Options for continuing education with inability to take out loans

[Matheo]

<p>

@mom2collegekids

You have no idea of how bad it would be to put your tuition on a credit card.</p>

<p>And, no, if you earn $50k per year, you would NOT be able to pay off $100k in debt in a few years. You can’t live for free with family, so you’d have to PAY TAXES (a lot of taxes since you’re a single person), you’d have to pay living expenses…housing, utilities, food, car, car insurance, gasoline, cell phone, internet, cable, clothing, etc. You’ll have VERY LITTLE left over each month to put towards loans.</p>

<p>You need to find cheaper options. Find an instate public that has your major.

Well, considering I haven’t lived without most of those things for most of my life, I don’t see why it’d be a problem in the future. Just roughly estimating the finances and taxes from federal/state brackets, I think I’ll have a little more than “very little” left over. Maybe “a few years” is slightly optimistic, but as long as I can perform research in my field for the rest of my life, I wouldn’t mind a lifetime of debt. What else more could I want?</p>

<p>

@polarscribe

You have several strong in-state public schools - SUNY Binghamton, UBuffalo, UAlbany, Stony Brook University. Any one of those is a major, well-respected research university.</p>

<p>If you don’t think you can get into any of those as an in-state resident, how do you expect to get into “better” out-of-state schools?

When I researched different undergraduate rankings, methodologies, etc. most of the listings did not even mention any of those in the top 100, so naturally I did not believe they were strong at all. The only ones of recognition I remember are Cornell/Columbia, both Ivies and I presume difficult to get into as transfers. I had been accepted to both as a high schooler, but as I remember neither one of them offered much money so I couldn’t attend then either.</p>

<p>When comparing the public schools you listed to the repute of other public schools such as Berkeley, UCI, UMich Ann Arbor, CU Boulder, UIUC, etc. they honestly seem rather weak in comparison. I had considered relocating to California to try and attend one of these, but I wasn’t able to gather enough demographics as much as I would’ve liked. I only stay in NYC because I’m very familiar with the city, so I know all the spots to crash in, places to obtain free meals, where to avoid, the timing of things, etc. and I can get by rather easily since I know where all the resources are located. I wasn’t confident I could survive in a state on the other side of the country, so I didn’t take the risk.</p>

<p>I’m aware that there are plenty of quality graduate schools, but I believe the better ones are less limited in terms of technology and money which would make accessibility much easier as opposed to having to spend the time+money to travel and use third-party equipment or having to order parts/chemicals unavailable whereas a wealthier school might have plenty in stock for immediate disposal.</p>

<p>Am I misinformed about anything?</p>