<p>I did read your post, goru, and I didn’t mean to move the focus away from the rest of it. I just don’t have much to contribute to this topic since I’m only a Senior in high school, so I responded to the only thing I felt I could.</p>
<p>I suppose I should have realized you were a senior, based on your ID, but I didn’t notice first time. You write well for a senior, and I’m glad you appreciate what you (and we all) have in this country.</p>
<p>thanks for the feedback, cld. i obviously fell into the classic CC-board trap, the one i accused others of in my post above. namely, making assumptions that are not explicit in the post. the quality of your writing and the mature sentiments you expressed led me to the conclusion that you were older than you are. </p>
<p>it bothers me when adults on these boards knowingly berate students. i hope you dont take my words as harsher than they were intended. i responded to you and owlice’s posts since they made it apparent i wasnt as clear as i could have been.</p>
<p>Cld, the way the college system works is unfair to students because the picking available to them is very strongly dependent on the parents. Most of you are considered adults at college age for nearly everything, but for college financial aid, you are stuck with your parents’ cooperation. If they won’t fill out a FAFSA, you aren’t going to get even the basic financial aid. If they have the money but don’t want to spend it on you or have made decisions that use up the money other ways, you are out of luck for many options. Until you are 24 years old or fit under a number of other categories, you are dependent to a great degree on your parents good will and cooperation</p>
<p>As for having a family that is does not have much in financial resources, that doe restrict you in many different ways far more important than choice of colleges. Though resourcefulness is still a big factor in quality of life at all economic levels, those with more money with the equal amount of wisdom and judgment, have more options. When our son was hit with a life threatening condition, we were able to go outside of our health insurance network, pay the uncovered cost to get the services of a research hospital and doctor who was one of the best in this particular medical crisis. I saw others go to the local hospital, have to run the gauntlet there, and then get referred to a hospital more able to handle the condition only after a lot of time and run around. Even then, it would be the nearest hospital in network. We had the money to bypass that situation and took it. </p>
<p>So I agree fully that having more money is better than having less. It gives you many more choices. But it should also be recognized that having that money does create responsibilities. If you don’t have it and can’t get it, you do what you can under those circumstances. You’re a cheap jerk if you have the money and don’t use it in cases such as medical situations and even less critical matters. It’s not just a matter of opinion either. You are a jerk if you can afford a safer, more reliable car, and you are risking everyone’s safety and having car troubles. You are a monster if you don’t use the money for better medical care. You are irresponsible if your yard and house are not kept in a certain condition. So yes, you have more money, but you often have the obligation to spend it in ways (and glady, I will add) that someone without it does not have. Which can mean you don’t have the money!!!</p>
<p>I say this because, we have less expendable income than my brother who makes less than we do, because we have had more of these situations where we had to spend the money. He could squeeze in a little house the size of a trailer with his smaller family that did not have issues. He only needed small cars. He chose (unwisely in my mind) a cheap HMO option since no one had medical issues. His kids are not yet in school so that is not yet an issue. He does not have an elderly parent that is losing function (my MIL) with limited resources who needs glasses, hearing aid, teeth, accomodations, care, etc that we feel is very much something we need to cover if she cannot. They don’t work on Wall Street where how you dress is important for client attraction and retention and is a subject that actually is discussed. They don’t (yet) have specific problems for their kids that warrant some intervention that costs money. </p>
<p>Which leads to secondary issues. With a nice house in a nice neighborhood that you own, you have to have responsible upkeep. That costs money. A handicapped person joining the household requires some changes (ramps, pathways, bars) that cost money. If your children would do much better in a different school that costs money over the public one, it is sometimes a wise decision to spend that money in education IF YOU HAVE IT. But when you spend it, you no longer have it for other things. </p>
<p>A poster was asking me why I don’t just take out loans. Well, every loan we take is more out of current and future income for payback and that lessens our available income that we are trying to increase, not decrease. And it’s not like the problem is going to get better for a while since we have 3 to yet get through college, even as we do the best we can to prepare them for life and college in high school and elementary school along with home environment. Lots of balls to juggle. And yes I complain about it, because frankly I’m not that great of a juggler and often miss some balls, and am scared the whole batch will come crashing on my head. </p>
