kristin5792

mcat2--let me try this one. If you're knocking 20k off of 45k, let's assume you're getting close to a "half ride."

I had a little more than a "half ride" to undergrad, and my parents could reasonably pick up the rest. I'd estimate that most of my friends (and all of my close friends) had at least that much funding for UG. In med school, save for the people who are in service agreements with the military, a primary care service program, or the Indian Health Services, I personally do not know one med student at my school who has close to a "half ride," although I am sure some exist.

Then again, part of the reason I knew so many people with scholarships in UG is that my state guarantees a certain amt of scholarship money once you get better than a 31 on the ACT, and guarantees more if you're within the top 2% of your graduating class. Most of my friends hit one or both of those marks, and I believe that's where most of the funding for their UG scholarships came from (keep in mind, we went to a state school where tuition is <$15k/yr). On the other hand, in med school, most of the merit-based scholarships come from gifts and endowments; and let's face it, my school's endowment is not that impressive. As a result, there are very few students with merit aid >$5000, which unfortunately doesn't come out to being a "half ride" (tuition = ~$24k)

Edit: I did think of one classmate who won a one-time scholarship for about half of that year's tuition.

GA2012MOM

Kristin, how great about the text books! Luckily, D's class is first at school to use and give all students an I pad. I think curms D's school has used them for a couple years now, correct?

bigreddawgie

give as in charging it to your fees for school!

GA2012MOM

Yep, lol, that's what I meant.

mcat2

I think the full tuitions and fees at DS's UG may be close to $51k/yr (i.e., swap the two digits, or maybe around $45k?) than $15k/yr this year. But I guess less than one half of the UG students are full pay students.

As regard to the out-of-pocket "true" cost of attending a med school (either from your future income or your parents' current income or assets), what I am trying to find out is whether the "social engineering" by and large stops right after college, for the majority (say, > 90-95%) of students in the MD program (excluding MD/PhD students of course.)

bigreddawgie

what do you mean by social engineering?

mcat2

Let me illustrate it using the example of elementary/secondary school funding in the state of Texas.

Rich school districts have higher revenue to fund their school districts because of their higher property values. Poor school districts are just the opposite, unless they happen to sit on the land with oil. So each year rich districts are required to write a big check to poor school districts by law, on the ground that the kids in a poor district are not there by their choice and they should receive their fair share of this society's resources to be educated just like the kids who were born into a household in a rich district. (BTW, the nickname of this school funding system is called Robin Hood by the haters of this system.)

If you replace the school district with the family or each individual in the above example, you arrive at the social engineering at more individual level.

I do not say this is right or wrong. I only know that the Robin Hood system is hated by many people and is also favored by many people in this state. I think the fight has last for several decades. And it appears more and more well-to-do families start to send their kids to private schools because the tax money they pay into the system does not stay in the school district their kids are in.

BTW, at the college level, many students go out of the state to receive their education because of the "top 10 percents" rule (and Texas loses a lot of money because of this and it is a "good business" for several adjacent states.)

curmudgeon

O.K.. Still lost.

I was posting this.

It apparently has Kristin's name on it, but no matter.

As to the "social engineering", my kid's med school is the only one I know anything about, and then only her situation, really. Without need-based FA she would most likely not be attending. There. They socially engineered that one. lol

So, no. I think that at her school it would be substantially higher than 10%.

parent56

op as well as UA in tuscaloosa you might want to look at UAB in birmingham..it has a full ride for nmf and national hispanic student... this one includes 4 years of housing (ua only includes one year now) full tuition (15 credits per year) and a stipend. UAB is the home of the med school, very very strong school for sciences. Has an incredible honors program (sci/tech) which is research based. the campus is surrounded by 7 hospitals so unlimited shadowing, volunteering opportunities. 11k undergrads, urban campus. not a football or party school. about 6% greek. very different vibe than UA.

