<p>Even though we’re in CA, we would pay full sticker for any of the schools listed. Though UC is less per year, the 4 yr grad rate at the private schools is equivalent to the 6 year grad rate at most UC campuses. So the net cost is going to be more comparable.</p>
<p>This type of question has been asked and answered a million times, IMO. Yes, it is a personal decision, and for some money simply does not matter. That would be a nice postion to be in, but those lucky folks are in the minority.</p>
<p>Many of our kids have pursued the merit money options and looked at schools that would hopefully offer nice merit aid AND be a good fit for our kids. I am more of a “find the best fit” person, as I personally feel these 4 years are precious years in our kids’ development. That said, I would NOT got into debt to send my kids to school, no matter WHAT school it is. But with the money that had been set aside for college, we let our kids decide where they wanted to go. </p>
<p>As I have said before, we spent more $ on older s’s undergrad as he planned to major in something that he anticipated would have grad school paid for if he chose that route. Younger s was thinking med school, so chose the school with the best merit award that he also liked the best (ie best fit for him). He was NOT going to go to our flagship state U no matter HOW much he could have saved attending there. It was not for him and we supported that decision. And, since we are bragging about our kids here, I’ll say that the merit awards that he got made it cheaper for him to attend his private U than it would have cost us to send him to the state flagship or state tech (a very good school where he spent a summer and confirmed he is glad he didn’t spend 4 years there), even with the scholarship he would have gotten had he attended the state flagship schools. So, he loves his school and it was very inexpensive. He changed his mind about med school and instead pursued an engineering degree. He has a job lined up and money in his pocket (leftover money from the college budget) that he will have should he consider med school in the future. </p>
<p>Now, would I have paid full freight to send him to the school he attends? NO. I dont think it would have been a good value. But that said, he had an initial early scholarship offered with his acceptance in October of his sr yr of HS that made the school affordable and a reasonable “value” even before the bigger golden ring full tuition scholarship came in, so he stopped applying to more schools at that point. Plus, he knew he’d also be getting the National Merit scholarship from the school as well.</p>
<p>So, if we had to weigh the “cost” of a full pay “prestige” school vs the inexpensive top tier school he attends, that would have been a conversation for the dining room table. But, it would have been a short conversation, as at that time he was planning to attend med school and wanted funds available for that. He knew we has a set amount we were setting aside for their education, and they could spend it as they wished. Older son chose a top 20 school and loved every minute of it. He had some merit and scholarship money, but we paid much of the bill. And we have no regrets. It was a perfect fit for him and in our budget. And he graduated with over a 3.7 gpa in engineering and had 4 job offers within the first month of his sr yr of college.
OK - done bragging :)</p>
<p>Wait, wait… one more thing. Fortunately, even if we had to have paid full freight for both kids undergrads it wouldn’t have meant a huge change in our overall lifestyle, thanks to early savings, good investments and frugal living (and 2 parents working full-time), we STILL would not have felt paying full freight for our younger s’s school was a great value. We would have had a long discussion about that, should that have been an issue. I think there are other schools that would have been a better “value” if we were paying full freight.</p>
<p>LOL jym at your editing marginalia. :)</p>
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<p>momsquad, many of the students taking 6 years to finish UC are doing so because they’re taking time off to earn money so they can afford to return to school. Students with families that are paying UC full freight aren’t going to have to take time off, so they don’t have to pay for an extra two years. Though as a California parent paying full tuition for a school on the OP’s list, I’m always happy to have more rationalizations for D1 not going to a UC. ;)</p>
<p>OP, there’s no one right answer to this. The good news is that you will be convinced that whatever your family chooses to do is the right choice. :D</p>
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<p>Help me out here, I don’t need my rationalizations clouded by pesky facts. She may pick UC anyway, we’ll see how things look on April 1…</p>
<p>Here’s some help: no matter what your kid chooses to do, it will be a good choice. How’s that?</p>
<p>That sentiment sounds good,Slitheytove, but the reality is that the wrong choice could cause major problems down the line-particulary for a kid that insists on a very expensive choice or logistically more difficult choice that means parents or kids are taking out major loans to make that happen.</p>
<p>Fair enough sevmom–I was responding specifically to momsquad, whose post sounds like they’re going to manage full-pay without major loans. In which case there are no bad choices. More expensive ones, sure, but seemingly not to the point of being unaffordable.</p>
<p>That makes sense,SlitheyTove, We are in Virginia and I think it can get complicated when you have great instate choices in states like California, Virginia,NC, Michigan,etc. Do we even want to/need to look outside our public schools,etc.</p>
