<p>To quote the Rolling Stones - “You can’t always get what you want”.
This is true in life and college admissions and affordability.</p>
<p>I simply can’t stress enough that there are many very fine colleges and universities that offer wonderful merit scholarships. you have to search for them with an open mind. many schools will offer a combined package of merit scholarship and need based grants.</p>
<p>^^^ One of my favorite quotes too, and don’t forget the rest…“you get what you need”.</p>
<p>This is what we did. </p>
<p>First: we only looked seriously at colleges that my son could commute to. So, we pay no room and board expenses. Yes, we do pay for gas, but that is not nearly as much as housing would cost. </p>
<p>Second: I looked at the average SAT scores and my son applied to schools where he was well above in SAT scores. I was certain that this would bring in merit scholarships (and I was correct).</p>
<p>When the acceptance letters and the scholarship amounts were all in, the cost of a local private college ended up being the same as our state university. I was stunned because I has assumed that our son would end up at the state university due to cost. The scholarship from the private college meant that we could choose between the two schools. (He had also applied to another private school and was accepted, but even with a large scholarship, that school was much too expensive.)</p>
<p>So, the debate was between the state uni where our son would be a minnow in the ocean and the private uni where he could be a big fish in a small pond. He chose the private uni and it has been a great fit for him. </p>
<p>One more thing we did to save money: Our son took about a year’s worth of college credit during high school. He was able to complete college in 3 years including a semester abroad. One year less of tuition made paying for college MUCH easier. Next year he will be at grad school at the same uni but with a grad assistantship and a stipend. So, this school really did turn out to be perfect for him.</p>
<p>For our daughter - she is attending our local community college. We are very fortunate that this school offers one of the top ten nursing programs in our state. She will be able to transfer to a 4 year college after completing her associates degree. Her degree will cost us very little since community college is quite affordable for us. Some scholarships will follow her so that will mitigate the cost of the rest of her degree.
The option of attending a community college and then transferring is not often mentioned on CC, but I think it can be a very cost effective option for many. Nope, it does not offer much of a ‘campus’ experience, but that is not always a great experience for everyone. </p>
<p>Hope that was helpful.</p>
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<p>I have often mentioned CC’s. There are many very fine community colleges that have wonderful articulation agreements with great schools. Some have honor’s programs as well. If there is a CC within commuting distance it is quite possible for a student to commute, work part time during the year, full time during the summer and pay all of their expenses for the first two years - CASH.
The problem is kids and parents are all caught up in “the college experience” which they feel is owed to them if they can’t afford to pay for it.</p>
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Some CC’s do offer great campus experiences with student goverment and volunteer organizations and even athletics - even if they don’t have dorms.<br>
You are right though - campus living and dorm life is not for every kid, and for some it’s not a great experience.</p>
<p>D is at a top-ranked school that has need-based aid that is amazing (for us). She is able to attend this school for less than she would pay at most of our state schools. She also had excellent merit awards at other very good schools.</p>
<p>S, a rising high school senior, is a different story. He has an awesome ACT score, but it isn’t going to get him what it got his sister for several reasons - not the least of which is that he will be studying PharmD. His options school-wise & merit money-wise are limited. We have discussed money with him. He has already decided that one of our state’s 2 schools offering an early assurance PharmD program will be a perfectly fine alternative if he isn’t able to get what he needs at an out-of-state school (he would prefer OOS for a variety of reasons). He knows he can get very good merit money at this school.</p>
<p>We were up-front & honest with both kids about what we would pay. If we could afford any school, we actually would pay it … as it is, we are stretching ourselves to pay what we do pay. We are not cutting into our basic needs - if we were, they would have to consider options other than where they are/hope to be. We cannot think of any better use for the money we are spending, though.</p>
<p>I see “household income deflation” happening on this thread.</p>
<p>Here’s the latest data found on hosuehold income</p>
<p>2006 Data Statistical Abstratct of the US<br>
earn between 100k-150k 11,332,000 14%<br>
earn between 150k-250k 5,676,000 7%<br>
earn over 250k+ 1,993,000 3%<br>
total households earning above above 100k 24% </p>
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<h2>Alamemom said: “I always thought we were middle class, until I came on college confidential and heard people lamenting that only the “very poor” get financial aid and the middle class get nothing.” </h2>
<p>Those lamenting folks are mixing up what it is to be culturally middle class with where they sit in terms of household income in the US. I know that earning $150k per year doesn’t make someone “rich”, but it does place that family in the top 10% in terms of household income. </p>
<p>Somehow it doesn’t surprise me that “need-based” financial aid programs don’t set aside much for those in the top 10%.</p>
<p>If I recall correctly, Columbia told us in their admissions talk that students whose family earn $60k or less pay nothing, and that students whose families earn between $60k and $100k have almost all their need met. In other words, they are targeting their financial aid to the “bottom” 75% of families, which sounds to me like solid support for the “middle income”, if not the middle class.</p>
