Should you incur substantial debt for dream school or even pay the "dream" tuition?

[Shrinkrap]

It's close to that for ALL the UC's, but not tuition; that's with room, board, etc.


My D did not think Berkeley was worth it....sigh... we are paying twice as much for private, fortunately wont have to borrow to do it.

[rcdmom]

taxguy: The $25,000 was tuition, room/board, books--the whole deal. It's a lot of money; it's Berkeley, though, so it's worth it. UCLA77 vouched for that figure, too.

But the implications of these figures are astonishing: $100,000 to attend an in-state, public university. And are these students able to graduate in 4 years? Are the classes available to help them do that?

[UCLA Band Mom]

Actual costs for UCLA, from my own experience, are WAY over estimated by several thousand dollars. Our family's total annual expenses averaged only about $15,000 per year.

The personal expenses of $1500 is way more than any student would ever spend for pocket money, and $800 for transportation is also estimated way high, especially since most freshmen and sophomores living on campus don't even have a car. When he came home, he took a city bus downtown, and then rode the Metrolink train for under $20 which was much cheaper than driving or flying. The $1500 estimate for books & supplies cost can also be trimmed down by simply buying used books, and then selling them back at the end of the term. Fraternity/sorority residents can also expect to pay several thousand dollars a year less in housing fees than dorm residents.

UCLA Undergrad Admissions: Fees, Tuition, and Estimated Student Budget

My son's summer jobs easily covered the expenses for his books & pocket money. I didn't buy the $750 health insurance, instead I kept him on my employee health policy.

[Shrinkrap]

^ That would have been good to know! So you are saying it was 10k less for you? You accounted for some, but WOW! I assume the trasnportation would be more if you had to go N. Cal to SoCal or vice versa.

[Atana]

With current developments at some elite schools and dependent on the parents income going to those schools would actually be less of a burden. Harvard was one of the institutional leaders in regards to addressing the debt to education problem. At least for those entering students whose families make less than 60,000 yearly. Which may make their initiative largely symbolic insofar as that population has got to be a very small part of their enrollment. But even with that it still was action on the right direction.
But many of the state institutions cannot do this, due to reductions in federal support. And depending on the problems in state politics, cuts in state support. Colorado for example has a tax spending limitation amendment which has played hob with funding for higher education. It's been particularly hard on the institutions which aren't directly linked to the two largest university systems- simply because they cannot bring the legislature to realize they too need funding. And those conditions of federal, state cuts combined with the intense and heretofore unbelievably successful lobby pressure on congress to move US education funding policy away from grant funding to loans, doesn't exactly make Colorado (and other states) higher education the bargain it should be...
And as noted the arenas wherein the state schools often make up the tuition gap (as it were) is in the supplemental fees and services. Food plans being a predominant example, at most schools the food services are subcontracted out-although not all publicize this situation. So the college gets the franchise fees, the franchisee raises the rates on students, and the parents pay for it all. Something to be said for leaving the campus and going to the Taco Bell, or learning how to cook. Or at least learning how to tolerate a diet of ramen noodles and tuna fish (which may not be a bad thing to learn given our current economy)
One of the more distressing parts of it all is despite the average 6% yearly increase in college tuitions, the increased and appalling debt loads dumped onto students and families...is that wherever this extra money is going much of it isn't drifting down to the classroom. Many full time faculty at state schools can provide illuminating stories about lack of necessary resources, especially compared with what was available not so long ago...at least in coffee table discussions...they don't dare do this at public venues if they wish to keep their stable jobs. But the mere presence of so many ill paid, poorly treated and exploited adjuncts is a de-facto revealing of the secret of how limited the resources applied to the lecture room or lab have actually become. Someones raking in the millions but its not going to the students...or the faculty...
And incidentally another casualty of the funding/debt in higher education issue is that many faculty dare not comment about the problem.

[BCEagle91]

Perhaps this explains the increased emphasis on the fundraising capabilities of university and college presidents. Yes, even at state institutions. I was at a fundraiser for a local community college and I'd guess that they took in about $120K in receipts. It's not a massive amount of money but it goes a long ways at the Community College level. The performer himself has already donated a million for scholarships.

