<p>I was not accepted to my state university, Rutgers.
I was although accepted to other great state schools and am wondering now would that be the best option?
Would going to the other good state schools be better than going to a school within NJ like Montclair or something?
The other state schools have a lot more prestige so would the debt be worth it?
Its a tough situation</p>
<p>
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<p>Just how much debt? There’s a point of diminishing returns. Some debt is sustainable, large amounts of it is not, unless you are willing to forgo large chunks of your life in order to spend the time paying off the debt. Taking on large amounts of debt so that you can go to a “prestigious” institution for an undergraduate education is not worth it in my opinion. Undergraduate educations, by in large part, are pretty much the same almost everywhere. The name on your diploma only really matters at the graduate level. If you are motivated individual you’re going to find a good job with a bachelors degree no matter where you got it from. After a couple years out in the real world employers don’t care about your education at all anyway, they only care about your work experience. People don’t even list where they went to school after they’ve been out in the real world for a while on their resumes. They only list their previous work experience. So if employers don’t care about your education that much when you are in your 30s, what’s the point of burdening yourself under a ton of debt for an undergrad education? It makes no sense. I can’t really stress how highly overrated taking on lots of debt is in order to go to what is probably mistakenly perceived as a more prestigious college when more affordable options are available for pretty much the same education.</p>
<p>I completely agee with gravenewworld. Excellent advice.</p>
<p>Thanks GNW. I am emailing a link to this thread to my son. We can’t afford to pay for full tuition at a private school; I think this thead excellently illustrates the path that would await him if he tries to take on the debt himself. And hopefully the state school option will look much more appealing.</p>
<p>*I was not accepted to my state university, Rutgers.
I was although accepted to other great state schools and am wondering now would that be the best option?
Would going to the other good state schools be better than going to a school within NJ like Montclair or something?
The other state schools have a lot more prestige so would the debt be worth it?
Its a tough situation *</p>
<p>*Decision: Accepted
Major: Accounting</p>
<p>Stats:
SAT: 1050/1600
SAT II: -
ACT: -
GPA: 3.3
Rank: School doesn’t rank*</p>
<p>There is absolutely NO REASON for you to take on debt to go to an OOS public for an accounting degree. NONE. </p>
<p>I see you’ve applied to Mich St, Purdue, & Penn St. All of these schools are expensive OOS options. Each will cost about $40k per year. </p>
<p>How much will your parents contribute each year?</p>
<p>
I hope not. If the government persists in creating favored debt and disfavored debt, it will only breed further economic crisis. And if prospective students see debt being forgiven, they will be more likely to borrow too much to attend college because they will anticipate a future bailout.</p>
<p>The solution here is to let the markets dictate the value of a college education. The best solution, one that surely won’t happen, is to get the government completely out of the college financing business. Will that cause aid to dry up? You bet it will. And then with less cheap money available to pay inflated tuition, the bloated budgets of institutions of higher learning will be brought more into line with the value of the educations they provide. Make no mistake, the main reason why college costs have risen faster than inflation is because the government is making it possible for colleges to raise prices by over-stimulating demand. (It’s just like the housing crisis: easy mortgage money, inflated home prices, defaults, …)</p>
<p>Want to further reduce college costs? No government backed aid except government supported, ultra low cost educations at public universities for the truly qualified. I’m talking $3,000 tuition annually (which any student ought to be able to raise working part-time) but you only get in if you can do college work at a high level. That will require competitors to provide real value for the dollar.</p>
<p>Think of the absurdity of forgiving existing student loan debt. New college students will see debt forgiveness and believe that if they are unable to pay, the government will bail them out, too. So the problem will continue, or perhaps get even worse. And why should existing debtors get a bailout when the prior generation had to struggle to pay off their debts? </p>
