speaking of college tuition - if you make less than 200K

[lulubelle]

and get accepted to Harvard, you only pay 10% of tuition! My friend, who went to Harvard, just told me about it this morning. She assumed most ivy league schools were headed in the same direction. Apparently, since their endowment is so enormous they can afford to do this. But, with the hit the endowment has taken, I'm not sure this will be true for much longer.

 

I'm just surprised to here it! And, of course your kid has to get in and then actually want to go to such a liberal school!

[tajott]

I'm not positive, but i also thought that if you are below 65K it is free...?

[TravelingChris]

We were making about 120K when we were living in Europe (and the dollar was much less than the Euro). Our expenses were much more than in the US but the financial aid formula didn't care. They thought we should spend 25% of our income for college for one of five of us. No way could we do that. About 10% is what we decided we could afford and what we did. That didn't include his airfare (an extra 500, or the extra money we spent for him to stay in the US over spring break or Thanksgiving,(He got a half tuition scholarship and a no interest loan and he chose a less expensive private college).

 

This kind of goes with Ria's post about the cost of education. I am sorry but I can't see spending that kind of money. I don't have that kind of money. (we went down in income when we returned to the US and now we live in an expensive area and he had a raise so we are up in income again).

[klmama]

and get accepted to Harvard, you only pay 10% of tuition! My friend, who went to Harvard, just told me about it this morning. She assumed most ivy league schools were headed in the same direction. Apparently, since their endowment is so enormous they can afford to do this. But, with the hit the endowment has taken, I'm not sure this will be true for much longer.

 

I'm just surprised to here it! And, of course your kid has to get in and then actually want to go to such a liberal school!

 

I remember seeing a show - 60 minutes, 20/20, something like that - several years ago, and it profiled an upper middle class girl who attended Harvard or some other Ivy League school. She had been comfortable in her Chicago suburb, but in college she suddenly felt poor. Her friends would go shopping and buy $150 purses just on a whim. They would spend $100 just on an everning out - every week. The young lady couldn't afford to do such things, and it was hard for her socially. Even with a great scholarship, tuition reduction, etc., I wouldn't want to put my dc in an environment where living the frugal life we've taught them to lead would be a social barrier for them.

[Carrie12345]

Nevermind!

Edited February 27, 2009 by Carrie1234
Babbled in wrong thread @@.

[abbeyej]

My school had a guarantee to cover 100% of government-estimated "financial need". Not as great a deal as that, but still made the school far more affordable. Scholarships covered my tuition, but I still received some additional money that helped with room and board and books. I left a large, private university with a grand total of $2,000 in debt. Dh had fewer scholarship $$ than I (a true testament to the fallibility of admissions staff, lol), but left with no debt at all, due to a combination of aid and good planning on his parents' part. Neither of us spent more for our private educations than we would have spent for state school educations. And I'm 100% sure that I had smaller classes and more access to my professors (not TAs) than I would have had in a state school.