<p>The university you attend as an undergrad can have a substantial impact on where you are accepted for graduate school--which, in turn, can have an impact on whatever career you choose.</p>
<p>As long as the third tier school isn't operating from an old garage it may be the better alternative. Yes where one does get the Bach. has a effect on graduate admissions committees especially at the Ivy's. However there are other factors which also bear on on admission committee decisions some of which can be more important than where the under grad degree was obtained. Aspects such as background, social class, and application essays can also be defining. As can the interview, at the schools which still do these. </p>
<p>And sometimes those rationales for admissions are just bizarre. For example it's not always a advantage to have the wonderful 4.00 GPA. I've seen a few instances where the grad. admissions committees turned down good students for not being well rounded enough. To the extent I do advise current students to not worry too much if they tank one course. </p>
<p>And of course they do other things which have nothing to do with the relative merit of the student. Little tricks like admissions to intermediate graduate degree programs (to hype the enrollment) or to push people on thesis back into the lesser degree (to give them something or to 'shame' them enough to resubmit over (with the attendant costs) what could be a thesis with minor flaws) </p>
<p>And anyway, at the grad degree level there is often fairly little aid available so whatever personal resources you can muster will be definitely needed. And so perhaps not expending these on costs at the Bach. level might be advisable.
Plus the costs of a graduate terminal degree, or professional degree is in the oh my (insert your deity here) range. So not wise to accrue debt before that point, gods know you'll end up with enough from the graduate degree,</p>
<p>I felt when I started this thread that it would provide crucial information. In today's economy , it might be even more important to read through this.</p>
<p>One poster, Maximus001 said it much better than I could:</p>
<p>We have so many friends that literally will say: "Beg, borrow, or steal" to send your s to the very best college you can. That's not what our investment counselor suggests. Debt compels one to make choices that may not always be in one's best interest.</p>
<p>The rat race of work, study, compete seems to start so early and last so long. When you add the burden of debt to the equation, it's depressing and overwhelming for many.</p>
<p>We subscribe to the idea of getting the best product at the best price within our budget. There are some great educational products out there that are a tiny fraction of full freight private colleges costs.</p>
<p>Graduating debt free is liberating and allows one's next class of choices to be based on something more personal than the repayment of crippling debt. JMHO</p>
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<blockquote> <p>getting the best product at the best price within our budget<<</p> </blockquote>
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<p>Great advice, taxguy, whether one is buying an education, a car, house or TV.</p>
<p>And another service that a thread of this kind achieves is to bring into discussion cost to benefit issues which academe generally only discusses in whispers. Students and families can be pressured into 'buying' the most expensive educational product by any number of factors including tradition and a hope for reciprocal reward. </p>
<p>But one of the heaviest pressures is the marketing promulgated by the colleges themselves. Which can be, in their own right, just as misleading and pervasive as any car ad. Academe spends a great deal of money on promotions, and sometimes uses these in manners which disguise the simple fact that yes they are selling a service (or product). To the extent that certain slogans have literally become accepted terms within academe itself. And some have been so successfully placed that these are not even recognized as such, a particularly notorious example would be "Lifelong Learners". And when this manner of campaign is combined with the very pervasive and misleading public relations/sales campaigns of the educational loan industry getting at the pragmatic truth of what one should do to obtain an education can be problematic. And it's not like academe or the loan contingent have a unbiased interest in ensuring students make the best choices-not when trophy buildings and other such glitter exist for exactly the other purpose. </p>
<p>And another function of a discourse such as this one, is perhaps enough of these will assist our leadership into realizing that the old educational game is no longer sustainable. That issue has combined with general economic pressures to bring academe itself close to a precipice. For example at my institution the first meeting at the beginning of the semester will be about what the current financial debacle will do to faculty hiring, resources for programs and the expected enrollment. And here in Colorado the reflexive response to such issues by Presidents of our flagship schools is to ask for the ability to raise tuition without the heretofore required consent by state representatives. This is at the same time one large institution recently spent 15 million + on a recreational sports center. So clearly there is a disconnect between what families and students can support, and how academe spends and is supported itself. </p>
