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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I grew up working class in the 1980s. I was accepted into every Ivy and top school I applied to, and the tuition at my college was about the same as my family's household income. So, I obviously benefitted tremendously from financial aid. Today, I earn a very good salary and my kid isn't going to have to worry about paying for school. But it is freaking ridiculous that the costs are what they are, even for schools that are nowhere near the level of a Stanford or Harvard. Just because I'm able to provide this level of financial resources to my kid doesn't mean that it's right that all parents should have to feel like this is a responsibility, or that they've failed if they don't have $400K set aside. I'm well aware of how rarified it is to be in my financial position. This is NOT NORMAL. These costs are out of this world. We might not be able to change all of the policies that support this insanity anytime soon. But at the very least, we should at least be able to have an honest and open conversation where nobody tries to gaslight others about this f'd up situation we all finds ourselves in.

NO. Having a fully funded pre-paid college plan is not the equivalent of being a responsible parent.

YES. A brilliant student with a ton of potential should be able to go to the school that will best nurture that brilliance. We need more schools and fed dollars that will make up the difference between a family's ability to pay and the cost of attending. This is a societal investment. We need to power out our best and brightest so that we can continue to lead the world in innovation. You don't get excellence by making your best and brightest go to a middle of the road school in a place where mediocrity is considered good enough. There is absolutely no way I'd be making the contributions to society that I can currently am if I'd stayed in my local community doing some 2+2 program. I've never seen a single person from my neighborhood survive the first two years of community college without falling off track. Those programs are completely unworkable for people living in 2-bedroom houses with 6 people and families with lots of drama that is a normal part of life in the working class and the poor. Never mind that in most American cities the public transportation systems are terrible so any student attending community college classes is going to need a car and gas & parking money, in which case they may as well have paid tuition at the good school out of town where they could have thrived. And at almost every one of those "live away" campus schools you don't need a car. Trust me, very few of the undergrads in Cambridge and Palo Alto have cars.[/quote]

I couldn't agree more. Excellent post, PP.

My brilliant child went to a mediocre state college that we could afford. I wish I'd been able to send this child to a top college, but that was not within our means. We got some FA, and some merit aid at a few private colleges, but the in-state option (with merit aid) was by far the cheapest, even though it wasn't what my child needed. She's in grad school now at the best program in the US (if not the world) for her particular specialty. She graduated at the top of her class in college with every honor the school had to offer. But for the first couple years of grad school, she struggled to rise to the level of her peers, most of whom had attended top universities and colleges. She would not have struggled had she attended a college at her level for undergrad. There must be a better way to apportion education in the US to meet the needs of kids like mine. She's OK, but how much further along in her research would she be now had she attended a more challenging undergrad college? She's doing research that will benefit humanity. I can't do this, most people can't do this, but she can. I think kids like mine should be able to go to the very best undergraduate academic institutions regardless of their parents' income or savings. Why punish brilliant kids like mine for having average parents like me who don't make enough money to save $400K for college?[/quote]

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