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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Bowdoin is a waste of $360,000 with mediocre outcomes. It is stupid spending that sum of money just for your kid to need to go to graduate school. We have the funds for it but only spent that much for a kid whose starting salary out of college is $180,000 and 5 years out they’re making nearly as much as the 4 year cost of attendance. Bowdoin will not give you that opportunity.[/quote]

Guess that you know little about Bowdoin, or pretty much any school for that matter. Nonsensical fictional post with a nonexistent child.[/quote]
 :roll: Would you like to make a point then since I know "little about Bowdoin." Average salary out of Bowdoin is not recouping 360k cost of attendance. I get that the financial aid is good, but I just don't think it is worth it even if you can afford it; especially for a service oriented institution like Bowdoin where many student going into public service roles and education. I believe in these valuable, fulfilling careers and believe a Bowdoin education is elite-there's no question. I just don't agree it's worth the average cost of a property in Vermont.[/quote]

Average salary isn't a good measure of anything because it doesn't take major, location, etc. into account. If we were to approach everything from an ROI perspective on a per major basis you would have to make the same comment about any top tier private school for many majors. I doubt that Bowdoin majors do measurably worse than other top privates including the Ivies and MIT on a major for major same geography basis. The same likely holds for any other top SLAC or R1, it's just not a good measure of value. If that is the hill that you want to die on go to a solid public and study engineering. SJSU should be near the top of your list because it is hard to find a better ROI once adjusted for field and location.[/quote]
I think we're agreeing. If my kid is interested in a liberal arts college, we have W&M and they can get the same experience for 1/2 the cost. I don't see why parents defend institutions that are overcharging by tens of thousands of dollars per year.  ROI isn't everything, but we also don't need to throw out reason.[/quote]

I assume that you feel the same way about the Ivy+ schools? The same holds for any of them as well.[/quote]
Depends. Our kid went into Computer engineering and made a great sum...I'd pay a ton for that degree. But i wouldn't spend 90k/year on harvard for a psych degree just cause its harvard. I'm not into the rat race of accepting colleges as being overpriced money suckers, just because they can be. If Harvard maintained its cost before it started heavily artificially increasing COA, it should be about $8,000 today, not 10x that.[/quote]

So your issue is less with the school than the major/career path, it sounds like. Because any of these top LACs, including Bowdoin, can place interested students in high-paying roles. All depends on the individual to make that choice.[/quote]
It would take an additional masters to get a computer engineering job from bowdoin.[/quote]

Seems pretty myopic to only consider engineering schools worth the money… but that’s your opinion.[/quote]
Worth $360k..okay. If kid has chops for finance also great degree. I don’t know why people here are so confused sensitive to someone not taking the bait and wasting 100s of thousands of dollars on a liberal arts degree.[/quote]

You could make the argument that ROI on a Sociology or Education degree from an expensive private college is not there, and I would not disagree with you, but to say a degree from a top LAC is a bad investment in a blanket sense is not logical at all. Because there are plenty of LAC graduates who studied Economics, Math, Chemistry, Computer Science, etc. with careers in finance, biopharma, management consulting, tech that made the math work. In these cases, $360k for access to these kinds of jobs on top of the LAC educational experience is very worth it.

It comes down to choice of major and career, not the institution. Most families who pay $360k for a sociology degree simply have the money to spend and don't care about ROI. And LACs are not uniquely bad in this sense anyways.[/quote]
Chemistry is going to require graduate education to be worth 360k[/quote]

Very narrow view. Chemistry majors can go into finance (industrials or healthcare coverage), biotech (commercial side, not research),  etc. and do well without graduate degrees. And even if a graduate degree is required, LACs are known for preparing students well for graduate school so I don’t understand the criticism vs any other private college.[/quote]
Chemistry majors typically cant and don't land finance. Biotech pays pennies without a graduate degree and currently is a nightmare industry with a lot of overqualified and career veterans looking for a job. I have an undergraduate major in chemistry and a JD. I'd find it pretty useless getting a chemistry degree just so you can go into finance-get an economics major and free up your schedule. A PhD is a long, arduous path that can be abusive and often isn't worth the opportunity cost from an ROI perspective.

I'm not meaning to be a party pooper, but a lot of people here have unrealistic visions of what's attainable from your degree and it's good to consider setting yourself up for a good career, rather than winging it that just because 0.001% of math majors go into Quant Finance, there's the remaining 99.999%. Of course, if your dream is getting a PhD and slogging through postdocs to eventually get whatever position you desire, that's great and I encourage you to go to an LAC and enjoy your time. Personally, I don't think I should cough up $360,000 for your prospects to be a grad student making $38k/year with multiple roommates.[/quote]

I have a BA in biochemistry from a SLAC and work in finance (asset management). No graduate degree.

Healthcare coverage groups on the street like, and even prefer, hiring science majors. This is a fact, and it is very realistic from any top LAC if a student has interest in going that route. Just need to send an application/network with alums and do a bit of accounting prep for interviews.  Commercial roles in biotech/pharma pay more than pennies (actually into the mid-six figures for midlevel management), to the chagrin of the scientists that actually do the bench work. You are correct that the industry is currently struggling, though we have seen sentiment turning ever since M&A came back in the last few months.

I agree that PhD is a tough, borderline abusive road. This is what scared me away from that but my LAC degree/network made a more lucrative route possible. See my long wall of text in the other LAC thread. It's no wonder that many PhDs come from wealthy families that can afford to support their academically minded children. $360k all-in is very pricey, but for those that can easily afford it through their own wealth or generous financial aid, an LAC education can be a fantastic experience and set you up well for a good career in industry or academia.[/quote]

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