University of Alabama at Birmingham - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

easy quick app, no essay. If you apply to sci/tech honors, it will require a short essay and possible interview as you move through the selection process.

feel free to pm for more info as uab does not have a forum on CC

plumazul

@mcat,
How long have you lived in Texas? Are you familiar with the history? These "districts" are artifacts of the past, when racism was institutionalized in Texas( and definitely not limited to schools) . They should not exist. Where I live the "school district" is the entire county. What a waste to have scores of tiny districts with all associated overhead, created just to deny resources to others, shameful. But because of changing demographics, things will be changing real soon in Texas

This makes no sense. They will still pay the taxes. BTW, the school tax rates in the affluent districts are much lower than they are in the poorer districts. How fair is that?

mcat2

plumazul,

I have lived in Texas for more than two decades. But I started to pay attention to the school district only when I needed to find a "good" middle school and high school for my kid. I am not an expert about this. The only source of information for me back then was just the local newspaper.

In the city/county where I live, the school district is really not the same as the county, but the size (in terms of the area or population) is about the same. It was very confusing to me at first. It is still confusing to me today.

Not many years ago, the congressmen in this state decided to redraw the election districts (not school district) for political gains. Some congressmen decided to run away to a neighboring state in order not to vote. The other (the majority) side tried to make use of state troopers to hunt them down and brought them back to the state to vote. What a fiasco! (It seems that the election districts were redrawn successfully in the end.)

I think the very well-to-do families just want the "best" for their kids. I think they do not care very much to pay to both the public school system (if they can not avoid it) and the private school their kids attend.

At one time, I had a chance to visit a high school in a poorer district. They posted where their students had gone to college. Among the whole graduation class, only about 3 or 4 kids went to 4-year flagship state college. A much higher percentage of their graduates went to a community college. I do not think the well-to-do families will ever want to send their kids to such a low-performing high school. (Some high power small private high school routinely sends about 20% or even 25% of their graduating class, to ivies every year.)

MiamiDAP

"state/public med schools can be a great option!>
-As I have mentioned several times, not in every state! In our state 3+4 year prices are about the same all across and are the same as in privates. In additon, some of our state/public are so much more expansive for OOS, that I do not understand any reason to apply if you are OOS, unless you cannot get anywhare else. We are talking about $57k+ /year in tuition alone!!!! While privates are the same pice for IS and OOS. That explains huge number of OOS at D's private.

MiamiDAP

Agree with mcat2 "I think the very well-to-do families just want the "best" for their kids. I think they do not care very much to pay to both the public school system (if they can not avoid it) and the private school their kids attend."

One correction: not "the very well-to-do families ", but pretty much ANY family that values education, I know several that are actually low income, they just found the way, there are scholsrships, both Merit and need based. And even my D. managed Merit scholarship at the most expansive HS in our area, that covered about 1/3 of her tuition. Her HS has been sending 100% of graduates to 4 year colleges since ever it was established, but it is very small (D. had 32 classmates n her senior class).

i_wanna_be_Brown

Please correct me if I'm wrong, but every citizen of the united states of america that pays taxes pays for public schools regardless of whether anyone they know is attending.

A family that sends its kid to private school is paying a premium so that its kid can attend a better school than the one the government offers, but they're still "paying" for the public school too.

mcat2

i_wanna_be_Brown, I think you are correct. At least here, how much you pay for the public school tax depends on the appraised value of your property (for most, it is your house) and the tax rate set by the school district. I think it is only when you are homeless, you do not need to pay. Even when you rent an apartment, the "property tax for school district" is implicitly included in your rent.

Actually, in some (not particularly) wealthy school district, they intentionally prohibit the apartments (esp. two-bedroom ones) to be built in their district, in order to prevent those families in the lower socioeconomic class from living in their school district. This is somewhat like segregation by the financial resourcefullness of families. Those days (back in 70's or 80's?) when the kids were bused across the town/city were long gone.

One of my coworkers does not have any kid. He always said he paid for other people's kids, but these kids, when they grow up, will work and pay for his retirement. So it is a fair game for him (It is a possitive attitude on his part, but in reality he really does not have other choice.)

But it appears that some people really prefer that we will have some voucher system so that whoever pay into the system will receive the vouchers and they can then use the vouchers to pay for either the public school education (or even select the school to attend at their will) or a part of the private school education.

Regarding "a family that sends its kid to private school is paying a premium", an analogy is that some family is willing to pay a premium for perceived "high-end" products (e.g., products from Apple.)