Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums General Discussion College choices

The Federal government has been pushing income-based repayment, so not necessarily. IBR plans are especially generous for people working in "public service" https://studentaid.ed.gov/sa/repay-loans/forgiveness-cancellation/public-service or going to graduate school.

Beware Savvy Borrowers Using Income-Based Repayment

Of course, what's good for borrowers may not be good for taxpayers.

College admissions has become complicated enough that it helps to have a savvy parent. So has the financial aid system.

I think the entire process is nuts. My husband and I both attended state schools between us we have a Ph.D. and a MD, we are doing what we love and are both quite happy. I think it depends a lot on the field. For instance, if DD wanted to go to law school I would encourage her to try to get in a top school for grad because, given the employment rate of lawyers, it matters. I received a full ride in both my undergrad and Ph.D programs at a state school and am doing exactly what I want to without being bogged down by a ton of debt. I will encourage DD to attend in state public schools and really distinguish herself at those places. I think the entire system is nuts and I work in it. That is just me though;)!

Some of these messages make it sound like such a simple choice: do the right thing and go to a state public and don't be bogged down with debt, or make a mistake and go to a private college and be a debt serf in perpetuity. It's like there's a whiff of negativity about private colleges that's the same negativity people have about giftedness (i.e. "Elitism! Meh.")

Thing is, some elite colleges don't provide loans as part of financial aid. Meanwhile, that in-state tuition advantage diminishes every year (UC costs $35,000 per year now). Yes, there are scholarships, but the terms for keeping them every year can be onerous (e.g. needing a 3.5-3.8 average is common, as is a high credit load).

Then there is the fact that students tend to get a lot more attention at private colleges than at state universities. At my college (which is not much bigger now than when I attended), a giant lecture class like introductory chem had 50 students. Multiple choice tests were not used.

There is also the fact that private colleges won't cancel a class due to low enrollment or force students to take classes over the summer when they could be working at a summer job or in an internship in their field. Students definitely get more attention at a private college.

I'm not defending admissions practices that have led to crazy arms races in terms of GPAs and student extracurricular activity rosters by any means. I'm also not defending the obscene costs of college in this country. I'm just trying to point out that it's not so black and white.

I think that is a good point. I am thinking of a school like, say, Rice University, which I could see being as possibly being a good fit for a gifted kid (but does not have all the crazy Ivy League admissions craziness).

Maybe that is true for private colleges without graduate programs (Amherst, Wesleyan, Williams etc.), but I wonder if it is for the private research universities, for which the admissions mania is most intense.

Princeton has a big focus on paying attention to undergrads (e.g. see here).

I went to a small liberal arts college and see the huge benefit that I got by going there. The concept of taking summer classes because you can't get the spring section you need for your major is non-existent (this is presumably true at big places like Harvard, too).

Really, IMO, it's obscene to force students to pay $35K per year and then expect them to shell out another $6-8K* for summer school because all the sections of Chem 102 were full in the spring, and you'll end up staying an extra year if you don't take this course ASAP.

*My estimate for costs of tuition and fees, plus rent if you could be living at home for free, plus lost wages assuming 20 hours per week at $12 an hour lost (this would be more if you have a higher-paying job like lifeguarding or writing code).

So these costs would have to be added to the in-state public university cost at schools where the need for summer school is common (e.g. anywhere in California). Add a fifth year (very common) and a sixth year (common enough) and you could end up paying almost as much for that California public flagship as you would have for Williams: $35K * 5 years = $175K (assuming no inflation; yeah, right), and we haven't added in summer school yet.

Val,

Thanks for bringing some balance to the conversation. I would go further than that and say that for families not in the top 25% of income, the cheapest 4-year colleges are likely to be elite colleges that are need-blind. About 20% of Harvard students' families pay nothing. Stanford is tuition free up to a household income of $125K.

The cost for private schools rises rapidly from there, and I would estimate that the most pain (as a percentage of income) happens roughly around $200-250K. Families making considerably more than that can comfortably write a check without noticing, and that assumes the unlikely scenario they haven't already saved it ahead of time.

So as a percentage of the total population, it is a fairly small demographic where private schools are more painfully expensive than public schools. The reason this small demographic gets so much attention though is that they are the middle class strivers for whom sending their kids to college is important.

For those in this situation, I recommend sorting potential colleges based upon biggest endowment per student. The ones with the most endowment funds per student are more likely to provide scholarships over loans.

Actually-- if you have a household income between 90 and 200K, that's where I'd say you're in the very worst situation currently-- because you cannot realistically write those checks, and yet many institutions expect you to anyway, or, you know-- just borrow the difference.


The super-elite institutions that offer THAT much assistance at those income levels are few and far between, sadly-- and the competition is incredibly fierce for them.


Along with Val's remarks about an elite LAC, I'd add (and I expect that people may sneer at me, and that's fine) that regional public schools may also be worth looking at. Sure, they may not have the prestige of the giant state flagships like Michigan or UCLA, but some of those schools have individual departments which are STELLAR. They also (like the elite undergrad LAC's) tend to focus on undergraduate liberal arts education.

I graduated from one of them in a class of 5. Four of us went on to earn PhD's, and about 20% of graduates in the decade spanning when I was there went on to earn PhD's at places like MIT, Brown, Nebraska, Cal, UVA, etc. Powerhouses in the field.

I got a LOT of individual attention, was very well-educated, and the thing that seems to have separated my experience from Val's is twofold only, from what I've been able to tell:

1. Most of my peers were as poor as I was, and a lot of us were commuters who worked or had family obligations,

2. No, not everyone around me was super-bright, and yes, sometimes that was annoying, but in my STEM classes this effect mostly went away, because there my classmates were pretty darned bright.

Okay, the school sometimes lacked the most modern equipment, too-- but at least undergrads could learn by DOING, rather than watching someone else doing. Ahem.

When I looked at the difference between a relatively modest pair of LAC's within our state (34-46K annual tuition) and a small public directional (8K annual tuition), I found it difficult to justify the additional expense, knowing what I know about those smaller public institutions. To be clear, that difference would have amounted to about 20K annually given DD's profile and our income level, and the resultant aid offered at those schools, which accept something less than 50% of applicants. They are selective, just not super selective.

But no, it isn't simple by any means.


There are a lot of things to consider, and fit is a thing that is hard to place a value on, but it's very important. DH and I have the same graduate degree but came there via very different routes-- I wouldn't have succeeded at his undergraduate institution in classes of 500, and he might not have flourished at mine, living under a microscope.

As someone who attended State U for undergrad, I agree that you can get an excellent education at a good public university.

But since I brought up the private school endowments, I want to point out an article in the NY Times last year that ranked colleges by endowment per student: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/09/upshot/top-colleges-that-enroll-rich-middle-class-and-poor.html

There are a handful of colleges with endowments of $1M or more per student. They include HYPMS, Swarthmore and Ponoma. Not far behind are Amherst and Grinnell.

Grinnell? Apparently Grinnell is a college with a 25% admission rate and $850K in endowment per student, far above Columbia, Cornell, and UPenn that are languishing with about $200-$300K per student but which remain much more selective. Grinnell apparently puts its endowment money to use as well--about 25% of the incoming class gets a Pell grant, one of the highest percentages in the chart.

For women, Wellesley is at $600K per student with a 28% admissions rate. Richmond is above $400k per student with a 31% admissions rate. There is no guarantee that a large endowment automatically means generous financial aid. However as someone who works in finance and with some universities as clients, I know that the endowment strongly influences how much financial aid is possible.

Instead of speculating, it is simpler and more accurate to use the "net price calculators" that all colleges are now required to have.