There was a fascinating article- WSJ? Maybe the Atlantic? a few years back about what it’s like to be on the faculty at a state flagship (the article focused on Georgia, examining the impact of merit scholarships on student body… hint- they get richer- a LOT richer). It was eye-opening. Professorss passing the student parking lot filled with shiny new BMW’s and sporty (and expensive) new cars on the way to the faculty lot filled with beat up Nissan’s and Toyota’s.
I’ve known plenty of kids on financial aid at Princeton, Middlebury and Yale; they don’t report an “us vs. them” mentality except for two handfuls of rich internationals who truly live apart from everyone else (even if they’re in the dorms- their lives are “elsewhere”). But that’s an old story- I had classmates back in the 1970’s who had private body guards (oil Sheik’s children) and they did not live like the rest of us. But the rest of us included children of Fortune 50 CEO’s (who ate on the meal plan, like everyone else), the scion’s of Mayflower, old money families, etc.
I don’t think public schools are status oriented. But many of them have POLICIES which enforce social segregation (differential pricing on dorms being one such policy). Asking for a housing deposit in January months before a kid has to decide to enroll-- a kid of modest means can’t possibly deposit months ahead of time knowing that he could lose the deposit. Shifting financial aid from need based (where you get kids who are truly needy and need a LOT of money) to merit (everyone gets 10K. Spread the wealth, much cheaper, but you price out kids who get gapped with these policies). Etc.
I can see charging extra for a single (unless it’s medically necessary and the students is not on FA) but having a 2-tiered pricing structure doesn’t seem right to me.
^ that’s a Tufts quote from the article. I guess that sort of, maybe, negates the effect of the change.
It’s a good life lesson to realize that none of these kids are paying for dorms or apartments themselves, most likely, but rather their parents. So the life lesson is, richer parents = better housing?
My alma mater also, and that’s also how my kid’s college housing works. Lottery system with seniors going first then on down. Luck of the draw combined with seniority.
And FWIW, the newest modern dorms at D’s college are also not the most sought after.
Two sides to this. Yes, it’s great to mix everyone together without regard for ability to pay and make it a lottery. Two, this type of thinking has gotten us to drive prices for some colleges into the 65-75K per year category. Low income and middle income kids end up working for ten years to pay back huge loans driven by things like gluten free food, high end work out areas and on and on. Yes, it’s great if you want a high end gym. I just am not willing to pay for it thru my full pay students. Likewise, specialized food. Have the basics and add a cost if someone needs something specialized. It has continually increased. The school I went to ( with a less than 10% admit rate) had a lot of old stuff but we survived. I’m sick of the entitled kids driving up prices for what they really don’t need. So when it comes down to it, I’d have my kids live in the “normal” dorm.
We are actually high income but paying for a high end set up isn’t what college is about. I was shocked by one of my nephews who chose his college by the new gym. I can honestly say, it had a chandelier type light. OMG. No. My kids know we’d opt out if/when possible.
“A lot of the kids going to BU/NEU/Harvard with " wealth” actually live in condos their parents. buy for them."
Can’t speak to the others, but this is not the norm at Harvard at all. There’s a meaningful population of grad students in nice condos, but the undergrads, including very rich ones, overwhelmingly live in the Harvard Houses. They aren’t required to, but 95%+ choose to.
when I went to college the amenities were nothing to rave about. It was very simple. It has become crazy and the cost of education confirms this. Every new quad living with private bath costs money and someone is paying for it and the vast majority of America cannot pay full fare. I think its a valuable learning experience living in basic conditions to prepare for life down the road as well as the comadary.
Now in terms of GF food, as another poster mentioned as adding cost that simply is not wheat based foods. That really is not a big deal as salad dressing should not have wheat in it. Its lurking in many processed foods. Meats, veggies and fruit dont have gluten which is what we should be eating. In many cases its for medical reasons and the ada protects those students from discrimination.
But the ADA doesn’t set the price of food. At a restaurant I went to recently, it was $4 extra for a gluten free English muffin. The ADA doesn’t require the restaurant to make the cost the same for everyone even if it is medically necessary.
I don’t think charging variable rates for housing is particularly rare. Searching some college websites, all I checked except HYPS… type private colleges charged variable rates for different housing. For example, NYU’s housing rates are at https://www.nyu.edu/content/dam/nyu/resLifeHousServ/documents/ApplicationsandAssignments/AY2018-2019PropHsgRatesUpdate.pdf . Freshman could pay $8k.year for a triple in Rubin, which is not air conditioned; or they could pay $19k/year for a private suite/loft in Third North.
