I’ve always wondered if I might have survived in my first major, Physics, if I hadn’t gone to an HYPS with what in retrospect was probably inadequate preparation, despite being an AP Calc and Physics student at a very well-regarded public.
I don’t at all mind the life I have had, but my family also had to pay WAAAAAAY less in inflation-adjusted terms back then, as opposed to full pay now. Just something I keep in mind when discussing college choice with my own kids. I really believe you need to take personal responsibility for deciding if you are adequately prepared for the more rigorous undergrad programs at these hyperselective colleges, as in fact they expect a bunch of people to switch out of those majors, and so are not really trying to minimize the chances that will happen to you individually.
If $100k/yr is not a drop in the bucket/easily doable, I would not spend it for the possibility of connections. Too many variables at play. And so much depends on the individual kid.
We knew a very bright, outgoing, mature kid who always wanted to go to UMD. A natural superstar. Then they looked at “lesser” state school. They chose Lesser State and said “If I don’t like it, I can transfer”. They loved Lesser State. Majored in their new physics major (@NiceUnparticularMan ), got involved, was tight with their professors, worked for them, and had a great experience overall.
Could they have done “better” by going to UMD? Maybe. Could they have done “worse”? Maybe. No point in playing that game.
This kid is doing great - because that is who they are.
I think if you have the money and want to spend it…you should. Whether it is “worth it” is a personal decision.
I also think you can make connections and achieve success at a less costly school. Most families likely cannot afford to spend $100,000 per year on college.
Premed competition can be fierce at state flagships, and grading curves less generous than at elite privates, so that may be overestimating the likelihood of success at a state flagship versus at an elite private.
“Ivy” means one of HYP, since SM are not… But if he did poorly in science at his first college, that does not predict doing well at science later or in MD or DO school admission.
Yes, I figured those reading my comment could interpret the Venn diagram.
Perhaps. But it doesn’t predict the opposite either. A kid who can get into an HYP unhooked is very likely to be able to do well at the sort of non-selective regional LAC that prepared my sibling for medical school.
College is still college, and prior performance in college science courses do have some predictive value on how well the student will do in college science courses in the future, even at a different college. Less selective colleges may not have as competitive students, but they also do not have grade distributions with 60% A grades.
My daughter didn’t have the option of a $100k school (top schools probably $60-70k when she went) but has done just fine. She works really hard (always has) and spends her money wisely. She has a few friends from college who were wealthy but they didn’t make introductions or steer her to jobs. In fact, the wealthy friends probably cost my daughter more as their weddings elaborate.
My friends from college varied from VERY wealthy to dirt poor like me. When I look at the success of my college friends 50 years later I think those who were wealthy while in college are not financially better than some who were very poor. I don’t think any of the wealthy friends ‘helped’ those who were poorer with jobs or mentoring. Did they invite us to their homes for vacations or give us rides in their cars while in school? Sure. Did my roommate’s mother bring us groceries and homemade cookies? Yes, and greatly appreciated. Did the ones who worked at Microsoft at the start (1980) get us all jobs there too? Nope.
Some of those who have success have had a little luck, be it a job in a good market or having excellent health, but most of it is hard hard work and making good financial decisions. A top school may get you interviews but you still have to do the work. One difference in those who ended up with more money in retirement? No kids. Even if they started out poor in college, those with no kids have a lot more money in retirement than those of us who shared our money with kids. I like my choice to have kids, but I’d have a lot more money if I hadn’t had them.
Lots of posts with similar takes to this, which I am more aligned with. As I think about it, however, I’m not convinced being able to easily afford something should have direct bearing on whether it’s “worth it.” That you can afford to light money on fire doesn’t confer any more value on the asset or experience. It’s value is what it is.
But as someone who has gone to expensive private schools from prep to Masters, I think some folks are selling their own trade. No way I can twist my mouth into saying paying $100K for college is worth it, any more than I can say paying as much as I did for my car is worth it. All the lifetime outcome numbers and “social network benefits” feel more like justifications than support.
I can hold the fact that the enormous amount of money I’ve spent to date on Private school for my kid wasn’t and isn’t worth it relative to the education she could have gotten at our top local school comfortably in my head. Just because I’m ok with doing it doesn’t mean I don’t recognize that its an extravagence.
Yet in our case, BS absolutely was worth it for our kid. That was based on the kid, the BS, and the way our LPS worked. Change any one of those, and maybe the response would be different. This is so much a YMMV issue.
You have hit on something, though. Many people who have attended what is now a costly institution value elements of that experience in a way that makes those elements seem essential. That influences their perception of value.
“As I think about it, however, I’m not convinced being able to easily afford something should have direct bearing on whether it’s “worth it.””
But money is fungible. Education doesn’t depreciate as you drive out of the showroom or strap the fancy watch to your wrist. People spend their extra money on all sorts of things. Why does spending on college turn everyone into a Puritan, horrified at the notion of spending money that you have earned on something that is meaningful to you???