<p>Had we never moved out of financial situation out of college, (and we know some couples that did stay in that life). We would not be in this house, neighborhood, jobs, kids in private school, etc. Those folks that stayed the way they did had to suffer a lot of things with fewer options, because economically they had no choice. For those whose kids did well academically, yes, some got very nice financial aid packages. Better than our kids did. At some great schools too. But some of their kids did end up with no choice but to stay at home and go to a local public college. Them’s the chances in that pathway. We could have chosen to go that route but we did not as we wanted the options our lives gave us. </p>
<p>So we ask for advice, a little bit here and there, and ideas regardless of economic situation unless in the stratosphere where living costs are irrelevant due to the plentitude of money. Very, very few of us are in this category. Probably no one on these boards, but if they are, they too should be welcome to learn the ropes of the situation.</p>
<p>^^
“Cld, the way the college system works is unfair to students because the picking available to them is very strongly dependent on the parents.”</p>
<p>Strongly agree</p>
<p>"A poster was asking me why I don’t just take out loans. "</p>
<p>We avoid debt, so we’re forced to live within our means. Some (wisely) warn students against taking on huge school loans. Isn’t this also a problem for parents, especially those close to retirement? We don’t have enough years to pay it back.</p>
<p>cptofthehouse, with all due respect, when times were hardest for me, I had the same responsibilities as I did when things got better. Yes, it would be callous to refuse to pay money on a necessary item if I was simply sitting on hordes of cash in the bank - but the point is there were medical bills to pay back then, I wanted a safe car to drive in back then, etc. </p>
<p>One thing I had to do then was to plan, budget & allocate. That didn’t change over time – more money simply makes the whole budget + allocation part easier in the sense that you have more to work with on one end.</p>
<p>But parents who want to send their kids to private colleges can be including a college savings plan in with all the other parts of the allocation. For those who are financially comfortable,this can begin at birth – this really isn’t a far fetched thing. I remember relatives giving my kids savings bonds at birth with little notes on it, saying “for college”… so its not like the idea wouldn’t occur to us. </p>
<p>But I am saying that with all of those other expenses and “obligations” – a family CAN include and prioritize a monthly or annual deposit into a 529 account. I am sure that many upper middle class families do in fact include that in their monthly budget — and I am sure that for many, that becomes a factor when they count how many dollars are available to pay for a mortgage. So maybe they end up in a slightly smaller house or a less upscale neighborhood because they want to deposit $500 or $1000 each month to the college fund instead, instead of to a mortgage payment. </p>
<p>A family can also set its priorities differently. With financial aid, I pretty much have been paying the same for a private college as I would for full-pay to an instate University – which is exactly what I told my kids I was willing to pay. It never occurred to me to save money for a private school – I felt I had done my part by choosing to live in a state with a good public university system. But if the family’s priority is to save for a public university – and the kid turns around and gets accepted to an Ivy, and the family does not qualify for aid dollars because their income is too high – that’s because the family didn’t plan well, not because the system is unfair. </p>
<p>I understand that life sometimes comes around and throws some curve balls – there are families who do plan well but then an illness or emergency wipes out their savings. But the OP of this thread certainly wasn’t in that situation. </p>
<p>I asked about borrowing because I feel that if a family does not need to borrow money to finance the education – then they don’t truly NEED financial assistance. (“WANT” - yes.<br>
“COULD REALLY USE” - yes. “NEED” - no.) </p>
<p>As long as the family is looking at loans as a choice, not a necessity --then they aren’t at the level of <em>need</em> that those of us need-based financial aid recipients are. LOANS put the the responsibility for payment on the parents or the students who take them out — and with the exception of a handful of well endowed, elite colleges – need-based aid is always built on loans first. (No one forces the student to take out the loans, but the college assumes that the student will take out the loan in calculating the amount of grant - you can’t call up and say “I’d rather not take a loan, can you give me more grant money?”)</p>
