s/o Sending your child to a small liberal arts college for $50k a year is a rip-off

[Anonymous]

if you can afford it then sure throw your money away but if you're saddling your kid with loans (i.e. saddling the American taxpayer with loans) it's really a shitty purchase. Send them to a larger state school, spend 20k a year less and have them get a real degree or a artsy-fartsy degree at a fraction of the cost. Go Tarheels!

[Anonymous]

while I totally disagree with your reasoning, I will likely encourage my child to attend a public school, even as a graduate of one of these "rip-off" places. When I graduated in the late-90s, it was less than $20K/year. It has risen to the $50K level in just a little more than a decade. Absolutely outrageous. And I would NEVER encourage my children to go that deeply in debt for a degree - that saddles them with practically crushing debt that will discourage them from so many other things they should be able to do as adults. I am eternally grateful to my family for allowing me to start life without student loan debt hanging over my head. I just don't think we can provide the same for our child, not with the cost of EVERYTHING going up exponentially while wages stay flat.

[Anonymous]

I'm a big fan of state schools, but you're giving liberal arts schools a bad name. I applied to all different kinds of schools (including state schools) and wound up at one of those extremely pricey liberal arts schools because they were able to give me far more in financial aid (and not loans). I did not find the education artsy fartsy at all, although it could have been if I had selected those courses. Very few students are actually paying the sticker price for liberal arts colleges. They have massive endowments that better allow them to provide grants. I will encourage my child to apply wherever they are interested in and wait to see what their real cost will be before making any decisions.

[Anonymous]

I have an undergraduate degree from an Ivy, a Master's from a small liberal arts college, and a Ph.D. from a big state school, so I have been on the inside of a pretty wide range of American post-secondary educational options. In general, I don't disagree with you. Having attended a prestigious private college and taught at a state school, I think that a person can get a very good education at both and that a person's success in life is largely a product of hard work, the scope of the vision they have for their life, and their ability to take advantage of what is special about whatever environment that they find themselves in.

However, I don't think it is as easy as saying "all students will do fine at a big state school." My DH, who went to the same Ivy as I did, leveraged the advantages of that environment into a fairly spectacular life. I, on the other hand, was a little overwhelmed by the environment and now realize that I would have been better off at a smaller school. I have done fine for myself, but my confidence in my own abilities wasn't as high post-college as I think it would have been if I had gone to a school that was less of a pressure cooker. (On the other hand, I met my DH at that prestigious school and his steadfast belief in my abilities has made a big difference in my life, so there is that intangible benefit of going to a prestigious university to consider.) My sister went to a big state school and it fit her outgoing, gregarious nature really well. That environment was clearly the best option for her.

I would encourage you to watch how your kids develop and think about them each as individuals when deciding what the best educational option is best for them. You will probably find that the answer is not one-size-fits-all.

[Anonymous]

I went to GW. At the time it was one of the most expensive colleges in the nation, and now I think it is the most expensive. I was able to attend on scholarship. I paid nothing for my education other than room, board, books and fees. A lot of private colleges charge some students $50K (which includes everything) in order to charge other students very little.

Ideally, my daughter will be able to go wherever she wants and wherever lets her in, but hopefully she won't have to go into a ton of debt to do it. We'll try for scholarships and ideally I can gift her money after graduation to help her pay down student loans.

[Anonymous]

12:50 has stated it very eloquently. Finding the right fit for the student is important. And some private colleges are able to give much better financial aid packages than state schools. Keep an open mind.

Personally, I want to save enough for my daughter to pick the school that is the best fit regardless of cost, and graduate without any debts. I am lucky enough to be able to do that without sacrificing my retirement though.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I went to GW. At the time it was one of the most expensive colleges in the nation, and now I think it is the most expensive. I was able to attend on scholarship. I paid nothing for my education other than room, board, books and fees. A lot of private colleges charge some students $50K (which includes everything) in order to charge other students very little.

Ideally, my daughter will be able to go wherever she wants and wherever lets her in, but hopefully she won't have to go into a ton of debt to do it. We'll try for scholarships and ideally I can gift her money after graduation to help her pay down student loans.

Recent graduate here. While hoping for scholarships is always a good thing, be aware that most colleges take away any minimal "financial aid" when you have outside scholarships. My last year at a prestigious college was $55,000 for everything. Of course this was before congress started investigating university endowments and several well-know private universities voluntarily dropped cost. I would have had a full ride had I gone to school 4 years later than I did. Instead I had $130,000 in debt. My parents and I cosigned on the loans so they don't have to gift me money by helping to pay down the debt.

