Reply to two kids in college - what is prestige worth?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Yes, kid is in at Princeton.

I called about the other concern -- changes in how schools are considering #2 in college. Even though some here thinks it's going down the rabbit hole (?), the schools I called were very willing to answer my family-specific questions on this and run numbers.  They don't want kids coming to school without a pretty clear picture of finances - that's a potential problem for them too.  Every private school I called said they planned to consider having more than kid in college at once ("That's part of the family's full financial picture") indefinitely. They asked public vs private bcs thats what they use to run estimates, but they'd give you a break no matter what the second tuition was.  The bigger the tuition, the bigger the break.

The two public schools I called were not sure what would happen fall of 2024 and couldn't be sure they'd take any other tuition into account. That was a short call. One person said, "believe me, I wish I knew." For us, it probably doesn't matter because it's financial aid not merit aid and we wouldn't qualify.  Kid #1 wasn't interested in the auto-merit offered at big OOS schools - we toured one - and that was fine with us, but obv an attractive option for many.[/quote]

It's FAR too hard for you to game (or plan for) this in advance. There are just too many unknowns.  First, you have no idea where #2 would get in (and where #1 chooses won't affect admissions officer choices on that). Second, there's no way to predict potential FA/merit offers "if" they get into "mystery school" based on the current list of potentials for kid #1 tuition.

Make a financial decision now on what you are willing to pay for Kid #1 and then determine how this choice affects what you are willing to pay for Kid #2 later (and does that seem equitable).  Be clear with kid #2 what their financial parameters are - sounds like no clean slate like Kid #1 had going in (but if so, make it clear with Kid #1 choice what is being taken from the pot - so kid #2 sees - and what is being taken from the pot for kid #1 future) .

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It wasn't too hard for Williams, Princeton, Grinnell or Georgetown to "game this" on the phone in about 15 minutes asking me a variety of questions.

It's okay if you don't want to think about this and take it kid by kid and not attempt a total COA, especially if your kids don't overlap. And it's okay if I prefer getting more detail directly from the schools.
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