Is any undergrad college/university worth $55,000+?

[Anonymous]

It's now more realistically $62,000 per year and that must be paid with pre-tax money which makes it $124,000 per year per child, which allowing for two children requires you to make $228,000 more per child per year and allowing for the now average of five years per child per SLAC means you have to $1,143,000 to send two kids to your SLAC - which, personally, I don't think mine is worth it. So we are going state and then sayving for grad school. Maybe I'd do it for HYP (I went to grad school at one of them ) but for my SLAC? hell no.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous



Discrimination based on race is wrong. Should that even be debatable?

But I understand why the beneficiaries of affirmative action continue to dream up bizarre justifications for discrimination.

Who says its affirmative action? In Va the AA population in 20%. I am more upset about the legacy admissions. In many case the minority students do not have the lowest test scores at the school, it the legacies. Look at the stats, it's like 6% are AA. So all the AA students at a school like UVa (what 850ish out of a class of 14,000) are there b/c there is an affirmative action program? Please! Even if it was true, you are talking about the last 6% of the class. Those students are like the last 4 teams(4/68=0.06) selected in the NCAA basket tournament. Get better test scores and you will not be on the bubble.

[Anonymous]

No. Not unless you have all the money you will need for retirement and future health care costs put away, your housing is almost paid off and you have this money just sitting there in the bank waiting to be spent. That is about 1% of the population. My dc wants to go to the private college I went to. It is a top 25 or 30 or so school. I told my dc that I was sorry but I did not think the value of the school was better than our state university. I was a financial aid kid. Now we would have to pay 100% and we could not afford that and retirement also. Sad but true. Just trying to be realistic. There is no more "we can pay $240,000 just so you can have a good time at college"

[Anonymous]

Pp here. Besides we have 3 dc so that would be $750,000+. that is way too much money.

[Anonymous]

It's now more realistically $62,000 per year and that must be paid with pre-tax money which makes it $124,000 per year per child, which allowing for two children requires you to make $228,000 more per child per year and allowing for the now average of five years per child per SLAC means you have to $1,143,000 to send two kids to your SLAC - which, personally, I don't think mine is worth it. So we are going state and then sayving for grad school. Maybe I'd do it for HYP (I went to grad school at one of them ) but for my SLAC? hell no.

While I agree that it is a huge amount of money to send your kids to private colleges regardless, and a lot of upper middle class folks on this board won't qualify for financial aid, I do think there are a few nuances missed from this calculation. First of all, the difference between the sticker price and the actual price. If you have several dependents in your family, particularly if you have two kids in college at the same time, even at higher incomes there might be some financial aid. Second of all, most high income families who really value education start 529s when their kids are small, taking advantage of compound interest, and tax-defferment, so it's not like you are paying it all out of a single year's salary.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

It's now more realistically $62,000 per year and that must be paid with pre-tax money which makes it $124,000 per year per child, which allowing for two children requires you to make $228,000 more per child per year and allowing for the now average of five years per child per SLAC means you have to $1,143,000 to send two kids to your SLAC - which, personally, I don't think mine is worth it. So we are going state and then sayving for grad school. Maybe I'd do it for HYP (I went to grad school at one of them ) but for my SLAC? hell no.

While I agree that it is a huge amount of money to send your kids to private colleges regardless, and a lot of upper middle class folks on this board won't qualify for financial aid, I do think there are a few nuances missed from this calculation. First of all, the difference between the sticker price and the actual price. If you have several dependents in your family, particularly if you have two kids in college at the same time, even at higher incomes there might be some financial aid. Second of all, most high income families who really value education start 529s when their kids are small, taking advantage of compound interest, and tax-defferment, so it's not like you are paying it all out of a single year's salary.

Yes but the problem for many upper middle class families is that when the kids were little they were not making what they are now and then you get hit with the high cost of housing and now you are playing catch up for college. Let's see. A few hundred bucks a month when kids are small does not add up to $240000.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous



Discrimination based on race is wrong. Should that even be debatable?

But I understand why the beneficiaries of affirmative action continue to dream up bizarre justifications for discrimination.

