Does everyone on here with kids applying to top 50 schools really have the $80K per year to spend?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Funny you should ask this OP.

When I hit “submit payment” and a link to deduct $42,650 from our bank account last Tuesday- for ONE SEMESTER- I had the same thought. Who in their right mind really does this?

1) those with over $20MM in the bank, 2) those with paying grandpas

Nope. HHI $230, have been saving since the children were little (started with $210/month for maxium tax benefit, as our income went up we did a little but more, plus bonus money, etc). DC 1 got merit aid, so very inexpensive, will have funds leftover for grad school. DC 2, attending am over $80k per year private, will be a stretch for us, between 529 and cash flow - there will be nothing left for grad school, they will need to pay on their own.

And, we don't go abroad for vacation, drive 10+ year old cars until they die, etc). We've made education a priority

So that your kids can take budget vacations and drive beater cars while making education a priority for their kids too?

This is harsh but really worth talking about. how is paying $80K a year for school worth it in this scenario? Are you hoping that maybe your kid will break into the next income level and not repeat this cycle? The reality is that there is no guarantee that attending a $80k school will lead to ANY better income or standard of living than a $40k school.

it's just insanity that people like have fallen victim to the $80k trap. it's honestly really depressing.

Okay OP - you change it, and get back to us. We'll wait here......

wHat's to change? send your kids to schools you can afford. It's really simple. Look outside the T50 and there is plenty of merit for decent students, more for excellent students. (hint for excellent students there is merit within the T50, it does exist in the 25-50 range)

My 26ACT/3.4UW/no AP/"average kid" attended a T100 school with 35% merit award. They also had offers at 2 other similarly ranked schools with similar merit. Paid only $40K/year. Had offer at T120 where cost was only $30K/year. Got all of that without us chasing merit---we didn't need it. Could have gone to 3 schools in-state (not the flagship but the next best 3) for less than $20K/year. Also, my kid attended college with some really smart kids---plenty of top students who chose to go somewhere with great merit, plenty of "strivers" as my kid would call them (my kid is a B's are excellent grades and C's get degrees mentality).

That kid has graduated, started a job at a great company 2 weeks after graduation and is excelling in their career one year in. First year raise was in the top 25% of first year employees. Not to shabby

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Funny you should ask this OP.

When I hit “submit payment” and a link to deduct $42,650 from our bank account last Tuesday- for ONE SEMESTER- I had the same thought. Who in their right mind really does this?

1) those with over $20MM in the bank, 2) those with paying grandpas

Nope. HHI $230, have been saving since the children were little (started with $210/month for maxium tax benefit, as our income went up we did a little but more, plus bonus money, etc). DC 1 got merit aid, so very inexpensive, will have funds leftover for grad school. DC 2, attending am over $80k per year private, will be a stretch for us, between 529 and cash flow - there will be nothing left for grad school, they will need to pay on their own.

And, we don't go abroad for vacation, drive 10+ year old cars until they die, etc). We've made education a priority

So that your kids can take budget vacations and drive beater cars while making education a priority for their kids too?

This is harsh but really worth talking about. how is paying $80K a year for school worth it in this scenario? Are you hoping that maybe your kid will break into the next income level and not repeat this cycle? The reality is that there is no guarantee that attending a $80k school will lead to ANY better income or standard of living than a $40k school.

it's just insanity that people like have fallen victim to the $80k trap. it's honestly really depressing.

Okay OP - you change it, and get back to us. We'll wait here......

wHat's to change? send your kids to schools you can afford. It's really simple. Look outside the T50 and there is plenty of merit for decent students, more for excellent students. (hint for excellent students there is merit within the T50, it does exist in the 25-50 range)

My 26ACT/3.4UW/no AP/"average kid" attended a T100 school with 35% merit award. They also had offers at 2 other similarly ranked schools with similar merit. Paid only $40K/year. Had offer at T120 where cost was only $30K/year. Got all of that without us chasing merit---we didn't need it. Could have gone to 3 schools in-state (not the flagship but the next best 3) for less than $20K/year. Also, my kid attended college with some really smart kids---plenty of top students who chose to go somewhere with great merit, plenty of "strivers" as my kid would call them (my kid is a B's are excellent grades and C's get degrees mentality).

