<p>I would say at this point, it’s sit down with the spreadsheet and show him the financial reality. Explain that if he goes to school a, he’ll graduate debt free, you’ll be able to help with law school & he’ll get a car (I know people mentioned fellowships for grad school, but it doesn’t work that way for law school.)</p>
<p>Then run the numbers for the other two schools. Show him what the monthly debt would be if he chose that route. And explain that the law school bill would be on him. Find out what the typical starting salary would be and explain what other expenses he’d have (rent, car, food, etc.) on top of the debt & how much he’d have to pay. </p>
<p>I fourth another visit to the debt free school also.</p>
<p>Relaxmom…Thanks for the suggestion of the overnight visit and class visit. You and several other posters suggested that and I think it’s a great idea and certainly doable.</p>
<p>Northstarmom said…“We all could give better advice if you’d name the schools. I’m also curious about why you allowed your son to apply to some schools that apparently you now don’t feel are worth your paying for him to attend. I think that such decisions should be made before a kid applies, not after he is accepted.” … </p>
<pre><code> Northstarmom - We visited every school that my son applied to before he applied. We were willing to send him to anyone of them. I never said we didn’t feel that certain schools were not worth paying now, but my son became a National Merit Finalist and certain schools started offering him money. I was unaware that one of his schools offered a guaranteed full-tuition scholarship until Feb 26th. What a wonderful surprise! It would be dishonest to say it didn’t change how we looked at the schools. I really don’t need to list the schools. We did research and looked at a lot of schools and my son applied to a very small group that seemed to fit what he was looking for. We just didn’t expect to get this kind of money - it changes the equation a bit!
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<p>Jumpstart: my D is also a NMF and she’ll be attending a school with an incredibly generous NMF scholarship, very similar to your sons. One of the things that came up in conversation during this process (we knew about the scholarship before applying) was that being wanted was a good thing. Kind of like dating…don’t you want to be with the boy who makes an effort vs. the one who doesn’t seem to care if you spend time with him or not ;)?</p>
<p>If you’re willing to give him the money now to pay for an expensive school or to give him the same amount of money by buying him a used car and helping with grad/professional school that seems like a good choice to leave in your son’s hands.</p>
<p>The total amount of money is the same, so it makes sense to me to let him make the decision about how to spend the money you’re so generously offering to give him.</p>
<p>Given the fact that your son obviously is very bright and hardworking, it may make fine financial sense for him to go to a more expensive undergraduate school and then look for fellowships and other options to pay for grad school. Depending on what field he chooses, he may be able to have his graduate or professional school education covered by fellowships, etc.</p>
<p>“He may be able to have his graduate or profeessional school education covered by fellowships, etc.”</p>
<p>This is true and a very good point. I paid for my undergrad, at a state school, back when this was still possible to do when the dinosaurs roamed the earth, but had all of my grad work paid for by the schools. fwiw.</p>
<p>Thanks everyone for all the thoughtful responses. </p>
<p>We’ll definitely do the overnight visit/class visit. The idea of sitting down with the breakdown in spreadsheet format is also a great idea. And, yes, we’ll share the notion of the used car and grad/law school payments as well. We just didn’t want it to seem like some kind of bribe!</p>
<p>Emeraldkity4 - He turned 17 as a senior. He’ll turn 18 in college.</p>
<p>Electronblue- Thanks for the math, and yes, we’ve thought all the same things. I’m pretty sure he’ll like the scholarship school, and it is most certainly not like we’d be torturing him. Thanks for the post. </p>
<p>Mom2collegekids - No Clemson is not the NMF school. He did get into Clemson, but not the honors college. He also didn’t get the OOS tuition waiver, which we told him in advance would weigh heavily in the decision for that school.</p>
<p>Thanks again for all the responses. This is my first child going off to college and it’s been quite a learning experience.</p>
<p>Another two cents, after reading your original post again, esp. noting that your son “likes all the schools, but some more than others” and that you do express concern for future parental income, so you’re not in the Bill Gates economic strata - I feel very strongly that none of us owe our kids financial sacrifice in this situation (I’d better start a new sentence here before this one runs on into oblivion…). You’re talking about the difference between “good enough” and “even better”, and the difference is highly subjective and based on the fleeting impressions of a 16-year-old anyway. It does not do our kids any good to think that our own future solvency, retirement before age 95, etc., is less important than their nebulous preference for one school over another. I don’t mean in any way to imply that your son is selfish or feels overly entitled; you didn’t give that impression at all. I think your reluctance to “make him” compromise is loving and understandable, but not a good idea. The “let the student take out loans” approach is well addressed in the thread I mentioned in my other post (sorry, I don’t think I linked it properly, but you can copy it into the search box; it was started by gravenewworld).</p>
