<p>Savings vs. debt. If you were the OP’s hypothetical family with ample savings (i.e. the family that habitually underspends its income), then $80,000 more on the kid’s college might be no big deal. But a more typical (in the US) family with very little savings (i.e. the more typical family that ratchets up its spending to consume all income and perhaps more) may find $80,000 of additional debt daunting, and may not even qualify for such loans if they are already heavily in debt.</p>
<p>While, in theory, the latter family could cut back on its spending to live substantially below its means in order to better finance the kid’s college, real life families appear to have a very hard time doing that. The kid planning for college should not have much expectation that the parents will actually do that and should adjust his/her college application list accordingly.</p>
<p>Well, ucb: your hypothetical family is screwed no matter what they do, right? They’ve spent every dime and they’re in debt. They’re going to have to cut back at some point, regardless of whether they sign on to fund Johnnies college expenses or not. That’s one scenario.</p>
<p>I did not have any particular colleges in mind when I distinguished “top 30” from “mediocre public” but here are some schools I would consider candidates for “top 30”. If I had to clarify somewhat, I would say any school, public or private, with an SAT midpoint CR + Math below 1200 might fall into the “mediocre” category. This would include hundreds of schools that might do a good job with the students they enroll but which would be a disappointing choice for a student who is accepted into a “top 30”.</p>
<p>California Institute of Technology
Harvard University
Princeton University
Harvey Mudd College
Yale University
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Washington University in St Louis
Columbia University in the City of New York
University of Chicago
Vanderbilt University
Stanford University
Northwestern University
Dartmouth College
Swarthmore College
Rice University
University of Pennsylvania
Pomona College
Duke University
Tufts University
University of Notre Dame
Bowdoin College
Carleton College
Amherst College
Brown University
Carnegie Mellon University
Williams College
Cornell University
Haverford College
Claremont McKenna College
Johns Hopkins University
Vassar College
Reed College
Wesleyan University
Georgetown University
Grinnell College
Hamilton College
Washington and Lee University
Middlebury College
Wellesley College</p>
<p>I’m not sure the fish are biting anymore.
If you really want to dog this, maybe start a different thread, asking if folks agree that a mediocre college can simply be defined by “SAT midpoint CR + Math below 1200.”</p>
<p>You make this look so simple that it comes across as superficial. Grasping at straws. Sometimes, trolling.</p>
<p>I would add that a few states with great public flagship campuses could make the choice difficult if the dollar differential were large such as Michigan, California, Virginia, Georgia Tech, North Carolina, Maryland.</p>
<p>I sorted a list of about 1200 schools based on SAT and then applied my judgment about where a reasonable cutoff might be for “top 30” candidates. There is no clear-cut top 30, of course. There are several dozen other great schools that might qualify, including some of the more selective publics. My rationale is that factors such as SAT and graduation rate are so highly correlated with many indicators of quality. So, I used selectivity, basically.</p>
<p>lookingforward, there is truth in everything I have said. If parents have done everything they can financially to secure the best education for their child, then kudos to them. But, parents should give until it hurts. Don’t hold back. As I said, many parents are unaware that quality private schools can be affordable. Many others could afford a better school but take the cheapest route because they fail to appreciate the value added by a substantially better school.</p>
<p>We don’t have any idea why this all interests you- you have a kid in hs or college or just curiosity and desire to steer a relative’s kid? Some here think you are a hs kid.</p>
<p>You don’t seem to get what makes a college right for someone- you went from top 30 to the likelihood Princeton grads marry Princeton grads to average net price…and now it’s SAT scores.</p>
<p>In fact, as some pointed out, what makes X the best choice is far more than an outside look at its standing or stats. Or at some average cost for all students combined, some figure that says average EFC is 12k. Those statements were not relevant to our college search and I daresay to others on this thread. It takes more than superficially looking at lists or numbers and assuming.</p>
<p>What matters is what is right for that family, what particular programs offer the most to their kid, what finaid policies make the costs for that family affordable, whether the aid comes through as expected- and how that family defines affordable.</p>
<p>Yes, you may have pasted in info that you found somewhere and that seems accurate. But I don’t see the critical thinking applied. Sorry.</p>
<p>If you are a parent, tell us about your decisions for your child and how it worked out. Not speculation.</p>
<p>“Parents should give until it hurts”? For college tuition? Is this a fundamental principle on the order of thou shalt not kill, or do unto others…? Do you really want to apply this sweeping statement to everyone?
