<p>Sometimes taking out more loans is the answer. I know that conventional “wisdom” on this board is that it is better for a child to just give up an education completely than to take out a loan to attend a quality school, but this is a decision that should be made by parents and their children and not by strangers. You won’t be the one to offer a job to student who threw away a chance at Penn or NYU to go to some directional state U for 4 years. Students who are admitted to schools like this should usually go because it quite often can be the only place they can get a serious academic challenge and build the strong alumni and other social networks that can help them get a job before and after they graduate. Sure, it might be cheaper to take the easy way out and go to a cheap school, but in the real world there is a saying that you get what you pay for, and you pay third-tier tuition then you will get a third-tier education and you will have a third-tier career unless you are obscenely lucky.</p>
<p>MD Mom-and I feel that sometimes the full pays are indeed penalized for doing the right thing>saving for that college education before that child is born! We did the same thing-saved and lived well within our means. We have paid for our student’s education in full as of May 16, 2010; however, I read and hear about parents who have not prepared and lived the good life, so to speak. And, then there are those students who are in college, perhaps on financial aid, that still cannot really afford to be there. The hidden costs are killers and thru the years with our student, we have indeed met these kids. And, believe it or not, some of them almost expect the full pays to shoulder their everyday, hidden costs! Not to mention, the schools that hound us for donations even tho we are the full payers. Our parents paid for our college educations (spouse and I) w/o allowing us to incur debt. We attended schools that could be afforded-they saved and paid in full. We passed along the same to our student and hope that our student will do the same for children. We have no money left to village other students or make donations to our schools. We donated when we all paid the full price! And yes, I do see that mostly you do get what you pay for, and perhaps that could mean pay for the most you can afford.</p>
<p>I think live within your means is key-whether it be the house in the burbs or the state school…</p>
<p>I’m graduating from college and my parents STILL flat out refuse to tell me–or anyone else–how much money they make. I can’t even get a 20k range for my dad’s salary.</p>
<p>Bedouin notes,
I know that conventional “wisdom” on this board is that it is better for a child to just give up an education completely than to take out a loan to attend a quality school"</p>
<p>Response: I dont’ think that anyone is saying to “give up” on a quality education. I certainly don’t feel that way. What I do believe is that there really isn’t much of a defference for job prospects and for what was taught in the major between that of an expensive private school and that of a decent state university. Notice, i am not saying to give up on quality! I am against, however, having substantial debt or severely compromising one’s retirement. If a kid wants true freedom in life, they are much better off managing their money then letting their money manage their life. The latter situation results in less freedom, less choice, and fewer opportunities.</p>
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<p>If you’re graduating from college, then it’s no longer any of your business, is it? You don’t need their income for FAFSA anymore. </p>
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<p>That’s very true in the ivory tower academic sense, but in the real world employers value and respect one thing: risk and achievement. If a student takes the path of least resistance, avoiding all risk, then he is setting herself up for failure. The easiest thing in the world is to go some cheap state university and throw quality in the wind, but what you and I understand is that sometimes quality and economics have to be balanced out. You don’t want to be buried in debt, but if you don’t challenge yourself out of some pathological, compulsive, maniacal fear of spending money then all that wll tell employers is that you are the kind of person who won’t add anything to an enterprise. Why should anyone waste their time and money hiring someone who could have done better but simply chose not to?</p>
<p>"simply chose "</p>
<p>If it’s such a simple choice, why is so much time spent posting about it?</p>
<p>^^ Bedouin,