<p>And how precisely would forgiving student loan debt “stimulate the economy?” These debts are owned by banks. If the government decides to “bail out” the borrowers, I guess that means paying the banks the balances due on the loans. The cries of “bailing out the bankers” will be heard again.</p>
<p>How to help borrowers? Allow discharges in bankruptcy. But that double-crosses the lenders who lent after 2005 secure in the knowledge that the debts couldn’t be discharged in bankruptcy.</p>
<p>No easy answers here other than don’t get into excessive debt for a low-value parchment.</p>
<p>I foresee some type of bailout happening. I won’t “bank” my kid’s future on it, but I think it is just a matter of time. I have heard some talk about limiting debt to 10% of gross pay, and all of the rest forgiven after 10 years, etc. Just another way to redistribute wealth. On the other hand, without that, we would have a growing population of less educated people our country. Oh, and the pricing of college in our state public Us is way out of hand in many states. JMO.</p>
<p>Forgiving any debt will just lead to university’s raising tuition.</p>
<p>On the other hand there are already some programs in place where education and medical student debt can be forgiven when you work for certain specific programs for a number of years. </p>
<p>I honestly believe you should only go where you can afford to go. Here in Pa state college tuition is $6000 a year. Not a bad deal.</p>
<p>I do see parallels to the mortgage industry. There seems to have been no lending guidelines, people were allowed to borrow obscene amounts of money with onerous terms (mortgage resets/tuition deferred interest buildup, fees)</p>
<p>Also, unemployment affecting student borrowers ability to repay mirrors the collapse of real estate prices.</p>
<p>I am not a fan of bailouts, but I think this is the price we may have to pay for having no government oversight on this process in the first place. Yes, people should not borrow money they can’t pay back. But 17 year olds really do not have a grasp of what this means. And they’ve had ‘trusted’ adults telling them everyone does this - this is what you need to do. And that’s not right either.</p>
<p>Lending guild lines need to be put into place to protect consumers and to protect banks and lenders from their own greed. If the lending industry keeps doing stupid things like this, should the government really keep bailing them out?</p>
<p>I have heard some talk about limiting debt to 10% of gross pay, and all of the rest forgiven after 10 years, etc</p>
<p>I’ve heard that suggestion, too, but it will just encourage schools to raise prices even more knowing that students will borrow more knowing that they will only end up paying back a small percentage of what they borrowed.</p>
<p>Think about it. A student would then feel comfortable borrowing $200k, and instead of making payments of $2500 a month ($30k per year) on a $50k salary, the student would only have to pay $416 a month ($5000 a year). </p>
<p>And, in the end, the student would only have to pay back $50k total ( more than a $150k loss - including interest!). I know, the amount of pay back would be a bit higher counting for raises, but even after 10 years of raises, the student would still have the majority of his loan canceled after 10 years.</p>
<p>^^ and the remainder owed would be paid to the banks and the gov’t by all taxpayers.</p>
<p>Ugh.</p>
<p>Why be a responsible citizen?</p>
<p>sax, exactly right.</p>
<p>The COA is out of hand (private and publics Us). Our instate U for commuters is nearly 12,000 per year (no room and board), IF you live close enough to commute and are either on a bus/train line or have money for a car. Instate COA for residents is 22,350.</p>
<p>I believe that the available amount of Stafford loans that seem to be included in most financial aid packages to meet need are too high (3550 subsidized, plus 2,000 unsubsidized just for freshmen year, and then climbing).</p>
<p>There is a bailout on the horizon. I see it coming, and then there will be wake up call to the American public. I foresee new government regulations directed towards colleges and private lenders and as usual, after the fact. </p>
<p>Face it, the average student is probably taking all of the Staffords offered in the FA pacakage (27,000). When they marry someone with the same debt, they now have 54,000 for just the undergrad degrees! Many who are not marrying are working for $10 per hour. I met a guy whose D was in that position (could get little more than a minimum wage job with her college degree from a solid school, and had student loans to pay) and the solution was more loans by going on to grad school!</p>
<p>
Um…where are you getting 6k/year?
