schools w/ no merit aid
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Anonymous
Well I say where you go does not matter and was not obsessed with getting my kid into t20 schools. They applied ED, got deferred, then ultimately got rejected. They had a great list of other schools, including safeties, and picked from those acceptances. They were upset for 1-2 days about the deferral/rejection and then we told them they had to move on and get excited about their other schools, of which there were several they really liked. |
Anonymous
Thank you! If the PP had read, they would have seen these numbers were for 2020 (that's the data points I could easily find). The fact remains for $25-30K, everything except W&M is within reach for all VA state schools. But some people would rather complain than actually plan and find a school that's affordable to them |
Anonymous
UVA estimates 36k for a fist year arts and sciences student for this year https://sfs.virginia.edu/financial-aid-new-applicants/financial-aid-basics/estimated-undergraduate-cost-attendance |
Anonymous
But you can save thousands by not taking the university's health care policy. Also, you can move off second year, which DD did, into group housing and save big on room and board. She did all her own cooking. No car, so no car issues. |
Anonymous
Look, this conversation somehow got hijacked by law school. OP never said their kid was interested in law school, but then somehow it was introduced and started to dominate. Personally, I think law school in general is a terrible decision...but would agree you need to really go top 10 or it is an horrific decision. A bunch of posters then said it doesn't matter where you go undergrad, but absolutely does matter where you went to law school. Yale is historically the #1 law school, and it is clear that it DOES matter where you went to undergrad if you want to increase your chances of acceptance to Yale (and I bet Harvard and Stanford and law schools 2-10 look fairly similar). |
Anonymous
Good point! How much were the costs of living off-campus if you care to share? |
Anonymous
One can also argue that the type of students who want to attend T20 schools (ivies) are more likely to do well on LSAT/want to be lawyers. Students at the T20 schools are all top students, with good SAT/ACT/GPA/ECs, etc. Whereas while other schools are great schools they have a more academically diverse student body. So yeah, a Cal State school is not sending 10 students to Harvard law, because A) they don't have as many students who want to be lawyers, and most kids at a cal state school are not wealthy. They are also largely a group of students who can afford to attend law school (hello $300K+....most MC families cannot support that, same as for med school. And the years for ROI are long, so many may enter the workforce rather than dumping $300K + they do not have into law school). So essentially, the T20/Ivies are a grouping of all really smart people, many of whom are wealthy and can afford to consider Law school. So I'd expect them to send a higher percentage of students to top law schools than a school that is more academically diverse (and economically diverse) |
Anonymous
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Anonymous
One thing I learned as a lawyer is never to make conclusions without seeing and understanding the data. Pp, according to them, supplied schools of origin for half the school, where is the rest? Also, pp describes the list as reflecting one first year class which is clearly not the case, as a first year class at Yale is about 200 students, not 600. So not sure what data exactly they are reporting. At my T5 law school, the most students we had for any one college was 7, from Harvard. No other school had more than 4. Most had one. Hardly some huge advantage to go to any particular school Also Wellesley, the school that op is lamenting, is not even on this list. So not worth the $80k as some have suggested? |
Anonymous
Great post! I'm not a lawyer so I can speculate 
I'm gonna guess, more kids from T20 schools go to Top 5-10 Law schools simply because they have the $$$ (Gotta be rich to afford $300K+ for law school, or willing to take huge financial risks/loans and hope you can pay it back--someone who grew up MC is not as likely to attempt this) and because T20 schools are already the "cream of the crop" as everyone attending is top academically and driven students (Similar to how kids from the Top 3 privates in DC area are more likely to attend a T20 university/T20 SLAC than someone from Baltimore City public schools) . Those who get into T5-10 Law schools from non Ivy/Non T20 undergrads most likely had the same drive, academics in HS, but chose for many reasons to attend a different undergrad (didn't get into a T20 like majority dont, couldn't afford it---which is smart if you want to attend law school save your $$ for that, etc), or they just hit their stride in undergrad and became a better student/focused on law school. |
Anonymous
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Welcome to the reality 9f higher education in America.
I guess this was not on your radar screen before. |
Anonymous
My husband attended university of Chicago Law and was accepted at Harvard, Standford and Georgetow n and went to UTEP undergrad. He had a single mom and that was the most she could afford. I would not spemd over $300k for a 4 year degree to raise my kid’ s chances to go to a top law school. That is silly. |
Anonymous
No, only for people with a limited view of what college actually is. |
Anonymous
This whole thread is weird, and I gave up in the middle after people just kept yelling at this person for being rightly upset that college costs have gotten so insane. I went to NYU in 1993, which I think was literally the most expensive college in the country. It was about 25,000 a year. My dad was a doctor. Not a specialist. We were upper middle class, and my parents had saved money. I later transferred and that savings had enough money to support me through a graduate degree. I did the math, and the cost of NYU has gone wayyyyy up proportionally from what it used to be--- and that's all colleges. Yes. If you were paying attention you knew it. We have a 529 plan and my parents did the in state tuition plan for our kid (which now I sort of regret), but it's still a big difference when you're theoretically considering this stuff to being like--wow---we could end up spending 360,000 for one kid's undergraduate education? We are probably top 2% of household wealth, and WE don't want to pay that. Not unless our kid is getting into an Ivy, which she isn't. That is why merit aid exists. It's not a "subsidy." It's because colleges realize that even wealthy families understand that the price is NOT worth it--not when you consider that your kid might go on to some kind of graduate program. Thank you for the merit aid website. I was actually looking for a list JUST like that after reading his book. OP, I get it. I think most of my friends get it. They either stick to the top publics if their kids can get in, go for lower ranking schools with merit, and few bite the bullet and pay full price. |
Anonymous
But the OP does not "get it". They think they are entitled to a top price school with merit, and that's not how it works.
Many smartly conclude that top tier is not worth it and actively search out slightly lower schools that provide merit (or lower schools that provide excellent merit--as in full pay) and graduate without debt. Yes, prices have gone up ridiculously, but it's that way for everyone. Fact is there are many many many excellent choices that will be affordable, no matter what your definition of affordable is. So search for those and recognize that "where you go does not matter nearly as much as what you do once you are there". If you don't want to pay $320K for undergrad there are plenty of options that will get you an amazing education for much less. That is the point. If you really want "top tier" then you need to pay |