My S has been accepted into Ithaca College’s 3 + 3 Doctor of Physical Therapy Program. We would have to apply for a lot of assistance through Private Student Loans to make this happen. Is it worth it to do this to go the Ithaca and be guaranteed to get his doctorate or should he go to a SUNY and hope he makes it into a graduate school to get his doctorate in a timely fashion?
I personally think private student loans are rarely justified. How much total debt would result from this plan?
Probably $100,000 over 6 years – 4 years undergrad 2 years grad vs. SUNY 4 years undergrad and 3 years grad somewhere not guaranteed for him to get in.
If SUNY is significantly lower in cost, have you thought about having him do the four years of undergrad and then work for a few years before going back for a doctorate? That might help reduce costs and help improve his chances of being admitted to a doctoral program. Also, are you sure he wouldn’t qualify for direct loans? If he does, then he might be able to get set up in a loan forgiveness program, provided he works for 10 years at a nonprofit employer while he begins paying off loans that are direct loan consolidated.
I am new to all of this, I really need someone to explain to me what the different loans are. I know there are federal loans which only gives you about $5500 for the freshman year, part subsidized part unsubsidized. I know there are private loans that you can get through banks like Citibank or through Sallie Mae…(I was thinking the Sallie Mae route) but what exactly is a direct loan? The great part about Ithaca is there is no GRE and he doesn’t have to apply for the graduate program at Ithaca, just as long as he has a 3.0 he automatically gets in and is done in 6 years. This is the thing I am struggling with most as he shaves off a year of grad school saving money, I guess depending on where he would get into.
SUNY didn’t give him any need based aid so really the difference over 4 years is about 40 grand, but then I am thinking that the 40 grand saved in undergrad would just wind up going into graduate school for the extra year that he’d have to put in.
The Direct loan is in the student name only, they are allowed:
Student Federal Direct Unsub Loan
freshman 5,500
sophomore 6,500
jr 7,500
sr 7,500
Of this you can only get subsidized loans if you are lower income, otherwise it is all unsub. Sub is up to 3,500/4,500/5,500/5,500 each year. This is not in addition to the loans above but in place of part of the total allowed as listed above.
For the graduate years the direct loan amount is increased to:
20,500 per year, all unsub
The student may be qualified to take a Direct Plus Loan as well.
For undergraduate years, the parent can get Direct Plus Loans from the Federal govt
https://studentaid.ed.gov/types/loans/plus
If you prefer you can take a private loan, but there are some advantages of Plus loans, see the Financial Aid forum, and read all the Fed pages as they explain all the different types of loans:
https://studentaid.ed.gov/types/loans