OP, I completely agree with you that $100,000+ is not worth a small-liberal arts education. But, I'm, in science and still 9 years later don't make enough to pay off my loans. The most valuable thing about my education was the instant network and reputation. I've had no problem getting my foot in the door.

State schools are an o.k. bargain for what you get. Some have better networks than others. The one thing that many of my friends that went to state school on the west coast experienced is getting screwed in the "Application to majors." Just because you get into a state school doesn't mean you will get into computer science, business, biology, etc all of which require practically 4.0s your first and second years at the university. If you don't get in then you have to take a lesser major (communications or marketing vs business) or leave the school. Leaves a lot of people high and dry. Ends up being 5 years to graduate instead of 4 because you have to transfer or scramble to meet requirements.

[Anonymous]

Op blanket statements such as that are ignorant. I graduated from one of the top liberal arts schools, received a fabulous education, both in the classroom & out, went into finance & began making 6 figures by 2 yrs after graduation. I paid off all of my loans quickly & find myself tapping into the network of alums fairly regularly. I would do it all over again & encourage my children to do the same.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Op blanket statements such as that are ignorant. I graduated from one of the top liberal arts schools, received a fabulous education, both in the classroom & out, went into finance & began making 6 figures by 2 yrs after graduation. I paid off all of my loans quickly & find myself tapping into the network of alums fairly regularly. I would do it all over again & encourage my children to do the same.

I disagree. Now would you like a non-fat soy chai latte? Please don't forget to tip.

[Anonymous]

For a top tier small, liberal arts school -- Williams, for example -- with a strong alumni network and some prestige? I think it's worth it. I went to a small, expensive private school populated with spoiled, less than scholarly kids and it most certainly was NOT worth it in terms of the ROI and the quality of my education. We had a lot of adjunct professors who varied greatly in terms of ability. The atmosphere and the class offerings were pathetic.

[Anonymous]

I went to a small highly selective liberal arts college and then to an Ivy grad school. I now make enough to be in the 1% and while I did work retail during high school and college I never worked as a barsita (of course coffee places didn't really exist back then). My DC now goes to a small liberal arts college and it's a great fit. UMD, our public option, would not have been a good fit at all. I expect DC will need to go to grad school but that's fine with me. I don't consider my education to have been a rip off (to the contrary it's paid off many times over) and I don't consider my DC's education, for which I am paying full tuition, to be a rip off either. Luckily there are plenty of college options out there so my DC did not have to go to UMD and yours do not need to go to a SLAC.

[Anonymous]

for the vast majority of families, these colleges are simply out of reach. Not everyone who went to the selective liberal arts schools comes out making 6 figures. Shoot, I went to one and I will never make that on my own because of the field I picked (plenty of my friends, though, do - lawyers, doctors, finance, management types) I don't think the education I got or the experiences I had were a rip-off, and the name and networking can certainly be helpful to many students.

If you can get scholarships to these schools, fantastic. More power to you. But, honestly, those of us in the true middle class (the $50-150K folks, not the "DC middle class") will not be able to afford these places out of pocket for our kids and also will not encourage them to saddle themselves with that type of debt burden at such a young age.

I think we're right on the edge of the a big college finance readjustment. Costs have gotten completely out of hand, as I stated in my earlier post about the cost of my school more than doubling over just a little more than a decade. At $80K, it was not completely outrageous. At $200K+, HELL no. Seriously, what average family can afford that? And with college degrees being such a necessity...it is just a vicious cycle. Something has to give.

[Anonymous]

I went to GW - way too many kids were on full scholarship there for no reason.

[Anonymous]

You do realize that in most places Harvard is considered liberal arts, right?

That said, I agree with OP on the whole. I'll be damned if I'm going to be saddled with people looking for handouts.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:if you can afford it then sure throw your money away but if you're saddling your kid with loans (i.e. saddling the American taxpayer with loans) it's really a shitty purchase. Send them to a larger state school, spend 20k a year less and have them get a real degree or a artsy-fartsy degree at a fraction of the cost. Go Tarheels!

Chapel Hill costs $40K/yr out of state. If you went out of state, you and your parents probably paid the equivalent of private school prices for a state school.