<p>@collegetime18 - Yes, kids are pretty prestige-focused. I think when their peers ask them where they are going to college, and they answer “Podunk U”, they are afraid it will be assumed that that is the best/only school that accepted them. Plus, I think there’s a feeling among top students that “I worked so hard for these grades / test scores / EC accomplishments etc - I deserve to go to a top college.” And I think most of us buy into that to a certain degree & want to see our kids recognized for their efforts & achievements. But this article is pointing out that a top college at a high price & debt is not really a reward, regarding future success. A lower-tier school with fabulous merit aid and an honors program may be a far better choice.</p>
<p>My other comment is that no, I haven’t seen many kids choose a state school over an Ivy, but that’s because we know only one student this year at D’s school who got into an Ivy and one other who got into Duke. This, at a top California high school with a senior class of 500 or so!</p>
<p>I completely agree, @GertrudeMcFuzz. Both parents and students are too prestige focused and want to be able to say they are attending a prestigious school (not all, of course!). Not sure how to break out of this. My family is certainly not immune!</p>
<p>My son passed over at least three schools that are perceived as more prestigious, and definitely were harder to get into (overall). I sometimes have a bit of an apologetic or a sinking feeling when I tell someone where he’s going. In his mind I think he feels his school <em>is</em> prestigious for his major (though most people don’t know that), but also he’s just not as brand conscious in general. </p>
<p>It is really hard to fight the tendency make decisions based on reputation. We almost certainly evolved to do that because to gather and analyze all the data for all possible options independently would just not be a winning strategy. So, a community like CC helps distribute that information gathering and (hopefully) establish plenty of reputation-worthy characteristics other than “prestige.”</p>
<p>I’m guilty as charged. I am an Ivy League (or any elite school for that matter) prestige focused, more so than my daughter who will be attending an Ivy this fall. Most parents are, IMHO. At least initially. That’s just the tendency in today’s world.</p>
<p>But in the end, it was my daughter that made the decision and chose the school that she thought a better fit for her (whatever that means). Are we wasting our hard earned money and be better if she attends a state school over an Ivy? Nobody can really answer that. Nothing can really answer that. Even time. You can’t really compare two end results because you can’t attend and graduate at two schools at the same time.</p>
<p>My son has a friend who passed on Carnegie Mellon (his “dream school”) to take that full scholarship at Temple. And my son passed on some more “prestigious” schools to take the Presidential Scholarship at Alabama and to be part of their honors college. When I tell people how little we’ll be paying for my high-stats kid to go there, they totally get it, and while it may just be wishful thinking on my part, I think a lot of them are silently kicking themselves that they wrote off schools they thought “beneath” their kids and will be paying through the nose for choices that really aren’t that prestigious anyway. In the Northeast, for example, a lot of folks send their elite school-waitlisted kids full pay to OOS flagships like UC Boulder, Delaware, and Vermont, schools that are all ranked similarly to Alabama.</p>
<p>We were lucky, in the end–my son actually liked Alabama the best of the schools he had to choose from, even though he knew we were willing and able to pay for some of his other choices. I think it was a lot harder for his friend because he loved CMU, but I’m sure he’s seen enough people weighed down by heavy debt that he knows he made the right decision.</p>
<p>I think a lot of times you have to be willing to do what’s best for your family and let the prestige thing be damned. Prestige isn’t going to pay the bills, and it’s funny how a school that many people would turn their noses up to suddenly becomes the Next Big Thing. I know this well, because I attended Penn when it was considered the dregs of the Ivy League (not that I felt that way about it!). I had no idea when I entered as a freshman in 1978 that things were about to change dramatically: <a href=“https://facultystaff.richmond.edu/~bmayes/pdf/the_early_decision_racket.pdf”>https://facultystaff.richmond.edu/~bmayes/pdf/the_early_decision_racket.pdf</a> </p>
<p>The same can be said of NYU, GW, USC and a lot of the “prestigious” schools of today. When I was a kid, they were No Big Deal. Now? Completely different situation. Who knows which schools will move up the ranks in the near future? I sure don’t, but I know some invariably will, because the numbers (both in terms of the total number of applications and the cost of the average bachelor’s degree) will necessitate it.</p>
<p>I started early in talking to my kids about college. The family mantra was “If you get into UVA or WM, you will have a hard time convincing me you should go somewhere else.” I think they got it from the beginning as both just did ED at WM and were done. I am surprised at the level of schools S’12 peers got into- in a class of 80+ from a public school program - there are two that are going to Yale (one of these got into Harvard as well) and one going to Cornell and several other next tier down - the funny part they are all girls!</p>
<p>D denied Northeastern and a few other schools including her first choice even though these schools are better ranked than the school she chose based on the scholarship and best value. I get flak for everything depending on who I talk to - choosing an instate vs slightly more expensive vs not spending money on the more expensive one because we could easily afford. What’s surprising to me is that, these are really nice people that usually do not comment much, so I smile and nod </p>
<p>Having said all of that, I think a few types of students absolutely will benefit from MIT/Stanford kind of environment and there is no doubt that these schools provide a lot more exposure and is totally worth the money. Will I support taking debt to go to these schools? No, I wouldn’t recommend that. </p>
<p>My bias has always been toward public education, so I am thrilled my S is attending a public school. But I still felt myself swayed by prestige of some privates. Most parents and students are swayed by cost differences as many of you have noted, but I’m seeing that, if all things are relatively equal cost wise, prestige tends to win out (as opposed to “fit” or location, for example).</p>