<p>^It’s true for PhD programs. It is a different story if he wants to go to Law school (which is what OP mentioned…)</p>
<p>There are, though, some fellowships for law school. One of my young friends was offered one. </p>
<p>People who get into those very expensive top law schools tend to get jobs that allow them to pay off their loans. </p>
<p>I do think that instead of forcing him to go to a school that he doesn’t want to attend, telling him how much they’re willing to spend for his college/grad/professional school, and then giving him the choice of how to divvy those funds up would be a fair way to leave the choice in his hands. This also addresses the parents’ concerns about their finances.</p>
<p>As part of this, they could help him research costs of law school and of other professional/grad schools he may have an interest in.</p>
<p>Important to keep in mind that although he now says he wants to be a lawyer, by the time he’s a college senior, he may have decided on a different career.</p>
<p>He could always go to the NMF school for a couple of years and then transfer if he doesn’t like it. It sounds like he probably would like it once he’s there. Since it sounds like his grades kept him out of some of his “better” choices, doing well at the NMF school may get him admitted later.</p>
<p>“There are, though, some fellowships for law school. One of my young friends was offered one.”</p>
<p>Depends what you mean by “fellowships.” I’m not aware of any law schools that offer living expenses. If they exist, they are few and far between.</p>
<p>We faced a similar situation. My D could have attended one university tuition-free (faculty benefits) or one of the other six that accepted her without any help beyond Stafford loans. My husband and I made it clear from the beginning that we would pay full tuition only for a college that was superior for her academic interests. Since there was no guarantee that she would be accepted to the free university (not all faculty children are admitted because of its selectivity), we allowed her to apply to comparable schools and below, for a safety, as well as to more selective schools. When the acceptances came, we automatically knocked out three of her schools for being comparable/weaker. </p>
<p>We allowed our daughter to make a case for the private LAC where she is now a senior and where we’ve paid full freight for 4 years. Because her argument was logical and persuasive and because we could afford it, albeit with financial sacrifices, we agreed to pay. It has not been easy, but we’ve never regretted doing it. </p>
<p>So it comes down to whether you can afford the favored university and why your son wants to attend. Make him outline why he thinks the more expensive school is better. If it’s all gut feeling and no logic, then chances are he hasn’t looked closely enough at it. I agree with everyone who advises him to attend accepted students day or to schedule a more informal visit that includes sitting in on classes. We required that my D do this for the tuition-free school and her top two choices, just to make sure she could compare them realistically.</p>
<p>My daughter is attending a great private LAC for 9K a year more than our well respected flagship would have cost. Like the above poster’s child, we had her evaluate her choice carefully and logically. We thought the 32K total difference was worth it. She is happy, gets lots of individual attention and has really come out of the meek persona she had in high school. Maybe she would have become more outgoing and confident had she attended that state school-I don’t know but I like to think the attention at her current school from professors and being forced to take part in the discussion based classes has built her confidence. </p>
<p>Good PhD programs can cost less than an instate undergraduate degree. I finished grad school with very little debt and had the loan I took out paid off within five years after graduation (I also continued to live like a graduate student during those five years-tired furniture from my parents, an old car and cheap meals). Before deciding on the LAC, my daughter investigated the graduate stipends and assistanceships at several universities in her potential major. Funding a graduate education can still be done reasonably as long as one doesn’t feel the need to rush into expensive living or if one avoids starting a family. If a student is willing to attend medical school at his/her state university, there are often grants and rural post graduate service options to lower tuition costs. Finally, there is always the military officer corp. We have a friend whose son is going that route for med school money.</p>
