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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]This is such an asinine discussion. I graduated from Middlebury over 20 years ago and plenty of kids were from middle class families, most of my friends got some sort of financial aid. The school is a lot more economically, geographically and racially diverse now with a lot fewer private school kids. It’s truly stupid to think that it’s all trust fund kids whittling away 4 years.[/quote]

NP.

There's clearly kids on this thread, they exhibit a shocking lack of grasp of fiscal reality and what it means to be an adult and how expensive life is even for the affluent and the long run cost/benefit of making various choices.

I'm sure what you say is true, all the top LACs and the Ivies are saying similar things, I'm confident my Ivy undergrad, which had demographics comparable to Middlebury, is even more diverse today. But the demographic change that has also happened is that a whole cohort of upper middle class families who could manage the tuition at expensive private colleges without any financial aid can no longer really do so or can only do so at great financial sacrifice and at the cost of retirement savings, mortgages and quality of life. From what I can tell what's happening is the student demographics are shifting towards a very affluent segment and heavily financial aid segment and full freight but not that affluent, the "normal" upper middle classes and now termed the donut hole families, are being left out.

As a product of an Ivy and DH also went to AWS for undergrad we would love to give our children the intimate, stellar and resource-rich education we experienced. But it will come at a great cost. We're years away from college and we're also fortunate to be comfortable but even with our income and healthy savings rate I am having second thoughts about having to spend so much money for we will not qualify for financial aid. $600,000 for two kids for undergrad is a stunning amount of money. If we instead went in-state for half the cost and left the other $300,000 into retirement accounts and the stock market for another 20 years we would get back so much more. Or we could use the extra money to help pay for graduate school, which is now increasingly more important than where you went for undergrad. Or use it to give our kids each $75,000 for a down payment on their first property after they graduate and get them on the property ladder. Or pay off our mortgage and free up more disposable income.

20 years ago when I was in college the tuition at Middlebury and other comparable schools were expensive but manageable and justified. I would have no hesitations. But today, as much as I love the liberal arts environment I just don't know if it's worth the stiff tuition we'd have to pay. [/quote]

I agree with everything you wrote, and like you, we are a donut hole family without generational wealth.

Our DC is going to a SLAC this fall that will cost almost twice what our in-state public would cost, but not $300k either.  DC got a great merit scholarship and we can cover the rest with college savings.  No debt, student or otherwise, necessary.

I recognize it is a luxury and acknowledge that it would be rational and practical to limit DC to our excellent in state public, but am glad we can make the LAC experience possible for them.  It is worth it to us.[/quote]

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