Should you incur substantial debt for that "dream" school? or an arts major?

calmom · May 4, 2007, 10:45pm

No, it’s fairly easy if the kids and parents come into the process with a clear idea of what their limits are. I mean, if you’ve got a budget and know what that is, its fairly easy to stick to it.

I think the bigger problem is that parents are not clear with their kids – instead of saying, “we will provide a maximum of $20K a year toward your college”… they say, “apply anywhere, and we will do our best to make it work” - or “let’s wait and see what happens.”

So the first step on the Financial Aid primer should be:

1) Reality check for parents: what will college cost at a minimum? (It may be a shock for some to realize what the expenses are even at an in-state school, when room, board, books, travel & incidentals are calculated in)

2) Develop parental budget: What parents are willing to pay + how much they are willing to borrow.

3) Help develop a kid budget: What it is reasonable to expect a kid to pay & borrow.

During that process, the kid & parent can also discuss their values, in terms of what they are willing to pay for. I can see why a parent might be willing to pay more for an Ivy than the flagship state U, but might not be willing to make the same commitment to a less selective private college, or why a parent might be willing to invest extra to support a pre-med program than one in musical theater. It doesn’t matter what others think – it matters whether the parent feels the extra expenditure has value to them.

I think that if the kids understand the ground rules to start, they are far less likely to fall “in love” with a school that is beyond their means.

taxguy · May 4, 2007, 11:26pm

Calmom, trust me on this: go to a BMW or Porche dealership and have you and your husband test drive the coolest, fastest car that they have. Afterwards, go inspect a home worth at least 3 million +. Check out all of the rooms. I would bet that you will have some great pangs about not being able to buy that nice car and dream home, and you are an adult. Kids don’t have one-third the maturity of many adults and usually don’t have the experience to put these dreams in perspective. Maybe your kids are different;however, I believe the majority of kids will set their hearts on cool looking schools.

My suggetion is why tease someone on some unaffordable dream? Yes, you might get that scholarship, just maybe. However, if the funding doesn’t come through, everyone will feel terrible. It is too bad that college scholarship decisions aren’t more palpably predictable.

calmom · May 5, 2007, 12:29am

Actually, I was going to use that as an example and deleted the post – I used to go test-drive fancy cars just for the fun of it, knowing I couldn’t afford that sort of car --and when my son was a little kid just about every weekend we would go off in search of open homes in the richest parts of town so we could walk through them. Again, just because we thought it was fun to walk around and see the insides of those houses. But we never felt upset – if we had, we wouldn’t have done that.

The advantage of the test-drive and the open home was that it gave us the chance to “sample” without actually paying any money – but it also made it pretty clear that there wasn’t that much of a difference. I mean, I couldn’t drive the luxury car past the speed limit, or ignore traffic signs, or zip around any faster – in fact, it’s patently obvious to me that a smaller, older car is a lot more convenient on a day to day basis – if you don’t care all that much about the car, you don’t have to fret over where to park it or shed tears over a little dent. Other than walk-in closets, I have never actually found anything in a luxury home that I truly envied – I mean, I can’t think of any way in which my life has suffered because my countertops are formica instead of marble.

We also used to go to FAO Schwartz around Christmastime every year, for the fun of looking at all the toys… with my kids knowing full well that their gifts would come from Kaybee. “Want” is not the same as “get” – and “admire” is not the same as “want”. There were really cool “toys” and “pets” at the science museum, zoo and aquarium, but my kids never came home begging for a pet Koala or their own dinosaur skeleton.

What does a “cool looking” school have that the public u. doesn’t have, anyway? If a kid spends time at both, they are going to figure out that they are pretty much the same on a day-to-day basis.

taxguy · May 5, 2007, 8:30am

Personally, I agree with you that the cool looking school doesn’t usually have any more offerings and facilities than that of the state universities and may even have less. However, I can assure you that the private schools have geared their marketing and literature to make most folks think that they are offering a superior product to the state universities.

Calmom, funny, I had the reverse experience in my life. At an early age I test drove a BMW. I also inspected a great home that I couldn’t come close to affording. I took a picture of both the BMW and the home and placed it above my desk so that every day I would see it. It was very motivating for me to earn enough money to buy that car and that house. Whenever I had a tough day and wondered if all of the work and travel was worth it, I looked at the pictures. Eventually, I did earn enough to buy both the car and even a better house. Those pictures probably changed my life.

juxtaposn · May 5, 2007, 8:50am

never mind

momfromme · May 5, 2007, 12:12pm

I was very proud of my daughter because she did not fall in love with any particular school. I had told her before applying that one of the places she wanted to apply to had a reputation of poor financial aid, but because it was possible she could get merit $, she could apply and see what they gave her. When she got in and the $ was poor, there were minimal pangs in crossing it off the list of choices. I think for this to work, the student needs to have had experience with the idea of “We like x, but, given our real needs, we can’t afford it.” Unfortunately, with so many people living beyond their means, they may not have encountered that idea much before.

