notice (med schools don’t give a crap about 14 days airfare notice or your own school’s schedule).

You’re a Texas resident. I can almost predict that if you do well as an undergrad, your interviews will be to a handful of med schools in Texas, and hopefully a few privates OOS.

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As a pre-med Texas resident, it seems like the most cost-efficient path is to attend a low cost university in Texas and then focus on the many relatively low cost medical schools in Texas. Lower debt after medical school will give you more options later.

52

And please think hard about how much $250k really is. It is a house. A retirement account. I’m not sure kids always understand that. It is not going to be “easy” to come up with it while keeping up a house and a retirement.

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“I know that you mentioned USC, but do not go to a Calif univ if you’re premed. That is like adding a ball and chain to yourself. Calif has too many premeds, its too competitive there. You won’t likely get into a Calif med school, so why bother going to school there. It’s a waste.”

mom2collegekids,
you keep on repeating this same advice. Would you give the same advise to students applying to expensive Mass colleges? New York colleges?
What is your issue with USC , Calif colleges and premed?
As I posted in another thread, Calif educated premed students get into med schools in the same ratio as the state population and the overall population of med school applicants across the US. There is no more a disadvantage going to a West coasts school for premed than an east school school.
That said, the OP should be HAPPY he has great Texas U’s that he can afford to go to, especially if Med School is in the future. Taking out unnecessary loans to go to a college OOS is stupid.

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I don’t think any premed should go OOS unless there is an ADVANTAGE doing so…such as creating a tie to a state that is known to give special consideration to applicants who went to their state’s undergrads. These are often states that don’t have an adequate supply of qualified premed applicants so they’re happy to consider OOS students who have a tie to the state (which suggests that they may end up practicing there, hence the willingness to give them a seat…and often with some merit to defray some OOS cost).

I have long listed the reasons why it’s a bad idea to go to a Calif undergrad as an OOS premed.

The state doesn’t have enough med school seats proportional to the number of instate applicants. It creates an atmosphere that is more grade-grubbing and gunner than exists in other states.

And when you’re attending a school where literally hundreds of students will be applying to med schools, the chances of getting superior LORs becomes sorely low.

California premeds do not have the same success rate, particularly in their own state. So many have to go OOS for med school (at GREAT expense). The UCs (and maybe USC) only have about a 50% acceptance rate to med schools.

Med school admissions just keeps getting more and more difficult. Why make the path more difficult? It’s an admissions game where sometimes the smallest things make or break success.

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Only about half of applicants to US MD medical schools overall get even one admission, so California is not special in this respect.

But it is a better idea for the OP to attend a low cost school in Texas, then try for a low cost medical school in Texas, in order to have lower debt at medical school graduation and hence more career options due to not being forced to chase the most money possible to pay off a mountain of debt.

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“The state doesn’t have enough med school seats proportional to the number of instate applicants. It creates an atmosphere that is more grade-grubbing and gunner than exists in other states.”
And exact same thing could be said for states like Massachusetts New York Connecticut – states where there are large populations of premed applicants where there are few public medical school slots available.
I don’t know why you think that California,in particular, is a bad state for an OOS premed student to go to college but it is not the case. The facts do not support your premise .

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Reality is that most HS kids who think they are going to Med school don’t end up going.

I don’t know why the crowd on CC is so wrapped up in optimizing the Med school applications of a kid who hasn’t really grappled with what’s required to get INTO Med school, let alone what’s required to then become a physician.

OP- Kick this can down the road. But finding some affordable options- NOW is job 1 whether you’re going to become a doctor, an archivist, an economist, or a biostatisctian.

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I am majoring in biomedical/ biological engineering. Since when did people assume Im majoring in pre med lol?? I am fine to go to either grad school or med school, depending on the costs. Also, Im only interested in USC as my merit option. Location and campus vibe are my deciding factors for this. Im NOT applying to schools like Tulane or Case Western. Let me know if anyone has more info to share about merit from USC into its engineering school. That would be helpful!

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Only about half of applicants to US MD medical schools overall get even one admission, so California is not special in this respect.


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When I get home, I will show you how Calif influences that overall US result (because that state alone has so many applicants). And, MORE SO, that is not true for Texas premeds (which is what this student would be). It is not that hard for a qualified instate Texas student to get into a Texas med school. It would be interesting what the % is nationally when Calif is removed.


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And exact same thing could be said for states like Massachusetts New York Connecticut –

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? Have you seen me advocate that a premed should attend an OOS public in one of those states? If the numbers are similarly bad for those 3 states, AND on CC IF we were seeing a large number of OOS premeds considering going to one of those 3 states, I would say the same thing. We just rarely see OOS premeds wanting to go to those 3 states…except for NYU and we often talk kids out of that school.

I will look at the numbers for those 3 states. I haven’t because it’s just not the attraction that we see OOS premeds wishing for Calif.

If qualified student is serious about med school (and some are just testing the waters and/or don’t have the foundation to be a successful premed), then he/she should consider routes that will more likely lead to success. Wasting money on an OOS school seems silly, unless there is a benefit. What benefit exists in this case???

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Also look at Baylor if you have great stats and plan on going to med school.