This has been bugging me too, having seen a couple of these statements on CC recently. While I get it in one sense - all of us have a threshold on a lot of things that we don’t think is “worth it” -what really worries me about this statement is also the pressure it puts on the kid to get into a “good enough” school. And what happens if the kid doesn’t get into a school the parent will pay for - what message are you sending the kid, that they are a disappointment to you? That they are not good enough?
I’m not sure if this is a question, statement or argument. But that’s just been bugging me and wondering what others think. (For obvious reasons I did not want to post it as a response in one of the original threads.)
Obviously I don’t like that approach at all! I agree we have way too many kids with shattered hopes and dreams because all their lives they have been told if they just “work hard enough” and are “just perfect enough” that they will get into their “top school.”
I would rather tell my kids “I have xyz amount for college” and have honest discussions about cost of different schools and how merit is chosen based on GPA and test scores etc. Kids are literally becoming increasing anxious and suicidal trying to get into “top schools” as rated by certain ranking systems. I think its cruel to push your kids to get into only highly selective schools with low acceptance rates that are also super expensive and may be out of budget. Pushing your kid to strive for the “best” and then moving the goal post and/or taking away the ball completely just seems unfair.
Of course yes we have seen this. It bothers me also. I think that it bothers me in perhaps three ways.
One issue is that it is not clear from a somewhat unclear “we will pay for a good school” whether the parents are aware of how much university costs. “We will pay” without thinking about the details is different from “We understand what this costs and we really do know whether the money will come from to pay it”. This might be particularly worrisome when medical school is a realistic possibility in the future, but can be an issue just for a bachelor’s degree.
A second issue is that I agree that it does put pressure on the kid to get into a highly ranked school, possibly based at least roughly on US News rankings, or on similar rankings, or on perceptions of similar rankings.
The third thing that bugs me is that this seems to presume that a famous or highly ranked university is going to provide a better education, in whatever specific major the student happens to select down the road. I might have fallen for this misunderstanding when I got my bachelor’s degree at a highly ranked university, when the far more affordable alternative was also a very good school. However many other people I know went with the affordable option for their bachelor’s and have gotten a very good education. One person who I know very well has said that the quality of education at Seton Hall (where she got her bachelor’s), was just as good as the quality of teaching that she got at Columbia (where she got her master’s). I think that this is a common experience.
Regarding the first issue, one daughter is of course getting her DVM. She has said several times that most of the students in her program are taking on way too much debt, and do not want to talk about it. Some of them have tried hard to minimize the total debt (for example by staying in-state for both bachelor’s degree and DVM), but some have not. I think that there are some parents and some students who said “we will find a way to pay for it” and will be dealing with the consequences for decades.
Maybe there is a fourth thing that is bugging me. After all these years, I still honestly do not know whether or not or how much I benefited from having gotten two degrees (bachelor’s and master’s) from famous universities. I understand that graduates from Harvard and Princeton and MIT and Stanford on the average are more likely to get to medical school, or file patents, or end up with stronger careers compared to graduates from a less famous university. I do not know how much of this comes from the types of students that these famous schools accept in the first place. I have heard that students that get accepted to Harvard but who instead attend their in-state public university on the average do just as well as students to attend Harvard. I have not however seen the study directly. Perhaps I have a big unknown here. The very best U.Mass graduates that I have worked with are just as strong, and just as numerous or more numerous, compared to the best MIT graduates that I have worked with.
I do realize that we tend to gang up on people who say “we will pay for a good school” with apparently vague understanding of what this means. I guess that there is a fine line between pointing out an important issue, versus being rude. I do think that this issue is worth mentioning.
I think - and no way of knowing if that is any of the parents mentioned here - it’s also that some parents see it as a reflection of themselves. I know someone like this irl who seems deeply ashamed that her son “only” got into (a perfectly good state school but not in the top whatever number she thinks is good) and I keep thinking that surely he must pick up on this from her? And wondering how that makes him feel. So yes I think in some circumstances it’s motivated by “I want what’s best for my kid” but in some (and there may be overlap) it’s also “I want what makes me look good/what I can boast about to my friends”.
