Anonymous wrote:The author lives in Virginia. Her daughter can go to VCU, one of the top art schools in the country, and pay in-state rates. I'm not getting what the big sacrifice is here.

I think daughter wanted to be an artist in NYC. But I agree, VCU is fantastic.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t get why the author didn’t save a realistic amount of money for college. It’s about priorities.

Do you understand that many families work to pay their bills and that’s it. I don’t have enough money to pay my bills some months so there won’t Ben any college savings. Not everyone is living beyond their means.

I do and I have sympathy for that. Her tone suggests to me that was not the case. She seems surprised that college costs money and that the $14,000 she saved isn’t going to do it. We saved from the time our kids were little. It was mostly small amounts (and a small direct deposit from one of our paychecks). We put all of those random checks you get (rebates, refunds, gifts from grandparents, and our tax refunds) into the 529. It grew over time. I think $14,000 for a donut hole family suggests they did not really try.

OP, not me but some families encourage the student to take the loans and then they help pay it back. In those cases the student may become *more* aware of the cost they are incurring for college, have some skin in the game.

A lot of parents say go ahead and apply, but when they see the reality of the financial statement, they change their attitude. An earlier thread posted about a student declining an ivy acceptance (oh, the horror) to go to a state university. Ivies offer no merit and are a full need school.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP, the reason it took you three tries is because you kept posting the link and only the link which is against the rules and I reported you. My guess is that Jeff took those posts down. Now that you’ve also posted a short post with it, it’s not in violation.

Wow. Such a snitch!

Yep—pisses me off to see lazy posts. If OP wants to start a discussion by posting, OP needs to use her words.

Anonymous wrote:I don’t get why the author didn’t save a realistic amount of money for college. It’s about priorities.

Do you understand that many families work to pay their bills and that’s it. I don’t have enough money to pay my bills some months so there won’t Ben any college savings. Not everyone is living beyond their means.

Anonymous wrote:OP, the reason it took you three tries is because you kept posting the link and only the link which is against the rules and I reported you. My guess is that Jeff took those posts down. Now that you’ve also posted a short post with it, it’s not in violation.

Wow. Such a snitch!

OP, the reason it took you three tries is because you kept posting the link and only the link which is against the rules and I reported you. My guess is that Jeff took those posts down. Now that you’ve also posted a short post with it, it’s not in violation.

Anonymous wrote:The author lives in Virginia. Her daughter can go to VCU, one of the top art schools in the country, and pay in-state rates. I'm not getting what the big sacrifice is here.

+1 It's not a sacrifice but is a smart financial decision. I'd be pretty pissed off at a VA school counselor pushing my kid to think that the in-state public option is inferior when it's VCU Arts! Yes, you can apply to lots of privates and maybe get merit aid but that doesn't really apply to the top art schools. They don't give much, if any, aid. VCU Arts is a wonderful option for VA kids who want to major in art.

I don’t get why the author didn’t save a realistic amount of money for college. It’s about priorities.

The author lives in Virginia. Her daughter can go to VCU, one of the top art schools in the country, and pay in-state rates. I'm not getting what the big sacrifice is here.

One friend recently told me that her son has his heart set on a pricey out-of-state engineering program, despite the fact that a fantastic engineering program exists at the public university in our town. “It’s a reach school, but if he gets in he’ll probably go there—and I guess deal with a lot of student loan debt afterward,” she said with a laugh.

This piece of ridiculousness I hear far too often from friends. I told my kids clearly that I would refuse to pay for any school that is more expensive than our state school if our state school had an equivalent (or even better) program. Taking on debt because you like the out-of-state school's campus and football team better than your in-state school? Nope. There are only a couple of schools/programs that I think the debt would be worth it, and that doesn't include every top 10 school. Save money for undergrad, go to the great school for a grad program.

Read that as well. I have friends and siblings near retirement age still paying off student loans until recently. I did public schools until they started paying me - think graduate schools. Still had student loans, but far less and paid off much sooner. Will give my kids the same message.

I read that. I didn’t understand why the daughter couldn’t major in art at State University.

‘According to our daughter, most of her friends are completely meh about student loans. They’re applying to places like NYU ($53,310 tuition) and Boston College ($56,780 tuition). Some of them have parents who can probably bankroll that. The others see it as inevitable that, in exchange for a nice bachelor’s degree, they’ll be working off grinding debt for the next 20 years.’

Great piece !


https://slate.com/human-interest/2019/12/college-dreams-say-no-avoid-student-debt.amp