Thank you all for the replies. You offered a lot to think about and I really appreciate it. My husband thinks a bit differently than I do about this topic and cares about school rank more. We both agree that we will allow our son to choose and will not force him to go to a particular school, as long as we can afford the school he chooses. Our son started out as wanting to go to the very cheapest option but he didn’t know what his options were. We wanted him to make an informed choice and had him tour schools. He chose where to apply. One school courted him quite a lot and he applied there EA before we really understood how EFCs worked. The language in that school’s letters did lead us to believe it would cost less than they ended up offering. He wants a major that doesn’t have a lot of jobs and for which you have to get a grad degree. Undergrad degree can be in various things and it isn’t necessarily an advantage to major in this thing as an undergrad. Some schools have his preferred major and some have his second choice, either of which can work for getting into grad programs he thinks he wants. In the past 2 years he changed his mind about what he wants to study about 10 times at least, so we all three are keeping that in mind.
If our son saw the lowest cost option and wanted to go there, we would let him, but to have him decide on it without seeing it or other options wasn’t what we wanted for him. I would love to have him live here during college because I love having him around but I think for his own growth, it would be better for him to go away for college. He wanted to be home but is starting to see he might want to leave by the time fall comes around and is starting to feel ready for that.
We don’t force our son to do particular things but we do make him try things and consider things. This has lead to him finding things he loves doing.
My local friend went to the lower cost regional college and wants her child to go there but said that students who go to the state’s flagship (a currently hot school) get their first job more easily than those who go to the lower cost school. My friend’s son is graduating the lower cost school and had a great experience there, got internships, won awards, and got into a great grad program in his chosen field. He is going to have fantastic career. He got a lot more attention from professors and mentored there than he would have at big state flagship school.
I agree, that the current situation is making everything up in the air for many people.
We will not take out any loans (no parent plus) and do not want our son to take out loans, either. I know some think it is a good idea as it makes the students feel they have some skin in the game, but we would prefer he graduated debt-free. We have savings set aside for his education and could pay for the more expensive private school that is about $9000 over our EFC, but he already got into other schools that are below our EFC that are very good schools (not lower in ranking and probably a better fit). I don’t see a reason to spend over $10,000 more a year for him to go to this school. If the price comes down closer to our EFC, maybe. All things being equal, why pay so much more is how we feel. Unfortunately, some of the college visits we had planned, which we think would have made our son feel more interested in a couple other schools, probably are not going to happen now.