insomb · May 7, 2007, 2:01pm

taxguy, those are both out of state schools, pretty competitive to get into, and uc would look at my highschool gpa more than i’d want them too. it looks like the rent in nyc is really whats hurting me. i looked at fit before parsons but decided against applying mainly because of the curriculum. they seem to be more business oriented and lack the innovation and creativity of art schools. i am also really looking towards being around other art students and a community that prioritizes art and design first.

insomb · May 7, 2007, 2:13pm

taxguy, although parsons was my first choice school they also provided me with the most aid by far. i also don’t really see how knowing what my parents will or will not provide before applying would have helped. everything i have read thus far suggests when applying to art schools to avoid looking at the sticker price and wait for an award package… not that it mattered seeing as how my parents aren’t providing anything.

i’m not sure if it was an average award package or not but they are covering over half of my coa… which would include rent at 11-12k a yr., food, tuition, books, and transportation, etc.

it still comes out to be a ton of money… but really what are my options? my highschool gpa is horrible. i raised it at community college and i’d be transferring as a sophomore with 30 credits when i only have 29. i could go back to communtiy college for a year but i think sophomore year is pretty important for a fashion major. the community college i attended didn’t have a strong enough design program that i’d feel could get me to the level needed to enter as a junior at parsons.

insomb · May 7, 2007, 2:57pm

oh yeah… what other public schools are worth checking out within michigan/pennsylvania and some of the nearby states for art&design, especially fashion design. i am really interested in fashion but i paint a lot and could convince myself to be satisfied majoring in communication design or something similar.

my mom is working at michigan state right now for her masters but i don’t really know about the art program. the design show was really bad… and i think penn state is in the middle of nowhere. i wouldn’t mind going to uc but i honestly don’t think i’d be accepted and i’d still have to wait until i could get residency.

i’m approaching 23 right now and i’m feeling really anxious about not getting into school soon. my gpa is less than stellar so it’s a concern for me about getting into a state school. i want to attend somewhere with decent art&design programs that i’d be able to pay off without my parents help.

taxguy · August 8, 2007, 8:01am

I started this about a year ago. I just thought that the new crop or parents/students should see it. It was on the featured thread of CC,but the moderators eventually took it down,which I believe was a big mistake.

My recommendation is that it is NOT worth being 150K in debt. It isn’t worth being 100K in debt by the time you graduate. In fact, I don’t think it is worth being 60K in debt for undergrad education.

lkf725 · August 8, 2007, 10:17am

I agree with you taxguy. It is so tempting to buy “the dream school” when the kid is in high school. The truth of the matter is that you can have a “dream experience” at many places.

We passed on the $46K (now $50K) annual debt and we are all so glad. Son is very happy and successful at his state U, with good friends, great grades, wonderful internship and research potential this year (engineering). Grad school is on the horizon. He has also been able to keep up with his love of music. I just can’t imagine that it could have been better anywhere else, and certainly not $120K better.

Sometimes you feel like a failure if you can’t buy “the dream”. But in retrospect I can honestly say that college is what you make it.

soozievt · August 8, 2007, 10:39am

Taxguy, your thread (this thread) is still a featured thread on the Parents Forum. You just don’t see it as you open the page and newer featured threads appear at the top but if you click on “more featured discussions,” indeed this thread is in the archive of featured discussions. The two that appear at the top are just newer featured discussions.

While an education is what you make of it and you can get an excellent education at all sorts of schools including state schools, etc…deciding how much to pay for an education at a school that is an ideal fit for a student is a value judgement and family decision. It is not a right or wrong and not a “SHOULD” as this thread is titled. I have a child in an arts major at her top choice school and her experiences thus far (she is a rising junior) have been outstanding and she is thrilled with her school and all she is doing there. I couldn’t be happier than to see my kid really loving the experience and getting SO much out of it. Can an education be gotten for less money? Sure. But the education and experiences she has had so far have been very worth the cost. To someone else, maybe it is not. But we could not be more pleased. I would feel NO differently about this issue whether she was majoring in the arts or some other major. The worth of her education and the expereinces she is having are the same to me regardless of the major or career field she has chosen, about which we could care less. We have no preference as to what our kids study or what careers they choose to pursue. We value their education no matter what. The value of it is not tied to the potential income either. For that matter, my D already makes very good money in her field and she is only 18. Her experiences so far at college and what she has gotten out of it and feels about it have been priceless as far as we are concerned. That doesn’t mean someone else should feel the same but I don’t understand this constant debate. Each family should do what they value or feel comfortable doing. There is no right or wrong. There is just a decision that each family must make for themselves and as long as they are OK with it, no problem.

lkf725 · August 8, 2007, 11:40am

I don’t think taxguy is trying to persuade anybody. It seems like more of an opinion poll to me and he was just giving his opinion, as we were too.

