<p>Marian, your grocery store experience and the OP’s class of comments are what I also have frequently experienced. I’ve referred to this, and more specifically to the issue of elite school bashing, quite a bit on CC, because sometimes it IS hurtful whether you want to be hurt or not and whether it was intentional or not. If your child has done well and is happy at college, and it would be nice if your friends were happy for you, or at a minimum it didn’t phase them either way. But when your child’s success or their college choice drives a wedge in friendships, it’s sad. People become very defensive about their own choices, and sometimes try to turn the situation in such a way that your child’s choice is bad or stupid, or the child himself must have deficiencies, like poor social or arrogance like those who attend such schools.</p>
<p>And in my town, almost everyone goes private. It’s almost looked down on when a kid goes to our state flagship. And forget about the satellite campuses!</p>
<p>When it comes to this issue people tend to do 2 things. Vigorously defend their own position and the feel the need to denigrate the other side. </p>
<p>Why should ANYONE criticize someone for spending their own money on their child’s education. Criticize someone for purchasing (or borrowing to purchase)worldly posessions seems fair game. But for the beleived benefit of their children? Seems like a selfless act to me.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>I don’t think people should criticize others’ choices in general. Advising friends to not date known creeps/criminals/weirdos, or to not buy a house that is about to fall off a cliff, might be reasonable exceptions.</p>
<p>I know this thread has been beat to death with a lot of good points, but I personally wouldn’t take such a comment as a personal attack on me. Rather I would think the OP’s friend would mean they felt it was stupid for them to pay $60,000 for undergrad. And it very well may be stupid for them to pay that much if they couldn’t afford it. It is stupid for many people to buy many things they cant afford. I had a customer who couldn’t pay his car insurance bill but could pay his $200 cell phone bill. Now that is stupid. People do lots of stupid things with their money.</p>
<p>If you have saved and you can afford to send your kid to whatever price school you choose, go for it and don’t worry about what other stupid people are doing with their lives and their money.</p>
<p>Now on the other hand, if this person made you have second thoughts about spending so much, or perhaps the reason for this thread is deep down you felt it was too much, then that is another story. No one but you and your family can make this decision for you. I don’t think it is stupid to decide to pay less than $60,000 for college. The rest of the money can go for that $200,000 wedding! We all make choices for what is most important to us and how we want to spend our money.</p>
<p>Every day I see people buy expensive things that I wouldn’t choose to spend my money on. Their choices are very different from mine. But I would never dream of saying to them that spending their money that way is “stupid.” For the simple reason that to do so would be very bad manners.</p>
<p>^^Exactly.</p>
<p>When your child becomes successful, just talk about how her college was so great and invaluable.</p>
<p>Revenge is a dish best served cold.</p>
<p>coureur hit the nail on the head. It’s galling because we would not, and in fact do not comment on others’ spending decisions. In some cases, those decisions are objectively far more “stupid” than paying for a good education, like the car insurance vs. cell phone example above, and in other cases the decisions are subjectively in our opinion far more "stupid. We don’t comment because we think it’s rude, and actually most people think it’s rude.</p>
<p>For some reason, though, people routinely do comment on the decision to pay for an elite school. It’s as if that is somehow a different category from boats, cars and vacation homes. College choice is like a public indication of money spent, since the tuition data is public. There is no new/used possibility, or chance of a special holiday sale or foreclosure deal. Also, unlike a composite purchase like a kitchen remodel where different options cost different amounts and the total cost may be harder for nosy people to estimate, college expenditure is a little simpler. </p>
<p>Or so they think. One problem is that many people are not aware that there is also variability in college spending due to how FA works at these schools, so their presumptions are often wrong. We paid less for elite privates than they did for the state schools. Try pointing that out, if you want to see how ticked off people can get over this. And of course, like for everything else, people don’t know and shouldn’t care to know how a college education could have been financed outside of the person’s earnings, eg. a gift from the grandparents (I wish, lol).</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>People also routinely comment on others’ decision to pay for “lesser” schools with no brand recognition (i.e., LACs). They comment on people sending their kids to state flagships that are known “party schools.” They comment on kids attending college in states that are deemed less desirable (“really…IOWA?”).</p>
<p>Good lord, I can only imagine what it will be like when our kids all start getting married and having babies.</p>
<p>Actually, sally305, in real life I have never heard anyone publicly make a negative comment about a kid going to the flagship. People don’t comment openly because there is an understanding that the state school is the affordable and academically attainable option for most people, and because there are way too many people they would stand to offend if they said something. Currently, 675 kids from our high school attend the local flagship. ONE student from our high school, my daughter, attends her elite school, only 2 currently attend H, 6 are enrolled at Princeton, none are at Yale. That’s the difference.</p>
<p>Some people have suggested that those who won’t spend money on private colleges haven’t been prudent in their savings. Actually, many people who have saved carefully and can afford to spend the money still don’t think it’s wise to spend $200,000 on a private education vs. a fraction of that cost on a public university – especially in states that have excellent public universities. In my state, most of the very top students, some of whom are from wealthy families, want to go to UNC, NC State, and, yes, other state universities.</p>
<p>That being said, it’s rude to comment on where other people decide to go to college or how much they spend on college. I make a point to make a positive comment about any college someone chooses to attend, whether I think it’s wonderful or not so great, and I would never make a comment about how expensive it is. I know someone whose child is attending a university I would never let one of my children go to. However, when I heard the “attending Liberty” news, I said something like, “That’s such a beautiful part of Virginia. What a nice location to go to school.” That’s just plain good manners.</p>
