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Tuition rates for Harvard and Princeton in particular are deceptive since if you earnestly cannot afford that tuition, they don't ask you to pay it. Those sc

Tuition rates for Harvard and Princeton in particular are deceptive since if you earnestly cannot afford that tuition, they don't ask you to pay it. Those schools are often actually cheaper than public schools for people without much money. Other expensive private-nonprofit schools may be another matter entirely. But those two are bad examples to use.

cosmie 7y ago
> Those schools are often actually cheaper than public schools for people without much money. While this is true on paper, it's not always the case in practice. I was able to get multiple acceptance offers to Ivy League schools, and poor enough to have the sliding scale of tuition slide all the way to $0. But all of them had an estimated cost of attendance[1] so optimistic about ancillary expenses during the school year that it was infeasible to actually go to any of them. There were other implicit barriers to acceptance as a poor kid as well, but the way the sliding scale was implemented was the biggest. I chose a state school instead. Despite a higher paper cost higher than the Ivy League schools offering free tuition, the total out of pocket cost for attendance of the state school worked out significantly lower. [1] Federal loans and many scholarships won't pay out over the university's estimated cost of attendance. By zero'ing out tuition and room and board, that just leaves the "books and personal expenses" line item,
- tacomonstrous 7y ago
  I'm a little surprised by your story. I was in a similar situation myself, except that I chose to go to an Ivy League school, and there were sufficiently many work-study options available to help pay for all my expenses.
  - cosmie 7y ago
    For sure! You can see my replies to sibling comments, but those opportunities exist. I just was too naive at the time and without sufficient personal support to be able to understand that. And while some of the acceptance offers made reference to things such as work study, there was a presumption of understanding in many of them on how that stuff works. And I was a first generation college student without anyone to help me fill in that knowledge gap. There were additional issues like the logistics and upfront costs of a cross-country move, as well as the timing of aid disbursements and expense needs. Which I neither had the savings nor the cashflow to confidently support, nor anyone to lean on temporarily for it. While there were plenty of unknowns for the state school, they were manageable enough for me to be competent in my ability to handle them and close enough to my personal support network if things went south. Many schools do in fact have the ability to address such needs. I just didn't learn was a possibility until after the fact. For anyone else that happens to be in that situation, I'd strongly encourage doing what you did and taking the Ivy offer. There will be sufficient support to accomodate your circumstances. It'd just be nice if the schools themselves improved their offer letters or follow-up collateral to address the concerns/needs that are likely for those which qualify for a zero'd out tuition or whose application/FAFSA documents indicate are a first generation college student.
- sushid 7y ago
  If you were accepted into multiple Ivies with full financial aid you were definitely eligible for work study and student loans. Personally, I would recommend anyone in that situation to opt for the Ivy as it really does open doors later in life.
  - kelnos 7y ago
    > ... and student loans With so many students exiting college with crippling debt, I'm not sure this is still a sustainable way of paying your way. Work study can certainly help, but the pay of even a fairly skilled job will fall far, far short of the cost of tuition, room and board, textbooks, etc.
    - lonelappde 7y ago
      This thread is about paying for books and clothes when tuition and room and board are covered by grants.
  - cosmie 7y ago
    > Personally, I would recommend anyone in that situation to opt for the Ivy as it really does open doors later in life. For anyone that comes across this post: I fully agree. I was fortunate in the particular intersection of my skills being comparatively rare, and having a professor that took a personal liking to me and acted as a mentor (while opening a few doors on my behalf through his connections). While I've been successful myself, it's been through connections I've made post-school (other than the bootstrapping from that one professor). I can't imagine the possibilities that would have come with seeding that entire process throughout school. > If you were accepted into multiple Ivies with full financial aid you were definitely eligible for work study and student loans. You're not wrong, but that was non-obvious at the time. The student loans were a particularly sticking point, as the cost of attendance letter provided by the schools had optimistic line items for personal expenses (which include books and supplies), creating an artificially low limit on the ability to take out loans. And I wasn't familiar enough with the college experience, nor had access to anyone that was, to understand the potential for work study. Better onboarding collateral geared towards first generation college students would have easily clarified things and provided confidence around this, rather than leaving a gaping unknown on how I was going to make ends meet.
- lonelappde 7y ago
  Ancillary expenses make college hard to attend, but that's not because the school is ripping you off, it's because life is expensive. The absolute cheapest housing in Cambridge, MA is in the middle of downtown on Harvard's campus.
  - cosmie 7y ago
    I don't disagree. But the cost of attendance includes a line item for "personal expenses" (which includes books and all that stuff). For 2019-2020 academic year at Harvard, that line item is $4,193[1]. There's also a line item for "travel expenses", but when using their net price calculator with my circumstances when I went to school, that kept coming back as zero. By zero'ing out tuition, fees, and room and board, that leaves $4,193 as the cap on demonstrable need, which federal loans and many scholarships will use as a max limit on cumulative aid. This is unrealistically optimistic, and serves to needlessly cap the potential ability to raise funds via merit scholarships or loans, shifting part of the cost burden to ongoing cashflow. Which, I'll concede, isn't necessarily too hard due to the plethora of work-study and student jobs available. But I only knew that after the fact, and the prospect of getting stuck far away from home without the money to make ends meet and the knowledge that your family is too far away to help you get home and too poor to help financially is terrifying to a kid right out of high school. I also learned, through the work that I did for the university I went to, that the cost of attendance isn't as black and white as it's made out to be either. Although universities may differ in policies, they can make accommodations in your individual cost of attendance letter if you can justify the deviations. But I only learned of that flexibility after experiencing the system, and it wasn't clear at the outset. So I didn't even realize that was a possibility when evaluating acceptance offers and aid packages. [1] https://college.harvard.edu/financial-aid/how-aid-works https://college.harvard.edu/financial-aid/how-aid-works

