There are known knowns, to quote Donald Rumsfeld. The COA is pretty close to what most end up spending. There are limits to their methodologies, but College Scorecard and Payscale (and levels.fyi if you’re in tech) publish median salaries. I don’t think it’s a fair characterization to say it’s a black box.
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Ok, but this still seems like a statement of principle over the reality that many of the most elite private colleges (due to financial aid or merit scholarships) can cost less than the in-state options. So what is wrong with students taking loans for elite colleges?
It is not just PSU (though it is one of the more expensive ones). I just went through the public university net price calculators for every state in which my current senior is applying to college (basically the Northeastern seaboard). For five of them (Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, Connecticut, New Jersey, and New York), we’d clearly be borrowing more if she were an instate student than if she attended any of the private colleges on her list including the “safety” schools. For another three (Maryland, Rhode Island, and New Hampshire), we’d be paying about the same amount as the most expensive private college on the list and we’d have to borrow including parental loans. There were only two public universities in which the price came in under the most expensive private colleges (University of Virginia and University of Vermont), but she’d still have to borrow for those universities --however, no parent loans. Finally, there was a single public university (Maine) that was as inexpensive as the no loan private colleges. So for 8 out of the 11 public universities that I checked, we would be borrowing as much or more to attend a that university as the “elite colleges” on her list. Obviously this is anecdote and for other families the numbers might come in very differently, but as I understand it, the statement that tax dollars should not go to private colleges is a statement of principle emerging out of the idea that public dollars should not support private institutions.
I think that is a fine principle, and as you note, it is similar to most people’s feelings about K-12 education (maybe not in voucher states, but in most states). However, I am just noting that such a principle is not necessarily about what would be cheaper for taxpayers. In fact, all of the the private colleges on my senior’s list, even those that require loans would be as cheap or cheaper for those beleaguered tax payers (who are always being forced to support policies that they dislike) than sending her to 8 of the public universities.
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They’re just either means or medians (of samples that may or may not be representative), not full distributions, even if one knows exactly what profession s/he would be in over the next 40 years. Besides, those distributions, even if they were known (and they are not) at a single point in time, are sure to change over time, unexpectedly and abruptly, as external conditions, unpredictably but surely, change over one’s career.
But by definition, half of the graduates in any given class will be below that number. No one ever speaks about that.
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More likely because of sports and size.
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Sure. A student who attends an elite college could be in the far left tail of that college’s distribution and a student who attends a non-elite college could be in the far right tail of its distribution. There’re lots of uncertainty (and often wide dispersion in outcomes).
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As another counterpoint to name recognition, when Forbes posted an article in 2017 titled “10 Expensive Colleges Worth Every Penny,” general name recognition appears to have been incidental to its choices:
- Amherst
- Dartmouth
- Williams
- UChicago
- Tufts
- Colgate
- UPenn
- Columbia
- Hamilton
- Vassar
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What is known is the median. What is presumed, without evidence, is the purported long tail. If there was such a thing, it would be evidenced in the workforce. For a few careers, this is seen, financial quantitative analysis for example. In most careers it isn’t.
People always cast this example aside, but every NASA center director, save one, did their undergrad at a state school, many of them random names. The one privately educated went to RPI. When you compare their graduate educations, they cluster.
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As in-state or oos?
Here is another recent study out of Georgetown rating the ROI of over 4000 colleges. Spoiler alert: number one is a pharmacy school that most of us have never heard of. Harvard rolls in at number 45, way behind Lehigh at number 25, and tech focused schools such as MIT and Caltech ( tied at no 4) and Harvey Mudd (7). Schools with relatively low name recognition such as Bentley and Babson at numbers 8 and 9 edge out elite powerhouses Penn, Stanford and Princeton at numbers 10,11 and 12.
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If there’s little dispersion and everyone is near average, then nothing really matters. But in the real world (not just in a few careers), there’s a wide dispersion in abilities and outcomes. A checkout line at Costco, for example, moves much faster than the one at your typical supermarket. In any job, some are more skilled than others at what they do.