That kid has graduated, started a job at a great company 2 weeks after graduation and is excelling in their career one year in. First year raise was in the top 25% of first year employees. Not to shabby

C's get degrees?

Is this actually a thing??

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Funny you should ask this OP.

When I hit “submit payment” and a link to deduct $42,650 from our bank account last Tuesday- for ONE SEMESTER- I had the same thought. Who in their right mind really does this?

1) those with over $20MM in the bank, 2) those with paying grandpas

Nope. HHI $230, have been saving since the children were little (started with $210/month for maxium tax benefit, as our income went up we did a little but more, plus bonus money, etc). DC 1 got merit aid, so very inexpensive, will have funds leftover for grad school. DC 2, attending am over $80k per year private, will be a stretch for us, between 529 and cash flow - there will be nothing left for grad school, they will need to pay on their own.

And, we don't go abroad for vacation, drive 10+ year old cars until they die, etc). We've made education a priority

So that your kids can take budget vacations and drive beater cars while making education a priority for their kids too?

This is harsh but really worth talking about. how is paying $80K a year for school worth it in this scenario? Are you hoping that maybe your kid will break into the next income level and not repeat this cycle? The reality is that there is no guarantee that attending a $80k school will lead to ANY better income or standard of living than a $40k school.

it's just insanity that people like have fallen victim to the $80k trap. it's honestly really depressing.

Is an 80k school better than a 40k school? Who knows. It is is true often but not all the time that the 80k school may provide more pathways. The 40k school will also provide pathways.

Harvard and Iowa State are not the same. Harvard will provide more options and pathways. But Iowa State will provide some of that as well.

Does it matter which? Sure. Can either work? Sure.

The 80K only appears to provide better pathways. In reality, for the vast majority (excluding Low income/first gen who do get a slight bump from being at an elite school, but who also have disadvantages because it's harder to fit in), the pathways are created by the student and their work ethic/motivation/attitude towards life. Those kids would build similar pathways at any School, because it's the kid not the environment.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Funny you should ask this OP.

When I hit “submit payment” and a link to deduct $42,650 from our bank account last Tuesday- for ONE SEMESTER- I had the same thought. Who in their right mind really does this?

1) those with over $20MM in the bank, 2) those with paying grandpas

Nope. HHI $230, have been saving since the children were little (started with $210/month for maxium tax benefit, as our income went up we did a little but more, plus bonus money, etc). DC 1 got merit aid, so very inexpensive, will have funds leftover for grad school. DC 2, attending am over $80k per year private, will be a stretch for us, between 529 and cash flow - there will be nothing left for grad school, they will need to pay on their own.

And, we don't go abroad for vacation, drive 10+ year old cars until they die, etc). We've made education a priority

So that your kids can take budget vacations and drive beater cars while making education a priority for their kids too?

This is harsh but really worth talking about. how is paying $80K a year for school worth it in this scenario? Are you hoping that maybe your kid will break into the next income level and not repeat this cycle? The reality is that there is no guarantee that attending a $80k school will lead to ANY better income or standard of living than a $40k school.

it's just insanity that people like have fallen victim to the $80k trap. it's honestly really depressing.

Okay OP - you change it, and get back to us. We'll wait here......

Not OP. There are many of us that feel this way.

living a bare bones life for 20 years so your kid can attend a $80k school which guarantees nothing is depressing. Period.

I'm not rich by any means. I have enough in the 529 to send my kids to $80k schools. I don't feel like my life has been drab and bare bones for the past 20 years. I live in a good neighborhood, kids went to public schools, I've had three cars since 1997. We have very satisfactory family vacations. Maybe my expectations are low, but there's nothing I really want that I don't have.

"not rich"... what is your HHI, and will your parents leave you an inheritance?

