@OHToCollege A couple of things to think about. First, while your D may have stats that are competitive at top tier schools, no one should ever feel confident about getting accepted to one let alone many. Read the threads of the countless disappointed seniors and their parents each year with near perfect stats and you’ll understand that the competition is fierce. Second, the benefits you ascribe to top-tier schools – good education, networks, opportunities – are not restricted to top tier schools. Sorry, I’m not trying to be combative. The prestige obsession that has become so prevalent is a pet peeve of mine (and I have multiple degrees from elite schools).
My income and our complicated family situation means my D will get no financial aid from any school. Sure, I could use up a good chunk of my retirement funds and cut back significantly to send her to one of my alma maters, but I don’t think any college is worth $60k+/year, especially when my D has the stats to get significant merit aid at very good schools from which she can launch a very successful career. I loved the education I received at the elite schools. But is that education worth upwards $240k more than a free ride to a good school or $120k more than our state flagship? In my opinion, no. And many other graduates of elite schools think as I do and choose to chase merit instead.
@2muchquan No, unfortunately, we are not in GA. In-state options in GA would be better than what we have here. I did not realize Emory offered merit scholarships. Thanks for the tip! I’ll look into their program and scholarships to see if I think it might be worth pursuing. Full-ride would be awesome, but we can make full-tuition work. Full-tuition means that she is going to have to take out her part in student loans. (None of our other kids have had to take out loans, so that would make me sad for her b/c of all of them, hers is probably going to be the lowest paying field.)
@OHToCollege I guess I am just immune to it by now. (Our oldest graduated from high school in 2007.) Nothing has changed in the process since then except that prices keep skyrocketing.
FWIW, our kids know that admission is only 50% of the process. Paying for attendance is the other 50%. It is really 100% irrelevant what we think is affordable. Universities cost what they cost and what they expect us to pay is not based on the real world. To give you an idea, our income is definitely in the donut hole category. Most schools (even generous ones) expect an EFC of close to $30,000. OK…that translates to a real world amt of $30,000 x 4 yrs x 8 kids. Now, how many families can afford to pay close to $1,000,000 in college costs with incomes around the upper range you posted? :)) We can either get upset about it (which is pointless b/c it doesn’t change a thing) or we can be proactive and find a better alternative.
When you have high performing kids, you have far more options than parents with avg performing kids. Those kids face high cost options in every direction other than the local CC. So, from my perspective, I am much happier to look at it as the glass half full vs half empty. My older kids have all managed to have great college educations at a very affordable price. High performing kids are appreciated and given a lot of extra bonus programs etc at schools that are actively recruiting them. Those programs can be awesome experiences in and of themselves. We are thrilled those opportunities exist.
ETA: I do want to add one additional comment. From our kids’ perspectives, they have not *“toiled away at it for years perfecting their academic record, only to realize that the benefits of good education, networks, opportunities, a kick-start given by top-tier schools is beyond their reach.” * Perhaps my kids are in the minority, but my kids really love learning. They accomplish what they do b/c it is what they want to do and who they are. They don’t do it for any outside recognition (we homeschool, they really don’t get any outside recognition for 99.99% of what they do.) But, the things they love and excel in are really far more about their personal goals than anything else.
@OHToCollege we ran the NPC’s a few months ago, and that’s when I started reading and posting in earnest on CC, because it was a big cold bucket of suck when those numbers came back for us despite older D’s numbers, classes, yadda yadda yadda.
I can’t tell you how accurate they are for us because we haven’t gotten the real numbers or acceptances from colleges, but I hope to heck it’s a worst case scenario. A few colleges we knocked off the list outright after getting the NPC’s back (like H’s alma mater Univ o Miami). Too expensive for what they offer.
That’s our boat too, minus the generous parents. We’re having a really hard time looking at the price tags of some of these colleges and seeing the value.
@canypava welcome, and yeah, I was bummed about Prince too. We were at a concert last week and the legendary Nile Rogers was playing, and he dedicated a song to Prince, who was at the time sick and had just cancelled a show to fly home.
We’re looking at this with our sophomore D. Unless she wakes up one morning and decides she wants to work like crazy and make her grades match her test scores, we think her first two years will be at a CC. It makes no sense to send someone who doesn’t value academics to a crazy expensive school-they won’t appreciate it. It’s like trying to get a toddler to eat caviar-everyone’s upset and what’s the point?
