$80K+ tuition

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:For med school admissions, probably he'll be better off in a premed undergrad where he is in top 10% of his cohort, not somewhere he is in bottom 10%.

+1

Why do people not understand that? It's much easier to get a high gpa when you are top of the class. Also much easier to get to know professors and do meaningful research when you are top of the class/honors program. You will get better recommendations when you are the bright star standing out. You will also likely have more time to study for MCATs if undergrad is slightly less stressful academically. And ultimately GPA, MCATS and recommendations/clinicals/research is what matters, where you attend undergrad really doesn't factor into the equation

[Anonymous]

I have a 12th grader and for our family the answer is yes.
Why? My child is still recovering from education disruption and I believe the tuition is an investment in their growth. What am I buying with $80K+ a year that is not available for my child at a lower cost? My child got into a reach school so there is some prestige for them. The school checks the boxes for what my child wanted - location, ability to play sport, program, diversity of school.

What will be the financial ROI? It will probably be negative? Do I believe that this college is a place that might just be a little easier to connect and create a community for my child? Yes - and for me this is like the MasterCard commercial - priceless.

[Anonymous]

I have a 12th grader and for our family the answer is yes.
Why? My child is still recovering from education disruption and I believe the tuition is an investment in their growth. What am I buying with $80K+ a year that is not available for my child at a lower cost? My child got into a reach school so there is some prestige for them. The school checks the boxes for what my child wanted - location, ability to play sport, program, diversity of school.

What will be the financial ROI? It will probably be negative? Do I believe that this college is a place that might just be a little easier to connect and create a community for my child? Yes - and for me this is like the MasterCard commercial - priceless.

That's nice, but not everyone can afford 80K a year.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I have a 12th grader and for our family the answer is yes.
Why? My child is still recovering from education disruption and I believe the tuition is an investment in their growth. What am I buying with $80K+ a year that is not available for my child at a lower cost? My child got into a reach school so there is some prestige for them. The school checks the boxes for what my child wanted - location, ability to play sport, program, diversity of school.

What will be the financial ROI? It will probably be negative? Do I believe that this college is a place that might just be a little easier to connect and create a community for my child? Yes - and for me this is like the MasterCard commercial - priceless.

But how much debt will you and your kid have after the 4 years? Genuinely curious.

I personally do think many schools are worth it. But we have fully saved and could cash flow easily without a 529 (Our EFC is 7 figures....so $85K/year is just a blip on our finances).

However, I wouldn't go into more than $40-50K debt for undergrad. It's just not worth the debt, especially when med/law/some profession school that costs $200K+ is on the horizon

[Anonymous]

not worth it. better for kid to inherit the delta between the middling private school and a public school with interest compounded over time. no one cares about the no name privates. if you are phenomenally wealthy, it's a different story.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:not worth it. better for kid to inherit the delta between the middling private school and a public school with interest compounded over time. no one cares about the no name privates. if you are phenomenally wealthy, it's a different story.

I lean this way too. But is it really true that a kid from Roanoke College has the same opportunity to get into med/PA/Law/PT/Dental/Pharm school as a kid from BU/Villanova/Cornell/Colgate/Ivies?
And I'm not trashing Roanoke (which is why I hate the "name the schools" comments on here and the college board) but I think most on here would argue that it is a diff tier school than the others.

You think the grad school AO's REALLY don't care about that????

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Depends on the school and the kid but yes, can definitely be worth it. DH and I met at MIT. For two regular middle class kids, the education, network and brand of the school profoundly changed our lives. I had full ride opportunities at other good schools so it was a huge sacrifice for my parents (who have never made more than 200K HHI in a very expensive California coastal region) to pay out of pocket for at the time. But now 15 years later, we all agree it was worth it.

Um, your family was not middle class.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Our 2 kids are at SLACs that are 82-84k/yr and we wouldn’t change a thing. Saved and sacrificed and funded 529s so they could have the same incredible education we had. IYKYK. If you don’t, you will surely think it’s not worth it.