<p>That’s why we are looking at financial aid safety schools . . . and all families - except those who consider themselves “rich” enough to just write the checks . . . ought to be doing the same.</p>
<p>A number of families in our community have kids commuting to local colleges, not just community colleges and state schools but local private schools as well. One acquaintance has a D who was given half off of tuition which was very doable with her living at home and having a part time job. Cheaper than going a way to a SUNY. There are a variety of ways to come up with lower costs.</p>
<p>I wish the figures were given in terms of families with college aged children. That is a whole different story from empty nesters and young families. Those may bring incomes down over all.</p>
<p>Kei-o-lei – I totally agree with you. When I have mentioned a few times in other threads that we are middle class and don’t qualify for need based assistance and can’t afford the sticker price at a private school people assume I am complaining about it or think I’m saying I should get assistance. That’s not whaqt I’m trying to say.</p>
<p>When I say we can’t afford the sticker price at a private school I mean it as a statement of our financial reality, although I know that is just my perception of our financial reality. And actually I don’t think the system should be changed, I think financial aid should be for people who are truly in need.</p>
<p>Sometimes I think there is a perception that if a school meets demonstrated financial need then any family accepted will receive enough aid to go there. From what I have observed meeting a family’s demonstrated financial need may still make it unfeasible for them to attend. For some family’s it is enough, for some it isn’t.</p>
<p>I’m really glad when people earning less that $60,000 per year get a free ride, that is what financial aid should be for.</p>
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<p>Agreed. And I also am glad that families who get free lunch or are receiving some welfare benefit do not have to report their assets on the FAFSA. I’m glad that students with a LOW EFC are eligible for the Pell grant.</p>
<p>And I’m grateful, very grateful, that we were in the financial situation to support our kids’ college educations. Sure…I would have LOVED some financial aid…but I also realize that others NEED it…I just WANTED it. There is a difference.</p>
<p>It’s not at all surprising that many parents are shocked when their kids start looking at colleges because the cost of college has increased exponentially from when they attended. I paid for 4 years of private college (albeit chosen for its reasonable cost) and 3 years at a top ten public law school for less than the cost of just one year’s tuition at many private colleges today. I’m talking 7 years of tuition, room, board, books, expenses, the whole works, vs. one year of tuition alone! Over the years I’ve heard the buzz about how college costs are outpacing incomes, but it’s only been in the past few years (since my oldest got to HS) that I’ve looked at actual numbers. Fortunately between current cash flow and savings we’ll be able to afford college for our kids without needing financial aid (for which we don’t qualify), but I do understand how kids get to high school without their parents understanding the financial burden college will be. For the life of me I cannot figure out why college costs have risen as drastically as they have over the past 30 years.</p>
<p>We are a family with a modest income and we live frugally. We have saved enough to pay for undergraduate and graduate education for our son, but are grateful we don’t have to. Saving for the full costs of an education is very doable, but you have to make lifestyle choices early in a marriage. We only had one kid, because kids are expensive. We opted to forgo a second income, because doing so suited our family lifestyle best. We never assumed any debt other than a mortgage, because carrying costs are a waste of hard earned money. We never bought cable or satellite TV, don’t have cell phones, don’t have the latest electronics, only buy necessary clothes and only at season end sales, drive a used car bought with cash, use the library instead of buying books, only exchange homemade gifts, etc. It’s really not a matter of “sacrifice”, but of simple, small savings that add up. We are 46 and 52, and have saved many times our annual income, which allows us to offer to pay for our son to pursue whatever education he desires without incurring debt. He turned down an ivy (he only applied as a favor to his mother) in favor of a full tuition scholarship at the only other school to which he applied, a relatively unknown public LAC he felt met his academic and extra-curricular needs for the best value. “Deals” are out there even for families that don’t qualify for aid, if a student works hard and values education more than a school’s name recognition. We are pleased that our son has learned the worth of a dollar, the costs of debt, and how to assess economic values when he has competing interests. </p>
<p>Education is expensive, and the costs need to be considered when planning the size of one’s family, the job one accepts and the area where one lives, the car one drives, the clothes one wears, the stuff one accumulates, etc. I was born and reared in one of the most expensive places to live in the U.S., and I left family and friends when I married because I wanted to be able to live within my means and save for the future. Some of my friends made lifestyle choices that allow them to pay for their children’s educations, while others made lifestyle choices that mean they and their children have to assume education debt. Neither option is “better” than the other; they’re just different ways to choose to live. But it seems unreasonable for those who chose an adult lifestyle incompatible with sufficient saving for their childrens’ educations, to claim college costs are somehow unreasonable, when many other ordinary families made lifestyle choices that enable them to pay.</p>
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I’ll take a stab:</p>
<p>1) Demographics. A record number of students are going to college. Higher demand allows colleges to charge more.</p>
<p>2) 15 year economic expansion. Strong economy coupled with a borrow/spend mentality greatly reduced price sensitivity as people had more money from the stock market and were willing to borrow irresponsibly.</p>