@greeny8 You got it. “2muchquan” is a play on his line: “Show me the quan!”. And, it relates to the current discussion of how college costs too friggin’ much! I finally decided to match up the avatar to the username.
Thank you all for the warm welcome! Yes, @Ynotgo, thanks for that, we did hear about the UC prompt changes when we visited UCSD over spring break. It was mentioned during the presentation and I thought, wow, yet another change for our kids of 2017!
GCs @ my DS’s school gave printouts about the new prompts. Also, no recommendation letters for UC Berkeley. New pilot program for 2017. I guess 2017 is year of change for college admissions!
@OHToCollege All of the Ivies are pretty similar and there are other 100% need met without loans schools like UChicago, Vanderbilt, MIT. There are lists out there. The biggest variation is that some schools ding you for home equity which may or may not be a big issue for you. My son16 is going to UChicago and his grant aid was within a few hundred dollars of our EFC and the NPC on their site. We are VERY lucky that he also got a merit award and that they don’t count home equity against you as the real estate market went crazy here after we bought our home. If she gets into more than 1 and prefers one where she got a lower award other schools will often match a similarly competitive schools offer. My son’s initial top choice was CMU but he quickly realized how awful their aid was when an older friend whose parents make less got a terrible offer so he didn’t even apply. We have what I would consider a high income and we are paying less for UChicago than most state flagships cost for instate. It’s worth applying to a few of those 100% need met reaches without falling in love to see what happens. It may also be worth applying to a few schools that are known for great merit aid to see if there are any offers she just can’t refuse.
@dcplanner is your child attending UChicago for significantly less than the predicted net cost on their NPC? I have heard of UChicago giving ~$5000 in scholarships. Do they offer larger scholarships or is it mostly grant $$?
Yes I think the merit this year ranged from $5000-25000. They also have a variety of grant and institutional aid categories so we have a regular grant that gets us exactly to our EFC/NPC amount, a merit award, and then a special institutional grant award. I know the kids in the admitted students FB group have talked about awards and apparently this was fairly common for upper middle class kids to have 3 sets of aid. The awards estimates people were given EA were finalized this month and almost all increased based on the increase of tuition and room and board for next year too (almost $3000) which is reassuring. It is highly variable though on our 2016 list there is someone who got $10000 more money each year from Columbia than UChicago but they are appealing. Harvard seems to be the only one with consistently the best offers for those who got many offers.
One more part of financial aid that I didn’t really “get” until we were looking at final offers is that pretty much every school has a work requirement for students which if your student can’t work during the summer or doesn’t want to work during the school year will fall on you to pay as well. This varied on our awards but most were about 2000 during the summer and school year so a total of $4000 in earnings. Different schools have different job types that may mesh well or not so well with school work. At UChicago they can do research and it is paid which is super nice. At other schools it would have been things like working as tech support for the dorm computer lab a few hours a week so still not terrible but also probably not terribly flexible either. This wasn’t something we thought about asking when we did early visits. So getting a job this summer is a nice idea–though if they have savings in their name they are expected to use 20% of it each year towards college in terms of the financial aid package.
We are owners of a small business, which really messes up any financial aid talk. I believe we will also fall into the donut hole of making too much to qualify for need based aid but not enough to pay their EFC, which happens to be much higher than tuition at our state’s flagship. I have heard that UChicago is quite generous with their aid as well. We did a college tour there last summer and they made a point of saying they will do what it takes to fill the gap between COA and EFC and not back fill it with loans. Problem is our EFC is artificially inflated due to our business because the business income is counted against us so we still would not be able to afford it. UChicago is a great school and beautiful campus though if you can afford your EFC.
@DOTexe That is also my understanding of UChicago’s general policy. I think that @dcplanner is saying that a family whose expected contribution is $40,000 can receive a $25,000 scholarship and their net cost is now only $15,000. However, that is contrary to what we were told last yr when we were there. What we were told by the university was similar to your description.
Our EFC is more than double what we can afford, so small awards are not enough. It has to be a large amt that actually brings our net cost.
