| sakky, regarding financial aid....again everyone thinks differently about that too. I agree that some pick a school based on the best financial offer. Guess what? Not in my family. Yes, we very very much need the aid. But my husband and I value education and feel our kids have worked hard to get to where they are at and we want them to go to wherever they feel best fits them.
Case in point....older D got into almost all of her colleges four years ago. She had a full ride at one. Two other schools offered merit aid. Her other schools were only need based schools. We let her pick her current college and it was far from the best FA offer as well as does not offer merit aid (is an Ivy).
My other child is attending the most expensive college on her list and one of the most expensive in the country. She did get a nice scholarship but we would have let her go to one of her schools that offered much smaller scholarships if she had preferred those. We let them pick their schools no matter the FA package offered and were grateful for any aid they received.
Another case in point...my oldest got into six grad schools (professional degree programs, not PhD). Almost all offered substantial scholarships and fellowships. The only one that didn't is MIT. She has chosen MIT. We will be in large debt. For us, it was worth it. In our family, we did optimize "fit". |