<p>I think it is really tough to figure out why kids aren’t graduating in 4 years at any given school, unless you are with them every step of the way. When they say they couldnt get the classes they needed, did they turn up their nose at 9 AM classes? Did they try to take a couple classes online over the summer? Or were they engineering majors, with a heavy load and it is what it is.</p>
<p>The other thing about four year graduation rates is that they may be measured in calendar years, not semesters or quarters. A school where many students do co-op jobs may have a very low four year graduation rate for this reason.</p>
<p>Also, all but the most selective schools will have students who need remedial English or math course work, which will impact graduation on time.</p>
<p>In-state publics’ lower cost may also reduce the incentive for students to graduate on time.</p>
<p>ucbalumnus,The in state publics lower cost may have reduced my kids’ incentive to graduate on time but not mine! We were/are full pay and made it clear to our kids that they were expected to graduate in 4 years, barring some unforeseen situation. So far so good, even with both kids being engineering majors. 15-18 credits a semester has been standard.Lots of early morning classes . I agree with kayf that you don’t always know what some of these graduation rates really mean. We had kids take minimal loans and expected them to work summers also so that they did have more incentive to graduate.</p>
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<p>I’d probably pay full freight for any of the listed schools. NYU and BU might fall into the “maybe” category, but I probably would. </p>
<p>Who on earth would decide that it’s worth it to pay full freight at the Ivies but not the “close to Ivies” or not the “top LAC’s”? People are weird sometimes.</p>
<p>I remember when I was in school, a lot of students took 12-13 credit course loads instead of the usual 15 credit course loads. Cost of attendance was very inexpensive, and “working one’s way through college” (which sometimes meant taking reduced course loads to accommodate work) was more common back then. Four year graduation rates at UCs have been rising, probably at least partly due to rising cost of attendance and the increasing futility of trying to “work one’s way through college” at the higher cost of attendance. I.e. taking a full course load to graduate on time will save more money than trying to work if the work would cause one to have a reduced course load.</p>
<p>Also, selectivity was much lower back then; more than half of Berkeley freshmen at the time (compared to fewer than one tenth now) were placed into remedial English courses, which at the time gave reduced credit (2 credits for a 4 unit workload course). The remedial precalculus math course (also reduced credit at the time) enrollment was also much larger back then. Presumably, this delayed graduation of many students; fewer than half of freshmen graduated in four years.</p>
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<p>It is entirely possible for some students to have a better academic and non-academic fit at one school than another, so the better fit school (whether it is the Ivy or the LAC or the public) may well be seen as “worth the money” but the other(s) not.</p>
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LOL!!! This is the secret knowledge that has allowed us to live peaceably with our teen for the past year. Prior to our acceptance of this sage advice I was searching boarding schools on a daily basis. </p>
<p>Very interesting stats available on collegenavigator.com. They are now including 8 year graduation rates for UC campuses. Here is example for UCSB:</p>
<p>[College</a> Navigator - University of California-Santa Barbara](<a href=“College Navigator - University of California-Santa Barbara”>College Navigator - University of California-Santa Barbara)</p>
<p>Seems that what matters most is that your own kid stays on track for graduating in a reasonable time (hopefully, 4 years or so),not what anybody else is doing at their school. Lots of reasons for kids not graduating in 4 years and a 91% freshman retention rate for a public school like UC Santa Barbara is not too shabby. Berkeley shows a 97% retention rate which seems excellent.</p>
<p>Top Tech Schools (MIT, CalTech) - No
Top LACs ("Williams, Amherst, Swarthmore, Middlebury, etc) - No
2nd Tier LACs (Colgate, Skidmore, Bates, Hamilton) - No
Out of State Public Ivy (like UVA, UC Berkeley) - No
Close to Ivies ("Tufts, WashU, UChicago, Northwestern, Rice etc) - No
Well-known city schools (NYU, BU) - No</p>
<p>Wouldn’t have had the money for any of them. If I had the money for any of them and then plenty more, it would be Yes to all. What else would I spend the money on?</p>
<p>The issue is only one for the 'tweeners - a very tiny slice of the population (generally with incomes between $175k-$250k, who don’t qualify for any needbased aid, but don’t have any “extra” money.) It’s really a very rarefied question.</p>
<p>It took me 12 years to graduate from Boston College. In those years, I had started a few businesses and worked at a variety of jobs for a variety of employers including doing some consulting. It was a grand time. Yes, I missed a lot of the college experience but I did get a lot of the real world experience. Taking a long time to graduate may not be a bad thing - especially if you’re getting work experience along the way.</p>
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<p>Another group is those families with much lower incomes that have accumulated a lot of assets.</p>