In the future, I think that you'll see more of an emphasis on fundraising for the selection of state university presidents as state budgets contract after getting overextended in the boom years.

[Atana]

Probably so, the university and college presidents will be hired as much for their ability to get donations as they will for administrative abilities.
And alumni organizations will get more aggressive on their donation campaigns. And will be under some serious pressure to use donations for core needs rather than athletics or memorial structures.
As these trends continue it'll be a potential PR disaster for state colleges and universities insofar as they'll have a hard time explaining why such enhanced fund raising is actually needed. It'll be a hard sell to parents who paid unreal tolls for their kids college, or students who are in debt bondage for a large part of their working career because of what their educations cost them to acquire. It would be difficult to explain because of the hellish complexity of the situation. And made even more difficult because at some point just exactly who benefited from the co-opting of higher education and who aided and abetted the development of this unworkable and inequitable system will need to be outed. And that would be politically very troublesome as it would indict some very influential people and institutions and won't be limited to just academia.
However there is now enough economic and social pressures which arose from intended and unintended consequences from the educational funding mire...that it's not going to be too long before such exposes are written. And these will be widely read as opposed to the current paradigm of such exposes being distributed and read by specialists or within academia itself.

[rcdmom]

One other thing to consider: Higher education in many countries around the world is free for its citizens (paid for by taxes, of course, but nothing extra out of pocket).

Can Americans compete in a global economy where we burden ourselves with such educational debt?

[BCEagle91]

In one of the other debt threads, there was the idea that the debt is worth it if you know that you're going into a field where compensation is near guaranteed. Well, those that have had a few years in the workforce know that nothing is guaranteed unless you have a relative that owns the business.

HONG KONG (MarketWatch) -- Citigroup Inc. plans to lay off as much as 10% of the 65,000 workers in its investment-banking division, with the first round of dismissal notices to be issued as early as Monday, according to a published report.

The New York bank, which employs about 350,000 workers worldwide, will dismiss thousands of workers this week, adding to the 9,000 layoffs that had been issued as of March 31, The Wall Street Journal reported, citing unidentified individuals familiar with the matter.

(CBS Marketwatch)

LONDON (MarketWatch) -- Investment bankers are preparing themselves for an acceleration in job cuts after Goldman Sachs made further cuts at its investment banking division, despite being the best performer in the sector, according to a report in the Financial Times Monday. Goldman is cutting about 10% of the division, which offers advice on deals and corporate fundraising,

(CBS Marketwatch)

[Atana]

rcdmom,
You're quite correct about how many other countries do realize that proper investment in education, including not damning their intelligentsia with impossible debts, is socially and economically beneficial. And quite correct that we cannot compete globally if this predation is allowed to continue.
And as to the rhetorical question whether the US can continue to compete in a global economy whilst burdening our most intelligent and ambitious with debt bondage to any rational and observant person the simple answer is no.
The consequences of the edudebt industry are wide ranging and will have varied and detrimental consequences. On one level for the edudebt industry to absorb such a high percentage of the income of professionals, at the onset on their most productive years, denies that income to more productive arenas of the economy. Another consequence is that our educated people will make the choice to leave the US, or drop out from the economy, because the unreasonable and unceasing demands of the edudebt industry will leave no other reasonable alternative. Granted at this point, there haven't been a exodus of people choosing this alternative but there will be more as the economy worsens. And as noted on other threads, the SL industry has been on a feeding frenzy for about a decade, deriving massive profits from an unsustainable and artificial condition, and its a matter of time before that speculative bubble explodes. Unfortunately when it does the government will save the SL speculators first, as is evident from the recent and massive inflows of government money to 'save access to student loans'. But as a struggling economy worsens and more are unable to pay the rigged demands of the edudebt companies what we will be seeing is a crash worse than the mortgage disaster.
On a more subtle level, one of the more malevolent aspects of this situation is that it will destroy a very essential core of social belief. What we have done is permitted profiteers to literally bind people into often appalling debts. Effectively what we have done is bind people to often impossible debt loads for the use and honing of their own minds. And as increasing amounts of their income are directed to these companies, those afflicted will use that same mind to draw the conclusion that our system has itself betrayed all the promises in which they had believed. And that loss of belief by our intelligent and dedicated people will be incredibly destructive to our society. Allegorically put Horatio Alger and Andy Hardy will die of starvation whilst imprisoned in the coffers of the edudebt financiers.
Many might say that this is an extreme scenario, but it has already begun. In academia, many faculty, have become very discouraged about the equity of the their own system and discouraged about the chances for their students. And that disillusionment correlates closely with the rise of the edudebt industry and its attendant feeding frenzy.