Our HHI is $320K, and we could not afford $80k per year per child (2) on that income without impacting our plans for our retirement, our nice enough vacations, cars that need replacing (13 yrs old). We don't have any student loans, and our PITI is like $2300. No private school. We have a college fund for each child enough for a cheaper oos, but certainly not $80k/year. We get zero financial aid.

You currently bring home (after taxes) ~$16.5K/month. take out the PITI and you have ~$14K/month. Assuming you have enough saved for $40K/year for college, you should be able to cash flow the rest. Or you could have saved another $2-3K/month over the last 5-6 years for college.

What do you do with that $14K/month?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Funny you should ask this OP.

When I hit “submit payment” and a link to deduct $42,650 from our bank account last Tuesday- for ONE SEMESTER- I had the same thought. Who in their right mind really does this?

1) those with over $20MM in the bank, 2) those with paying grandpas

Nope. HHI $230, have been saving since the children were little (started with $210/month for maxium tax benefit, as our income went up we did a little but more, plus bonus money, etc). DC 1 got merit aid, so very inexpensive, will have funds leftover for grad school. DC 2, attending am over $80k per year private, will be a stretch for us, between 529 and cash flow - there will be nothing left for grad school, they will need to pay on their own.

And, we don't go abroad for vacation, drive 10+ year old cars until they die, etc). We've made education a priority

So that your kids can take budget vacations and drive beater cars while making education a priority for their kids too?

This is harsh but really worth talking about. how is paying $80K a year for school worth it in this scenario? Are you hoping that maybe your kid will break into the next income level and not repeat this cycle? The reality is that there is no guarantee that attending a $80k school will lead to ANY better income or standard of living than a $40k school.

it's just insanity that people like have fallen victim to the $80k trap. it's honestly really depressing.

Okay OP - you change it, and get back to us. We'll wait here......

wHat's to change? send your kids to schools you can afford. It's really simple. Look outside the T50 and there is plenty of merit for decent students, more for excellent students. (hint for excellent students there is merit within the T50, it does exist in the 25-50 range)

My 26ACT/3.4UW/no AP/"average kid" attended a T100 school with 35% merit award. They also had offers at 2 other similarly ranked schools with similar merit. Paid only $40K/year. Had offer at T120 where cost was only $30K/year. Got all of that without us chasing merit---we didn't need it. Could have gone to 3 schools in-state (not the flagship but the next best 3) for less than $20K/year. Also, my kid attended college with some really smart kids---plenty of top students who chose to go somewhere with great merit, plenty of "strivers" as my kid would call them (my kid is a B's are excellent grades and C's get degrees mentality).

That kid has graduated, started a job at a great company 2 weeks after graduation and is excelling in their career one year in. First year raise was in the top 25% of first year employees. Not to shabby

C's get degrees?

Is this actually a thing??

Yes--why not? Once you get your first job, nobody cares what your GPA was in college. Now, if you have a 2.5 gpa you may have trouble getting internships and getting that first job---you will have to work harder. But 1-2 years in, try switching jobs and what a company cares about is your references and what you do on the job. Nobody gives a shit about your grade in Accounting 101 or Business 300.

Point was my kid did decent in college, but did not stress if they did not have all As. They graduated with a 3.4 overall, and would have had a 3.5/3.6 had they started in their final major---freshman year in pre-med did a nice job of tanking their gpa. They had no internships due to covid. Yet they are at an excellent company with a 3.4 gpa, doing very well in their job and high achiever at the job. Nobody cares whether they got a 2.5 or a 3.5 or a 4.0 gpa in college---they care about what you do daily on the job.
And yes, they work with others who had lower gpas in college who are excellent employees.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Funny you should ask this OP.

When I hit “submit payment” and a link to deduct $42,650 from our bank account last Tuesday- for ONE SEMESTER- I had the same thought. Who in their right mind really does this?

1) those with over $20MM in the bank, 2) those with paying grandpas

Nope. HHI $230, have been saving since the children were little (started with $210/month for maxium tax benefit, as our income went up we did a little but more, plus bonus money, etc). DC 1 got merit aid, so very inexpensive, will have funds leftover for grad school. DC 2, attending am over $80k per year private, will be a stretch for us, between 529 and cash flow - there will be nothing left for grad school, they will need to pay on their own.