Who says its affirmative action? In Va the AA population in 20%. I am more upset about the legacy admissions. In many case the minority students do not have the lowest test scores at the school, it the legacies. Look at the stats, it's like 6% are AA. So all the AA students at a school like UVa (what 850ish out of a class of 14,000) are there b/c there is an affirmative action program? Please! Even if it was true, you are talking about the last 6% of the class. Those students are like the last 4 teams(4/68=0.06) selected in the NCAA basket tournament. Get better test scores and you will not be on the bubble.

Giving legacy status favored treatment is just good business, it is not unconstitutional discrimination.

[Anonymous]

Yes but the problem for many upper middle class families is that when the kids were little they were not making what they are now and then you get hit with the high cost of housing and now you are playing catch up for college. Let's see. A few hundred bucks a month when kids are small does not add up to $240000.

Yeah, but if you plug 200 dollars a month for 18 years into a 529 calculator, that comes out to be ~100K for college--less than half the total full price cost, but still a pretty large dent and would cover over a year and a half of tuition, room and board. And if you started to contribute more as your income increased, presumably it would make an even larger dent.

[Anonymous]

You do not have to live on campus. Campus living costs about half of college fees.
That alone is a huge saving. So what if you do not get the 'experience', you are there for the education

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Discrimination based on race is wrong. Should that even be debatable?

But I understand why the beneficiaries of affirmative action continue to dream up bizarre justifications for discrimination.

So what excuse do you use for a minority with a 4.0 and 2300 on the SAT? You better believe they are substantial. HYP is not admitting ANYONE with substandard grades and can't handle the work.

2300 is solid, but below the top quartile of kids going to HYP. 4.0 weighted or unweighted? from which high school? These scores are competitive, but not a lock for HYP.

Nor is a 2400 with a 4.0 with AP courses up the whazoo from a highly rated exclusive private school with ECs pouring out your ears is a lock for HYP either.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous



Discrimination based on race is wrong. Should that even be debatable?

But I understand why the beneficiaries of affirmative action continue to dream up bizarre justifications for discrimination.

Who says its affirmative action? In Va the AA population in 20%. I am more upset about the legacy admissions. In many case the minority students do not have the lowest test scores at the school, it the legacies. Look at the stats, it's like 6% are AA. So all the AA students at a school like UVa (what 850ish out of a class of 14,000) are there b/c there is an affirmative action program? Please! Even if it was true, you are talking about the last 6% of the class. Those students are like the last 4 teams(4/68=0.06) selected in the NCAA basket tournament. Get better test scores and you will not be on the bubble.

Giving legacy status favored treatment is just good business, it is not unconstitutional discrimination.

Yep, C student George W. Bush would agree with you.

[Anonymous]

I don't have a problem with legacy preferences or preferences for recruited athletes, but to the extent these preferences have become excuses to perpetuate race based discrimination (affirmative action), I'd say scrap them. A study of three selective private research universities in the United States showed the following effects (admissions disadvantage and advantage in terms of SAT points on the old 1600-point scale):

Blacks: +230
Hispanics: +185
Asians: -50
Recruited athletes: +200
Legacies (children of alumni): +160

[Anonymous]

Parent of white child without any athletic or legacy hooks here. I am fully supportive of efforts by public and private colleges and universities to diversify their student bodies. The idea that white students face discrimination in admission to higher education is laughable.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Parent of white child without any athletic or legacy hooks here. I am fully supportive of efforts by public and private colleges and universities to diversify their student bodies. The idea that white students face discrimination in admission to higher education is laughable.

You don't understand "affirmative action" - preferences based on race = racial discrimination. Support it if you like, defend it if you will, but you can't deny what it is.

[Anonymous]

OP, are you starting with the assumption that $20K a year for in-state tuition at a public is worth it? In that case, you're really talking about whether the extra $30K is worth it -- the important thing is the extra, not the total.

And if my kids want to go someplace where the teaching staff is tenure track professors rather than exploited adjuncts, plus the sort of student:faculty ratio that leads to individual attention -- not to coddle, but to push -- then yes, it is worth it to me.

I think it really depends what your financial situation is. If you have an extra $30k per year lying around, then by all means it's worth it. But if you have to take out $30K in loans per year, or forego retirement saving, etc etc etc then yes, you can question whether it is worth it.