https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2019/07/columbia-costs-mfa/593215/
I was tempted to help this obviously talented young woman, but she’s already fairly successful, and still wants to pay $200,000 for a two-year MFA program at Columbia just because it’s a prestigious program. This just didn’t seem a worthwhile charity cause for me. Do you agree or disagree?
Columbia is actually not considered one of the more prestigious MFA programs, precisely because it’s unfunded, unlike top ones like Michigan, Iowa, Texas, and some others. It has a higher admit rate because it takes a lot more students, because it’s not funding them, and because the funded ones are considered top notch. OTOH, just being who and where it is, writers in the program get noticed by agents and publishers. But you pretty much have to be independently wealthy to go there. It’s hard to believe she didn’t know it does not fund students; any MFA research would show that.
GoFundMe sites are generally not considered charitable contributions since they are for a specific person’s goals. They are not tax deductible. I know that isn’t exactly what you were wondering but the charity designation doesn’t really fit.
@chardonMN I know, I guess I was trying to put some irony in my choice of words.
I don’t donate to any go find me things. They keep a %age of the donations. If it’s a cause I wish to donate to, I send directly to the recipient so they get the full amount.
From what I understand from a lawyer friend, the proceeds from these are taxable to the recipient. @BelknapPoint what do you know about this?
Anyway…if someone applies to a college they can’t afford, I won’t donate.
My favorite “charity” is my own DD’s college fund. I donate to other causes too, and our family does a whole lot of volunteering. Having said that, this cause doesn’t fill a true need so much as one person’s dream. Needs vs. wants.
Isn’t it considered gift? One doesn’t pay tax of gift received.
“Fortunately” for her, she can borrow the full COA courtesy of us taxpayers.
@bluebayou if this student is NOT a U.S. citizen, she is not able to take federally funded loans at all…and that includes the Grad Plus loans.
Is she a U.S. citizen?
No, she’s Ugandan.
Well…if she is from Uganda…she is NOT eligible to take out a nickel of loans funded by “us taxpayers”.
In fact, she will have a huge amount of difficulty getting loans in this country unless she has a qualified U.S. citizen co-signer in this country.
I’m uneasy with links that lead to links for GoFundMe.
A lot of news articles these days have GoFundMe links. I trust users not to be coerced to donate.
I think most people are savvy enough not to be moved by someone who decided that a $200k college is their dream and others should want to pay to send them there. I don’t believe she’s raised enough for airfare. When she doesn’t have the money to pay for the fall she won’t be able to register. I don’t know if you can defer grad school for a year, but even if she can I think the likelihood of getting substantial donations is small. Raising $100k is enough of a challenge and she has to do that twice.
I just keep thinking, This is the new version of the Nigerian prince.
I know from my kid’s experience (Brown '19 MFA acting) that a number of MFA programs (in acting) are now funding the students who they really want to admit. I’m assuming that this may also be the case with MFA writing programs. Not sure why the author of the article wouldn’t have applied to one of those programs.
As i mentioned above, exactly! The best programs are funded. However, their admission rates are vanishingly tiny. Make undergrad Ivy look easy. For instance the fiction acceptance rate for the Michener Program at Texas is .5%. That’s usually considered a top three program, with Iowa and Michigan, and is well-funded. So people apply to Columbia because it’s comparatively easier to get into (still very tough) and the connections it provides.
Is it possible that she isn’t aware that state schools or other schools can provide a quality education as well?
In creative writing MFA’s, it isn’t really even a matter of state or private. Most of the absolute best ones ARE state schools, and again, they are the hardest to get into. It’s possible she wants to go to Columbia because of the name, but if that was the case, then she didn’t do thorough research. As far as Ivies, the other two MFA’s, Brown and Cornell, are ranked much higher than Columbia. But as I’ve said, places like Michigan, Texas (Michener), Iowa, Wisconsin, are considered the best of the best. So it’s much more than an “as well.”