Actually, I think it would be interesting to hear from parents or graduates who may regret their decisions (either to spend more $$$, to study in a low-employment major or to settle for less than the “dream” school). Normally, everybody you hear from is happy with their decision…maybe a bit of rationalization? How about anybody with different hindsight?

weenie · August 8, 2007, 12:07pm

Our paper had a story about financial aid the other day (I already started a thread about it <a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showthread.php?t=378317[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showthread.php?t=378317</a> ) and in it a student was commenting that she was depressed that she was graduating from Nazareth College with an anthro major with over $50,000 in loans. I thought, AH, YEAH! That is a HUGE concern.

SoOreMom · August 8, 2007, 12:29pm

Interesting thread. I am new on CC, and learning a lot, but on this topic I can weigh in a little.

My husband is an actor. Not a rich, famous actor, but one that has been more or less steadily employed in his profession for 30 years. His income supports our family, albeit modestly, and we own a house, have no debt, etc.

Our daughter (still one year out from going to college) wants to study literature, then hopefully to get into a great MFA program in creative writing. Our son will major in some aspect of social sciences.

Kids coming to the theater where my husband works (tons of school groups come) ask him all the time about college and a career as an actor and how to make that dream come true. Nearly all successful actors go to college and often grad school. There are a few “celebrities” who stumbled into a career without any training – but the reality for the vast majority is they went to college. My husband went to Cheap State U. (they really were cheap back then!) that was a commutable distance from his parents’ home so he could still live there. Later he went to Better State U. for an MFA.

Although he has done fine and certainly a whole lot better than the vast majority of actors, he has felt limited by his humble training grounds. Not because of the quality of instruction, but because there really are these potent alumni mafias in this field, esp. Harvard, Yale, and Northwestern. When kids ask, it’s worth it for them to understand that and go to a good “connections” school if they can afford it. At least all those schools offer decent financial aid for needy kids who can get in.

That said, the biggest thing is talent. You can’t learn it and you can’t buy it. If you have it, and if you work hard, any artsy kid at least stands a shot.

For those that have to follow that path (the ones that really feel they HAVE to) carrying a huge amount of debt can cripple their dreams. Not because it isn’t a “practical” profession or it’s “low-income” or anything like that, but the truth is when you are pursuing a profession like theater or writing or art you need to be able to be poor for long stretches of time while you build a career, and debt won’t allow that. Debt forces you into “responsible adulthood” too quickly and there go the dreams. Like having a family too young.

So, my advice, is go to the very best (ususally expensive) school you can afford for an arts career. Pick one that has an outstanding reputation. It will help you when you get out. On the other hand, if you can’t afford it, go to a good, solid program at a public university, because in the end it’s talent and detrmination that will carry you on. Big debt will kill dreams.

taxguy · August 8, 2007, 12:45pm

Soozievtnotes,“Taxguy, your thread (this thread) is still a featured thread on the Parents Forum. You just don’t see it as you open the page and newer featured threads appear at the top but if you click on “more featured discussions,” indeed this thread is in the archive of featured discussions. The two that appear at the top are just newer featured discussions.”

Response: Soozievt,you are correct in what you say. Sadly, few people are going to go to page 3 or 4 of the archive( which gets further back each year) in order to find this thread, especially if they don’t know it exists. Frankly, I would put this as a sticky thread that everyone can see in the front page of CC. It is, in my opinion, a major consideration that each parent and student has to consider. I know of too many people who, unlike you, personally regret having incurred the college debt that they have incurred.

Sadly, too few kids apply to their dream school without any consideration of affordability or of the consequences of incurring future debt. Just read over most of the posts here on CC forums. VERY FEW folks discuss or even consider the affordability aspect of the schools that they apply too. They somehow have this belief that money will come from heaven, or schools will always meet their financial expectations,which is why this thread should remain very visible to everyone as a counterpoint to the hype of “top college at any cost or bust.”

Moreover, some jobs, notably film and acting, usually “require” low paying entrance types of jobs in order to get their foot in the door. Having a high college debt can preclude folks from taking these position. Thus, a high debt for some jobs, as Sooremom noted, can actually help kill their dream regardless of the cache of the school.

