<p>I am wondering if this is the year that Private College Admissions finally experiences its long awatied bubble as the recession pulls down parent's ability to utilize home equity and borrow in general, as costs for the typical 50% of freshman who pay full boat fees exceed $50,000 (with another incresse beyond the rate of inflation), and as endowment values plummet along with the stock market. Also, with student's diminished job prospects, I don't see how many of them will continue to be willing to accumulate debt from even federal programs. Also, many schools are denying AP credits they routinely gave for high performance even a few years ago, further diminishing parent's ability to cope with rising costs. With higher gas and airline ticket prices, travel beyond local areas to attend schools will drop too.</p>
<p>I just don't see how even very good private colleges will be able to buck a trend which will be away from them for state schools, and as the number of parents willing to pay full boat diminishes, I see financial aid for the 50% who are on the other fortunate end of the "Robin Hood" equation going down too.</p>
<p>I think yield rates first and subseqnently applications themselves are about to collapse. Much like mortgages taken out that people can no longer pay, the commitment to private school education can simply no longer be funded.</p>
<p>Outside of a handful of elte schools (for instance,Edmund Fiske's elite 13 universities and 12 liberal arts colleges) I think the rest of the private school world is set for a major fall. Any thoughts?</p>
<p>I agree with you. In fact I just posted this under the Va State School thread in the parent's forum:
[quote]
Popularity of publics are higher, probably because of a combination of downturn in the economy and schools just increases COA tuition to a point where their bubble is about to burst. Sure the truly rich can always pay, but the middle class and upper middle class family just has trouble making that $200,000 commitment for each of their children. Many of these families are getting loans and work study and gaps in their financial packages with too little in the form of grants. JMO.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>I think the same will happen for out of state publics too, because many have priced themselves to a point that parents can no longer pay that either. In fact, our upper middle class family feels that we will still pay less at a private school that offers good merit and financial aid, than most out of state public schools (offer little aid to OOS students on the whole, unless they are way above the average applicant).</p>
<p>
[quote]
Edmund Fiske's elite 13 universities and 12 liberal arts colleges
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</p>
<p>Which universities and colleges are those? I tried the obvious Google search, but I didn't come up with a list. </p>
<p>You have an interesting idea, that if people just don't have the money, they will stop paying for elite colleges. I think, however, that there is enough money even in a bad economy among some families, and enough desire for expensive private education among those families, to keep quite a few private colleges in business even at very high list prices. The high-list-price market segmentation strategy has worked well for Bennington College </p>
<p>Fiske's Book Getting into the Right College identifies them. They are the expected names (there are 13 universities and 12 LACs and without the book in front of me, I don't want to list them for fear of omitting the name of an LAC or two and causing some needless hyperventilation on this board). I posit that this group would be unaffected due to their resources and prestige. </p>
<p>My larger point is that I just don't see how this avalanche of applications and debt creation can continue and I think it has to be close to falling off a cliff.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Fiske's Book Getting into the Right College identifies them.
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</p>
<p>Thank you. I'll check that book, which I've just requested from my public library, for the list of elite colleges you mentioned. The larger Fiske guidebook, which I have at hand, doesn't identify a smaller list of most elite colleges in that same way. </p>
<p>I agree with your point that some elite colleges are essentially immune to short-term economic effects, especially because they draw from applicants all over the world. I also agree that at the margins, some colleges are going to have fewer eager applicants, because they will be perceived as just plain too expensive for what they offer in a declining economy. But in between those two points you made that I agree with, I think there are some colleges that are </p>
<p>a) not "elite" in the Fiske list sense </p>
<p>but </p>
<p>b) plainly very expensive for all but a few families </p>
<p>that will still draw students, because students from those few wealthier families will stay wealthy enough even in the current economy to exercise their taste for colleges at which their children can meet other children from wealthy families. Thus, among the expensive-but-not-quite-elite colleges, there will be competition for that wealthy echelon of students, and there are enough of those around to preserve the existence of some, but perhaps not all, of those colleges.</p>
<p>I think this year will be a tough admission year all around. But if you like a college and are offered a spot on its waiting list, accept the waiting list spot.</p>
<p>I never knew we were so trendy! We live in the midwest, and in 2005 S chose a top 20 private in another region, where he has been mostly happy academically but complains about the "rich kid" vibes. After concentrating her search along the East Coast and choosing to apply to 2 privates and 2 OOS flagships along with our state flagship as her safety, D has just decided to attend the IS option; after considering its strong honors program and the amount of credit with which she can enter (significantly more than even East Coast flagships because AP's are just beginning to catch on in our geographic area), she decided she couldn't justify the cost difference. When I heard the news reports last night about the expectation for soaring airline fares, I said a silent thanks for her decision.</p>