cosmie 7y ago

> Those schools are often actually cheaper than public schools for people without much money. While this is true on paper, it's not always the case in practice. I was able to get multiple acceptance offers to Ivy League schools, and poor enough to have the sliding scale of tuition slide all the way to $0. But all of them had an estimated cost of attendance[1] so optimistic about ancillary expenses during the school year that it was infeasible to actually go to any of them. There were other implicit barriers to acceptance as a poor kid as well, but the way the sliding scale was implemented was the biggest. I chose a state school instead. Despite a higher paper cost higher than the Ivy League schools offering free tuition, the total out of pocket cost for attendance of the state school worked out significantly lower. [1] Federal loans and many scholarships won't pay out over the university's estimated cost of attendance. By zero'ing out tuition and room and board, that just leaves the "books and personal expenses" line item,

tacomonstrous 7y ago
I'm a little surprised by your story. I was in a similar situation myself, except that I chose to go to an Ivy League school, and there were sufficiently many work-study options available to help pay for all my expenses.
- cosmie 7y ago
  For sure! You can see my replies to sibling comments, but those opportunities exist. I just was too naive at the time and without sufficient personal support to be able to understand that. And while some of the acceptance offers made reference to things such as work study, there was a presumption of understanding in many of them on how that stuff works. And I was a first generation college student without anyone to help me fill in that knowledge gap. There were additional issues like the logistics and upfront costs of a cross-country move, as well as the timing of aid disbursements and expense needs. Which I neither had the savings nor the cashflow to confidently support, nor anyone to lean on temporarily for it. While there were plenty of unknowns for the state school, they were manageable enough for me to be competent in my ability to handle them and close enough to my personal support network if things went south. Many schools do in fact have the ability to address such needs. I just didn't learn was a possibility until after the fact. For anyone else that happens to be in that situation, I'd strongly encourage doing what you did and taking the Ivy offer. There will be sufficient support to accomodate your circumstances. It'd just be nice if the schools themselves improved their offer letters or follow-up collateral to address the concerns/needs that are likely for those which qualify for a zero'd out tuition or whose application/FAFSA documents indicate are a first generation college student.
sushid 7y ago
If you were accepted into multiple Ivies with full financial aid you were definitely eligible for work study and student loans. Personally, I would recommend anyone in that situation to opt for the Ivy as it really does open doors later in life.
- kelnos 7y ago
  > ... and student loans With so many students exiting college with crippling debt, I'm not sure this is still a sustainable way of paying your way. Work study can certainly help, but the pay of even a fairly skilled job will fall far, far short of the cost of tuition, room and board, textbooks, etc.
  - lonelappde 7y ago
    This thread is about paying for books and clothes when tuition and room and board are covered by grants.
- cosmie 7y ago
  > Personally, I would recommend anyone in that situation to opt for the Ivy as it really does open doors later in life. For anyone that comes across this post: I fully agree. I was fortunate in the particular intersection of my skills being comparatively rare, and having a professor that took a personal liking to me and acted as a mentor (while opening a few doors on my behalf through his connections). While I've been successful myself, it's been through connections I've made post-school (other than the bootstrapping from that one professor). I can't imagine the possibilities that would have come with seeding that entire process throughout school. > If you were accepted into multiple Ivies with full financial aid you were definitely eligible for work study and student loans. You're not wrong, but that was non-obvious at the time. The student loans were a particularly sticking point, as the cost of attendance letter provided by the schools had optimistic line items for personal expenses (which include books and supplies), creating an artificially low limit on the ability to take out loans. And I wasn't familiar enough with the college experience, nor had access to anyone that was, to understand the potential for work study. Better onboarding collateral geared towards first generation college students would have easily clarified things and provided confidence around this, rather than leaving a gaping unknown on how I was going to make ends meet.
lonelappde 7y ago
Ancillary expenses make college hard to attend, but that's not because the school is ripping you off, it's because life is expensive. The absolute cheapest housing in Cambridge, MA is in the middle of downtown on Harvard's campus.
- cosmie 7y ago
  I don't disagree. But the cost of attendance includes a line item for "personal expenses" (which includes books and all that stuff). For 2019-2020 academic year at Harvard, that line item is $4,193[1]. There's also a line item for "travel expenses", but when using their net price calculator with my circumstances when I went to school, that kept coming back as zero. By zero'ing out tuition, fees, and room and board, that leaves $4,193 as the cap on demonstrable need, which federal loans and many scholarships will use as a max limit on cumulative aid. This is unrealistically optimistic, and serves to needlessly cap the potential ability to raise funds via merit scholarships or loans, shifting part of the cost burden to ongoing cashflow. Which, I'll concede, isn't necessarily too hard due to the plethora of work-study and student jobs available. But I only knew that after the fact, and the prospect of getting stuck far away from home without the money to make ends meet and the knowledge that your family is too far away to help you get home and too poor to help financially is terrifying to a kid right out of high school. I also learned, through the work that I did for the university I went to, that the cost of attendance isn't as black and white as it's made out to be either. Although universities may differ in policies, they can make accommodations in your individual cost of attendance letter if you can justify the deviations. But I only learned of that flexibility after experiencing the system, and it wasn't clear at the outset. So I didn't even realize that was a possibility when evaluating acceptance offers and aid packages. [1] https://college.harvard.edu/financial-aid/how-aid-works https://college.harvard.edu/financial-aid/how-aid-works