<p>3) Rankings/marketing. The rise of the ranking industry allows many many colleges to cultivate a bogus air of elitism (Top 50 in USNWR’s ranking of Most Trees on Campus!), which, coupled with with 1 and 2, has allowed them to raise prices with impunity.</p>
<p>4) Financial aid/grant industry. When <em>everyone</em> can get loans, it is easy for schools to raise prices high enough that more people would take/need to take them, essentially giving the schools free money.</p>
<p>5) Raising prices in order to be able to give discounts. Many schools (I’m convinced) do not expect many of their students to pay full price - instead they give coupons to the top of the applicant pool in order to make the school more attractive, and if some suckers^H^H^H^H^H^H^Hstudents are willing to pay full price, hey, the schools don’t object.</p>
<p>6) Institutional greed - administration. How many school presidents are making 7-figure salaries now? They have somehow raised themselves to the status of celebrities or high-level business people, and weak boards have gone along with it. And these huge salaries ripple all the way through the chain. I was told by a student at my alma mater that the president now has two full-time bodyguards. Huh?!? Does she think she’s a rock star or a head of state or something?</p>
<p>7) Institutional greed - room and board. Room and board at my alma mater costs about ten times what it did when I went there - for the same crappy cinder block building with communal bathrooms, that has not been significantly updated or upgraded in the last 25 years. Food prices have not increased 10x, labor prices have not increased 10x, it’s the same dining halls, so why has board increased by 10x? My school recently started requiring sophomores to live in the dorms. It’s obvious why - it’s a huge cash cow, and too many students are moving off campus where they can live for 1/3-1/2 the price. I don’t think this is atypical. Greedy, greedy, greedy.</p>
<p>8) Massive building sprees. Every school we visited is undergoing a huge building campaign. Every school was showing off new multi-million dollar student workout centers, every school was renovating multiple buildings. It’s like an arms race somehow got started where the schools think they need to have the shiniest newest buildings in order to attract parents (who pay the bills) and secondarily, students.</p>
<p>I probably missed a few things.</p>
<p>I think we’ve reached a tipping point though. A lot of people did not save much/enough money through the 90’s for whatever reason, and at $50K+ you are looking at 1/3-1/2 of your after-tax income to send your kid to school. The middle/upper middle class is getting/is already priced out, and that’s the majority of families.</p>
<p>Something has to give. High school populations are falling, the stock market has wiped out a lot of assets, the housing crisis has wiped out home equity (the ultimate college piggy bank). The college bubble is going to pop, it is inevitable.</p>
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<p>While I admire your austerity, I think it is way too much to ask for parents to have to sacrifice all this in order to put one child through college in the U.S. Something is seriously out of kilter.</p>
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<p>Perhaps what is “out of kilter” is parents thinking they should be able to have it all. If by “sacrifice” you mean parents have to choose between some of life’s bells and whistle or assuming debt to educate their kids, then you are correct. Everything costs, and when income is limited, people have to prioritize their wants, and forgo some things for other things. But that doesn’t mean life has to be “austere.” My life is very rich life. My family and I read books aloud to one another, we write love letters instead of buying “things” for anniversaries and birthdays, we debate issues over dinner and into the night. We have found that most of what we think we can’t live without is stuff we really don’t need (though we’d give up every dime for permanent good health.) And there’s nothing to admire, it’s just a lifestyle that we have chosen that has priorities that differ from other lifestyles. Education is expensive, but we think it pays for itself rather rapidly – tangibly in income and intangibly in self-esteem – so we deem it good value for the cost.</p>
<p>“At Harvard, only about 40% of students are on financial aid. Financial aid goes up to $200,000. You do the math.”</p>
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<li> It goes to 180k and it depends on assets.</li>
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My senior year (the most expensive) cost my parents less than 10% of the family’s income, which had only one earner.</p>
<p>Had my S gone to a private school with no aid (we are “too rich”) the bill would have totaled more than 30% of our family’s total two-earner income.</p>
<p>At current rates of increase, my friends with kids in grade school could be looking at school costs of $100K/year+.</p>
<p>I don’t care how much you save, or how many trappings of modern society you do without, this is not a sustainable model.</p>
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<p>I sort of agree with your statement. But there are plenty of parents who don’t want to make any of those sacrifices (on both ends of the income spectrum) and still want send their kids to $50,000 a year colleges and universities.</p>
<p>We don’t seem to be paying that much less in taxes than Europeans and Canadians, yet they get free or almost free education. Living a deprived life only to educate one child seems way too drastic. I think colleges should cut down on their administrative costs, marketing costs, building expansions and start living frugaly on their end first.</p>
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<p>Europeans pay some of the highest taxes in the world. Danes pay about two-thirds of their income in taxes. Do you really believe it would be fiscally more prudent for you to pay twice as much in income tax for your entire working life in order for your child(ren) to have a “free” college education? If so you must have an extremely low paying job and very many college bound children.</p>
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<p>And an inability to find richness in life without an abundance of toys is very sad.</p>