<p>I'd love to hear your thoughts and experiences. Many of the colleges which offer full need are well endowed and many of the students attending come from families of means .. obviously or they wouldn't have enough of those paying to be able to give scholarships to those in need. I know that there are some state schools which do, but as those are more socioeconomically diverse, I'm really looking for info regarding the upper tier privates, including ivies.</p>
<p>What has your student's experiences been? What have your experiences been? I'm having a hard time putting my thoughts into words, so I'd just like to be a fly on the wall on this thread.</p>
<p>Nrdsb4–because public schools don’t have the money to give like the private schools and those needing aid usually do better at private schools financially. Even without financial aid, for our kids, after merit aid, the public schools are a LOT higher cost then then private schools.</p>
<p>Not sure about the question, are you asking for experiences regarding a person of lesser means among a bunch of rich kids? I have a friend whose son (on full ride) just switched dorm rooms because his wealthy roommate is dealing drugs from the room. I don’t think most college kids would care about the socioeconomic status of others in their classes, in general, but don’t have any specific personal experiences. Our school district is diverse economically, and it hasn’t been a problem for my kids, but they wouldn’t want to hang around with those who would care about their economic status.</p>
<p>My kid has full tuition, not full ride ('cept for the year she was an RA). I was nearly a fullride back in my day.</p>
<p>Yes, there is a bit of a culture shock when surrounded by wealthier kids. For some, it can be stressful. In my day, I was left out of a lot of social activities because I could not afford to go clubbing, or skiing, or whatever. I found my niche with the other workstudy kids - we food service kids became very close. Birds of a feather really DO tend to flock together, and there are friends to be found if one looks. And for the most part in college, class isn’t all that big an issue. Well, other than the girl on my freshman floor who had no clue how to put sheets on her bed and paid us poor kids, and the son of a famous TV personality who used to get into all kinds of trouble until daddy kept making generous contributions to the college…</p>
<p>My daughter has some very wealthy friends, and some who are worse off than we are. She has a very strong sense of self and takes pride in finding good used clothing or bargains - more than she would in owning the designer clothes some of her peers wear.</p>
<p>Nrdsb4, what SteveMA stated I think is generally true. But it’s not that we’re not looking at state universities, it’s that I don’t think my question applies as there is more economic diversity at state schools.</p>
<p>Mamabear, I agree that the majority of the students, my daughter included, wouldn’t care at all. Unfortunately drug use and dealing can be in any school and has little to do with the financial situation. Sorry to hear the other student had to move. </p>
<p>I’m just interested in hearing about different experiences.</p>
<p>Still don’t understand the original question(s). You’re asking about how a full ride student feels they’ve been fitting in socially at college? Or asking how well the financial situation is really covered?</p>
<p>KKmama, I just lost my long reply, so this will be a shorter version. It’s not so much the clubbing and skiing as she’s not interested in those anyway, but I could see day trips off campus might be a problem, depending on the plan and choice of places to eat. I also got to thinking about the parents’ role when reading the thread about taking the college friends out to dinner. Then I started thinking about parents’ weekends and other types of “social” events. While my daughter has her own sense of style and loves finding bargains, her parents are more lacking in that department. Thank you for sharing your experiences. That’s too funny about the sheets!</p>
<p>SoMuch2Learn, There are really two parts to this equation: 1- How the student receiving the aid copes with the obvious differences in means. You can gauge this now. If the student is extremely social and the school has a high percentage of kids who go off skiing during Spring break, the financial aid recipient may have a hard time.</p>
<p>2- How other students at the school treat the financial aid recipient. While many people who do not receive full aid will tell you that they do not think there’s a difference, I will tell you (as the parent of a child receiving generous aid) that it is generally tied in to whether there are racial divisions on campus. Students at those schools simply don’t know too much about the other kids’ financial situation but, in many of the schools where there is not a lot of racial diversity, you will find that other students assume that white kids (even if on generous financial aid) are not receiving tons of aid and that African-American kids (even if middle-class) are. This means that at many of these schools white, poor kids may have an easier time making friends on campus than you think (in that people won’t care about their financial status as much) and middle-class African-American kids may have a harder time (since students with whom they have much in common may assume they don’t). In my experience, if the school is well-integrated racially (kids have friends across the racial spectrum and minority kids are not generally just friends with each), there is a lot less division based on economics also.</p>
<p>I had a full ride in my day and stupidly had a real inferiority complex-- my classmates were absurdly well-traveled and sophisticated and it never entered my little head that it was because they were so much wealthier! I don’t think it occurred to them either. But honestly I blame myself–I don’t think they were really excluding me, just kind of being themselves. If I’d had a little more confidence I’d just have been curious about their lives instead of feeling bad about my own.</p>
<p>My daughter is a scholarship athlete and has seen the divide among teammates and other athletes. Some have spending money to eat off campus, trips to local attractions, concerts, movies, etc., but many do not. The decisions are made with respect to the kids with less spending money, not the kids with more.</p>
<p>Slightly off topic, but with some relevance, the chapter “How to Be Black at Harvard” from Baratunde Thurston’s book, “How to Be Black” touches on some of the issues of students of different means. Obviously, it is more about being black, but his experiences about his work-study jobs as well as involvement in extracurriculars (Harvard Crimson) can probably be extrapolated outside the race topic. (For the most part, he had a great experience at Harvard.)</p>