<p>The comment that OP found offensive may not have been directed at the OP personally. Still, the person shouldn’t have used the word “stupid” in that context.</p>
<p>Agree that these OP’s friends were a bit tactless in what may have been a flip, insensitive, blockhead comment. I have to wonder what the course of the conversation was before they said this. If the OP and her friend were merely talking about their kids, the senior class, or post-HS plans in general, then perhaps the friend was talking in generalities. </p>
<p>However, if they were talking about their particular kids, and perhaps the OP had just shared with er friend where her son was applying to school (private) and the friend responded with that crack “Joe and I think its stupid…” I would have loved for the OP to respond (or at least thought in her head) “my DH and I think its stupid to insult someone to their face”.</p>
<p>Sometimes people put down what they can’t afford as a way of justifying it to themselves. Like the cost of an expensive car, a boat or other luxury item. But gee, they don’t complain if they get to ride in the car or on the boat, do they?</p>
<p>***ETA: We personally value education. We would be way more willing to be full pay for our kids than to drive around in some extremely expensive car. If one has the luxury to make choices with big ticket items, then that’s their perogative.</p>
<p>I don’t see any problem in that statement other than the tactless use of the word “Stupid”. That’s what makes the statement the flame.</p>
<p>Not the most tactful comment, but still… $200 000 on an undergrad degree seems very steep. People talk about saving money but that is a lot to save. What also if you have more than one kid at that point tuition fees will be approaching the same cost as a mortgage. </p>
<p>Again if you are wealthy enough that $200 000 on tuition is manageable for you all power too you. However I would think that most families would have to make very substantial sacrifices to pay that (for those that CAN even afford it). Just doesn’t seem to make sense, especially for an undergraduate degree for the large majority of families. Were it for paying to go to a top graduate school or professional school, I could maybe see the price being justifiable (although with stipends and TAships you can often go to graduate school for a lot less).</p>
<p>Mrs. Joe’s dd has fallen in love with a private school in that price range. They don’t want to pay that. I do not know if they <em>could</em> or not. My guess is that they could, but they probably don’t think it’s a wise use of their money. My other guess is that they will not qualify for need-based aid. I would assume they are in that dreaded middle zone, kwim? DD will not qualify for merit aid at this school (I <em>think</em> she will get in, but she is on the lower end of their stats - particularly with regard to test scores). While the mom says they have told her they would only be willing to cover $25,000 per year, I am not sure that dd is getting it. Perhaps she thinks she will convince them otherwise??? I do not think they want her to take out loans. Which, I guess, would really mean that they as the parents would have to cosign with her since the Stafford amount alone is not going to make up the difference. I do not disagree with this at all! We are extremely anti-debt in our household. </p>
<p>What I do worry about is their dd being sorely disappointed when this just does not work out for her. She is doing an overnight next month. I guess I don’t understand why her parents are allowing her to continue her to pursue this school if they are not willing to pay for it.</p>
<p>
How many teenagers will actually listen to parents? Parents sometimes let them have their way in terms of doing an overnight…(perhaps in their mind, that could really convince their DD that it is not a dream school).</p>
<p>I am not sure of the point of this thread. I don’t think your friend was in any way trying to convince her opinion on you. Personally, I am not a big proponent of taking out loans or emptying out personal savings on private education, unless (yes there is always UNLESS) it is maybe a couple of colleges and a major I think warrants that. I have seen too many kids getting out of 4 year liberal arts colleges and sitting at home or trying to take evening grad school classes (while their parents are 200K down on their savings).</p>
<p>At the same time, it is a personal family decision, and what works for one , may not apply to the other.</p>
<p>Parents do get caught up in stress and strain over college decisions. It can dominate conversations, and intemperate remarks can be made. I have heard the other side of the OP’s coin – people criticized for NOT spending $200,000 plus to send a 2.6-ish student to a very mediocre but pricey private school. The critic, in this case, had done exactly that, is now struggling to pay for it, in conflict with the recent grads over responsibility for Parent Plus loans, and she may find it disturbing to think that there was another legitimate approach she could have taken. So she verbally scorns those who are not willing to walk down the same path. The critic also had significant grandparent help . . . and this is where all such discussions break down, because you can never know the details of other people’s finances, health, attitude toward risk, future at work, marital power balance (and outlook for the marriage), prospect of inheriting, or odds of having to help support the elder generation (and how that could change the marriage), confidence in the kid’s ability to successfully launch after the education (or even to finish it), knowledge about what the kids may inherit and whether the parental generation will be bypassed in favor of the kids, etc. Nobody I know lays all this out in detail for friends (or has friends who could stomach it). But all these things are quietly considered, as people make these decisions.</p>
<p>I hope that my adult life will go on, friendships intact, after my kids are educated. So I try not to be thin-skinned about people’s comments, knowing that they’re really talking about their own kids and their own situations even when they speak in generalities. It doesn’t sound like what was said here was meant as an attack on the OP and her choices – more just the ill-advised use of the word “stupid” and the broad nature of the comment. If the OP’s friend had said “we don’t think it’s the right thing in our situation to bla, bla, bla” – no offense would be taken. If it’s otherwise a nice friend, maybe OP would do best to just reinterpret the sentence that way, and move on.</p>
<p>If the OP’s friend really has an axe to grind over the OP’s separate parenting and financial choices, maybe this is not such a nice friend.</p>
<p>Some people are just crass, tactless, or have no filter between their brain and their mouth. I recall asking someone for some suggestions about relocating to their area, as I had a friend who was doing so. They asked me what the person had already done, and when I responded shey said “your friend is stupid”. I don’t recall much of what she said after that because I was quite taken aback at her less-than-diplomatic response and tuned her out.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>“In general, or are you just talking about for your own kid?”</p>