<p>Responses appreciated as is the Oberlin link as that is high on her list.</p>
<p>I guess guidance instead of "a guide" is what I should have said.</p>
<p>I imagine when they say average award, they mean a combination of loans and grants/scholarships? So some of that needs to be repaid along with the other 20K you have to come up with on your own to afford Oberlin, as an example since the link for their average was posted. </p>
<p>So it does sound that unless you are wealthy and have dispossal income, you are likely to run up an over $100K debt for 5 years at Oberlin. Whereas going to a state university could be less than a fifth of that. Tough to justify that kind of luxury when you are barely middle class. Take another job to try and make payments on the loan and you lose funding for the next year? This justs gets uglier and uglier.</p>