I was accepted today to Parsons in NYC to study photography. I received $18,000 per academic year ($72,000 after four years). The cost of Parsons is over $66,000 per year ($264,000 for four years). I have applied for many out side scholarships and have yet to win any. My family has little money but we are not poor enough to get a lot from FAFSA. The school is in NYC and photographers tend to make more there than anywhere.
Will the education and networking be worth $264,000?
Also if I don’t have enough out of pocket to go for a year how do I go about filling that gap between school given loans and my scholarship? (i.e if it costs $66k and I only have 20k covered by scholarship and school loans?) Thanks I’d appreciate any help my parents struggle to understand the aid as well.
Most kids don’t go to private universities because they are too expensive. Students go to their in-state publics or transfer from CC’s. It doesn’t matter where you go to school because a job is a job if you have a degree.
Parents, like me and my husband, have saved since our three children were little through our State’s 529 account. It wasn’t much money, but we tried. We currently save as much as we can; we drive old cars, make home repairs ourselves and limit our “leisure” expenses. Our children were all required to work each summer to contribute to their accounts. It has not been easy, but we’ve all made it work.
You are only eligible for limited federal loan money per year:
Freshman: $5500
Sophomore: $6500
Junior: $7500
Senior: $7500
It is distributed by semester (so Freshman year, Fall, you get $2750).
If your parents live paycheck to paycheck, they will not be eligible for large parent loans, to fund this school, because the banks won’t loan these large amounts.
Unfortunately my parents saved $0. I just started working but it doesn’t pay much. So even with the minimum federal loan I can’t make ends meet. I wanted to study in NYC because photographers earn more there and the connections would’ve been great. Most succesfull photographers study in NYC. Thanks for helping I’m very very very sad because this really was my dream school. My parents make to much to earn need based aid but to little to pay for it. I’m just sad.
You can go to school outside of NY and get connections through your local professors. You’d be surprised how many connections the local schools have.
You don’t have to be in NY to get a job in NY.
Very true but I have a constant fear of dying before I can be successful. I didn’t want to wait here to eventually get a job in NYC. You know the whole do it before its to late philosophy. I don’t really have an option now though. Thanks I hope I can get a job there one day.
It is not a matter of your parents making too much for need based aid, unless you are an HEOP student (and Parson takes in about 3 a year) the school does not give a lot of money to anyone.
Even if you had a 0 EFC you would have gotten $5950 from PELL , which is still not making oarson’s affordable.
I have a student who is doing amazing work in photography - he started at CC then transferred to SUNY as a fine arts major.
Very likely, parsons does not have many students attending whose parents can’t/won’t pay their EFC or more. Your parents won’t pay anything. That’s a huge hurdle.
Btw…most kids don’t go away to college. Most commute to their local cc or state school.
Likely, the students at parsons are largely from affluent families that pay.
If you’re talking about middle class students attending OTHER pricey schools, those schools likely give great need-based aid. Parsons does not do that.
That said, a number of students have college funds that their parents started when they were babies…and/or they have grandparents who help pay.
As for large loans. Your parents would have to qualify and cosign for such large loans. Not only is that very risky for them, which is why most parents will not do that, but photographers don’t usually earn enough to pay the loans back. And since they live paycheck to paycheck, banks aren’t going to loan to them anyway…and I doubt they’d borrow for you anyway.
What do you think the salaries are for newish photography grads from Parsons???
Not really. Even if your parents only earned $25k per year, Parsons still doesn’t have the money to give you. And federal aid (after filling out FAFSA) is not much aid at all. You still wouldn’t have enough money. Schools like parsons are filled with students whose families can PAY
University of Arizona and University of New Mexico are listed in the top ten for photography (graduate school but I don’t think they rank undergrad) by US News. They are both taking applications until May 1.
Parsons is not affordable for you, but these schools might be. Run the Net Price Calculator on their websites before you spend the application fee.
Well starting pay is very different for the various types of photographers. I could do retouching and other editing on the side too. Yeah I agree, Parsons wants rich people with no talent instead of broke people with talent. Sad.
