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The most active thread yesterday, by some measure, was titled, "Why do donut hole families" and posted in the "College and University Discussion" forum. This thread, which garnered and amazing 21 pages of responses in just one day, discusses the families whose finances fall in the "donut hole" between those wealthy enough to easily afford college and those poor enough to qualify for need-based financial assistance. The original poster claims that there are plenty of in-state options, lower-tier private colleges, and even some out of state public universities that are affordable if families are not fixated on out-of-reach Ivy League schools. I don't have time to read much of this thread but from what I can tell, many posters are resentful to have found themselves in the donut hole. Some posters explain that having grown up in less financially well off families, they were forced to take out loans for college. They then got good jobs and worked hard to climb the corporate ladder which puts them outside the bracket that is eligible for need-based aid. However, the burden of paying off their own loans meant they could not save for their own children's college. Now they are too wealthy for aid and too poor to afford top colleges. Other posters argue that the term "donut hole" is misleading because it understates the realities of being poor. Being poor does not mean that college affordability issues suddenly disappear and that poor families struggle just as much, and in most cases even more, than so-called donut hole families. A few posters have little sympathy for families in this situation, describing this as a failure to save and misplaced priorities. Quite a few posters do circle back to the original poster's point that many affordable options do exist if people would choose to pursue them. As one posters writes, "Why isn’t in-state good enough for people? Stop going after prestige and prestigious institutions."