<p>
</p>
<p>Whoa–that’s a mean thing to say! Sounds to me like they want to make their kid’s dream come true and want only the best for him.</p>
<p>I agree with everyone else. NYU undergrad, except in the case of Stern and Tisch, is not that prestigious and is in no way worth that much $$ in comparison to UC Davis. Save the $$ for grad school!</p>
<p>What a refreshing change over most of the money-vs-prestige threads. You’re a fantastic kid, and you have fantastic parents. In fact, your parents are SOOO good that they’ve taught you to exceed them in financial sense! I think that’s every good teacher’s goal.
Convince THEM back that YOUR biggest goal in life is to have them have the time and money to come visit you in your new home after graduation! </p>
<p>Seriously, if they think about their goal, it probably isn’t to put you into a prestigious university, but for you to have a good life. And you can have that at UCD, and nicer winters besides. And if it really is their goal to put you into a prestigious university, they can alter that goal slightly to pay for your law school, which is very expensive and would likely be impossible for them if they pay for NYU undergrad.</p>
<p>If you decide to go to UCD, and there seems to be unanimous advice here to do so, you might consider taking (or majoring in) heavy reading courses, such as History, Philosophy, Comparative Religion, perhaps Classics and others that will strengthen the reasoning muscles that produce high LSAT scores. There’s nothing automatic or guaranteed about doing very well on LSAT, no matter the undergraduate school.</p>
<p>Choose your English Lit courses where, by reputation, there are papers assigned that are serious and receive feedback from professors.</p>
<p>If a lawyer who reads this agrees, I think I just came up with a good piece of advice there.</p>
<p>I’m not a fan of “practical majors” if you want to push on to Law School following undergraduate years.</p>
<p>I’m a lawyer and I agree. 
</p>
<p>I think that courses in which you do a lot of analytical writing are the best preparation for law school.</p>
<p>There are MANY CC posters who have chosen NYU and then found the loans unbearable, and they’ve wound up severely in debt or transferring out. NYC is not a cheap place to live, and NYU is notorious for gapping and expecting parents to borrow heavily.</p>
<p>P3T, great advice and I would add that a logic course would be helpful, too. DH was an accounting/management systems major before heading to law school and these skills have been a huge asset to him. Amazing how many lawyers don’t know how to read a corporate financial statement!</p>
<p>OP, congrats for having your head screwed on straight about college costs. Davis is a great school. The more money your parents can save for retirement, the more grateful they’ll be for their continued independence and your wise choice – and the more thankful you’ll be that YOU don’t have to fund their golden years. </p>
<p>My younger S decided not to apply to NYU because he felt it wasn’t worth the $$ over the college experience he could get out of our state’s flagship. (He used this criterion to drop a few schools from consideration.)</p>
<p>^^^</p>
<p>Good advice…</p>
<p>This is from a top tier law school’s website…</p>
<p>*Potential law students should choose courses that will enhance their abilities in the areas of critical thinking, oral and written expression, and logical and analytical reasoning. Applicants considering law school are encouraged to enroll in a broad range of courses that will help develop these skills. *</p>
<p>And by “practical major” above in scare quotes, what I meant was those majors that are high on lists for getting readily hired right after undergraduate school. Barron just started a thread on that in this forum, so it was on my mind. I got a slight hint from the OP that the parents aren’t sure what he’ll do after college if he doesn’t go to law school from UCD. So choosing a major that continues his dream to go to law school afterwards might be an important decision point at UCD, if that’s where he goes.</p>
<p>A lawyer cousin was a Math/Econ double-major as an Undergraduate, so I guess that’s another way to develop those reasoning skills. Now he works in bankruptcy corporate law and is quite busy.</p>
<p>As a New Yorker, I say, go to UC Davis. Better campus experience, highly prestigious, more convenient, and cheaper!! New York will always be there, but the chance to have a real college experience will not. I don’t know why anyone would think that NYU is more brag-worthy than UC Davis. Besides, if your parents don’t save enough for their retirement, who else are they going to rely on but you?</p>
<p>I say go to UC Davis. Your parents should not use retirement funds to pay for your college.</p>
<p>That said, I am an NYU parent. I had no idea the school I am sending my child to is so disliked:). Truthfully it IS a good school, my child is happy there and had a paid internship in her major last year (as a freshman). </p>
<p>It’s just not a good idea to take money from the retirement fund.</p>
<p>It’s not that it’s NYU…</p>
<p>People would be saying the same about any school that meant draining the retirement acct.</p>
<p>I’m sure your child is happy 
and good for her that she has a paid internship, but you don’t have to go to NYU to get one as a freshman. Both my boys got paid internships as freshmen and they go to a state school.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>This is why I mentioned the internship.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Possibly, but NYU bashing seems to be a popular sport on cc.</p>
<p>I still think the OP should choose UCD based on finances, the fact that they are both good school and s/he likes both.</p>
<p>i’m sorry, but since when is nyu more “prestigious” than davis??? i’m lost on that distinction…</p>
<p>u have received excellent advice. go aggies!</p>
<p>plus, u began your post by saying that u come from a “very low income” family. how is nyu being afforded then? reminds me of that prince song that something ‘does not compute’…</p>