I think if you have the funds to pay cash, that's a valid choice. If you have to borrow, it's a different calculation.

I would say you're really not in a position to say your "incredible" education is superior to what you would have received at a more affordable state school. I get you have some confirmation bias to rationalize your choice, and I'm happy for you that you had a good experience. But the insinuation that it was superior to someone else's is really ridiculous. As you point out, IYKYK - and you don't know what the more affordable experience was like. For all you know, it was equivalent or better, and you just overpaid for your "incredible" experience.

+1

Or for that matter, superior to what the experience at a lower-ranked LAC with merit aid would have been.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Is it worth it vs. a no name school (like waaaaaaay down the USNWR tiers)? For a name brand school, not ivy (I'm leaving those out of this as people get irrational about ivies). Kid was admitted.

For a pre-grad school track (med or other health path) where you'll likely have $300K plus tuition on the line. 529 won't cover all of that, not even close. Does the school matter? Does the "Brand" help grad admissions? What is it I'm buying for that $50K delta in tuition?

I hate to have kid say no b/c of money but . . . posting in money b/c it's about the money. But the college name is relevant too, I guess.

NO, it's not. My own SLAC (once had a great reputation but no longer - went woke dei and destroyed the college's fiber) is NOT WORTH $86K a year. Be sensible people? Just because a college can ask that figure does not mean that it is a sensible financial decision!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Depends on the school and the kid but yes, can definitely be worth it. DH and I met at MIT. For two regular middle class kids, the education, network and brand of the school profoundly changed our lives. I had full ride opportunities at other good schools so it was a huge sacrifice for my parents (who have never made more than 200K HHI in a very expensive California coastal region) to pay out of pocket for at the time. But now 15 years later, we all agree it was worth it.

Why wouldn’t you just take the full ride at another good school, pocket and invest the tuition savings, and then get a Ph.D., S.M., or other graduate degree from MIT? This is what most smart people do. If you’re good enough to get accepted as an undergraduate, you should be good enough to get a fully covered graduate degree as well. Then, you have a more useful and prestigious degree from MIT as well as hundreds of thousands in tuition savings.

Anyone smart enough to get into MIT would be smart enough to perform this very straightforward analysis.

Especially since PP lived in coastal California and could have easily gone to Berkeley for a fraction of the cost of MIT. And then still gone to MIT for free as a grad student. What a dummy.

I don't agree with this statement obviously the poster is sharing real life experience and where you go to college matters and give you opportunity that is not available in other colleges. Paying the difference tuition might be worth.

The problem is you never really know for any one individual situation. The research looking at large groups of people indicates that the big brand-name school can make a difference for URM/1st gen students but doesn't really matter for others.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:For med school admissions, probably he'll be better off in a premed undergrad where he is in top 10% of his cohort, not somewhere he is in bottom 10%.

+1

Why do people not understand that? It's much easier to get a high gpa when you are top of the class. Also much easier to get to know professors and do meaningful research when you are top of the class/honors program. You will get better recommendations when you are the bright star standing out. You will also likely have more time to study for MCATs if undergrad is slightly less stressful academically. And ultimately GPA, MCATS and recommendations/clinicals/research is what matters, where you attend undergrad really doesn't factor into the equation

+2 My good friend's husband is an Ivy grad and a doctor. One of their kids wanted to work in investment banking and they paid full price for him to go to the Ivy (same as dad) because for IB that matters (he's now graduated and does in fact work in IB). Other kid wants to be a doctor. That one goes to a good, lower cost state university, not a flagship but a smaller, more undergrad focused college where she can get good experience, rank highly in the class, have good faculty relationships, research experience, etc. Then the parents will pay for medical school.

What matters for most about the college choice is what you can DO at the school, not the specific name. Which, I think really is the case generally outside of a small number of fields like IB/big consulting.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Is it worth it vs. a no name school (like waaaaaaay down the USNWR tiers)? For a name brand school, not ivy (I'm leaving those out of this as people get irrational about ivies). Kid was admitted.