<p>I think the important part is to help the young person look at the various paths and weigh out the pros and cons of each. By choosing to pay more for undergraduate school the trade off is that there may not be as much family money available to assist with graduate school.If the young person can feel that they were heard and taught how to evaluate choices (such as the spreadsheet of costs), the parental nudge toward a more affordable education could seem more as a choice they made rather than one made by the parents (assuming the parent could pay for either education without going into debt). The no loans for undergrad was my stipulation for college choice and one both of my kids accepted.</p>
<p>We may be facing a similar situation, depending on how acceptances and financial packages play out.</p>
<p>We have told our son that if he decides to go to a school that offers great merit money and we end up paying significantly less than our EFC that we will be amenable to providing him with extras such as a good used car or “premium” housing (if available).</p>
<p>My feeling is that whatever choice he makes will be better in the long run than any choice I impose on him. If he makes a mistake it will be HIS mistake, and he will learn from it. However, if I made him go to a school that didn’t work out it would always be my fault for making him go there.</p>
<p>On the other hand, I have no problem with offering enticements (o.k. --bribes) to try to get him to go where I think is best. It would make the situation a win-win with the kid “buying in” to attending the school and us getting a better financial deal.</p>
<p>S was in a similar position last year. He accepted a full-ride merit scholarship to a Top 20 LAC (the merit scholarship includes everything, even personal expenses). We told him we would contribute what we would have paid for 4 years at the 1st choice school to his future law school expenses. The choice was his. He followed the money. : - )</p>
<p>I think it entirely depends on your financial situation. I’m a believer in “don’t apply to any colleges unless you are willing to attend” with our kids, and for us, we would have stressed that a full ride would seal the deal as long as the college/uni would provide an acceptable education and probably tell him it’s the NMS school. But we have a history of saying “no” to our kids about things every now and then so for them it wouldn’t be as if a huge chasm in the earth opened and swallowed them. They “get” that when we pay, we make certain decisions on their behalf. I would say that the things that happen in college that derail kids are there in a small school as well as a big school (and I’m making a big assumption here that the NMS school is a big school) and if you have misgivings about his maturity, a small school is really no different than a big one. He’ll still have to “navigate” registration, he’ll still have to get up in the morning, he’ll still have to study, he’ll still have to set up meetings with his advisors etc. etc. Small schools don’t really “hand hold” in a way that some people want to believe in my opinion. The only real differences may lie in the intro classes which can be quite large in the big schools. If the NMS school is a big school you might look and see if there is honors college, residential college, living & learning community, etc. that make big schools “small.” If the NMS school is not a big school then have him do a repeat visit. Unfortunately without knowing the schools no one can make a judgement about whether one is better than another, but I can also understand the reluctance to expose your son.</p>
<p>Just a note about PhD programs: most offer full tuition and a stipend, especially in the sciences. We paid for the private LAC, and now my D will be attending a PhD program that will actually pay her to attend.</p>
<p>I don’t get being willing to buy a car but not pay tuition. I don’t think that college students need cars except in very rare circumstances. Most of the time it seems like a recipe for trouble. I assume that you would be paying the insurance also–and quite likely for any expensive repairs. What about gas money and maintenance? If your S wants to go to law school I think he’d be better off living like the typical poor student and cracking the books than driving around the countryside with other students in search of a better party/beach/club/ski slope. :)</p>
<p>This smacks of a bribe, to me, even if it isn’t meant as one.</p>
That’s not quite so simple. Sure, there are no automated call to the parents if the student did not show up to class. But the student is much less likely to miss a class where he is 1 out of 15 students, and his absence will be noticed. He is also more likely to be prepared for discussion when he is expected to contribute to it.</p>
<p>If a student has a problem with the schedule or with a deadline, he is much more likely to have it addressed and resolved at a small school. The amount of personal attention that students get at some small schools is unbelievable. (Of course, this happens at large schools too, but much less frequently…)
I think it is a bribe. And it makes sense financially (20K vs. 200K…).
If the kid takes it, it means he does not want his “dream school” badly enough, so it’s a win-win situation.
We tried it with 2 of our kids - it did not work. Looking back, I think they made the right choices, so no regrets here… :)</p>