Tulane. It’s not even close enough of a decision to debate.
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I find the reality of the 30 year olds much sadder…
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I agree that Tulane makes the most sense, but I disagree that it is an easy decision when your child has worked hard and been admitted to the school of their choice. I am paying OOS public tuition for one child and paid full private school tuition for two others – when I could have paid a lot less with scholarships and in-state options – so who am I to judge others? Likewise, I took significant personal student loans myself for college and law school, and I don’t know if I would say that was a mistake. This forum is pretty big on ROI and no loans, but I think whatever your child’s major and career goals, it does make a difference where they go - it is a place where they will be living and studying for a chunk of their life, relationships will be made, and like it or not, perceptions of them will be partly based on it. Having worked and been hired, and hired others, as an attorney in Big Law, where you attended undergrad is not as insignificant as some suggest, but which law school you attend and how you do there is still more important. And Tulane is a very respected school. To me, Tulane seems like the better choice, particularly because it shares much in common with Georgetown, although their demographics are different. I don’t think it is ever an easy decision when it comes to our children, and whatever you decide, you have two excellent choices (and hopefully others will follow).
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I agree that this forum skews more pure ROI-oriented than I do in making decisions, but we all have a limit. I had some debt (that I paid off quickly after college), and wouldn’t have been opposed to my kids having some level of debt. The amount in question is above my threshold, though. $40,000 is one thing…4X that amount is quite another…for me.
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I also agree that the board skews ROI focused but reading through the responses above I don’t believe it’s about ROI - it’s about Debt v Non-Debt. The sentiment was “if you have the money, can afford it go send your kid wherever they want to go”.
And the debt amount in this situation is just too large to ignore.
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For undergrad school now…the student has limited loans they can take themselves ($5500 freshman year Direct Loan…it does go up a little in subsequent years.
Anything above the Direct Loan amount for undergrad will either need to be co-signed by the parents or taken out by them. The student can’t do this alone.
For law school, students can take the Direct Loan but the amount per year is $20,500 I believe…which won’t fund most law schools. They can take the Grad Plus loans up to the cost of attendance for law school. @kelsmom do I have the amount correct for grad direct loans?
Yes, that’s correct for now. There is a lot of chatter about limiting federal loans at the grad/professional level, though, and I would not assume that federal loans will be available up to the cost of attendance in the future.
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Also to be noted…the grad school and professional school federally funded loans are unsubsidized.
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One consideration no one has mentioned yet: The political climate in LA vs DC. While Tulane doesn’t necessarily reflect Louisiana itself, the difference between the two locations could be a factor.
I’ll join the chorus suggesting that Tulane is the far better choice. It’s an excellent school and, most importantly, affordable. Unlike some, I’m not opposed to a modest amount of borrowing for undergrad, but $180k in debt while you are starting out is liable to be life limiting. That amount of debt may preclude a student from taking certain jobs that interest them, force them to live at home and may even mean that they can’t afford to attend law (or grad) school as soon as they’d like to (or at all).
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I’m neither ROI focused not anti-loan. And I have a degree in Classics, so you’d hardly accuse me of being pre-professional- and paid off my grad school loans early despite reduced income during pregnancies and VERY brief maternity leaves (my company did not offer parental leave, so it was “uncompensated PTO”.)
But debt is a tool like any other. Don’t use a wrench when you need a screwdriver; don’t use a hammer when you need a toilet plunger.
Grad school debt- or more specifically, professional school debt- is a different animal than undergrad IMHO. In my case, I tripled my income from my pre-grad school job to my post grad-school job. I also went into grad school determined to take the highest paying job i was offered (and I did, and never regretted it even though I didn’t like what I was doing). A 24 or 25 year old is in a solid place to be making decisions and trade-off’s like this; I doubt a 17 or 18 year old understands what it means to “be unhappy in a highly compensated job for a few years” the way a 25 year old with professional work experience does.
I also had a much more stark financial decision than the OP- a free degree at a third tier program paid for by my then-current employer, vs. a top 5 program with loans. I ran the numbers- it was worth taking the risk. But Tulane vs. Georgetown is NOT that kind of dichotomy.
YMMV.
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Yeah, I am not against student loan debt in all circumstances. In fact I am still paying off a combination of college and law school loans that I was originally able to defer interest-free, and then consolidated at a ludicrously low rate, such that it has never made sense to pay off early.
But I completely agree this is far too much debt for this particular purpose.
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It’s not an ROI thread per se - but I think we’ve all read enough horror stories and we’ve seen the action they government has taken the last few years to help those with loans - to know that in general (not all purposes), not having a loan is better than having a loan.
That said, if you have a loan, what is reasonable? The government limits kids to $27K total - perhaps there’s a reason behind that #?
We also know - there are predatory folks out there selling something as an assurance or near assurance outcome wise - that frankly isn’t true. And that often includes very “respected” institutions doing this.
So some, as referenced above, have handled their loans responsibly.
But others fall way behind, lose flexibility/choices in life, and often never dig out of it.
We all are different in how we see things (I think we can agree) - but certainly a warning for anyone taking a loan seems appropriate - so they at least look at the longer term, bigger picture.
And this OP mentioned a $60K annual loan (vs. a $60K loan overall) and I don’t know of too many, no matter their financial beliefs, that would recommend that for any college.
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If I was having trouble with choosing between these two, I’d back up and ask myself why did I apply to Tulane in the first place? They thought enough of Tulane to apply in the first place. If it isn’t a relatively easy choice compared to that level of debt, then I’d say it was never a choice in the first place. If it was a true choice, then you aren’t going to get a better deal than “free”.
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It’s not worth the debt to go to Georgetown. $180,000 in debt for an undergraduate degree would be financial suicide, even if he went to law school. Lawyers aren’t in the same pay league as doctors, so high amounts of debt would put him in the law of diminishing returns. Best to keep the debt down if he plans law school.
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I agree with your post but you are factually incorrect here.
There is no “league”. There are pediatricians and gerontologists who are at the bottom of the physician pay scales; there are partners in big time white shoe law firms (and not just NY and DC… Houston, Boston, Cleveland) who out-earn doctors by healthy multiples.
I agree with you on the debt- but you are wrong on your facts.
And for lawyers who don’t care about prestige-- a modestly aggressive personal injury lawyer can out-earn even the orthopedic surgeons and dermatologists.
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Well, it still doesn’t justify taking out 180k in debt for an undergraduate degree. We can probably agree on that. If the OP can get into a high paid legal career, no debt would put him much further ahead.
Agree- the debt seems quite extreme in this case.
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I’d back up and ask myself why did I apply to Georgetown at all? Wasn’t it clear it would be unaffordable just by running the NPC? As a polisci kid, Georgetown was my S18’s dream school (and his main rival in HS ended up going there, with parents borrowing on their HELOC). It wasn’t affordable for us without borrowing money, so my S didn’t apply (and attended our state flagship instead at less than half the cost). And after graduation he moved to DC for work and I think has had a better outcome than his HS rival.
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Where did the OP go?
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