If you turned down a top liberal arts school for a cheaper state school?

[Anonymous]

MY DD has been accepted to Emory University and total costs will be close to $85,000. We received no merit. She was also accepted to UMD - College Park and we are in state.

If she goes to Emory, she will use her entire 529 College Fund leaving nothing for graduate school.

Of course, if she goes to UMD, she will have $ left.

I am rather sad for her but it doesn't seem like a wise move financially to go with Emory and we are leaning towards UMD College Park.

Anyone else in this situation? Accepted to competitive college or top 20 college and cannot justify such a high cost?

[Anonymous]

There are a lot of people in your situation, and many do end up at UMD, including mine.

DC got some merit aid, coupled with the many AP credits, DC will be able to graduate in < 4 years, which means money left over for masters.

Also, if your 529 has been opened for at least 10 years, by the time your DC graduates, you can rollover the amount leftover in the 529 to an IRA for your DC. We plan on doing that, as well.

I guess it depends on the major and what your kid wants to do, but mine is in a STEM field, and they will be fine either at UMD or the expensive private they originally wanted.

[Anonymous]

If I had enough to pay for four years of 85k/year, I would leave it up to her after talking through the realities very plainly.

I don’t even have enough saved to send my kid to ONE year at 85k/year, so my conversation would be very different. (And yes, we’ve been saving since he was in preschool.)

[Anonymous]

OP here. I meant $85,000 a YEAR total costs. And $27,000 for UMD. A year.

[Anonymous]

Be happy that there is enough in the 529 that she gets to make the decision

[Anonymous]

Do you know if she definitely wants to go to grad school? If not, it may be worth spending the money on Emory since it's in the 529 anyway.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:MY DD has been accepted to Emory University and total costs will be close to $85,000. We received no merit. She was also accepted to UMD - College Park and we are in state.

If she goes to Emory, she will use her entire 529 College Fund leaving nothing for graduate school.

Of course, if she goes to UMD, she will have $ left.

I am rather sad for her but it doesn't seem like a wise move financially to go with Emory and we are leaning towards UMD College Park.

Anyone else in this situation? Accepted to competitive college or top 20 college and cannot justify such a high cost?

It’s a tough calm but I would send her to Emory. She can always take out loans or get other funding if she attends grad school.

[Anonymous]

(Emory isn't a liberal arts school.)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If I had enough to pay for four years of 85k/year, I would leave it up to her after talking through the realities very plainly.

I agree with this IF you can pay for Emory with no loans. My daughter is grateful that I am paying for 4 years of in-state tuition, but at the same time will probably always be a little resentful that she was limited to state schools but I refused to take out parent loans.

[Anonymous]

I was in this position when I was your DD's age. I wound up going to the state school and have mixed feelings about it. My parents did not have as much money saved as you do, but we did not qualify for financial aid. So attending the SLAC would have required loans and that is the primary reason I attended the state school. I am really, really glad I did not incur undergrad loans. However, I did feel overwhelmed and a bit lost at my huge state school, never really fit in with the culture, and didn't enjoy my college experience very much. Now, it's been decades and I don't often sit around thinking about how I didn't enjoy college that much -- it was a long time ago and I have a great life.

However, from a career standpoint, I do sometimes wish I had a stronger network from undergrad, or really any network from undergrad, because I can see how that is really beneficial. I also envy people with close friends from college -- I have a couple friends I've stayed in touch with but no one I'm close to because I was honestly never that close to people in college. In retrospect, I was almost certainly depressed and struggling, but I think it was hard for people to recognize that (and I wonder if the large school environment contributed to that as well).

I don't think it was the "wrong" choice to go to a state school. I did in fact wind up going to grad school (though would I have done that if I'd had a better undergrad experience and felt less adrift? hard to say). Again, no debt is huge. But you have the money to send your DD to Emory without incurring debt. There's no guarantee she'll go to grad school, and there are ways to do grad school affordably (do a fully funded program, don't do law or business school unless it's a top program and you are fully committed to working in a high-pay job until loans are paid off).

I think if I were in your position, given my own experience, I would let her decide and a major factor would be personality and whether that state flagship would be the right fit for this particular student. She's obviously worked hard in school to gain admission to a school like Emory, I think there is an argument that pushing her towards the state school to save money, especially if attending a huge school might not work for her, could be a mistake.

[Anonymous]

We have chosen a larger state university for our son because the private LAC with the more impressive name is $80/k a year with only a 10k merit scholarship.
It's simply not worth the loans or financial anguish. We can afford the larger state university without him taking out loans. He got a larger merit scholarship there as well.

We phrased it that it's an accomplishment to be accepted but no one asks where you went to college by the time you are 30, but school loans follow you forever.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:MY DD has been accepted to Emory University and total costs will be close to $85,000. We received no merit. She was also accepted to UMD - College Park and we are in state.

If she goes to Emory, she will use her entire 529 College Fund leaving nothing for graduate school.

Of course, if she goes to UMD, she will have $ left.

I am rather sad for her but it doesn't seem like a wise move financially to go with Emory and we are leaning towards UMD College Park.

Anyone else in this situation? Accepted to competitive college or top 20 college and cannot justify such a high cost?

It’s a tough calm but I would send her to Emory. She can always take out loans or get other funding if she attends grad school.

This is terrible advice. Do NOT take out loans if possible.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We have chosen a larger state university for our son because the private LAC with the more impressive name is $80/k a year with only a 10k merit scholarship.
It's simply not worth the loans or financial anguish. We can afford the larger state university without him taking out loans. He got a larger merit scholarship there as well.

We phrased it that it's an accomplishment to be accepted but no one asks where you went to college by the time you are 30, but school loans follow you forever.

100% correct regarding "financial anguish" and that "school loans follow you forever."

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:MY DD has been accepted to Emory University and total costs will be close to $85,000. We received no merit. She was also accepted to UMD - College Park and we are in state.

If she goes to Emory, she will use her entire 529 College Fund leaving nothing for graduate school.

Of course, if she goes to UMD, she will have $ left.

I am rather sad for her but it doesn't seem like a wise move financially to go with Emory and we are leaning towards UMD College Park.

Anyone else in this situation? Accepted to competitive college or top 20 college and cannot justify such a high cost?

It’s a tough calm but I would send her to Emory. She can always take out loans or get other funding if she attends grad school.

This is terrible advice. Do NOT take out loans if possible.

Then, find work using her Emory degree (debt-free) and save up/try to get money through grants/employer to pay for grad school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If I had enough to pay for four years of 85k/year, I would leave it up to her after talking through the realities very plainly.

I agree with this IF you can pay for Emory with no loans. My daughter is grateful that I am paying for 4 years of in-state tuition, but at the same time will probably always be a little resentful that she was limited to state schools but I refused to take out parent loans.

Us too. I refuse to take out parent loans. I'm not sure why this is even on the table for a generation which has the highest housing costs and just paid off our own student loans. You have to have a very motivated child who is going for a career that can pay off those loans and part of your own mortgage one day, we don't have that child.

My child has the option of a state school where we don't have to take on that level of debt. I sat through a few financial aid seminars at college open houses where they talk about a family taking out private loans and I really shook my head. I can't imagine that being a popular option. I would rather put it on a credit card that I can include in the inevitable bankruptcy that would follow if I piled on 50k a year in debt for 3 years.

I realize that we aren't the typical DCUM level income here.