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It's important to remember that most people do not pay the "retail" cost of college tuition. Those who do often have parents who are well able to afford it. (Whether or not it is a wise expenditure is a matter of opinion.) The reasons why tuition and fee levels are so high when 50% or more students at most schools receive some type of financial aid are complex, having to do with the ways scholarships work and the accounting systems for recognizing the "costs" of student aid.
Any college is a brand name union card, so would evaluate ROI based upon what are median incomes of grads (from majors like finance or computer science) upon grad and 5-10-20 yrs post-grad
Not many smart kids ever end up at USC (or UCLA), no matter alleged scholarship; much cheaper to watch their football teams on TV for "free"
And those from truly wealthy families can easily donate whatever to Stanford or Wharton to secure admits (and many wealthy parents in NYC or SV are alums of leading colleges, so kids get legacy preferences anyway)
College has been "expensive" for decades; smart parents don't have kids they can't afford; smart kids/parents figure out basic college/career economics well in advance; and work together to build a HS academic record and choose a specific college/major that ideally helps kid to enter a lucrative career like finance or tech where college costs are trivial....Darwinian selection, no?
Any college is a brand name union card, so would evaluate ROI based upon what are median incomes of grads (from majors like finance or computer science) upon grad and 5-10-20 yrs post-grad
Not many smart kids ever end up at USC (or UCLA), no matter alleged scholarship; much cheaper to watch their football teams on TV for "free"
And those from truly wealthy families can easily donate whatever to Stanford or Wharton to secure admits (and many wealthy parents in NYC or SV are alums of leading colleges, so kids get legacy preferences anyway)
College has been "expensive" for decades; smart parents don't have kids they can't afford; smart kids/parents figure out basic college/career economics well in advance; and work together to build a HS academic record and choose a specific college/major that ideally helps kid to enter a lucrative career like finance or tech where college costs are trivial....Darwinian selection, no?
I recall a story about a kid whose parents paid or put money towards some building at Brown (I think, not 100% sure) and said student did not get admitted. And we're talking a lot of money here.
USC is worth it in those fields (Film,Buisness) where alumni mafia speed your way thru life with almost as little effort as it takes to graduade there.
If you have any intellectual interests, UCLA,Claremont Colleges etc etc are orders of magnitude above the University of Spoiled Children.
If you're only making $30-50k out of school, I dont think it's return on your investment that will matter....it's return on their investment, it only strengthens their brand and reputation.
There are the exceptional ibankers, doctors, lawyers that make 6 or 7 figures, but that's only a small percent of the total student population.
If you're making $30-50 k in LA, with huge student loans, how do you ever get ahead to make it pay off?
Contrast that with someone in Florida. You could probably buy any number of foreclosed condos or homes now in the low 100's. There's your house payment, and you've got $50 or $80k to start a business with or invest.
Invest the money in another home fund, wait 7 or 10 years, and maybe you could buy the home the poor USC student making $40 k has been barely renting.
Not to mention that you can go to UF for $4,300/yr in tuition and a total cost of less than $15,000 before any scholarships.
Grad from a Fla High school and get 75% to 100% of base tuition covered by a scholarship from the Florida lottery called Bright Futures.
Buy into a prepaid plan and pay the tuition rates from the year you bought it.
Combine the two and throw in any private scholarships, and I know a significant amount of college students in Florida that are getting fat refund credits to pay all other expenses and after that some even get a check in the mail and are actually getting paid to go to school. Freshman year, my roomate had all expenses covered by this and got a refund check of $2,000 each semster for beer money.
It's pretty funny how cheap the tuition in Florida is, though it is starting to go up a little bit.
Any kid with talent at a private school like USC is NOT paying the sticker price, they are getting a variety of scholarships, etc. At times I wonder whether the high sticker prices are there to keep middle-class kids from applying.
For grad school I went to a college that was equally expensive, the only undergrads that I knew that were paying full sticker were foreign students from rich families.
I agree. My husband's best friend graduated from Stanford with a full-ride. He paid zero dollars and that included room and board.
Not to mention that you can go to UF for $4,300/yr in tuition and a total cost of less than $15,000 before any scholarships.
Grad from a Fla High school and get 75% to 100% of base tuition covered by a scholarship from the Florida lottery called Bright Futures.
Buy into a prepaid plan and pay the tuition rates from the year you bought it.
Combine the two and throw in any private scholarships, and I know a significant amount of college students in Florida that are getting fat refund credits to pay all other expenses and after that some even get a check in the mail and are actually getting paid to go to school. Freshman year, my roomate had all expenses covered by this and got a refund check of $2,000 each semster for beer money.
It's pretty funny how cheap the tuition in Florida is, though it is starting to go up a little bit.
Yep, and now the schools are broke with their lowballing of tuition. Glad I graduated in 2008!
As long as your college is doing an adequate job of teaching you the basics of your degree, the only benefit of going to a particular college is what doors open for you. It might get you to shake hands with some people that have a soft spot for fellow alumni. For certain fields, this might matter more than others.
I can say that in my field (engineering), I landed my first job due to being #1 in my class. Some businesses might hire based on the college name, but that is only for entry-level jobs. Once you are past that point, what you produce is what counts.
In my case, I went to a local school in the NY area. In the NY metro area, my school is well-known. Some of my coworkers were fellow alumni. Yes, one guy dropped my resume on his boss' desk and that got me my interview. A few years later, I went for a job interview in SC. Down in SC, they had never heard of my college. It didn't matter. My experience is what impressed them.
Looking back on it, I could have paid 40K/yr to go to a nationally known school. Or I could have paid 15k/yr to go to my school. Maybe in those first few years (the entry-level years), maybe I would have landed a higher paying starting job if I had gone to the 40k/yr school. Maybe I would have made an extra 5k/yr. That would have put a tiny dent in the possible 160k education debt I would have had. But, 7 years later when my experience is what counts and not the name of my college, I have 100k less debt and a great job.
Long story short (too late), if you are at the top of your class, the name of your school won't help you as much as if you are in the middle or at the bottom. Then you might need those doors opened for you. But, you'll be paying those debts back for years and years.
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