<p>When I was looking at colleges myself, it was much easier to get into those tier one schools and HYP. I got into a HYP, but when I visited, some admissions person met with me and said, in a very brusque tone, “So what are you going to bring to us?” I answered the “right” way, but I was very annoyed. I thought, “I’m bringing you almost $10,000! What are YOU going to give ME in exchange?” (Isn’t it funny - that was the TOTAL COA at an IVY way back then!) I visited a nicely ranked public university where they wanted to know what THEY could do for ME. It swayed me way back then and I wasn’t even footing the bills! I went to the public and I could have gone to either. I also visited a different state school, where a professor took me aside and told me he didn’t want me in his class because girls shouldn’t go into engineering. He suggested I visit the CS department where girls “fit in.” THAT school would have given me a free ride, but it wasn’t worth it. Just given my own experiences, I felt that “feeling right” was the MOST important thing in choosing a college. Sometimes you pass on the free ride, sometimes you pass on the most “prestigious” name, it just has to be the right place for YOU (or your DS/DD)</p>
<p>Due to mainly financial and some fit reasons DS will be picking a full tuition scholarship at Pitt over prestige at Rice, UVA, and USC (all of which were full pay minus token amounts). DS knew the story going in, “From the Net Price Calculator, you’re going to need merit aid”, but he gave them a shot anyway. I admit to feeling a little bit of angst, but it lessens every day. With two more to fund on the way, I just could agree to 200K to 250K. And we old him…</p>
<p>If you think you get odd reactions when you tell people your child selected a less prestigious school for financial reasons, imagine the reaction I get to paying a lot of money (even after merit) for a well-regarded but relatively unknown school. For D and I, it was all about fit instead of prestige.</p>
<p>In my area, most people aren’t familiar with the prestigious schools other than HYP. So telling someone that your child got in to Rice, Williams, etc. doesn’t illicit much reaction. D joked that she was so tired of people assuming she would go to Clemson because she has good stats.</p>
<p>I have one taking on debt to attend Cornell (a reasonable amount, IMO) and another who turned down his “dream school” (Lehigh) and other higher-ranked schools (not Ivies – he was not interested) for a full tuition scholarship at our instate public. Probably the correct decision for each of them. As with anything in life, there is no one-size-fits-all rule that will work for everyone.</p>
<p>Tons of kids from DS’s school end up at UVA after turning down Ivies, Duke, etc. One kid last year turned down five Ivies plus Stanford to be a Jefferson scholar. Hard to pass up a UVA education that comes to you completely free plus all the other amazing opportunities open to Jefferson scholars. </p>
When you consider their entering freshmen classes range between 1,200 and 1,800 students and there are over 6,100 high schools in the US, you can see why the admissions numbers are so low.</p>
<p>D has an excellent college GC at her school who preaches that in many cases for many families (but not all) that the privates can end up costing less on a net basis than many of the publics. This excludes, of course, the programs such as at Alabama where they have an excellent merit program for the high performering students. In our case I have to agree. S-2011 was more at his private in year 1 and less in years 2 and 3. D-2014 will be about 30% less net COA than the instate publics where she would have received some merit aid. But, as said above, everyone’s financial situation is different and everyone’s kids are different.</p>
<p>Our state flagship ends up being our cheapest option because they give full tuition for in-state NMFs and their room and board and fees are relatively low. He got full tuition at Drexel also, but it would have cost quite a bit more (but still would have been a very affordable option). If he wasn’t a NMF, the balance might be different, though with ADHD resulting in a not incredible GPA (3.6ish) the NMF scholarships are a blessing since he tests well (without accommodations for the PSAT). But yes, in many cases the privates can be less than your instate public. </p>
<p>We may have the only state flagship that uses the CSS Profile. Definitely not a guaranteed good deal there. </p>
<p>It looks like Brown is going to their waitlist. He’s finally getting excited about Michigan. He’s participating in the Class of 2018 Facebook page and people from that page are friending him. I don’t think I’m going to tell him that I know Brown is going to the wait list. The chances are so darn slim and I don’t want him to be sad all over again. He signed up for orientation at Michigan and there was only one session still available- the last one. That means he’ll be the last to sign up for classes and will be stuck with the leftovers for his first year seminar. I hope he can still have some choice there. The odds of getting into his major’s Intro class are pretty slim too. This is what happens when you wait until the last couple days to commit and put your deposit in. I guess he’ll learn you can’t wait for anything at Michigan because the other 6000 kids in your class aren’t waiting. </p>
<p>He also doesn’t seem thrilled that he has to take a whole bunch of placement tests before orientation. Finding that out the week he has 3 AP tests isn’t great timing. He’s kind of burned out on testing. </p>
<p>That line about prestige does not pay the bills is so true when it comes to colleges. We instructed our boys to look at financial safeties before they consider other schools, because many of those financial safeties have excellent majors that interest them. Unfortunately, others often do not see it that way, and mainly because their parents are doing the paying. Several times this year, Son '14 has heard comments about his college choice, and all those comments are negative. Just because you have not heard of a school does not mean that it is a bad school. Just because it is in a part of the country you have never visited or cared to visit does not mean the education is bad. </p>
<p>Gertrude McFuzz is right. Make the most of the opportunities that the college offers. My nephew graduates this weekend from a small, Virginia public. He will have a computer science degree. He recently turned down Google for other opportunities. The same people who keep telling Son '14 that he should have considered other options? Well, he has a full tuition scholarship and a chance to run competitively at the collegiate level. Guess what? He wanted those two things, and there’s a lot of STEM companies where he will attend school, so he just may have a chance to do some awesome internships.</p>
<p>@2016BarnardMom - D also received an email this week regarding placement tests and summer reading assignments - in the midst of AP exams and trying to finish make-up work! She has to take the placement tests by the end of this month and has an essay due for college in July! Don’t these kids ever get a break? </p>
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