I’m not saying that everyone is near the average. I’m saying that the school attended doesn’t predict if you’ll be above or below the median for your chosen career (for most of them).
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As in-state. I changed our residence and to pretend that we lived in the particular state when I ran the NPCs.
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I think that this discussion is more relevant to a 4 year bachelors level student who is seeking both a degree and a “college experience”. Or a graduate program that (such as law or business, that is impacted by internships and connections gained in school). I am an NP, and got my degree later (after I completed a different masters degree) through an ABSN and MSN program - I chose the most affordable path, for a brick and mortar program that offered a hybrid option and the flexibilty I needed with my career. “Elite” was not a factor. My kids are at “elite” schools. What they need as young people to grow and discover their career paths is very different than what I needed as an ABSN student. The “value” in their schools comes from the experiences that they are having as young adults who are growing and learning about themselves. They want the whole package - the “college experience”. That is why “fit” becomes an issue for them, and not for an older or more focused student who is on a path to gain only a particular degree, rather than a college experience.
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This is the case for us as well. We are in Illinois, and our in-state flagship was considerably more for our family than the elite private schools that my kids attend.
Even if one has a large budget, its common when making any large purchase to decide if it’s “worth it”. But gauging whether it’s “worth it” for a car or a house is, IMO, different than making a decision about the investment in our child’s education. That said, there are cases where one decides if a college/university is “worth it”. As has been discussed many times before, if the cost makes no dent in a family’s lifestyle or retirement planning or what have you, they are fortunate to have the luxury of deciding what in their mind is the value of their child’s education. Sometimes it’s hard to understand when someone puts an arbitrary cap on what they are willing to spend for their child’s education. That said, college costs are through the roof. For our family, we promised to pay for undergrad and put no limit on them. But that was the value we placed for our family. One son happened to get a large scholarship, so there were funds left over that had been earmarked for college. When he turned 21, we asked him what he wanted for is birthday. He replied “I want your name off my account”. We trusted him, so we did.
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I get that, as well. Both my kids are at “elite” schools, too.
I went to my BSN program straight out of HS and then to my MSN program after 10+ years of nursing experience. My lower-cost state school definitely provided a great overall college experience, as are the elite schools my kids are currently attending.
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We were lucky enough to be in the same position with our kids. Surprisingly, my husband and I have done quite well with our degrees from one of those schools that @tsbna44 claims has no name recognition. 
We never looked at either our alma mater or the schools our kids chose in terms of ROI or opportunity cost. Let’s face it, for most upper middle and upper class families in this country college is a right of passage. There are intangibles that we place value on even if it can’t be quantified in economic terms.
From the standpoint of opportunity costs, there is an argument that for many people no college elite or otherwise is “worth it”. As a full pay family, if we were to take the $350k that we would spend on a private university and stick it in an IRA with a 6 percent return, there would be a nest egg of something like $4.5 million by the time our kid is retirement age. Wouldn’t it make more sense economically to send the kid to an inexpensive trade school?
Even for high achieving students maybe we should be questioning whether the traditional American system is not just overpriced but archaic. Several years ago there was an off the charts brilliant young man at my kids’ school. He taught him self to code as a middle schooler through open courseware from Stanford. As a fourteen year old he was profiled in the New York times for an app he developed. He did not go to college. He landed a Thiel fellowship, has founded a few successful startups and there is a Wikipedia page about him. He is still in his twenties and has accomplished more than most of us will in a lifetime.
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It would, but they don’t make vehicle rear window stickers for trade schools.
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Again I said to the masses. I acknowledged the schools are excellent (most are) and their grads do very well.
We actually find out on here both kids and parents are unaware of schools they end up applying to when they start the search. They learn of them from here or us News or a fellow student etc.
I suggested Lafayette to a young man I’m assisting on here and he had no knowledge.
I never said these schools aren’t delivering for the kids.