While HYPS… often did have a flat rate for undergrads in spite of having very different housing quality in some cases, they often had more variability in pricing among graduate housing. For example, Stanford’s graduate housing rates are at https://rde.stanford.edu/studenthousing/rates-billing#Grad . Housing costs vary from $795/month to $2975/month (max $2100/month for single students).
I think grad housing is a completely different animal, Data. I have a nephew who has just gone back to grad school. he has a spouse with a job; it was worth it to them to be in the more expensive grad housing option because the parking, location, etc. made it more convenient for the non-grad student to get to work in the morning.
Not the same dynamics as with an undergrad- we’re talking about a student who is almost 30 years old! Not especially worried about his social integration on campus…
At Duke, there are many different types of dorms for Freshman, from the really old cool buildings, to the ones built 10-15 years ago, all the way to the fancy hotel style dorm that just opened that has double beds, as opposed to the Twin XL (the rooms are HUGE). And yes, the rates are different, depending on which dorm you are in, and whether it is a single or a double. But, if you are on financial aid, the grant aid will rise to cover the cost of the dorm. The students are placed into random housing, so you really do not have a say into which dorm you are placed into. Same things goes for when you move onto West campus the subsequent years.
That’s interesting - so if not on FA, you don’t know the cost of your room and board? But if you get even minimal FA you pay the same thing every year?
I think FA should cover housing in situations where students cannot control that cost, and probably even when they can, but I’d never heard of lottery housing with different prices. Goes to show there an infinite number of ways colleges handle this, I guess.
I’m a fan of the residential one-price lottery/seniority system because I see how that works well for a LAC trying to build a tight community of students. Less useful for a large U that is perhaps trying to build smaller communities of students within the larger institution. I also know some LACs do variable pricing based on single/double, suite, etc. but I am not a fan.
@OHMomof2 From what some of the moderators on the Class of 2022 Facebook page have said, it is implied that Duke does not charge the differential housing price for the first year, since there is no say in which dorm you live in. However, the website does state different prices for regular singles and doubles on East Campus versus Premium singles and doubles. Our bill just shows housing, so it could be true, but we are not full pay, so that could be the reason. My daughter is in a middle of the line dorm. The only ones on East Campus that are supposed to be premium from my understanding is Trinity, which is like a fancy hotel.
“lottery housing with different prices” Sure. Prevalent enough, after first year. The better your number, the more choice you have, including whether to go for higher end/more costly. Or not.
Add my D1 to those who weren’t crazy about being in a much newer dorm. But both of mine had same cost for all choices. No premium pricing.
A “Ritz Carlton” dorm for the silver spooners? I imagine colleges would do anything to make more $$ by charging a premium for those rooms. And they’d likely fill up every room. If this works in one college, get ready for a trend.
Perhaps it matters more for colleges that try to have a more integrated residential experience living in college or college-associated housing for all four years, rather than the probable majority of colleges where only a portion of frosh (those from out of the area) live in the dorms, and almost everyone lives off campus after frosh year.
Boston is a tough housing market, especially for students. The city wants the colleges to house more of their students but construction costs are very high. Even with new dorms (NEU has built several in recent years - IV, EV, and now this new one which they are not the owner of), schools can only guarantee housing for 1-2 years. At places like BU and NEU, the college campus is pretty much integrated with the city and living off campus has few drawbacks in terms of convenience. Also, at NEU, with it’s coop program, people come and go, so students’ housing needs can be fluid. You end up with students in “tiered” housing both on and off campus. Those living in fancy condos their parents bought (I only know of one Harvard grad student who has this), those living in nice dorms, those living in less nice dorms, those living in dumpy apartments in not very nice neighborhoods, those living in slightly nicer places a train ride away from campus, etc.
I never gave it a second thought that different dorms/room set ups cost different amounts. When I went to school it was a lottery of sorts but the price was differentiated based on where you ended up. Back then it was not much of a difference as the only real differences were air conditioning, # of roommates, and private bath. That said I was on a very tight budget and requested the least expensive and ended up somewhere in the middle, having to pay the difference myself. I thought this was how every place worked.
When my son applied to my alma mater two new dorms had been built within the previous 2 years, and were obviously much nicer and more modern than 80% of the rest of the buildings. The school had gone to mandatory Living Learning Communities for the dorms so the student had to rank which communities (1-10) they wanted to live in and then they were placed in housing based on that. Again a kind of a lottery but not every community was in every dorm and some were only offered in the newest, most expensive dorms. As luck (or unluck?) would have it the community he was assigned was only housed on one floor of one dorm, the newest most expensive on campus and we definitely paid a significant amount more than if he had been assigned to one of the older buildings.