<p>With regard to high school students feeling entitled to a private education, I think part of the problem is that private schools often talk out of both sides of their arses. They’ll target a kid with strong stats and tell him not to let the list price be a deterrent, because (as Lynn Neary alluded to) the net price of attending their private college is “frequently less than an in-state public.”</p>
<p>And that’s likely true for a number of top private schools IF the student qualifies for financial aid OR the school wants a particular kid. But Junior interprets that to mean that ALL private schools will treat him accordingly. What Junior frequently doesn’t understand is that merit money will only be dispensed if he adds something of value to THAT particular school. </p>
<p>Most of the top 20 LACs, for instance, don’t need to dangle merit money because they have 10 applicants for every spot in the freshman class. So the families sending their kids there either can afford full pay, received enough FA to make it competitive (in terms of value) with what they’d pay for the in-state (or in some cases OOS) public, or the student’s need is so great the cost of attending the school is actually cheaper than attending an in-state public. (I had that very experience 35 years ago.) </p>
<p>If Junior’s family needs significant merit money to offset a high EFC, however, Junior needs to have it explained to him that he must target private schools where he brings something significant to the table – high stats (above 25th %ile) or some other major hook, which will vary depending upon the specific school. In our case, we targeted Midwestern schools where geographic diversity might make him more desirable, schools where there were more women than men on average, and schools where his stats placed him in the top 10% of applicants. That’s about as “hooked” as he was going to get. He’s already been accepted at his (public) safeties, so now we just wait. But he knows any acceptances and offers he receives from private colleges will be weighed against the costs of the public schools. “Value” is key here, for us, up to a point, but for some folks it will come down to “Which is least expensive?”</p>
<p>A lot of upper middle class families where I live just skip this entire step of applying to private schools and have their kids apply to in-state publics and possibly one or two affordable OOS publics. Very few kids apply to private colleges unless they’re being recruited for athletics or the school is known for dispensing a lot of merit money. And these are families that frequently send their kids to parochial schools, so they’re used to paying tuition. But most of them have more than one child, and they’re not prepared to give up their lifestyles when perfectly fine public options are available. And the kids don’t seem to mind in the least. The vast majority of them have probably never heard of most of the “elite” schools that many CC posters salivate over. It’s kind of an alternate universe here!</p>