As a full paying parents we only were planning to pay for few schools. We knew that DD will get in number of UCs and having good in state options we were only willing to pay for few very top private colleges and majors that historically have good ROI. She got into top UCs but ended up attending MIT. If someone has unlimited money they don’t need to set up expectations but in our case we had to.
I refuse to tell my kids I will pay 80k/yr in tuition (and/or take out loans for them) but only if its an Ivy League school because I don’t trust the job market. If one is willing (and/or able) to pay 80k/yr, who is to say the student wouldn’t be equally successful at a different school.
The Thumper Family discussed college and costs before our kids applied. We were in the position to fully fund any college our kids attended. We know this isn’t the case for everyone, and we are very fortunate. We discussed options woth our kids before applications were sent, and they were able to choose themselves amongst their acceptances.
Neither choice the least costly option. Or in one case, the post “prestigious”.
I think families should be clear on the financial budget for college woth theor students. It’s heartbreaking to read about acceptances that kids get and have to decline because they didn’t understand that they were out of budget.
We didn’t rank our kids’ college choices as being somehow good enough or better than any other college to which they applied.
This is how we have framed it. There’s x amount of money in budget and child can spend it all on undergrad school of choice and take loans for grad school (which they’ll likely need for their choice of career) - or they can choose an undergrad school that checks most of their boxes and is affordable enough that we can pay for grad school as well.
There’s no such thing as “good enough” school, but there are some stipulations we have as parents (must have direct flight, must have good medical care nearby, etc)
I guess I am reading the title differently than it is intended. When I hear ‘I’ll pay for a good enough school’ I hear I will pay for a safety school instate. The rest you are on your own. So, if it cost $60,000 private school or $30,000 instate then the parent will pay $30,000 total that year.
Not trying to judge anyone, but this should not happen in the first place. Parents shouldn’t let their children apply to colleges they simply will never be able to afford or have no intention of paying for. NPC’s exist and even self-employed parents should know how much they are able to spend per year on college. If they are letting the child apply on the basis of “You can attend IF you get enough aid”, that’s a conversation they should have well before apps are submitted.
I am working with a parent right now who literally told me she can’t afford any of the reach colleges her kid is applying to. These colleges are private and public tippy tops, which are very expensive for OOS students. The parent is super anxious and stressed about paying for college. Her son had about 7 high reaches on the list. After mom and I talked, she said she would speak to her son. And the son is still applying to all 7 reaches. With tons of supplements, doing all that work, and he has no chance of attending, even if he does get in.
Yes, a reach or two, just in case your kid gets enough aid, is okay. This student will get no aid. They are a doughnut hole family.
Parents need to be honest with their kids and have these conversations long before their senior year.
Or to just have the conversation. We have said go ahead and throw application in for xyz private school as there’s a chance there’s merit/financial aid money awarded that will bring the cost down (some schools tend to award $$ but you don’t know until you know). But we’ve made clear that $50-55k would be fine, but full sticker price of $70k would not be ok.
It’s taken spending time in this process for past year or two for me to conclude that fit is just as predictive of outcome as school prestige. Had my kid put his hat in the ring - could have gotten into more “ranked” or prestigious school? Maybe, maybe not. But he fell in love with the out of state safety. Knowing that he’s healthy, happy, and thriving where he is / that to me is worth more than spending the same amount of money at a place that’s prestigious, but maybe he would not have been happy or thriving.
I inadvertently broke a TOS by quoting from another thread (since deleted the quote), where it was more clear what the meaning was. A couple of students have been told by their parents that they will full pay for schools only if they are “good enough” to justify that (in the parents subjective estimation of course)
It’s not a case of can’t afford, it’s a case of parent refusing to pay for a school that’s not prestigious enough in their eyes. Yes, maybe they shouldn’t let the kid apply in the first place but everyone needs targets and safeties, right? You can’t only apply to reaches that the parent thinks are “worth it”.
Of course.
I was thinking of your post in a different way, but yes, you are right. Unfortunately, I think there are plenty of parents who say they won’t pay for a school that isn’t good enough in their view. I wonder when it comes down to it, is it more shameful to them if the student has no college to go to at all, if they can’t or won’t pay? How “shameful” is CC, for example? Just speculating.
I agree we have way too many kids with shattered hopes and dreams because all their lives they have been told if they just “work hard enough” and are “just perfect enough” that they will get into their “top school.”