<p>Please look at this data from Yale and you will see that the financial aid perception is wrong. <a href=“Yale University Tuition | CollegeData”>http://www.collegedata.com/cs/data/college/college_pg03_tmpl.jhtml?schoolId=244</a></p>
<p>I wrote my message from an phone so please forgive me if I screwed up the link. At the collegedata page for Yale, specifically look at the section representing All Undergraduates at Yale. Approximately 31% of the students received financial aid (if my math on this Android phone is correct). That means that 69% of the student body is FULL pay. The perception is that you pay very little at these schools and they are great bargains, that is not true at all for the majority.</p>
<p>stemit, that’s very helpful information. if there’s other such info out there we’d be glad to hear it. we need a new post: schools with job machines.</p>
<p>This link has Harvard and Yale as top two for best value schools
<a href=“http://colleges.usnews.rankingsandreviews.com/best-colleges/rankings/national-universities/best-value”>http://colleges.usnews.rankingsandreviews.com/best-colleges/rankings/national-universities/best-value</a></p>
<p>Hard to compare apples (private universities) to oranges (public universities). </p>
<p>Kiplinger’s Personal Finance 100 Best Values in Public Colleges 2014
(Dec. 11, 2013)</p>
<p>Ranked 7th for in-state students
Ranked 14th for out-of-state students
This marks UMD’s sixth consecutive year in the top 10</p>
<p>Bigbooklover, look at the percentage receiving aid. Plus, the average cost are for those receiving aid. That leaves a lot of students and families who are paying full price. Plus, the numbers can be skewed by the percentage of kids below $60,000. </p>
<p>Frugal doctor is spot on. The privates only give big aid to A) financially FAFSA qualified students or B) to the top 1 to 2% of the class. Why? Because so many middle class to rich kids that are able to get in, are also willing to pay full boat, and do. I’m an example of parent that’s paying full tuition at a name private for daughter. And trust me, we’re not rich, but don’t qualify for a dime of “need based” aid, and our D simply “got in” as opposed to top of class. We all made the decision so it’s on us. But that’s the truth of it. Our deal for the two kids is “if you go private, you’re on your own for grad school”. Child number two is leaning heavily toward an honors program at a public, and then knows we’ll help with grad school. Different strokes.</p>
<p>MarylandBro,</p>
<p>First, re-read what I wrote:</p>
<p>“It would be very unusual for someone to go to Harvard and graduate with $100,000 or more in loans.”</p>
<p>It’s true that there are some folks in some circumstances who might graduate from Harvard with six figures in debt. But they are the exceptions, the rare exceptions, not the rule.</p>
<p>However, what you said here is false:</p>
<p>"…a family with a household income of about 150k a year will have an EFC of ~30k-35k."</p>
<p>Since I live in the Washington, DC region, I understand what you’re saying. Nonetheless, a family with $150K in annual income is only going to be asked to pay about $15K per year at Harvard. Not $30K or $35K. Fifteen thousand dollars per year. It’s hard to accumulate $100K in debt when tuition for such a family is only $60K over four years.</p>
<p>To even get to the point where Harvard will charge $100K over four years, a family would need $180K in income.</p>
<p>To accumulate $100K in debt, that family would have to pay $0 each year on the tuition bill. That’s ZERO.</p>
<p>I’d have little sympathy for such a family.</p>
<p>A family that paid just 10% of their income annually in tuition would wind up with perhaps $30K - $35K in debt.</p>
<p>There is a “doughnut hole” in the financial aid formula, though, and that’s for folks right around $240K per year in annual income. At that point, financial aid at Harvard, with one child in college, just about phases out. At that point, the whole $60K is on the family. That’s 25% of gross income, which is onerous.</p>
<p>However, even in the DC area, folks who make a quarter million dollars a year are still the exception, not the rule. Unless you’re living in Bethesda or Potomac, or McLean, it’s unlikely you’re making a quarter million per year. Folks living in Silver Spring, or Bowie, or Manassas, or Frederick are much more likely to be making $100K than $240K, and that’s the majority of the region.</p>
<p>And families with $240K in family income are somewhat more likely to have some savings put aside, and don’t need to pay tuition out each paycheck.</p>
<p>But, it’s true that you could have a family with over $200K in annual income that has so overspent their budget that they can’t squeeze out more than a tiny amount for tuition, and who have set aside nothing in savings that could be used for tuition. There are such folks. Nonetheless, families making that much money, even in the Washington region, are the exception, and families making that much money who are in such straits rarer still. And it would be difficult to sympathize much with such families if they accumulated $100K in debt.</p>