<p>I doubt very seriously that the parents at CC who consider themselves “upper middle class” and live in nice houses in upscale neighborhoods bought those houses for cash. Except possibly for a lucky few who inherited their homes, most upper income families sign mortgages just like the middle income families. College is another one of those big-ticket items that is often financed through borrowing – the difference is simply that not everyone feels it is the sort of thing worth investing in or borrowing large sums of money for. When I pay off my house, I will be left with … a house. It is a tangible piece of property that will probably be worth a lot of money if I decide to sell it. But a PLUS loan pays for an intangible – and some people aren’t willing to go into debt for that. </p>
<p>Which is fine: but if you want something that has a set price, then you either pay the price or else you give up on that “want”.</p>
<p>I told some of my financial aid officer coworkers about this thread. They suggested that anyone who thinks an income in the neighborhood of $200,000/year is any kind of “middle” anything should take a job in a financial aid office of a public university. ;)</p>
<p>It’s all a matter of what you’re used to.</p>
<p>These are the financial aid employees that work hard on loading up poor and innocent students with debt. There’s a strong pejorative that comes to mind when thinking of this but I’ll leave it unsaid here.</p>
<p>Financial aid officers are required to present the available options to students. We do not suggest to them that they borrow any money at all.</p>
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<p>Strawman.</p>
<p>“BCEagle91, you really don’t have a clue. Unfortunately, that is something that cannot be bought.”</p>
<p>On the contrary, you appear to be biased by your “profession.”</p>
<p>Wow. I guess I thought I was helping people. I guess I should have realized what a stupid loser I truly am earlier in this thread when I was told that intelligent, educated people are rich … meaning I am neither intelligent nor educated.</p>
<p>I am done with this thread now, so feel free to blast those of us who were dumb enough to think that kids who were not fortunate enough to be born into families with lots of money might deserve some assistance in affording a college education. I won’t be reading, so I won’t be offended.</p>
<p>“Wow. I guess I thought I was helping people. I guess I should have realized what a stupid loser I truly am earlier in this thread when I was told that intelligent, educated people are rich … meaning I am neither intelligent nor educated.”</p>
<p>That’s an interesting interpretation.</p>
<p>“I am done with this thread now, so feel free to blast those of us who were dumb enough to think that kids who were not fortunate enough to be born into families with lots of money might deserve some assistance in affording a college education.”</p>
<p>Perhaps providing grants would be a better response than loading these kids up with debt.</p>
<p>"Which is fine: but if you want something that has a set price, then you either pay the price or else you give up on that “want”. "</p>
<p>Calmom, I pretty much agree with everything in your post. But, the problem here is that there is no set price for higher education, when some get significant aid and others get nothing. </p>
<p>I also don’t think higher education is a “need”. It’s a “want” for everyone.</p>
<p>Kelsmom, don’t leave – you are a valuable voice of experience. </p>
<p>Please – use your account settings to set any poster who insults you to “ignore”.</p>
<p>I will tell you something: if there was NO financial aid and NO merit aid, these 6-figure earners who come here griping would pay for their kids to attend pricey private colleges just the same as they chose to pay full freight to send their kids to pricey private K-12 schools, despite the existence of perfectly good free public schools serving their upscale neighborhoods. </p>
<p>What they really don’t like is the fact that need-based financial aid makes the elite accessible to families who don’t have as much money. It isn’t that they can’t come up with $200K to send their precious kid to Princeton – it’s just that it ticks them off that somebody else’s kid gets to attend Princeton for $60K over 4 years. It muddies the eliteness of the school in their eyes if working class families can afford to send their kids there.</p>
<p>“I will tell you something: if there was NO financial aid and NO merit aid, these 6-figure earners who come here griping would pay for their kids to attend pricey private colleges just the same as they chose to pay full freight to send their kids to pricey private K-12 schools, despite the existence of perfectly good free public schools serving their upscale neighborhoods.”</p>
<p>Rubbish. I am your counterexample.</p>
<p>“What they really don’t like is the fact that need-based financial aid makes the elite accessible to families who don’t have as much money.”</p>
<p>Rubbish. The people on this thread with six-figure incomes came from low or middle-class families.</p>
<p>“It isn’t that they can’t come up with $200K to send their precious kid to Princeton – it’s just that it ticks them off that somebody else’s kid gets to attend Princeton for $60K over 4 years.”</p>
<p>Rubbish. Everyone wants a discount.</p>
<p>“It muddies the eliteness of the school in their eyes if working class families can afford to send their kids there.”</p>
<p>Rubbish - see above.</p>
