It’s a very fair point. And I got to go to an “elite” school - with a lot of financial aid and one manageable student loan- and had a good experience but don’t feel that it helped me at all career wise. So I don’t even think an elite undergraduate school is some magic bullet.
I’ve told my son from day one that we would find a way to send him wherever he wanted to go. He’s worked very hard his whole school career- much harder than I did - and done all the right things. I feel that having that promise about college was a motivator. And he has the scores, grades and EC’s to earn a spot anywhere. But even before covid some of these schools had a 5-6% acceptance rate and with schools going test optional and apps exploding, his odds aren’t great.
He is a NM finalist and has a free ride if he wants it. And a half scholarship at another excellent school. My guess is that he will want the prestige of an “elite” school if he gets in. But there will be several more discussions about the ramifications of that decision before May 1.
In their efforts to attract full pay students, if college A upgrades its dining to differentiate itself, college B upgrades its dorms, and college C upgrades its gym, pretty soon there’re arms races in all these areas, aren’t there? Do we send our students to colleges to learn, or do we send them there for certain ancillary lifestyle? If we want both (i.e. to learn while enjoying that lifestyle), then should we be complaining about paying the full sticker price, especially when a college spends more on each student than even the full sticker price?
We can afford the full $80k a year (cash, no loans needed). And if S would rather stay in FL and use BB and FF) then he could use that money ($320k) for grad/law school. But we would still pay for grad/law school if he chose OOS for undergrad. While we don’t have 50 million, we do well enough to pay for both. (No loans.)
Our S isn’t “demanding” to go OOS. He is very reasonable. We have told him the money is his pretty much either way. That offer has made him consider FL schools, of course. But his top school he’d still for sure choose to spend the $320 on. However, the schools 2-6 on his list of total 8 schools applied to - would be a much bigger decision for him.
It will unfold when decisions arrive and we will all discuss. Ultimately it’s his decision but we are okay with that bc he’s a great, hard working, insightful, kid who is less emotional than H and I are about things, which I find impressive.
She can only borrow ~$5500/year. I hope you’re not planning to co-sign for her.
Why are you letting your daughter make the rules? If my kid refused to consider in state schools they’d be taking a gap year and working until they learned to appreciate the opportunity to go to college.
This is us, but we have 5 children. If we had one we could manage, but alas that is not the case. They will get through with the $30,000 we have saved for each of them, the merit they receive by going to less competitive colleges, work (they’ve all worked since 14), and loans which we co-sign, and then they get put in their names only when they get employment (plus we pay the monthly interest on those loans). We choose to live here (we grew up here), knowing we could live elsewhere on a much lower income and receive FA. Most of the families I know here are considered middle class, and are not eligible for FA (which comes as a shock when the first child goes to college).
I’m a student and this thread is very interesting. I have a genuine question. Why would you save for college if it means you won’t qualify for need based aid? My family pays for my private school, nice vacations, and a boat which were all disclosed on fafsa/css. We live in an expensive neighborhood. Our EFC was $30k and a lot of schools are meeting this. So I’m genuinely wondering why I should save for college once i have a family if I can do whatever I want and qualify for aid??
There are two main reasons to save. One would be if your family income is too high (above 250-300K) so you know that you will definitely not qualify for aid. Coming up with 75-80K each year would be quite painful for most people, even in the 250-300K income bracket. The second is the power of compounding in tax advantaged 529 accounts. We have been saving since our kids were born, and basically the accounts have about twice the money than the amount we contributed. So in effect we doubled our money through compounding. All this increase is totally tax free if you use it to meet educational expenses.
When our oldest started college, our household income was definitely under $150,000, and we were not eligible for any FA. My sister has a friend with 3 daughters, who made a huge effort not to go over a certain income so that her kids would be eligible for a lot of FA (by taking jobs that paid under the table, bartering).
Yes that was my point. I’m surprised at the number of people I see on CC who have significantly impacted both their own quality of life, and ability to help their kid in future, in order to pay $320K for college.
I see them in real life too, although perhaps not in quite as much detail, but still remember my kids’ friend who mentioned his parents were taking out a HELOC so he could go to Georgetown rather than Berkeley or UCLA (instate).
I HIGHLY recommend that all parents of prospective college students carefully review with their students the data available on the DOE-College Scorecard and the Common Data Sets for every college under serious consideration by their DS/DDs. The “Salary After Completing” information in the Scorecard for each degree was enlightening. For example, median earnings for a new graduate with a degree in Business Administration is is $44,821 from the University of Florida, $47,113 from the University of Georgia, and $73,823 from the University of North Carolina. English majors from UNC make an average of $24,325 compared to $27,553 from the U of F. OOS tuition might make sense for some fields of study but not others at some colleges but not others.
The concept of saving money to help pay for grad school might also require careful examination. It may become irrelevant, if your kid studies business or engineering. If your student majors in English and then wants a masters degree in art therapy, you might not want them to “know” that you still have $50K set aside to pay for it.
But money is fungible. It can always be used to pay for a home downpayment instead (the taxes on taking cash out of a 529 are pretty low if the money goes to your kid and is reported on their return - it can be as low as 10%-15% of the total balance depending on how much is earnings and whether there is no penalty due to it being offset against merit scholarships).
I didn’t listen to Gladwell’s podcast, and I’m not going to, but I do have a simple question that maybe Gladwell answers: how does Bowdoin, as a need-blind meets-full-need school, actively “hold steady on the percentage of low-income students it admits whose educations are paid for with institutional aid”? What mechanism is supposedly in place to screen out low income students so that college funds that might otherwise be used for financial aid can be directed to dining services?
Bowdoin has increased number of Pell Grant recipients over the last few years, as homerdog said that podcast is five years old. I don’t think it’s a binary choice between number of low income students and funding dining services (but I know you know that).
With that said, LACs like Bowdoin (and many others) do know (by and large) the financial aid status of a not-insignificant proportion of applicants…including all of the recruited athletes (which can be 20% of the incoming class at some LACs), and those coming through Questbridge, Posse and/or other CBOs. Beyond that, I expect some need blind LACs do infer level of need based on other inputs such as address, HS, and parents’ jobs, and some probably separate out those who applied for FA and those who didn’t.
That was my reasoning for not paying full price. My DD took a full ride and I gifted her the cost of our in-state flagship. With 4 internships under her belt, 2 of which paid very well, she’ll graduate with a very fat bank account and no debt. And she still landed one of those high paying consulting jobs many go into significant debt to try to land. $300k to $320k is a lot of money. I don’t see the ROI.
@usernamelol1, I am a former financial aid director. I also have children who went through the college financial aid process. My D went to a school that meets need, and her financial aid was fabulous. That was due to our financial situation at the time. She just had a baby, and the first thing I told her to do is start saving in a 529 NOW. There is no way D & her H will be eligible for aid, given their careers. I would never tell her to try to do things to increase her ability for need based aid. That just doesn’t make sense. It’s always best to save if you can. I have had the same conversation with colleagues who thought it was unfair that their savings would preclude them from getting aid. I maintain that if you can save a lot of money, you will always be better off in the long run. Some people are unable to save or to save much due to their financial situation … financial aid exists to help those people. If you have a lot of savings and don’t want to spend it all on college, that’s cool. Find a less expensive school or one with merit. The fact that you can have that choice is so much more than most people have.
Bowdoin was need-blind and met full need five years ago. There’s been a recurring rumble here on CC that perhaps need-blind schools aren’t really need-blind because of certain admissions policies and possible presumptions made by admissions officers as they read through applications. Does Gladwell mention any of this? How does he square the idea that a need-blind school limits the percentage of low-income students that it admits?
