We live at n the States and have to pay for university. Wow, the cost!

[Wenjie]

My oldest got her first acceptance. It's in-state and public. After the excitement and congratulations, I looked at the financial aid package. It's just over $38,000 usd

Tuition & Fees $17,339.00, Room & Board $17,428.00, Books & Supplies $1,181.00, Other Expenses $2,210.00.

It’s so expensive! How long have you lived here for? I’m in the states too but planning to go back to the UK. A lot of families start what’s called a ‘529 plan’ when their kids are born, which is a savings account only allowed to be used on education. Crazy that they have to start it at birth.

@Nitflux! You're right. I moved to California 6 years ago so I could have planned better.

This is the main reason we only have one child. Even with saving from birth, it’s going to be a struggle.

Appreciate that this isn't helpful - but actually that's a lot less than I thought it was to go to university in the USA. I'm British and every single US tv show makes it clear that college fees are crippling.

Did you not have any idea of this, or check it out in advance? I knew that people started saving from practically birth to give their kids a college fund.

Wow that is a lot! Presumably they don't have the equivalent of student loans over in US?

NovemberR

That is the fee for one year. It takes four to graduate.

They can access state loans though can't they?

Wow - I know understand why the concept of "saving the kids' college fees" is a thing from US television and films.

Can your DC work while at university, to help cover some of the cost?

*Now, not know dammit (where is the 'edit' button?!).

@novemberr I did know tuition was that high at full price. Room & Board was more of a surprise than it should have been. I didn't know she wouldn't get any merit aid or need-based grants to offset the cost.

@HollyBollyBooBoo

I'm excited. I actually know the answer to this. There was an information session for her school. There's public loans for $5500 a year the first two years and then $7500 a year for the last two. And then there's Parent Plus Loans the parents can take out and only the parents are responsible for paying back. And there's private loans that require a cosigner, but then both the student and cosigner are responsible.

My step-daughter's tuition was $45,000 per year and that was just the basic tuition and didn't include the accommodation, food and books etc. It's shockingly expensive here. Yes, you can get loans but imagine leaving university with nearly $200,000 debt.

It’s just normal to get student loans though, so you don’t have to pay up front if you don’t have the money. You must have already applied for them on DD behalf?

A lot of my friends did the two years at a community college, commuting from home, before they went to the big university for the final two years. It saved them loads of money, although it does take away from the ‘college experience’ but then with COVID she’s not gonna have the typical experience anyway so I’d encourage this plan if you are short on money and don’t want to get out a lot of loans

@MixedUpFiles

NovemberR

That is the fee for one year. It takes four to graduate.

Yes - I understand that! Otherwise it makes it cheaper than the UK, frankly. It's around £27,000 - which would be 3 years tuition fees here.

It's still less than I thought it was. Honestly, I had vague ideas in my head from watching US tv shows that it costs about $300,000 to put a child through college.

That's not staggeringly worse than the UK. Tuition and fees are about £12.5k? Tuition in the UK is over £9k and would not include room and board either - I assume the v high r&b costs are to live in halls rather than in a flatshare off campus. The real kicker is the need to pay for 4 years rather than 3.

I say Uk but of course Scotland is properly civilised! Long as you are a Scottish resident.

It's still less than I thought it was. Honestly, I had vague ideas in my head from watching US tv shows that it costs about $300,000 to put a child through college.
It's still less than I thought it was. Honestly, I had vague ideas in my head from watching US tv shows that it costs about $300,000 to put a child through college

OP is putting her child through an in-state public school so it is actually a lot cheaper than out-of-state public or private.

Quality varies and is not necessarily related to the price point

How much financial aid would a student from a poor background get?

I live in Scotland where we don't pay tuition fees which I think is important to widen access to poorer students.

@cabingirl

My step-daughter's tuition was $45,000 per year and that was just the basic tuition and didn't include the accommodation, food and books etc. It's shockingly expensive here. Yes, you can get loans but imagine leaving university with nearly $200,000 debt.

It’s really not typical to leave university $200,000 in debt. The average is around $30,000 (yes, still a lot!!!)

The huge dollar loans come from law school/med school where it is assumed you can recover that debt easily. Funnily, law schools are very cheap for a university to run so they are really squeezing the students there and at the same time producing a glut of graduates so the graduates aren’t even getting the premium they used to.

Totally depends on the place that you get in, any merit scholarships you get, and financial need.

So, for example, if she went in-state at a Cal State (rather than one of the Universities of California), tuition is less than half that. And in many schools, including really good private schools, if you make less money you actually pay less money, on a sliding scale. Hell, if your family makes under £46k and you go to Harvard, you go for free; you don't pay any more than 10% of your income until your family makes over £106k.