I am guessing you aren’t facing paying for your student’s education…</p>
<p>Are you willing to take all of the debt load for your student…or are you the student?</p>
<p>Sophomore year we showed our now senior son how much money we saved for him and let him know that his choice of school was up to him. He could go to a state school, we’re in NC so there are good options, and graduate debt free with money left for grad school, he could apply to more expensive schools and hope for merit money, or he could apply to more expensive schools and graduate with loans. He’s going to UNC-Chapel Hill and, lucky him, he got a small merit scholarship.</p>
<p>We just had a similar conversation with our sophomore son. This son isn’t sure about going to a large university, so our conversation included the importance of maintaining good grades to be sure he leaves himself with options (like merit money). We’ll see.</p>
<p>Bedouin, I would be nervous about my child going into massive undergrad debt, especially if they picked a career that needed further schooling. There maybe some careers that are acceptions, but I think that’s the unique situation, not the norm. Also, perhaps an employer would respect a student who worked hard to achieve at a place that didn’t put him into debt. To me, that is a sign of intelligence.</p>
<p>i think that Rebecca should go the school she feels she will be most successful at. The cost is irrelevant because only the very wealthy can actually afford expensive private school tuition (and even then it’s a struggle). This being the case creates a class system in the education system… only the very rich or the super academically talented indigent can benefit from the Ivies or Private Universities, the average wage earner then has no shot, if only based on a family’s income. The whole system is a crock… For example, my D’s father has been in her life since our divorce years ago (but he does not want to help her with college in any way), I am remarried… I do not work… We only have one child… yet her Stepfather’s income counts against her and his income is “too” high (75,000) for my D to qualify for any federal aid. This is so unfair, when other families who have more kids get freebies,… maybe I should have had three more kids so that we could qualify for some …
Why shouldn’t my D be able to attend a school of her choice when she has worked so hard? Shouldn’t the government just set aside a certain $$ amount for each family to use towards college, and then each family can disperse that $$ amongst the number of children they have? I mean why should only some kids “qualify,” Don’t my husband and I pay the same taxes as most other couples… we probably actually pay more because we don’t have as many dependents? I’m sorry but this is irritating, so here we sit with $120000 in student / Plus loans… but I don’t care… they can’t repossess her brain!
This all being said is merely to point out that Rebecca is not spoiled, nor is she a brat, she is merely a young girl who wishes to succeed at a school of her choice. If she wants to take on the debt, that is her decision and I personally wish her a life of success and fulfillment because education is never a waste of money.</p>
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<p>You’re a tad “out there” with your thinking. No employer would “know” what colleges you applied to, what colleges you “could have” gone to. It just isn’t a factor. The factors are “Did you finish your degree” and “Can YOU do the work.” The student who paid $200,000 a year and the student that paid $80,000 aren’t going to be evaluated differently.</p>
<p>I mean… lets be real, people finance cars that cost $60000… right? I guess it is just a matter of choice and priority!</p>
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<p>It is not a simple choice, but it is one that is treated rather glibly on this forum. Too often I see people telling students to reject an offer from somewhere like NYU, Penn, or Duke to go to a much lower-ranked school without a proven track record or a reputable program in a field, simply on the basis of cost. Yes, cost should be a MAJOR factor in college selection, but to treat it as the be all and end all of college admissions is to risk destroying the promise of future happiness and prosperity, two things which are worth are more than any dollar ever will.</p>
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<p>What your first employer will notice is what college you went to. Anyone who has even a thimbleful of intelligence can get into a better school than, say, Liberty University in Lynchburg, Va.
