<p>I recently got accepted into UW Madison, and I will most likely attend. I applied to some other schools, such as UChicago, Vanderbilt, Duke, UNC Chapel Hill, (and Cornell, Brown, and Dartmouth as longshots). </p>
<p>Honestly I doubt I will get in to any of those schools (but you never know, I have really interesting ECs) and even if I did, I feel like it would be too expensive to justify going to one of them over Madison for a similar (or at least not far behind) education. It is my (and my grandparents') goal to get through undergraduate almost completely debt free. </p>
<p>But now to the actual question: When I was reading though some recent reviews of UW Madison, the majority of them said it was a "very expensive" school but still worth it. This confuses me. My in-state cost total is around 22k per year, And the costs per year for all of those other colleges above are mostly 50K-60K a year with a few of them around 40. </p>
<p>How can Madison be considered an "expensive school"? Are these reviews just comparing it to schools like UW Milwaukee and community colleges, or do you usually get enough grants from similarly ranked private universities that they become cheaper?</p>
<p>now obviously “average aid” means nothing to an individual who doesnt qualify for it…</p>
<p>and yes ive seen those student review, expensive is relative, it might be cheap for someone in the east cost 40k a year isnt much because cost of living is already high and all the privates there cost about the same…whearas some town in wisco that the average income is 30k a year 20k a year for school might be a little high because you dont get all your food from a cow anymore and there arent funds coming to pay for your food. </p>
<p>Remeber in the future expensive is only relative </p>
<p>Well, they could be talking about how expensive it is from an OOS perspective? Out of state tuition for Madison is much more expensive than instate. UChicago’s tuition for one year is in the $50k range which is 2.5x Madison’s instate tuition. However, some private schools’ tuition is around $40kish and they give the majority of their applicants significant scholarships. Which in turn, could possibly bring it down to the cost of Madison’s instate tuition. Personally, I don’t think Madison’s instate expenses are too much compared to other colleges, but from an OOS standpoint, it may be a different story.</p>
<p>As parent of out of state freshman, I agree that “expensive” is relative. We are one of those families who cannot write a $50,000 check each year for each child, but also don’t qualify for financial aid. </p>
<p>We were delighted when our son fell in love with UW because OOS tuition is about $27,000 instead of the the $40-42,000 at private schools. Room and board is also cheaper than many privates, running around $8500-9000 for the year rather than the $10-12,000 at some schools. So, UW is about $15,000 cheaper per year than privates for someone who is not getting financial aid. </p>
<p>My son is likely to go to grad school/professional school, so minimizing debt now is a priority. </p>
<p>All in all, a very personal decision, but UW is a wonderful place. </p>
<p>Good luck, and congrats on having this acceptance in the bag already.</p>