Rice tuition announcement

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I would prefer fewer gimmicks and more thinking about why tuition is so high and what we can do about it.

Our income is such that there is no financial aid for us. That doesn't mean 70k per year is affordable. We had our son late, had some career changes along the way and have some health issues. We expect graduate school in our son's future.

Where will the money come from for this plan? Raising tuition on people like me.

+ a million

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I would prefer fewer gimmicks and more thinking about why tuition is so high and what we can do about it.

Our income is such that there is no financial aid for us. That doesn't mean 70k per year is affordable. We had our son late, had some career changes along the way and have some health issues. We expect graduate school in our son's future.

Where will the money come from for this plan? Raising tuition on people like me.

+ a million

Did either of you even read this thread before commenting? The money for this plan does not come from full pay people. It comes from the big pot of Texas oil money and other funds in Rice's very large endowment. If it drives you insane that people who are less wealthy than you might pay less to attend the school, just don't have your kid apply to Rice, or the Ivies, or other generous ones like Bowdoin, Amherst, or Pomona.

If your kids are actually academically talented enough to get in to any of those schools, then they will be able to get merit aid at public schools or private ones that are stingier with financial aid, so there is zero reason for you to feel bitter.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I would prefer fewer gimmicks and more thinking about why tuition is so high and what we can do about it.

Our income is such that there is no financial aid for us. That doesn't mean 70k per year is affordable. We had our son late, had some career changes along the way and have some health issues. We expect graduate school in our son's future.

Where will the money come from for this plan? Raising tuition on people like me.

+ a million

Did either of you even read this thread before commenting? The money for this plan does not come from full pay people. It comes from the big pot of Texas oil money and other funds in Rice's very large endowment. If it drives you insane that people who are less wealthy than you might pay less to attend the school, just don't have your kid apply to Rice, or the Ivies, or other generous ones like Bowdoin, Amherst, or Pomona.

If your kids are actually academically talented enough to get in to any of those schools, then they will be able to get merit aid at public schools or private ones that are stingier with financial aid, so there is zero reason for you to feel bitter.

The only person who is bitter is you.

PP above shared some very reasonable preferences, essentially saying she'd like the US admissions process to resemble that of most colleges in any other developed country.

If you think that's bitter, that says a lot about your incapacity for debate.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I would prefer fewer gimmicks and more thinking about why tuition is so high and what we can do about it.

Our income is such that there is no financial aid for us. That doesn't mean 70k per year is affordable. We had our son late, had some career changes along the way and have some health issues. We expect graduate school in our son's future.

Where will the money come from for this plan? Raising tuition on people like me.

+ a million

Did either of you even read this thread before commenting? The money for this plan does not come from full pay people. It comes from the big pot of Texas oil money and other funds in Rice's very large endowment. If it drives you insane that people who are less wealthy than you might pay less to attend the school, just don't have your kid apply to Rice, or the Ivies, or other generous ones like Bowdoin, Amherst, or Pomona.

If your kids are actually academically talented enough to get in to any of those schools, then they will be able to get merit aid at public schools or private ones that are stingier with financial aid, so there is zero reason for you to feel bitter.

The only person who is bitter is you.

PP above shared some very reasonable preferences, essentially saying she'd like the US admissions process to resemble that of most colleges in any other developed country.

If you think that's bitter, that says a lot about your incapacity for debate.

The PP you are referencing said nothing about admissions. At all.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Honestly all of this conversation about how I saved and others didn't is just a narrative that people want to keep spreading to keep poor people out of these selective schools. Thankfully schools like Rice are onto this and they know full well like other schools that if this country doesn't get all of its populations (URM, poor, immigrant) participating in our economy to their fullest potential, we as a country are DOOMED. Higher ed is a part of that equation.

If you make a decision that you want to save and pay full freight great. Just do it. What does that decision have to do with anyone else's situation? Be happy you have $2M in assets and move on with your life.

If you understand the economics around college costs you would know that you aren't paying the full cost of tuition at these private schools anyway. That's why schools have endowments and they can do what they want with them.

Listen I get what people are saying. They are not trying to bring URM's down. I think the whole point is accountability. If we continue to give debt relief, tax breaks, financial aid, and other things, it is basically teaching people they do not have to be accountable to save for things or strive to do better. My sister's family makes $150K and have back tax issues. It is ridiculous. They were given so much financial aid for college because of it too. I get that it is not fair to punish the child, but we make far less and had to pay so much more because we created a 529 and saved up for years for it.

Most people have very little finance skills. It needs to become a mandatory class in high school. This spend everything mentality and ask for help later is just insane

[Anonymous]

Other developed countries treat college like a public good and provide support for universities so they are not tuition dependent. In the US, states have been steadily withdrawing support from schools and Feds focus on giving their support to students (Pell grants, subsidized loans) rather than to schools. BUt as a whole, the US higher ed system has long been a leader in the world and drives a lot of scientific, technological and cultural innovation in addition to providing education. Businesses should also be subsidizing universities because a lot of them build on the innovations they share freely.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Honestly all of this conversation about how I saved and others didn't is just a narrative that people want to keep spreading to keep poor people out of these selective schools. Thankfully schools like Rice are onto this and they know full well like other schools that if this country doesn't get all of its populations (URM, poor, immigrant) participating in our economy to their fullest potential, we as a country are DOOMED. Higher ed is a part of that equation.

If you make a decision that you want to save and pay full freight great. Just do it. What does that decision have to do with anyone else's situation? Be happy you have $2M in assets and move on with your life.

If you understand the economics around college costs you would know that you aren't paying the full cost of tuition at these private schools anyway. That's why schools have endowments and they can do what they want with them.

