I think MOST kids are limited to in-state schools. It’s not the worst thing in the world. I’ve always found it kind of funny anyhow how kids in a couple of the adjacent states to us want to come here and pay way more while the kids in our state want to go there and pay more.
Your son may get merit money at some lower tier LACs or he could go to your in state public. I am kind of wondering why this is a surprise to you now. Did you not consider options for your kid when you made your family career decision (one public school teacher salary)? This sounds harsh, but that’s why some of us have stuck with our jobs. On the other hand, you probably will have a very nice pension and good health care when you retire, and your kid will still have some very good options for college.
I wouldn’t go 150-200K debt for college, especially not with public school salary.
As a single working parent household…think also about the large dollars you saved on child care. That’s another savings you netted when one parent didn’t work.
There are trade offs.
In the Thumper family, one of us was an engineer, and the other worked in public education (didn’t any lengthy leaves). My salary paid all of the college costs for our kids to attend college… and both went to expensive private colleges.
Since you were able to live on just your salary until not that many years ago, can you continue to do so (especially since you have moved into a higher paying position), and dedicate you wife’s earning towards college costs? That’s what we did…for seven years. And it worked.
Just as an aside… I know in many locations, public school teachers have good salaries/benefits, but this is definitely not the case everywhere. It took H 25 years to crack the $50K. Health insurance? Lol… Try $1800/month for families for a $1000 or $1500 per person deductible. I don’t know how a single parent could swing it. We didn’t even have dental as an option through either of our public sector employers until my kids were in middle school and we pay 100% of the premiums. Vision insurance we only added through mine this year. And no, they pay 0% of insurance for retirees. Pensions, yes… But hardly a lot of $$$ compared to some others out there. When I had my older S, I didn’t qualify for FMLA. I had to go back part time after 1 week and full time after 7, because we couldn’t make it at all without two incomes. I’m not complaining - just pointing out that don’t assume it’s the same everywhere.
Yes there are many inaccurate (surprisingly inaccurate) stereotypes about what public educators see in terms of salary and benefits in these posts but I didn’t want to take the conversation that direction as it is irrelevant to the core of the discussion- the amount of debt middle/upper middle income families are taking on.
To answer the thread title…we pull not have considered taking out ANY loans to send our kids to college. Zero $0.
If you don’t feel that a college requiring 6 figure debt is affordable for your family…then look at options that will be less costly. They are there.
I’ll mirror what others have said. We are a one income household because our youngest child has multiple disabilities. I became a full time caregiver when managing two careers and a medically fragile child became unmanageable. My eldest was a student very similar to yours. We did a full on merit hunt for a small liberal arts college with a lot of success. I’d recommend if you chose this route to focus on upping the ACT score (or seeing if SAT was a better option-some do better on different tests). It’s totally doable even with home prep to boost it a bit. This will seriously help the merit hunt. Look for schools we’re your son will be a “catch”. Best of luck!
Do you believe there is a boost in merit money (significant boost) if a student ups ACT scores from 32 to say 33 or 34? He has only self-studied as test tutors here are extremely expensive. Final ACT is in 6 weeks and I think if he really pushed he could go up 1 or 2 points.
Veryapparent, can you give me a rough idea how you conducted your “full on merit hunt?”
Thanks again all who took time to post!
Yes the higher the score the better chance for automatic scholarships and/or other scholarships.
There is an October test date. Also December.
PS. A few colleges will superscore your ACT subscores. An example is Miami of Ohio
http://miamioh.edu/admission/high-school/application/college-entrance-testing/index.html
“No preference is given for ACT or SAT; Miami superscores, using the highest test scores submitted for admission and scholarship consideration. For ACT, the highest scores for each subscore from different exams will determine a combined highest composite score. For SAT the best Evidence-Based Reading and Writing (ERW) and (Math) subscores will be used to calculate a maximum single score. Miami University does not superscore across the previous SAT and current SAT exams.”
Using this method, my kid has a 33 for Miami. my kid’s composite scores are 31 and 32 but recombining subscores for superscore rounds up to a 33.
Self study is more than fine for a motivated kid- my observation is that the tutoring works for the indifferent student because they need that push. But there’s nothing magical about a tutor…
And yes- push that score up. Your son will have more options from an admissions perspective AND a better shot at the bigger merit awards.
There is such a difference in what schools will give students. DS has one school he’s applying to that he only has a 50/50 shot of getting into and will get no merit aid there because all the students are top notch, yet he has other schools willing to give him a lot of money to go there. We’re probably going to go with the “big fish in a small pond” experience to save money.
If you know what schools you’d be looking at, you can look at their website. A lot of schools are pretty straightforward. If you have X ACT and X GPA you’ll get X incoming merit scholarship. At the one school DS is going to increasing his ACT won’t help him any as his GPA is already set.