And, we don't go abroad for vacation, drive 10+ year old cars until they die, etc). We've made education a priority

So that your kids can take budget vacations and drive beater cars while making education a priority for their kids too?

This is harsh but really worth talking about. how is paying $80K a year for school worth it in this scenario? Are you hoping that maybe your kid will break into the next income level and not repeat this cycle? The reality is that there is no guarantee that attending a $80k school will lead to ANY better income or standard of living than a $40k school.

it's just insanity that people like have fallen victim to the $80k trap. it's honestly really depressing.

Okay OP - you change it, and get back to us. We'll wait here......

Not OP. There are many of us that feel this way.

living a bare bones life for 20 years so your kid can attend a $80k school which guarantees nothing is depressing. Period.

I'm not rich by any means. I have enough in the 529 to send my kids to $80k schools. I don't feel like my life has been drab and bare bones for the past 20 years. I live in a good neighborhood, kids went to public schools, I've had three cars since 1997. We have very satisfactory family vacations. Maybe my expectations are low, but there's nothing I really want that I don't have.

"not rich"... what is your HHI, and will your parents leave you an inheritance?

Our HHI is $320K, and we could not afford $80k per year per child (2) on that income without impacting our plans for our retirement, our nice enough vacations, cars that need replacing (13 yrs old). We don't have any student loans, and our PITI is like $2300. No private school. We have a college fund for each child enough for a cheaper oos, but certainly not $80k/year. We get zero financial aid.

You currently bring home (after taxes) ~$16.5K/month. take out the PITI and you have ~$14K/month. Assuming you have enough saved for $40K/year for college, you should be able to cash flow the rest. Or you could have saved another $2-3K/month over the last 5-6 years for college.

What do you do with that $14K/month?

You assume that because you don't know our expenses.

1. we are self employed so we have to pay self employment taxes

2. we have to buy our own health insurance, which is really expensive, with a high deductible plan. We probably spend $20K per year on healthcare.

3. we don't have a company contributing to our 401k. That's just all us. I've also been helping my elderly parents with finances.

4. we have been saving $15k/year for college for the past few years.

So, after all that our take home is less than $14k. But, FAFSA doesn't seem to care about any of that. We applied and got zero FA. Luckily, DC got merit aid.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Funny you should ask this OP.

When I hit “submit payment” and a link to deduct $42,650 from our bank account last Tuesday- for ONE SEMESTER- I had the same thought. Who in their right mind really does this?

1) those with over $20MM in the bank, 2) those with paying grandpas

Nope. HHI $230, have been saving since the children were little (started with $210/month for maxium tax benefit, as our income went up we did a little but more, plus bonus money, etc). DC 1 got merit aid, so very inexpensive, will have funds leftover for grad school. DC 2, attending am over $80k per year private, will be a stretch for us, between 529 and cash flow - there will be nothing left for grad school, they will need to pay on their own.

And, we don't go abroad for vacation, drive 10+ year old cars until they die, etc). We've made education a priority

I don't care about cars, so that's a wash, but I can't understand not taking your kids to Europe over 18 years etc and then changing gears and paying 4k a week to a college who won' know your name. the whiplash is too extreme. education may be a priority , but going to Rome is educational too.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Funny you should ask this OP.

When I hit “submit payment” and a link to deduct $42,650 from our bank account last Tuesday- for ONE SEMESTER- I had the same thought. Who in their right mind really does this?

1) those with over $20MM in the bank, 2) those with paying grandpas

Nope. HHI $230, have been saving since the children were little (started with $210/month for maxium tax benefit, as our income went up we did a little but more, plus bonus money, etc). DC 1 got merit aid, so very inexpensive, will have funds leftover for grad school. DC 2, attending am over $80k per year private, will be a stretch for us, between 529 and cash flow - there will be nothing left for grad school, they will need to pay on their own.

And, we don't go abroad for vacation, drive 10+ year old cars until they die, etc). We've made education a priority

So that your kids can take budget vacations and drive beater cars while making education a priority for their kids too?