I’m sure that most of the parents posting here, no matter where they stand re college loans, would give their kids a kidney without hesitation.</p>
<p>And lots of people don’t care to have others telling them how they “should” budget their money.</p>
<p>I notice that on the list of really good schools the OP mentioned, my alma mater (The University of Texas at Austin) was not mentioned. If one plans to stay in Texas to work (as many of its graduates do), having a degree from UT carries a lot more weight in the job market than some of the schools mentioned. I would even go so far as to say there might be more than a few employers who would not have even heard of some of them, so while it wouldn’t be a mark against the candidate, it sure wouldn’t give them any advantage worthy of a much bigger price tag.</p>
<p>That’s why which school is “best” for a particular student involves so much more than a ranking based on some pretty arbitrary criteria.</p>
<p>Good point, Nrds. For all but a small percentage of employers in a few fields, they only know the colleges they know- and it’s often about sports rep. So even Name-It State U can have more name recognition than Williams or Mudd.</p>
<p>This might be the most ridiculous and irresponsible statement I have seen on this site.</p>
<p>It is STUPID to put oneself in a “hurtful” financial situation around age 45-60 or whenever most parents have college-bound kids. Especially if the only reason to overextend one’s finances is so Johnny or Susie can go to their expensive dream college. You fail to understand that some parents also believe personal responsibility is important, and that we don’t want to burden our kids with having to help us in our retirement OR failing to leave them something as an inheritance. Not to mention, some of us who recognize the difference in the economy from when we were starting out also consider it a gift to help our kids with their first downpayment on a house or a jumpstart on THEIR kids’ college funds. It is really just not as simple as you would like it to be.</p>
<p>Someone in an earlier post asked what is meant by “top 30” or “mediocre” so I was trying to make it more concrete by attaching some names. </p>
<p>Not sure why it is so hard to see the relationships among my comments. It all has to do with optimizing costs and benefits, including the intangible benefits such as the role models you will have and the relationships you will form. It IS a very complex problem, I know this. SAT is a good proxy for items that might fall on the benefits side of the equation.</p>
<p>I didn’t mean to insult anybody’s sensibilities. U Texas Dallas and Austin are certainly great schools and have many excellent students. I certainly wouldn’t consider them mediocre. If your child were accepted at, say, Yale and U Texas, where would you want your child to enroll? I think it would be a somewhat difficult choice for a Texas resident…and U Texas is one of the best public flagships in the country.</p>
<p>The SAT midpoints at U Texas Dallas and Austin are 1275 and 1255, respectively, and I imagine these campuses have their share of “top 30 caliber” students although the “density” may be lower than at a top 30 school.</p>
<p>What IS simple is that parents who love their children will make sacrifices for them, maybe even take some reasonable risks. If you are a parent who has made your children your top personal and financial priority and who has made sacrifices…well, I guess I am not talking about you.</p>
<p>If you were to NOT take this personally, can you think of parents who ARE personally and financially self-centered? Who DO seem to have priorities higher than their children?</p>
<p>I know of a family who is very tight with their money and sent their kids to a two-year commuter community college. One went on to finish at a 4-year public but is now working at a grocery store. The other is working at a rather low-paying job unrelated to their major. I can’t say for sure, but I wonder if the kids might be doing better if they had attended the best college that would admit them instead of the least expensive.</p>
<p>It would depend on my child’s interests and which school would be a better fit. If these were my kids, and the costs were no different, I would predict that one would choose Yale and one would choose UT–and I would be completely supportive of both of them. Every student is different.</p>
<p>collegehelp, there is almost no reasoning with you. Just because a parent doesn’t see the value of financial sacrifice does not make him or her a bad parent. I know many parents who have expected their kids to go to CC for two years before transferring to the state flagship. For all I know they own a boat and a large TV and have taken a few vacations during their child’s lifetime. They might even keep the heat at 75 in the winter or have a few more pairs of shoes than they really “need.” That does not make them “personally and financially self-centered.” Maybe they themselves did fine without an expensive education, and they just don’t see the value.</p>
<p>Okay, I’ll help beat this dead horse a little dead-er, though I’m sure others have made, and re-made, my point more eloquently than I will. Sure, some parents are selfish and don’t do enough for their kids. Some others are excessively self-sacrificing and do too much for their kids. The vast majority make a whole range of decisions based on their own perspectives, circumstances, kids’ needs, own needs, risk tolerance, worldviews, etc. Most of these decisions are perfectly reasonable even if Collegehelp disapproves. Collegehelp, whatever your own education was like, I don’t think it taught you that “there are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamed of in your philosophy” (apologies to Shakespeare for the mangling).</p>