@dcplanner. We also visited U Chicago campus and loved it. I am intrigued now, based on your post. I just ran the NPC on Chicago and the EFC is at 45K. That’s absolutely nowhere close to going to say OSU at appx 20K where I know my daughter will likely qualify for some tuition scholarships, further reducing her costs. Are you suggesting that in reality merit aid is usually granted and is not reflected in the so called “grant aid” portion of the NPC? When we were at the campus we were told otherwise, the lady said trust the NPC. This is contrarian to what you are stating or as @Mom2aphysicsgeek saying above. I want my daughter to apply to UChicago but will be a financial reach for us if NPC is accurate.
I would treat UChicago like ANY financial reach school (meaning they give competitive merit): UNC, Duke, Emory, Tulane, Rice, Grinnell, etc. They all are affordable IF your C wins the merit lottery (on top of the admittance lottery).
Not sure what I’m missing. Apply, apply, apply, IF your C has the time for all the apps and supplements, and understands that just admission is not enough. The money needs to work for your (realistic) budget. Oh, and of course your C’s stats and ECs need to be competitive. This is kind of important.
ETA: If you have an atypical financial situation (like your own business) then I would not obviously ‘trust’ the NPC, so YMMV in those situations. But I have not heard of too many NPCs that are WAAAAY off (excluding merit awards).
Also, I would add that if you think your kid will be crushed by getting accepted to a ‘dream’ school, and then not being able to attend because of finances, then I personally would not have my C apply. The chances pretty fair that merit won’t come through at these more ‘reachy’ schools.
Well - my ds just recently visited the University of Richmond and he was pleasantly surprised. He did not think he would like it at all but he absolutely loved it. He thought the architecture was a lot like Princeton’s (except its all brick) and loved the cozy feel of the campus, dorms, and buildings. Of course it was an absolutely gorgeous day - tulips in bloom everywhere, birds singing, lake sparkling. He’s thinking about a minor in math and economics and discovered they have a mathematical economics major so that sparked incredible interest. The information session was really good - led by a student with some really good videos (I almost bawled at the dropping off your kid the first day vid - but fortunately caught myself before said ds disowned me).
They have a really good merit program called Richmond Scholars - it’s competitive merit aid but makes it very affordable if earned. The dining hall was amazing - my ds ate for a solid hour. lol
My ds is interested in taking Chinese but I did notice they had a solid Russian studies program and have introduced a new Arabic program recently. Also study abroad is huge there - most kids take advantage of it. The information session student said the aid for study abroad was very generous too. I would encourage you to check it out if your child is looking for a smaller place that has a little bit of everything.
They gave us an application waiver as a gift for visiting the University. I thought that was genius!
I am not seeing the complete picture - if the so called merit aid is already embedded in the “grant aid” portion of the NPC, it’s simply not for us. Basically, for top-tier schools (other than few ivies), if you are a parent with a family income in 150K range, expect to shell out 30% of your total after-tax income. In other words, state schools are a good fit for you; don’t come here unless you make too little or make 250K or above when it doesn’t matter what it costs. All I am struggling with is whether I should steer my daughter make applications to top-tier schools or let her just concentrate on OSU/OU/Miami U at OH. I wouldn’t have brought up this issue of affordability if I didn’t have confidence in my daughter’s stats or the ability to do well at top-tier schools.
@2muchquan Applications add up quickly. Say $75 application fee, SAT score ($11.25, $31 for rush), ACT scores ($12-$16.50), DE transcripts (varies by school, $5-20). Add in time for all the supplemental essays.
If a school is not going to be affordable, it is a waste of time and $$. (And honestly, I don’t feel like giving them almost a $100 for no reason. ) If a school’s policy is to not let awards drop below what they determine to be the familial contribution, it makes sense to know that ahead of time. There are schools where zero scholarship $$ ends up in the same place as scholarship plus grant $$ bc they simply intertwine the awards so much that it is really just more wording than any net gain.
From what we were told by UChicago when we were there, the suggestion was that getting any significant amt below your EFC was pretty much impossible. If $25,000 below EFC is possible, that is very different. That would make it worth investigating.
schools like UNC-CH and Tulane, where their competitive scholarships are described on their website with known award amts, fall into a different category in my mind than the “we offer merit” but no more info schools.
I remembered someone mentioned that their child wanted to take java and this reminded me of coursera.org - do you know about this?! It is an incredible website of online learning - mostly free - from the country’s top universities. My ds will take an occasional class just for fun on this site. @isitfridayyet Check it out - it may have the java you are looking for!