This is harsh but really worth talking about. how is paying $80K a year for school worth it in this scenario? Are you hoping that maybe your kid will break into the next income level and not repeat this cycle? The reality is that there is no guarantee that attending a $80k school will lead to ANY better income or standard of living than a $40k school.

it's just insanity that people like have fallen victim to the $80k trap. it's honestly really depressing.

Okay OP - you change it, and get back to us. We'll wait here......

wHat's to change? send your kids to schools you can afford. It's really simple. Look outside the T50 and there is plenty of merit for decent students, more for excellent students. (hint for excellent students there is merit within the T50, it does exist in the 25-50 range)

My 26ACT/3.4UW/no AP/"average kid" attended a T100 school with 35% merit award. They also had offers at 2 other similarly ranked schools with similar merit. Paid only $40K/year. Had offer at T120 where cost was only $30K/year. Got all of that without us chasing merit---we didn't need it. Could have gone to 3 schools in-state (not the flagship but the next best 3) for less than $20K/year. Also, my kid attended college with some really smart kids---plenty of top students who chose to go somewhere with great merit, plenty of "strivers" as my kid would call them (my kid is a B's are excellent grades and C's get degrees mentality).

That kid has graduated, started a job at a great company 2 weeks after graduation and is excelling in their career one year in. First year raise was in the top 25% of first year employees. Not to shabby

C's get degrees?

Is this actually a thing??

Yes--why not? Once you get your first job, nobody cares what your GPA was in college. Now, if you have a 2.5 gpa you may have trouble getting internships and getting that first job---you will have to work harder. But 1-2 years in, try switching jobs and what a company cares about is your references and what you do on the job. Nobody gives a shit about your grade in Accounting 101 or Business 300.

Point was my kid did decent in college, but did not stress if they did not have all As. They graduated with a 3.4 overall, and would have had a 3.5/3.6 had they started in their final major---freshman year in pre-med did a nice job of tanking their gpa. They had no internships due to covid. Yet they are at an excellent company with a 3.4 gpa, doing very well in their job and high achiever at the job. Nobody cares whether they got a 2.5 or a 3.5 or a 4.0 gpa in college---they care about what you do daily on the job.
And yes, they work with others who had lower gpas in college who are excellent employees.

Seems C's at Harvard would be very different than C's at a college 2+ tiers down, at least at my company.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Funny you should ask this OP.

When I hit “submit payment” and a link to deduct $42,650 from our bank account last Tuesday- for ONE SEMESTER- I had the same thought. Who in their right mind really does this?

1) those with over $20MM in the bank, 2) those with paying grandpas

Nope. HHI $230, have been saving since the children were little (started with $210/month for maxium tax benefit, as our income went up we did a little but more, plus bonus money, etc). DC 1 got merit aid, so very inexpensive, will have funds leftover for grad school. DC 2, attending am over $80k per year private, will be a stretch for us, between 529 and cash flow - there will be nothing left for grad school, they will need to pay on their own.

And, we don't go abroad for vacation, drive 10+ year old cars until they die, etc). We've made education a priority

So that your kids can take budget vacations and drive beater cars while making education a priority for their kids too?

I don't think this will be possibly in 25 years unless the entire college system falls apart and is put back together. People here are just barely able to afford doing what this person describes .. saving and scrimping for 18 years to pay for private school. But tuition is outpacing earnings by a lot. UMC won't have a chance.

So what if they do? DP here. They are not trying to keep up with the likes of you, and that is what is important.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm realizing that the top 50 or so schools are all about $80K+ and none of them offer merit aid, outside of maybe CWRU.
The rest have 20-50 full-ride scholarships for their most elite students but that's pretty much it for merit aid.
Then of course there is UVA and W&M which are instate. And UMD which is ranked just above 50.
We've in DC so none of these in-states are particularly relevant.


So all this constant chatter about this or that top50 school----are you all paying the $80K/+year sticker price(s)?