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<p>This is precisely the point that I have been trying to make for years now.</p>
<p>Bedouin notes," Why should anyone waste their time and money hiring someone who could have done better but simply chose not to"</p>
<p>Response: Are you kidding? If I found out that a kid took a full ride to our state university vs. paying full pay at a top private school, I would be even more impressed with them.</p>
<p>Again, you are assuming that a good state university won’t challenge them, which is NOT the case.I can attest to the fact that state universities provide a very high quality of education and challenge. </p>
<p>I will agree with you that I do want kids to take challenging courses and have a demanding major. That does insure some degree of risk and hard work. </p>
<p>In fact, here is a story that you will appreciate. I met a guy who always does a credit check for his employees. I asked if this was to insure good credit and no criminal background. His answer was startling. He said, " I certainly want no criminal background,but I also want them to have lots of debts. I want to see a home mortgage and maybe even educational and car loans. If they have all this, I own them! Think about this. Having a lot of debt means someone will own you, whether it’s the employer, the bank etc. Zero debt means no one owns you. It means freedom of choice and freedom from having to work for the idiot that I quoted.</p>
<p>mclaxton - are you talking about you financing your daughter’s education or your daughter financing her own education. If parents want to go into debt, that is their choice. It is a young adult starting a new career at a beginning salary that worries me. How do they get our of the hole unless they are in a career that is high paying?</p>
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<p>Many, many states have grants for all students reaching certain academic levels in the public high schools. And yes, your taxes play a tiny part in that system. You’re confusing the world of private institutions and public institutions. You can pull your children out of public education and put them in private education for the K-12 years, but you pay to do this. It’s really no difference with colleges/universities – you can go through the public system and finish with zero or reasonable debt or you pay for the private college or uni unless the private institution wants to underwrite your education with their funds. Kids will be faced with these types of financially grounded decisions over and over again. Personally, I dont think we do our children any good if we leave them debt laden at age 21. There is nothing shameful about telling your kids “no” when you have decades of perspective about what it all really means.</p>
<p>Plus loans are parent loans… My D will end up with about $17000 in stafford loans, the rest is on us, we are glad to do it! I already told her that if she goes to grad school, she will have to pay for that…
But for a young person to acquire $100000 in loans… I can see the issue with low starting incomes, but on the other hand, it depends on their course of study, if they will be attending grad school and if they are willing to give up other things… ie. new cars, designer clothes…etc… for their education. Everything in life is a choice, but if an education is their choice, I would prefer to see someone in debt for that, rather than a new BMW or a Coach Handbag!</p>
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<p>Well then I know a ton of folks who were insanely lucky. In fact, most of the successful folks we know were NOT grads of top schools. Many started out at community collegs, went to school part time at night while they worked during the day, took terms off to earn money for school…and guess what…they have very successful careers.</p>
<p>You don’t have to go to the Ivies or equivalent and amass a huge amount of debt to become successful.</p>
<p>Assuming debt is a personal decision. Bedouin, you have posted over and over that assuming huge debt to attend a top school is the preferred choice. Please start putting “in my opinion” at the beginning of your posts. It’s tiring to hear you again and again tell students that a degree from Tier 3 U at no cost is NOT worth the money and they should assume $100K of private loans to achieve their dreams.</p>
<p>In my opinion…your feeling about top schools vs others is just plain poppycock…especially when huge debt is an issue.</p>
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<p>Just because a school is cheap in the monetary sense doesn’t mean they offer a shoddy education. </p>
<p>Mclaxton, $100k won’t just prevent a student from being able to buy expensive handbags, but may prevent them from [owning</a> a house or getting married](<a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parents-forum/871140-education-all-costs-myth.html?highlight=marry]owning”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parents-forum/871140-education-all-costs-myth.html?highlight=marry).</p>
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<p>A 27 year old wrote that. So it will take him until he is 57 to pay off his debt. I don’t like to think about how long it would take if he’d taken out $100k instead of $50k.</p>
<p>Well, unfortunately they don’t give you forever to pay back the loan, if you borrow more they just bill you more each month. If you look back to my first post on this thread, you’ll see that my husband and I have been paying off his loans for years. He will also be 57 when we are done.</p>
<p>Again, I am not dealing with outliers or hypothetical examples but the average, day to day lives of students who attend mediocre colleges. Yes, of course it is possible to rise above this, but unless it is unaffordable financially there is no reason to work with inferior resources and opportunities. You need internships and work experience in order to get a good job, and those are harder (not impossible, but harder) to find at lower-tier schools.</p>
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<p>Huge debt is never the preferred choice. However, assuming some debt (not a lot, but a reasonable amount) if necessary to achieve one’s goals. There are many students who can’t do better than a directional state university, and there is nothing wrong with that. There are many students who can do better but it is simly beyond their ability to pay for the better school. That is also acceptible. I am merely trying to offer a counterpoint, an equally valid point that should be taken into account. The traditional dogma about chasing money over academic rigor and social opportunities is dying away; successful families are angry about having to subsidize the educations of children whose parents didn’t bother to save for college, and then being condescendingly told that they should go to a CC while their tax dollars and potential tuition dollars are padding the pockets of bureaucrats and spendthrifts.</p>