But yes, OP, it's a stupid amount of money. It used to be a lot cheaper, and then Americans got cranky about taxes (I'm being polite), and now it's shit.

If your daughter can get a part-time job, even something nice like a library job, it'll help. Most universities pay $15/hour minimum for those sorts of things.

I will say that if there are any Americans out there, there are also crazy good scholarships at some state schools based on merit alone, including for out of state students. (I know this because a friend's son just went through this.)

A huge mistake people make is assuming that instate tuition in the big states is going to be cheaper than OOS with a merit scholarship. Another is thinking that private school sticker price makes them impossible to pay for--almost all are at a discount of some sort unless a family is quite well off. They're now required to have calculators on their financial aid pages where you can estimate the rough out of pocket price. People are surprised!

@Gingerkittykat

How much financial aid would a student from a poor background get?

I live in Scotland where we don't pay tuition fees which I think is important to widen access to poorer students.

Like most things in America, the poor and rich are fine. Poor families get grants so they won’t need to pay much back. It’s the working classes/lower middle class that get squeezed.

But yes, OP, it's a stupid amount of money. It used to be a lot cheaper, and then Americans got cranky about taxes (I'm being polite), and now it's shit

Honestly, the universities have only themselves to blame. No one made them raise tuition fees, but they did because of easy access to guaranteed student loans.

Also, no one made them accept students who clearly are not prepared for college. The drop-out rate is very high for freshman students, but no one ever asks if these kids should have been accepted in the first place. But colleges will happily collect their guaranteed, government-backed tuitions fees and the student is left with nothing but a huge bill to pay.

If colleges had some skin in the game, we’d have never seen these ballooning costs. Even with medical bills, you have the ability to negotiate with the hospital to bring down the final bill quite a lot, since from the hospital admin POV, a little bit collected is better than nothing.

Colleges do not even have to consider this, as they’ll get the entire amount courtesy of the government regardless.

This, by the way, is before we get to the bloated admin, all the while squeezing the teachers, many adjuncts who are barely making ends meet.

Easy to blame state budget shortfalls but I do not feel one bit sorry for these colleges.

... I have a lot of thoughts on this ....

@Nancydrawn

She got no merit or need-based aid. I suppose we're wealthier than I thought.

She did apply to Cal State schools, but they have not decided yet. You're right that tuition would be less if she's accepted there. She applied to some privates, too. Stanford would be the cheapest for us, but of course she can't get in there.

Americans got cranky about taxes is a good way to put it.

The school suggested work study, so you are probably right that a part-time job could help off set the cost.

She applied to Arizona State, so I hope she gets merit there. If she is accepted. It's not a typical year, so I should just be happy she was accepted somewhere.

My oldest went to Private Uni in California, ended up being cheaper that State which he was also offered a place at.
Make sure you fill in your FAFSA, it'll give you your family expected contribution.
Ds also had federal loans sorted out by the Uni and loans though the Uni itself. You do all that through the finance office. He finally finished paying them off in November. So 10 years since graduation for him last year.
His Education ended up costing something close to $120, 000 for the four years definitly worth it, he's doing really well here in UK. It'll be a lot more now I'm sure.
We used to buy all his books each term. Buy used, buy online though the Uni bookstore and they will have them all boxed up ready for his first day back in each term. Take good care of all the books and he gets money back on them at the end of each term, saved us a fortune.
I also used to drive to see him once a week or so (wasn't far in US terms) I'd take him to Lunch and do a grocery shop for him to save him money. He had a job on campus in the restaurant first year, then the campus grocery store the rest of the time.

You're all right that it's far more complicated than Americans got cranky about taxes, but it's partly about that. States supported 65% of higher ed funding back in the 70s, and now it's less than half that. And there's even a big drop just since 2008--a 25% decline.

OP, sorry to hear about the scholarships. It makes everything so tough. She could, I suppose, take a gap year and work on her SATs and re-apply to places that still care about standardized scores. But I doubt she'll be overly thrilled about that idea.

I'd say the state schools care a lot less about need-based financial aid for middle class (American middle class) people than private schools do. Public schools tend to have help for those close to poverty but very little for families making, say, $80-100k a year, while private schools might offer a bigger package.

If you have younger kids, though, it might still be worth thinking about for the future. The pressure it puts on them is really unfortunate. But it's also true that it can be cheaper with the scholarships to be out of state at a big flagship than in-state with no merit aid, depending on the state. And if the high school scores are great, they can have a full ride at a lot of places.