College is around the corner for us and I'm realizing that yes indeed, they're all about that much. Guess I knew that in theory but it's another thing
entirely to think "huh, they're asking $360K for undergrad. Are we really going to pay it?"
Sobering.
Are people really paying it?

Our kids declined their top choices from T10 colleges and attended T25 colleges where they got half tuition merit scholarships. We just couldn't swing four years of almost $100K for each child. However, we are aware that we got luck with merit money, otherwise could've sold our rental property or pulled money out of retirement or primary residence. We could've been luckier if our kids took full rides to state schools but we felt it would be unfair to push them as only reason they aren't getting need based aid is because of us. If we hadn't worked hard and spent money instead of being frugal, they would've been eligible for aid.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Funny you should ask this OP.

When I hit “submit payment” and a link to deduct $42,650 from our bank account last Tuesday- for ONE SEMESTER- I had the same thought. Who in their right mind really does this?

1) those with over $20MM in the bank, 2) those with paying grandpas

Nope. HHI $230, have been saving since the children were little (started with $210/month for maxium tax benefit, as our income went up we did a little but more, plus bonus money, etc). DC 1 got merit aid, so very inexpensive, will have funds leftover for grad school. DC 2, attending am over $80k per year private, will be a stretch for us, between 529 and cash flow - there will be nothing left for grad school, they will need to pay on their own.

And, we don't go abroad for vacation, drive 10+ year old cars until they die, etc). We've made education a priority

So that your kids can take budget vacations and drive beater cars while making education a priority for their kids too?

This is harsh but really worth talking about. how is paying $80K a year for school worth it in this scenario? Are you hoping that maybe your kid will break into the next income level and not repeat this cycle? The reality is that there is no guarantee that attending a $80k school will lead to ANY better income or standard of living than a $40k school.

it's just insanity that people like have fallen victim to the $80k trap. it's honestly really depressing.

Is an 80k school better than a 40k school? Who knows. It is is true often but not all the time that the 80k school may provide more pathways. The 40k school will also provide pathways.

Harvard and Iowa State are not the same. Harvard will provide more options and pathways. But Iowa State will provide some of that as well.

Does it matter which? Sure. Can either work? Sure.

More pathways to WHAT? Kids from Iowa have great jobs too, I hate to inform people here.

[Anonymous]

To be honest, it would be better for all of you to send them wherever they get merit scholarships. You should save your money and spend it on their grad/professional schools so they can graduate without any debt.

[Anonymous]

I think people who don't go to Europe for 20 years so their kids can go to Middlebury are the parents who care THE MOST about the bumper sticker. I don't find it inspirational.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Yes. We the DCUMers are the full-pay class. Most of us who actually will do it have been saving for years in 529s in addition to having high incomes.

Of course other people do blink and make their kids do something else, including state school or even community college -> state school.

Speak for yourself. We don’t have it but their grandparents do so no student loans. I’m surprised at some of the people I know who had to take out loans. Everyone’s situation is different.

[Anonymous]

I think I would have bought into the whole full pay thing if I didn't work in HR. But I do and on the daily I see a dozen resumes from Ivy League grads that would make you weep (in despair), especially the humanities majors. As an English major myself, I hate that this is true. But you can pull up tables. Humanities grads coming out of HYP making 45k.

You're an engineer? It doesn't matter where you went. Save your money.

You're an enlglish/history etc major? It doesn't much matter, and you should save that money for a downpayment. Working in a lower income profession is 100% fine, but doing so while owning a home will be a lot better for your mental health and allow you to do what you love.

You end up in some kind of sales, like most people. It really doesn't matter.

Science? Doesn't matter.

Law school or med school? Undergrad doesn't matter.

Arts? Doesn't matter.

And trade or skill, pilot, etc? Of course it doesn't matter. Not usually even offered.

In almost every area, studies show it pays to be a bigger fish in a smaller pond. Your kid would be better off, financially, at a lower ranked school.

It does matter in a small world of front facing professions only when the clients thinks it's matters. So .. consulting, some IB/finance.

You're raising a kid that you dream ends up at McKinsey? Hmm .. okay. Then you should pay up to make that happen.