<p>The understandable desire to "beg borrow or steal" to provide ones children the best education sometimes ends up in getting that child's entire future educationally stolen. Dream schools or even the less ideal schools have agendas which have little to do with service or education and gods know the edudebt industry isn't there as an angelic entity which only desires to further education. </p>
<p>And taxguy the final service a discourse such as this one provides is that it gives those of us who are faculty a means to comment directly about an important issue. At many schools there can be substantial administrative pressure upon faculty not to comment on the costs of the institution or it's potential benefit or detriment to students. The point at which academe began to view students as a resource or customer is when we forgot we are not selling a product but are supposed to be serving our community and its future. And part of that service would be to ensure critical discussion about the proper function, credibility, and ethics of higher education itself.</p>
<p>Yeah I got accepted to Rice (first choice) and Texas A&M… And because we hardly got any aid from Rice, it would’ve ended up being about $120,000 more expensive to attend than A&M. I still struggled over the choice a bit, until my dad simply asked me “Even if you had an extra $100,000 laying around, would the marginal benefit from attending Rice be worth it? Or would there be a better way for you to spend it?” Needless to say, that made my decision for me. A&M has actually become my first choice in the process, which makes for a much less painful decision.</p>
<p>To juniors who will be applying to college next year: Go ahead and apply to your dream schools! But if you get accepted and will have to incur a huge debt to attend, really weigh your options. I’m not saying Ivies and the like are never worth the cost, but prestige alone is not a good reason to take on 1/10 million $$$ of debt. Even if you’re going for a “lucrative degree” like engineering (my major), you have no guarantee of a job after graduation (see this thread) <a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/college-confidential-cafe/910385-what-i-learned-my-year-unemployment-6.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/college-confidential-cafe/910385-what-i-learned-my-year-unemployment-6.html</a>. Even if you do get a job right out of school, you likely won’t be earning enough right off the bat to pay off loans like that. Good luck!</p>
<p>There was nothing that I would not have given up for my first born to attend MIT and sons two and three to attend Cornell and daughter to have her chance at her dream private U. My first son graduates in May and it was worth every bit of our struggle to see this day. There are not only no regrets, but I could never imagine a bigger house or fancy car, being more worthwhile than the happiness and success of my children. My husband and I still can’t believe that we managed to do this. At the time it seemed almost impossible…but here we are. It is the greatest feeling in the world.</p>
<p>momma-three notes,"but I could never imagine a bigger house or fancy car, being more worthwhile than the happiness and success of my children. "</p>
<p>Response: I am very glad that you feel good about your choice, but it isn’t the fancy car and big house that you are giving up. It is the house for your kids that is being given up! High debt means fewer choices! No debt means freedom.NO undergraduate school necessarily gives a leg up on grad school or professional school admission based on the school’s reputation. Thus, few undergraduate schools warrant significant debt, absent special factors such as learning disability programs etc. </p>
<p>I am writing a financial planning book. I can tell you that 52% of all Americans who hit age 50 have a net worth of under $60,000! 22% of all elderly live at the poverty level of which 74% of those are woman! Only 4% of folks who hit age 65 can retire with the same standard of living that they had before retirement. The rest must either continue working, live on some charity and/or reduce their standard of living. Saving an extra $50,000-$200,000 in tuition and costs would have gone a LONG way to improving the odds for your kid’s financial future for what… a nebulous return based on the name “MIT?” Sorry if this upsets you,but it is what it is. I want others to understand the ramifications of incurring large indebtnedness for a “Name” school vs. no debt for a decent state university.</p>
<p>I have a friend who spent $20,000 on a bar mitzvah for their son many years ago. It was partly the way they proved their love and partly done out of pride that they could do it. Sadly, that same kid would have been MUCH better off with the money. He had to scrape for a bare downpayment on his home and is struggling each year to make the payments on a larger debt than he would have had to do.</p>
<p>By the way, I have a cousin whose daughter was a top notch student and could have gone anywhere. I strongly advocated that she take her “full ride” at the University of Florida ( which was in in-state school), over incurring substantial debt going elsewhere. I do live what I preach.</p>
<p>Throwing a party is not the same thing as sending your child to a great school. I invested in my kids and with that there are no regrets. The ammount of debt that all of my kids have could be paid off with them living at home (son at MIT will pay off all debt within one year…has a great offer at graduation). He will then go to grad school with hopefully no need to take loans. Sons two and three will do the same if they could get a job close to home (it looks promising based on the fact that their internships are within an hour of home.) Daughter is now attending a state school and majoring in a less lucrative paying major. Her loans are more than my sons.</p>