<p>The fact of the matter is that without the money, people do without the safe, reliable car, the best medical care. I have seen and still see many who are doing this. So if you have just enough to somehow make those items obligations, you are then at the same mark as the person who can’t afford those things, except you have those items. </p>
<p>Sounds crazy, but that is where we are. Our disposable income after we take care of the obligations, responsibilities, best decision as we have gone through the years, does not leave much. It’s less than my brother’s, for example, though we are in a higher income bracket than his family.</p>
<p>As for borrowing the money, there are many who are in the catch 22 of needing to borrow to get something but not having the income to pay it back. I know folks who end up borrowing over the $100K mark for their kids educations, and when it comes down to the monthly payment, they absolutely cannot pay it. When your income is pretty much sewn up and budgeted, it just may not have room for an additional monthly payment.</p>
<p>Don’t think that I am trivializing the issues that those who are middle and low income have. They have issues far more serious than these and paying for college does not even make the list when things occur that need attention.</p>
<p>I don’t think most folks realize when they are “negotiating” with the fin aid officers what the average incomes in that field run. It would humble them greatly and perhaps fin aid would not hear so many “I’m so poor” grievances. We did not bother to apply for fin aid from the unis, as we well knew we were not eligible. Just filled out the FAFSA for eligibility for some outside awards, Stafford and PLUS eligibility. However, son was able to double his merit award by letting the admissions office know that this was his first choice school but the cost was too high for value considering his other offers. Since he had an ivy at a little over state prices in his pocket, that gave him some leverage, in addition to being an out of area, high test score male. I doubt he would have gotten anywhere with fin aid as they didn’t have the flexibility to give him anything given our EFC.</p>
<p>But I know many families making far more than we, with plenty of assets whose kids gave up UPenn for big merit packages at BU and at BC. Two of them, one for each Boston school. The parents could have afforded UPenn, but did not feel it gave the value for the dollar. They were quite pragmatic about the whole things and their kids were in agreement.</p>
<p>Calmom, I’ve paid for private school for all of my kids before they headed off to college. Those schools were the best choices for them at the time the decisions are made. As a result combined with other things, we cannot pay full freight at a private college for our kids. At the $45-60K range for these schools, which is what it costs starting with the oldest one 7 years back to the youngest who has 7 years till college, this six figure income cannot do it. There are many of us in that situation. You are wrong, Calmom, because I know lots of us who have kids in private school, and we are paying private school tuition for them, and trying to work out college. My son did not even consider those schools that did not give him any merit money and had sticker prices over $30K for COA for him. That was the hard line figure for us.</p>
<p>Calmom - why is it necessary to write in that tone of voice? What’s your point? Some how those upper middle class kids are just spoiled and too precious to go to public schools? I know wealthier people than me that wouldn’t part with their money to send their kids to private schools because it’s more important for them to have a house in Italy or another car. Paying for my kids private schools is not putting me over the edge, but I could think of 100 other things I could do with 60,000 a year for 13 years.<br>
You add nothing to the discussion when you take on that bitter tone.
Kelmom - I don’t know how you to came to conclude
</p>
<p>There’s a girl at my school I would definitely classify as “wealthy” (probably op’s income range or higher) getting need based aid at Princeton…some schools just have too much money.</p>
<p>"What they really don’t like is the fact that need-based financial aid makes the elite accessible to families who don’t have as much money. It isn’t that they can’t come up with $200K to send their precious kid to Princeton – it’s just that it ticks them off that somebody else’s kid gets to attend Princeton for $60K over 4 years. It muddies the eliteness of the school in their eyes if working class families can afford to send their kids there. "</p>
<p>Wow! This truly does not dignify a response, but I just can’t leave that one hanging. In no way, shape, or form does the financial aid system “muddy the eliteness”. I truly don’t begrduge anyone the aid they get. I have no ill feelings toward a single family/child who is able to attend ANY university! Like I said in my previous post, and some choose not to believe it, many of us who are in the 6-figure income bracket have come from those same working class families. That makes us your children, calmom. </p>
<p>It just boggles the mind that some can’t understand the fact i don’t like paying $200K for something that someone else pays $60K. Not for some elitist bs reason. But because college tuition/board is really the only product we buy where the price is based on the purchaser’s income. Should I pay $30K for the same used car you pay $10K for? Should I pay 6$/gallon for gas?</p>