Listen I get what people are saying. They are not trying to bring URM's down. I think the whole point is accountability. If we continue to give debt relief, tax breaks, financial aid, and other things, it is basically teaching people they do not have to be accountable to save for things or strive to do better. My sister's family makes $150K and have back tax issues. It is ridiculous. They were given so much financial aid for college because of it too. I get that it is not fair to punish the child, but we make far less and had to pay so much more because we created a 529 and saved up for years for it.

Most people have very little finance skills. It needs to become a mandatory class in high school. This spend everything mentality and ask for help later is just insane

I assume you got a tax break for your 529? Did that teach you a bad lesson?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
Other developed countries treat college like a public good and provide support for universities so they are not tuition dependent. In the US, states have been steadily withdrawing support from schools and Feds focus on giving their support to students (Pell grants, subsidized loans) rather than to schools. BUt as a whole, the US higher ed system has long been a leader in the world and drives a lot of scientific, technological and cultural innovation in addition to providing education. Businesses should also be subsidizing universities because a lot of them build on the innovations they share freely.

This!

These are policy choices. After the 2008 recession / crash state governments sharply cut funding for public universities. They in turn, dramatically increased tuition and fees.

The privates were always pricey, but there are fewer high quality, low-cost alternatives.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

I'm the PP who originally asked the question about $2M assets.

Why do you think this PP has to pay? Because they were thrifty enough to save and everyone else did not? We have over $2M in savings. Do not live in a fancy house (our house is below median price for FFX county), Do not take fancy trips, etc. I could have easily lived in a house twice as large, spent money on fancy trips, cars, etc and have close to no savings. With income at about $200K, I would get a 50% discount at a school like Rice. That's about a $100K per kid. With 3 kids, that's $300K. I'm now penalized for being responsible. Put another way, my thrift is sponsoring some spendthrift a-hole!. How is that fair?

And $2M is NOT rich. At all. Probably not even enough to cover retirement.

This post sounds confused. With a HHI of between $130,000 and $200,000 Rice would give your child 50% reduced tuition, assuming you have reasonable assets. Retirement funds, sure. A home to live in, yes. But if your assets include second and third homes, rental property, or ginormous retirement accounts above and beyond the tax deferred ones... you will be expected to be able to pay complete tuition.

If your HHI is $200,001 or above, you will be expected to pay ALL tuition. So unless your HHI is below $200,000 (for Rice) you will need to have saved for college no matter what.

PP with your $2 million already in taxable retirement accounts, what is your HHI and what are your total assets? And why do you think your thrift is subsidizing others? Did you contribute to Rice's endowment?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Honestly all of this conversation about how I saved and others didn't is just a narrative that people want to keep spreading to keep poor people out of these selective schools. Thankfully schools like Rice are onto this and they know full well like other schools that if this country doesn't get all of its populations (URM, poor, immigrant) participating in our economy to their fullest potential, we as a country are DOOMED. Higher ed is a part of that equation.

If you make a decision that you want to save and pay full freight great. Just do it. What does that decision have to do with anyone else's situation? Be happy you have $2M in assets and move on with your life.

If you understand the economics around college costs you would know that you aren't paying the full cost of tuition at these private schools anyway. That's why schools have endowments and they can do what they want with them.

Listen I get what people are saying. They are not trying to bring URM's down. I think the whole point is accountability. If we continue to give debt relief, tax breaks, financial aid, and other things, it is basically teaching people they do not have to be accountable to save for things or strive to do better. My sister's family makes $150K and have back tax issues. It is ridiculous. They were given so much financial aid for college because of it too. I get that it is not fair to punish the child, but we make far less and had to pay so much more because we created a 529 and saved up for years for it.

Most people have very little finance skills. It needs to become a mandatory class in high school. This spend everything mentality and ask for help later is just insane

I assume you got a tax break for your 529? Did that teach you a bad lesson?

Burn.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP, you are a great example of privilege. Just because OTHER people get something for free, it does not hurt you. Yet you are still upset by it. Because you are UMC and used to the world bending in YOUR favor and not the poor kid's favor. You feel threatened and attacked even when your lot in life has not changed.

And you sound like a complete idiot. I'm not the person you are referring to but we have 3 kids entering College 2 years after each other. We don't qualify for any assistance and we certainly are not independently Wealthy by any stretch of the imagination. We've been saving since the boys were born but we will have to pay a majority of these cost out of pocket. The boys will likely take out loans if they don't qualify for any Merit Aid. Why would I pay a University where I am supplementing another child for free while we are going to be barely scraping by so that our kids aren't graduating with massive amount of debt

. Barely scraping by? Please post your HHI.

[Anonymous]

Know what this means in terms of practicality?

If you have two applicants who have the same test scores, etc. except one is full pay and one is not, guess who they are going to admit first?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Know what this means in terms of practicality?

If you have two applicants who have the same test scores, etc. except one is full pay and one is not, guess who they are going to admit first?

The one who is recruited for their (really good) men’s baseball team?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Know what this means in terms of practicality?

If you have two applicants who have the same test scores, etc. except one is full pay and one is not, guess who they are going to admit first?

+ 1

This kind of thing is actually good news for UMC + who can afford to save and pay full price. It makes your kid more competitive.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Know what this means in terms of practicality?

If you have two applicants who have the same test scores, etc. except one is full pay and one is not, guess who they are going to admit first?

+ 1

This kind of thing is actually good news for UMC + who can afford to save and pay full price. It makes your kid more competitive.

And you may not want poor kids to crowd your kids out of the best schools, but you want them to be educated enough to support themselves, pay taxes and buy products from the companies in your investment portfolios.