<p>I’m glad that your financial situation allows for a top-tier school without huge debt. Just please realize that when other parents don’t send their kids to top-tier schools, even if they could/did get into them, it doesn’t mean they don’t love them. It just means their financial situation is different. Middle middle class folks (such as myself and my family) cannot afford the expensive private school tuition without significant scholarships, which are very hard to come by at such schools.</p>
<p>Taxguy–what I would like to see is how many kids would go for the big name school if they were told that if they took the scholarship mom and dad would write them a check for $200K (or the difference) upon graduation. OR if the parents invested that money in a trust that the child would inherit. The numbers for attending private schools are enormous today for those who are full pay.</p>
<p>This is another old thread by the way!</p>
<p>I did offer it to D1, she didn’t take it. Not only did she not take it, she offered to contribute $10,000/year (summer job, on campus job, borrowing from us) to go to a full pay school.</p>
<p>taxguy, you are assuming that if the parents didn’t pay for these private colleges, that they would offer their kids the money instead post graduation. Sorry, but my thinking is not the same as yours (which is OK…different strokes, etc.). Everyone values different things. We offered our kids to pay for college and grad school. We did not offer to support them when not in school. We value paying for their educations and it was worth every penny we will pay (have parent loans…will not make kids pay any loans). I do not feel the need to support my kids as adults after college. So, it was not an either/or situation. College>> yes…pay their living expenses once out of school>>no. It is fine if you don’t think private colleges are worth the money. Yes, you can get an education for a cheaper amount. But if some are happy to spend more on education to send their kids to schools that fit them well and for a certain experience, there is nothing wrong with that. There is nothing I’d rather have spent it on than that. Others view it differently and might rather have the bucks for something else or to give the kids later and that’s fine. But that is just one value system, and not a better way.</p>
<p>Also, another thing that is not either/or for some families…the assumption that the money is just sitting there and the parent is contemplating whether to spend it for college or give it to the kids once they graduate. That was not the case for us. We didn’t have all that money in a lump sum. Part of their education is being paid through loans we took out. I am not about to take out loans to pay my kids once they graduate! For college? yes.</p>
<p>The thing a lot of us don’t get is how it is smart to “struggle” (#287), sacrifice and shortchange our retirements for the brand name school. If you can’t do the brand name school without a struggle by the time the kid is ready to go, you just can’t afford it, and should feel fine about settling one rung down. Not criticizing anyone’s choices, just saying I don’t get it and chose differently.</p>
<p>Not everyone is looking for “brand name”. Some of us were looking for best fit. That was worth the sacrifice for us.</p>
<p>Also, it is not about “one rung down.” For my kids, all the schools on their list cost in the same ballpark. The only thing that would have been considerably cheaper was the state school, which did not fit them and what they wanted to study and do at college. taxguy is advocating the state school (nothing wrong with those schools) but that may not be a good fit for what the kid wants to do. You can get a good education at the state school, but in my kids’ cases, they could NOT have majored in what they did or done the same activities at their state school that they did at their respective private colleges.</p>
<p>“Fit” is one of those subjective things that tends to stop the discussion. No one cares enough to get into the weeds about what fits someone else.</p>
<p>My point was that you brought up sacrificing to pay for a “brand name” education and I was saying that “brand name” wasn’t the rationale for paying for the more expensive school. The private school that costs more than the public one met the college selection criteria and the public school didn’t. The criteria was not “brand name” itself.</p>
<p>paid/paying for several expensive privates, and you bet I’ll have about 500k less or as the taxguy might say several million less because that 500k over 10 or 20 years invested would be millions. but I’m with momma-three, the value my kids get from their universities is worth it.</p>
<p>And I think the 500k+ I could have given my kids latter in life is nothing compared to the life they are living because of their educations (experiences, academics, friends, sports). Top private universities are very cool places, who wouldn’t want that experience and opportunity for their kid.</p>
<p>Speaking as a Californian, there was clearly a time that I would have made the argument for the state school option given our UC system. Although still arguably the strongest public university system in the country, one cannot possibly claim that a student is not being impacted by the financial crisis and the plummeting level of state support for these wonderful campuses. Classes have been cut in many cases, and class capacities are clearly on the rise (with no end in sight). As parents, we must be realistic and view the current status of our state universities. In our case, a private university was the best choice (debt, and all!).</p>