Here are the costs of JUST TUITION at PA state schools…it is RIDICULOUS for the average family when you add in room and board(averaging 10k/year)…</p>
<p>Bloomsburg-7,100
Edinboro- 7,316
IUP-7,225
Slippery Rock- 7,235
Cal U- 7,676
Clarion-7,380
Penn State Altoona-12,750
Penn State Erie- 12, 250
Penn State University Park- 14, 416
University of Pittsburgh-14, 154</p>
<p>Assuming you go to an IUP or a Clarion and live on campus all four years, the total cost for your family is going to be around 60k…that’s out of reach for my family…</p>
<p>I don’t know what the answer is, but the current system isn’t working. My parents are not contributing and trying to get an education is nearly impossible</p>
<p>And…why would parents pay in real time at all? Why not let your kid take out loans…pay the loans for at a discounted rate for 10 years, and then the loan “goes away”?</p>
<p>You’re right about the increase, rocket. With tuition and all fees West Chester (example) is $7,100 a year. I do not assume living on campus. Penn State and satellites are not state schools so I was not counting them.</p>
<p>In addition many community colleges have agreements with state schools that their credits and students will be automatic admits. This would lessen the cost even more.</p>
<p>Students can work during the year and the summer to help defray costs.</p>
<p>My point is that there are more affordable options.</p>
<p>One family on this Cc forum actually looked at there 5 kids coming into college age and moved south where the state schools are much cheaper. Not an option for all but really, what a great idea.</p>
<p>The most rediculous thing I have heard would be to offer any type of loan forgiveness on college debt…and all of my kids have substantial debt. What a horrible message that sends to all future students. It reminds me of the reason we are in this trouble to begin with. Sorry folks but my opinion is that if you borrow…you must pay it off. There should not be any type of forgiveness for this type of debt. Parents and kids need to evaluate what reasonable debt is for a college education and this should include the type of child that is attending college, the type of college and the realistic future earnings of that child.</p>
<p>Debt for education is a realistic factor today especially when parents have more than one child attending at the same time, but there needs to be a realistic look at what that child could handle later. Once again, I have four kids, and what would be o.k for one may not be o.k for the others.</p>
<p>sax-there is not a single affordable option in state for me except Community College. I’d have to live on campus anywhere else and it would cost WAY TOO MUCH. </p>
<p>Like I said, I don’t have an answer, but the cost needs to come down…i don’t know about loan forgiveness, I do know I won’t borrow more than I can pay off</p>
<p>
An interesting idea, but where will you send all of the “marginally” qualified people who are nevertheless capable of graduating college? Currently the problem is twofold: 1) some state universities are priced out of lower-income affordability; 2) some state universities are so intent on serving their population that half the class doesn’t graduate. It has been argued that even a year of college education is better than none; if public universities are limited to those who “can do college work at a high level”–versus those who can do college work, period–then they will no longer be serving as much of the population as possible.</p>
<p>I’ll also note that in Canada, all (or almost all, certainly all the decent) universities are public.</p>
<p>
I’m not putting a word in either way on whether this is the right change to make, but logistically it’s simple enough. Grandfather in 2008-20xx loans as non-dischargeable but make all future loans dischargeable.</p>
<p>Loan forgiveness has always seemed like a really stupid idea. It’s basically time-limited bankruptcy without the severe credit penalties imposed by actual bankruptcy.</p>
<p>Penn State and satellites are not state schools so I was not counting them.</p>
<p>Really? They aren’t public?</p>
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<p>Went out with some people last night. One person mentioned that a college graduate with a lot of student loan debt became severely and chronically ill. I won’t go into the illness, but I heard enough to know that it is a tragic situation and a chronic one. He has not found any relief from his student loan repayment schedule.</p>
<p>I still believe, whether right or wrong, changes with this situation are coming!</p>