I strongly suggest that this thread remain very visible as a front page article so that people are at least thinking about the consequences of incurring debt.

mythmom · August 8, 2007, 2:01pm

Okay. Today I started reading post #1 and have now read the entire thread. I agree that this is a very important and useful thread.

taxguy: I completely concur that a student incurring large debt is very ill-advised and appreciate the hard numbers that accompany this assertion.
However, I think the case of student debt of $150,000 is a bit of a straw dog, and there is an anti-private school bias to your posts, no matter how many disclaimers you articulate. The real world rarely presents choices such as a free-ride public university versus $150,000 of debt at a private, though I don’t deny that in some cases this senario does present itself. I think for most people the case is not so black and white, and here is where values come in, and your position is certainly not value free.

Yes, we would all agree with the basic premise that debt reduces choices. However, I don’t agree that for all people tangible, material goods are more valuable than experiences. Why is a BMW (your desired object) more valuable than an Amherst degree? Why is a nicer house more valuable than a trip to Paris? Yes, provisions for retirement are important. No argument there. However, a Kia can provide transportation and a trip to Hershey Park can provide diversion. If we reduce the value of a college education to a diploma that translates into earning power we get one answer. If we view a college education as a set of experiences that may be the most memorable in someone’s life we get another. Why is owning a home necessarily more valuable than a fabulous four years in college? Economists are questioning the idea that home ownership necessarily has economic benefits. So we get to values and desires.

I think the vital contribution your posts make to an understanding of the realities of college financing unfortunately lend false credibility to subtle but
persistant value judgements.

BTW: The financial decisions I have made fit well into the critera you outline. However, I do not think material rewards are the only measurasble indices. After all, life is a series of experiences. I think fiscal intelligence should be balanced by joi de vivre. The saddest thing is to understand the cost of everything but not the value of anything.

soozievt · August 8, 2007, 2:25pm

mythmom, your post truly articulates my thoughts on the subject. I think the realities of incurring debt are important to note. I also agree that talking of either a state U or $150,000 in debt for a private are two ends of a spectrum. (many also receive scholarships, by the way) I also agree that the value of a college education and the experiences that go with it is important to many people and they do not choose their colleges or their majors with potential income in mind (I never did and nor did my kids). I think this discussion does involve one’s values. Some place certain things as more important, more worthwhile, or more valuable than how others would place the same things. I don’t think our choices are right for all people but by the same token, I don’t think other posters’ values and “should or should nots” are right for me. If my kids never got jobs, their education would still have been worth it to me. I could care less what they major in. I also have a positive outlook that they will be successful in whatever they do. Further, one’s major does not limit someone to ONLY having a career in that field. I don’t think of picking a college or a major with future earnings in mind. The colleges and majors were chosen for their own sake, in my family. One child is studying musical theater and one is studying architecture and in my case, I am in the field of education, a low paying field, though I am so happy for where I attended college and graduate schools and for majoring in my area of interest. Not everyone is willing to incur debt and that is fine. Also, everyone has different resources which is the reality of life. My children are at colleges they absolutely love and are studying things they have a huge interest in and for that, it is exteremely worth every penny in my book, but I don’t expect others to share my values. As well, for my child in the arts, it is not a “chosen major” as much as it is the core of her being. I cannot imagine her NOT in this field. It is who she is. As well, while she did not pick her college for this reason at all, I have to say that the contacts she is already making and the professional opportunities she is already being paid to do, have been related to where she is going to college. Perhaps it could have happened elsewhere but we are very pleased that she is where she is attending but our main reason is that SHE is very happy there and she is getting SO much out of her experiences. As the ads say, the cost is “priceless.”

weenie · August 8, 2007, 2:51pm

soozievt:
Do you really mean this? “…it is exteremely worth every penny in my book, but I don’t expect others to share my values…” Or do you mean, “it is worth every penny in my book, but we have more resources than most”?

My point is that statements like yours, which are so commonly heard on CC, but so uncommonly heard in real life, can make some people feel like,sigh, if only they cared about their kids a little more…they could justify tens of thousands of dollars of debt…

I know you don’t really mean that, but it just sort of sounds that way on this forum.

Allmusic · August 8, 2007, 2:57pm

As another parent of an “arts” child, I concur with SoosieVT. My son didn’t choose music; music chose him. I’d welcome anyone to dissuade him from pursuing this passion (people have tried and failed; others are welcome to give it a try ;)).

The state U music will not offer what he needs; I wish it did. The caliber of the other players is exceptionally important, and he needs a place in which to grow; our flagship is not the place (although the price is right, and he would get a full ride, due to his scores and stats).

This is why these are personal decisions. Perhaps others would contend that his music education is not as important as the fact that he could go to State U for nearly (or totally) free. We think it is more important to have the appropriate caliber of players, contacts and opportunities for growth. Different people make different choices. Don’t malign my family’s choice, just because it isn’t yours.

Should you incur substantial debt for that "dream" school? or an arts major?

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