Agreed. Where we lived when older s was in kgn, the public school was pretty rough, so we moved him to private he next year. When we moved to a good public school system, he was already comfortable in his private school, so we left him there and then started younger s there as well when he was in kgn, as we didn’t want them in different school systems with different vacation schedules. Without getting into details, we chose to move older s when he was in middle school, but we felt the public MS, despite its great reputation and very convenient location, wasn’t the best fit for our s, so he went to another private school which we felt was a better fit, but was a bit of a distance from home. When we decided to move younger s, we felt that he would do better with the “eyes on him” at the school older s was at. Both kids would have done fine academically at the public schools, but we were a little concerned that younger s would have been tempted to test limits in the public school, and thought he’d do better with a tighter rein, as it were. We may have been wrong, but we felt it was a better choice.
So we spent $$ on private school when we live in the best public schools in the area. Our $, our choice. Both kids, fortunately, did extremely well. We are a full pay family, and while I don’t know that if we were looking at schools now if we would consider the 100K/yr tag, at the time our kids were in school, we did not qualify for any need-based aid. Fortunately they both got NMS, though it wasn’t a lot of $, and older one got some outside 1 year scholarships (covered about 20% of his first year in college), was, for all intents and purposes, full pay. Younger s, who we were concerned might not have focused on academics if he went to public school, did well in private and won a full tuition scholarship to college (plus the NMS).
My point in telling this is, yes we spent a lot on private school when we could have moved them back to public when we moved to the top school district, but we chose to invest in them and their education in this way, and IMO it paid off in spades. We have no regrets. Both are doing extremely well. Whether they would have ended up on the same academic and vocational route we will never know. But we have never questioned the money we spent on their education. It was our choice.
If you are sending two kids to private through school and college, a lot of belt tightening happens very early on, and never relaxes because it happens for 16 years. Because that level of belt tightening is taken for granted, whoever is doing this feel less of a pain than people who have always sent their kids to public (school or college). Those who have always sent to public cannot contemplate taking a 100k per kid per year out of their current consumption because that feels very very painful. Understandably. It just means vacations once every every few years as opposed to every year or more than once a year, running your car down to 200k miles a year etc. On a routine basis. Retiring later in life. Hoping that the kids put this to good use that you don’t need to give them anything more later. Some people are used to it. Many people are not. And some people don’t need to sacrifice – that is also fine.
We used to say that when we paid their private school tuitions, we were just practicing for the college tuitions.
I love to find deals so in that way am “frugal”, but I think you are making assumptions about the belt tightening that is/was necessary. DH and I have always been savers since before we met, so we have been very, very fortunate in that we were able to live in comfortable homes, pay for private schools, nice annual ski (and other) vacations, new cars, live-in childcare (we both had fulltime professional careers), etc. I realize how fortunate we are and do not take that for granted, but tuition payments at any step of the way, while eye opening, is something each family needs to evaluate for themselves.
As I said, and apologies if this sounds like a humble brag as that is not as it is intended, we both retired when we chose to, have contributed to grandkids 529’s, gift our kids $, and unless something drastic happens, do not expect to either “have” to give them more later, or for them to “have” to give us any. Again, I realize we are extremely fortunate and count our lucky stars, but we have worked hard in our professional careers to be fortunate to reap the benefits. We are both from middle class families who instilled in us the importance of saving from an early age, and the value of an education.
Perhaps our sacrifice was (at times) long work hours, being on call (both of us), and work travel (DH). But all of our choices were just that. And that, IMO, is what this thread is about. For us, being able to let our kids choose their undergrad colleges with no strings attached was “worth it” .
I wish my parents lived nearby, to be able to help out, but alas they lived many states away. For us, and again only speaking for ourselves, we promised our kids they could choose their undergraduate college with no strings attached. (Anything beyond that was on them). We were fortunate that it also meant no overt “sacrificing” for us. (Maybe the sacrifice was that I typically buy inexpensive clothes b/c it doesn’t matter to me and I guess I don’t have much fashion sense!) This was and remains a gift that they appreciate and that we will always feel happy that we could give them. Again this is not true for many folks, and we understand and respect that, but as for the topic of this thread, spending $$ on our kids’ education was a value and priority for us, and “worth it”.
eta: @neela1 The school that younger s attended with the tuition scholarship, I might not have considered it, in my inside voice, as “worth it” if we had to pay full pay. But fortunately, back then, he had a preliminary merit scholarship offer very early on that put the cost in the “worth it” category in my head so it was a non-issue. The bigger award, that came several months later, was a true gift.
I think everybody considers the worth it question carefully for their situation, whether with a scholarship or without a scholarship. We thought Madison CS was not worth it vs Rutgers CS at 2x the cost. We would not have applied at all to Williams for CS even though it is highly ranked by some metric, and it would have been a difficult decision vs something like Rutgers because the desired major would not have been available 4 years ago. We may have chosen it if we thought it could have happened for one kid and not for the other. Similarly, Berkeley was not even a consideration for CS at 75k or so against many other private schools that ranked below Berkeley in CS etc. Even if we were prepared to by full pay with no scholarship, the question whether something is worth it is always present, and there is not too much debate about any particular place. Given our utility function, we would know pretty easily what something is worth for us. And if an application went out, it means it is worth to us at full pay, unless there are multiple acceptances, in which case we need to order them.
), got involved, was tight with their professors, worked for them, and had a great experience overall.