<p>too many of our elderly end up struggling due to poor financial decisions. don’t let your parents get placed in that boat.</p>
<p>A low income family shouldn’t spend most of its savings and future retirement funds on an intangible perception of ‘prestige’ such as going to NYU vs. UCD - they might be willing to or even want to but they shouldn’t. It doesn’t make any sense. Have your parents told you firstly, why they think NYU is so prestigous relative to UCD, and secondly, what they think attending NYU vs. UCD will gain you? Maybe they’re just not well informed in this area and you could provide some data (average incoming freshman SAT scores, USNW rankings, campus experience, true cost including higher cost of living in NYC, etc.) that will help them understand some of your points.</p>
<p>The point a poster raised about how them spending most of their retirement funds on this affecting not just them but you (and any siblings) down the road is a valid one and one that should be strongly considered. </p>
<p>My vote, as you could probably guess from my moniker, would be for UCD since the cost to attend NYU would be far more, your parents can’t reasonably afford it, they’re in the same category as far as general ‘rankings’ go, and you seem to actually prefer UCD given your thoughtful assessment of the two scenarios.</p>
<p>One of my DDs turned down loans at NYU for a mid-range UC, now en route to a PhD she seems very happy to have no UG loans as it gave her much more flexibility to choose the post grad options she wanted to pursue.</p>
<p>"That said, I am an NYU parent. I had no idea the school I am sending my child to is so disliked. Truthfully it IS a good school, my child is happy there and had a paid internship in her major last year (as a freshman). "</p>
<p>People like me who are suggesting that the OP go to Davis don’t dislike NYU. I like NYU. I have a friend and a cousin who are professors there, and I have friends who have gone there.</p>
<p>I think, though, it’s a mistake to take out big loans or to drain one’s retirement fund to send students to NYU.</p>
<p>And I mentioned the internship because where I live – which is not close to NYC – being an NYU student or alum will not open doors. The student whom I mentioned wanted to work at home over the summer, but couldn’t get a paying job because people where I live want to hire students from the local second tier public or from the state flagship, both of which are ranked lower than is NYU.</p>
<p>This was a big surprise to the student and her parents, who knew of plenty of other students with lower gpas from lesser ranked schools in our state who were able to get jobs that the girl was overlooked for.</p>
<p>The student as an upperclassmen was able to get a paid internship in NYC, but that was more costly than a paid internship at home would have been because she had to pay for housing and other expenses since she was not spending the summer at home.</p>
<p>Her parents have made many sacrifices to send her to NYU. THe mother is having health problems due to working a job that is very stressful and that she loathes. If the daughter had gone to the state flagship or another less costly school, the family wouldn’t have less financial stress.</p>
<p>Fine to go to NYU if one’s family can afford it, but it’s a mistake if going there will cause a major financial burden, something that happens to many NYU students since NYU doesn’t meet the financial need of many students.</p>
<p>Your parents are incredibly nice to make this offer, but I hope you don’t take them up on it. UC Davis is a great school, and your costs are very reasonable there. If your parents spend their retirement funds on your education – and those funds are in retirement accounts – they’ll probably take a pretty significant tax hit to use them, and maybe even penalties if they’re not old enough. Furthermore, when they do retire, what are they going to live on? Social Security doesn’t provide all that much, and people trying to get by on just that have a really tough time. Your folks sound really generous, but this is likely to be such a bad thing for them in the long run.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>I am also suggesting that the poster go to UCD as I think in this case it make sense. </p>
<p>However, I am responding to some of the posters who feel the need to refer to NYU as not prestigious and not that good but “popular”. I see no need to trash NYU as this appears to be a financial decision.</p>
<p>I did misunderstand your comment about the internships. I thought that you were referring to internships in NYC. Sorry.</p>
<p>I don’t mean to hijack the thread. So back to the regularly scheduled programming…</p>
<p>I think the point is that NYU is not enough *more *prestigious than UCD to justify the cost difference. If money were no object, this discussion would be different, and if we were comparing schools with a bigger gap in prestige/quality, it would also be different.</p>
<p>One more vote for UC. Think about it. You will have a choice, in life, between a $20 K car that runs fine and a $60 K car that has an all leather interior. You can choose a nice house or a house with a pool, a sauna, a view and 16 bedrooms. Either you make these choices based on what you can afford OR you make these choices with the knowledge that you will be immensely in debt.
Tell your folks that they are just going to have to love you without the braggy bumper sticker. That’s loving them, for sure – because we show our love by caring – not by buying.</p>
<p>calimami, your question has already been answered. The Op’s “low income” family has over $140k in retirement funds according to the Op. The 35k X4 yrs would take a big chunk of retirement fund.</p>
<p>And Hunt is right, there in post 58. I’d even add there is always debate about the value of prestige anyway. Sometimes name-recognition and sometimes a regional preference outweigh prestige.</p>