<p>The overwhelming majority of folks who go to Harvard are not going to wind up with six figures in debt at the end.</p>
<p>frugaldoctor,</p>
<p>“Stanford and MIT…”</p>
<p>I’m not commenting about Stanford or MIT. My experience is with Harvard, and I’ve been told by folks with kids at both Harvard and either Yale or Princeton that aid is roughly comparable at these schools, and a little less so at the other Ivies.</p>
<p>Your link to the Yale financial aid information seems to say that about 2900 undergrads are receiving financial aid. Since Yale has, as far as I can determine, about 5400 undergrads, that’s about 54% of all undergrads, not 31%.</p>
<p>Harvard provides financial aid to over 60% of undergrads.</p>
<p>This doesn’t mean that these schools don’t provide aid to folks with typical incomes. Median household income in the US is in the $50Ks. Family income, if I recall correctly, is a bit higher. Thus, regular, middle-income folks who go to Harvard pay little or no tuition.</p>
<p>Although making a couple of hundred thousand a year hardly makes one rich, it does make one high-income. About 3% or 4% of the population makes as much as a couple of hundred thousand a year. Everyone else makes less. Most folks make a whole lot less.</p>
<p>What’s different about Harvard’s population (and, I imagine, Yale and Princeton, too), is that the children of very high-income families represent an outsized proportion of the student body. The fact is that the median family income for Harvard students’ families is actually about $200K per year.</p>
<p>Is it surprising that the children of high-income earners, folks who are rather successful, often have both the nature and the nurture to get into the top schools? Students whose parents can afford the best K-12 educations, tutors, various other enrichment programs? Students whose parents are likely also fairly intelligent?</p>
<p>I agree that it stinks to make a quarter million bucks a year and have to pay $60K per year in tuition. But most folks don’t make a quarter million bucks a year. And even so, folks making that much money should 1) be able to pay a substantial portion of tuition out of current income, 2) have at least modest savings on which to draw to help pay that tuition and 3) will be able to pay off loans that are borrowed much more readily than folks with truly average incomes.</p>
<p>For most American students who apply to Harvard, should they be accepted, Harvard is very affordable.</p>
<p>For the statistically-overrepresented top 2% or 3% who comprise 40% of its student body, Harvard isn’t as affordable, but is not less so than most other private universities.</p>
<p>I pay less for my son to go to Harvard than I would at University of Maryland if my son hadn’t received a full scholarship for Maryland. I would have qualified for nearly no financial aid at Maryland.</p>
<p>MitchKreyben,</p>
<p>You said:</p>
<p>“I’m an example of parent that’s paying full tuition at a name private for daughter. And trust me, we’re not rich, but don’t qualify for a dime of ‘need based’ aid, and our D simply ‘got in’ as opposed to top of class.”</p>
<p>Again, as I said to frugaldoctor, I’m speaking mostly about Harvard, and to a lesser degree, Yale, and Princeton. I don’t know what “name” school your daughter is attending, but if it’s not one of those three, then my own remarks aren’t addressing her school.</p>
<p>My son was accepted at a number of “name” schools, and I was shocked at the difference in financial aid packages between Harvard and the others. The closest was Notre Dame, which was competitive (only about $5K more per year, but I think it had loans included in the aid). Another school, my son’s actual first choice, was $10K per year higher, which was a substantial percentage higher, and included loans. I visited the head of financial aid at that school and told him that his school was son’s first choice, but that I wasn’t going to lose sleep if my son wound up at Harvard instead because of finances. He said, and I quote, “I hope your son enjoys Harvard.” He is.</p>
<p>notjoe, you’re right about the 54%. That is the mistake I made from trying to do the math and read from my phone.</p>
<p>Lots of discussion about H, Y andP. How about some of the lesser Ivies, like Cornell for example? How valuable would an economocs degree from Cornell be in comparison to the same from UMCP with Hnonors citation? Thanks!</p>
<p>Well, we’re happy for ya notjoe. You’ve named two schools out of thousands. I believe you. Factually you are correct. But as a practical matter most of the elites have most of their attendees paying full fare, and that is around $200,000 give or take. So the continuum for those kids is on one end, parent pays $200k, and on the other end…some combination of % student loan, and % parent paying.</p>