[K9Leader]

The personal expenses of $1500 is way more than any student would ever spend for pocket money, and $800 for transportation is also estimated way high, especially since most freshmen and sophomores living on campus don't even have a car. The $1500 estimate for books & supplies cost can also be trimmed down by simply buying used books, and then selling them back at the end of the term.

UCLA Mom:

It sounds as though your son was particularly frugal. My son is as well as he is trying to make his pocket money stash of cash last all four years (so he has the option of internships instead of working during the summers) and I am hoping my daughter will be as frugal when she goes off in a year. However, they are the exceptions-- most students would have no problem spending $1500 pocket money. I think many would have trouble keeping it under $1500. I live near the University of Delaware and I see the students out and about in restaurants, bars, stores, shows, cruising around town in their very nice cars (many nicer than anything I own). Living on a budget does not appear to be a concern for many of them. Heck, there are some who spend $1500 on Starbucks alone. My son confirms that there are many big spenders at his school and those of his friends. There are many students who are frugal and do have to watch every penny but I think it is off base to say no student would ever spend $1500. (Although I would agree that few students need to spend more than $1500.)

Transportation costs will vary widely depending on how far away home is. My son is 5-6 hours away and has not had a car his first two years, although he will for the coming year. He has traveled back and forth through a mix of Amtrak, we go down and get him or take him back, getting rides with other students, or taking one of our cars for short periods (like between Thanksgiving and Christmas). The train is $150 - 180 round trip, driving uses up a couple of tanks of gas (so $80 - 120 and going up every day), and even bumming rides means chipping in $15-20 each way. The $800 estimate is a pretty good average -- some will be lower but many will spend that much or more.

Books and supplies depends heavily on the area of study -- most should be able to do it under $1500, unless you are counting a computer in there. My son's books (English and anthropology double major) run $350 - 700 a semester, and that includes buying as many as he can find from online used book sellers. While we do turn around and resell what we can, he ends up keeping about a third of his books, about a third aren't saleable (not in demand, an out-of-date edition, etc.), so only a third can be resold for any significant amounts.

Those estimated expenses do not seem that far off to me. You are just fortunate that your son has good money sense and you live close enough that transportation is not too big a ticket.

[Shrinkrap]

"You are just fortunate that your son has good money sense and you live close enough that transportation is not too big a ticket."


But even those items seem to only account for hundreds, not 10 thousand dollars...am I missing something?

[Bay]

Shrink,

I noticed that as well. If Band Mom's son lived in the dorms and paid tuition ("fees"), then according to UCLA's website, just those two expenses alone are $20,432.

[K9Leader]

Shrink:

I was only addressing the pocket money, transportation, and books & supplies. No idea how they got their total costs down to $15K - maybe there were scholarships or other FA not mentioned.

[UCLA Band Mom]

My son did not live in the dorms, he lived in a fraternity where rooms cost about half as much as the dorms. He did not buy a full meal ticket, instead he made his own sack lunches. I gave him my Costco card to use for food purchases. We live about an hour away, so the Metrolink train costs about 15 bucks for a round trip ticket, he only came home once or twice per quarter. My son's books typically cost him about $250 per quarter, he always bought used books if he could, and sold his books back at the end of the term. Many of his science and engineering books were good for the entire year. He worked a part time job on campus, and always had a summer job as well, which gave him all the spending money he needed without having to ask us for more. I carried him on my health plan. He does not spend a lot of money on clothes.

He has now graduated. And he has zero debt from student loans. He had a small scholarship his Freshman year, but none thereafter. Next year he has a full ride fellowship.

Also, the tuition I paid was for the years 2004 through 2008. The tuition has been rising about ten percent a year, so the $15K costs that I paid would of course be higher for future years.