I definitely didn’t take any loans, both of my kids took about the same, less than the Direct amount.
Cost was the number one factor for both of my kids, and both chose the lowest cost schools they were accepted to. In one kid’s case that was the best fit overall, the other made a sacrifice and honestly I wish I’d been able to afford the other choice, things might have gone better. But I couldn’t, so that’s that.
Many of us - and our kids - have to compromise.
Cast a very wide net. She applied to 17 schools. She paid the fees on the ones not free to apply to with babysitting money. She also added in some interesting extra schools on the common app that were free to apply to and no extra essay. Easy to do. She was in the top 10% at all but 2 in terms of stats. Showed interest at every single one by getting on mailing list, local interview, reps at college events (local). Visited ones on family road trips or vacations (not necessary though). She boosted her math SAT score by over 100 points by self study junior summer (20 min drill daily, practice test once a week, khan academy). She was accepted with merit at 15. Received full tuition merit at a women’s college where she is attending. Had some great options overall though. Many were less or equal to our State Flagship after merit. Also got a local math scholarship that covered almost all of first year room and board. A practical note… mine did not fall in love with any school. She acknowledged that all on her list would be suitable. Nothing was decided until all the numbers were in. In the end she was very happy with her results. I must admit I had time to help with research process being home with my other child. It’s definitely an effort but completely worth it.
Yes, if you need lots of merit money, higher test scores are better.
Your kid and your financial situation are very similar to our family’s.
We got costs down to under $20k per year for each of three kids by hunting merit (no need based aid at all and no loans). They each had at least three affordable choices in the end.
Can you be more specific about what your son is looking for in a college? If it’s an LAC my D applied to Puget Sound, Lewis and Clark, Clark U, Knox, Trinity U (Texas), Southwestern U, and Centre College. All offered a full tuition or full ride competitive scholarship. We ended up with one of those affordable (Southwestern) and a couple others were in the 25k per year range. Puget Sound and Lewis and Clark came in at 40k/year. She had a 32 ACT but a higher SAT. There’s others that offer full tuition but didn’t meet her requirements. Those LAC large scholarships are very competitive. Her other two affordable choices were our state universities. She has said she would have been fine anywhere.
Two of my kids have graduated from college. They both had great experiences at their merit scholarship schools, took advantage of the opportunities they were offered, and landed really great jobs. As a parent who has been where you are, it will be what he does, not where he goes, he just needs to make the most of the opportunities.
You do need to take a look at your finances and figure out what you are willing and able to pay and make sure your kid understands the budget as you go through the process.
Note that some of the public LACs in other states may not be that expensive for out-of-state students. Examples include Truman State (Missouri) and University of Minnesota - Morris.
Slight detour away from my original question… You know, as I read these thoughtful responses, I have to wonder if this generation will be the last in which a 4 year college experience is the norm. If prices continue to rise 7-10 percent each year (and with news from NYTimes that much of this rise is to support non classroom administration), will our own children tell their own kids NOT to attend… that the undergrad experience just isn’t worth it? Already employers (some big ones like GOOGLE) are not requiring a bachelors degree for some positions.
Students from my high school(s) often report they spend way more time partying than studying. Maybe short duration trade schools or targeted internships will be the route to jobs.
I hear these high percentage increases thrown around a lot, but it certainly isn’t the case around here (Midwest). The University of MN has only increased 28% total the past 10 years. 9% the past 5 and 1.9% from last year to this year. Wisconsin has been under tuition freezes by the state for a long time. The other surrounding states are about on par with us.
The 50 year average annual change is about 7%, but there were some periods of time where things went nuts (like it doubled from 1980-1985), but it’s been pretty stable at 2-3% for quite a while now.
The “4 year college experience” is not the norm now. In 2018, bachelor’s degree attainment for people of age 25-29 was 37%. Also, a large percentage of bachelor’s degree graduates took more than 4 years to finish, and some transferred to another college along the way.
However, it may be the norm among higher SES families like most of those who populate these forums. But it does not seem like most such families will push their kids toward blue collar trades (even the skilled well paid ones – note that these do require their own education beyond high school) instead of bachelor’s degree study in college, probably due to the social status involved (they may actually have to learn how to talk to a plumber if their kid goes into that profession).
My son got a 34 and got enough merit to bring his top 40 school to state flagship price. Those extra points matter. It’s still an expensive option considering his stats but he has been loading up on credits, used his AP and dual enrollment opportunities and will graduate a semester early with a double major.
DD took a different strategy in that she knew she wanted a big state university but didn’t like the vibe of our state flagship. She looked at similar sized ones in states that don’t draw a lot of high stat kids from our state and ended up with a full ride - the merit money they offered brought the COA down to about $22K before she won the scholarship. Think outside the box of what “everyone” else is doing.