For a pre-grad school track (med or other health path) where you'll likely have $300K plus tuition on the line. 529 won't cover all of that, not even close. Does the school matter? Does the "Brand" help grad admissions? What is it I'm buying for that $50K delta in tuition?

I hate to have kid say no b/c of money but . . . posting in money b/c it's about the money. But the college name is relevant too, I guess.

NO, it's not. My own SLAC (once had a great reputation but no longer - went woke dei and destroyed the college's fiber) is NOT WORTH $86K a year. Be sensible people? Just because a college can ask that figure does not mean that it is a sensible financial decision!

You are raising different, and highly charged, political opinions. And those are not relevant to this discussion. You're opinion is noted but really outside the discussion.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Depends on the school and the kid but yes, can definitely be worth it. DH and I met at MIT. For two regular middle class kids, the education, network and brand of the school profoundly changed our lives. I had full ride opportunities at other good schools so it was a huge sacrifice for my parents (who have never made more than 200K HHI in a very expensive California coastal region) to pay out of pocket for at the time. But now 15 years later, we all agree it was worth it.

Um, your family was not middle class.

Yup, 200K even in Expensive CA 15 years ago was NOT MC.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Depends on the school and the kid but yes, can definitely be worth it. DH and I met at MIT. For two regular middle class kids, the education, network and brand of the school profoundly changed our lives. I had full ride opportunities at other good schools so it was a huge sacrifice for my parents (who have never made more than 200K HHI in a very expensive California coastal region) to pay out of pocket for at the time. But now 15 years later, we all agree it was worth it.

Why wouldn’t you just take the full ride at another good school, pocket and invest the tuition savings, and then get a Ph.D., S.M., or other graduate degree from MIT? This is what most smart people do. If you’re good enough to get accepted as an undergraduate, you should be good enough to get a fully covered graduate degree as well. Then, you have a more useful and prestigious degree from MIT as well as hundreds of thousands in tuition savings.

Anyone smart enough to get into MIT would be smart enough to perform this very straightforward analysis.

Especially since PP lived in coastal California and could have easily gone to Berkeley for a fraction of the cost of MIT. And then still gone to MIT for free as a grad student. What a dummy.

I don't agree with this statement obviously the poster is sharing real life experience and where you go to college matters and give you opportunity that is not available in other colleges. Paying the difference tuition might be worth.

The problem is you never really know for any one individual situation. The research looking at large groups of people indicates that the big brand-name school can make a difference for URM/1st gen students but doesn't really matter for others.

This is exactly right! And the students who benefit the most are typically NOT paying fully price (most URM/1st gen who will benefit are not---sure you can be URM and have a lawyer and doctor for parents, but you are not in the targeted group for benefiting, you already are steps ahead in life)

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:For med school admissions, probably he'll be better off in a premed undergrad where he is in top 10% of his cohort, not somewhere he is in bottom 10%.

+1

Why do people not understand that? It's much easier to get a high gpa when you are top of the class. Also much easier to get to know professors and do meaningful research when you are top of the class/honors program. You will get better recommendations when you are the bright star standing out. You will also likely have more time to study for MCATs if undergrad is slightly less stressful academically. And ultimately GPA, MCATS and recommendations/clinicals/research is what matters, where you attend undergrad really doesn't factor into the equation

+2 My good friend's husband is an Ivy grad and a doctor. One of their kids wanted to work in investment banking and they paid full price for him to go to the Ivy (same as dad) because for IB that matters (he's now graduated and does in fact work in IB). Other kid wants to be a doctor. That one goes to a good, lower cost state university, not a flagship but a smaller, more undergrad focused college where she can get good experience, rank highly in the class, have good faculty relationships, research experience, etc. Then the parents will pay for medical school.

What matters for most about the college choice is what you can DO at the school, not the specific name. Which, I think really is the case generally outside of a small number of fields like IB/big consulting.

BINGO! Last paragraph is so true!