College Update #3

"Hammerfrog" (Hammerfrog) 08/31/2014 at 16:59 • Filed to: Mazda, College, RX-7, BMW

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It's been a little while, but Carspotting in Ithaca hasn't gotten old!

Never expected to see an RX-7 this clean, especially on campus.

In typical BMW fashion, I spotted this 3-Series parked in the middle of a quad. No respect!

It was joined by a 7-Series a couple hours later, for no apparent reason.

That's all for now!

GhostZ > Hammerfrog 08/31/2014 at 17:00

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... who the fuck is allowed to park there like that?

norskracer98-ExploringTheOutback > GhostZ 08/31/2014 at 17:02

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When you're paying $60k a year to go to Cornell who the fuck cares. Although that is super douchey

Leadbull > GhostZ 08/31/2014 at 17:06

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Allowed

College students

GhostZ > norskracer98-ExploringTheOutback 08/31/2014 at 17:07

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My college sits at $66k a year and no one would dare do something like that for fear of having their car crushed by the administration. Or the police.

norskracer98-ExploringTheOutback > GhostZ 08/31/2014 at 17:09

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What school? Also Ithaca is a really laid back town.

GhostZ > Leadbull 08/31/2014 at 17:10

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Clarification:

Who the fuck's car is about to be towed, impounded, and then crushed?

Twingo Tamer - About to descend into project car hell. > GhostZ 08/31/2014 at 17:11

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Holy shit your college is 66k a year?! I complain about $16k a year.

GhostZ > norskracer98-ExploringTheOutback 08/31/2014 at 17:12

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I go where fun goes to die.

Leadbull > GhostZ 08/31/2014 at 17:13

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But I learned in sociology class that society, and therefore the police, is only a figment of the collective imagination!

norskracer98-ExploringTheOutback > GhostZ 08/31/2014 at 17:14

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That helps a lot. (Not really)

GhostZ > Twingo Tamer - About to descend into project car hell. 08/31/2014 at 17:16

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For undergraduates. MBA programs are insane . Thankfully, I'm poor and creative so they give me lots of money.

Hammerfrog > GhostZ 08/31/2014 at 17:16

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I have no idea. they were there, then disappeared. that area is also about 300 feet from a parking lot.....

ly2v8-Brian > GhostZ 08/31/2014 at 17:19

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66k a year!?!? They better give you a f-ing solid gold diploma for the reaming they're givin ya.

GhostZ > Leadbull 08/31/2014 at 17:23

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Ugghhhh.

GhostZ > ly2v8-Brian 08/31/2014 at 17:24

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No, they just give me lots of financial aid. Not enough, mind you, but I get by. That being said, I'll probably have a $50k/year job before I graduate at the rate things are going, so I'm doing something right.

Twingo Tamer - About to descend into project car hell. > GhostZ 08/31/2014 at 17:31

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Do you get grants and scholarships? Not sure how it works in the US. Here in the UK tuition is capped at around $15/16k and you loan that cash off the goverment. Then you get varying loans and grants depending on family income. I get full everything because low income family. I loan about $5k and get given around $6k to live on.

ly2v8-Brian > GhostZ 08/31/2014 at 17:36

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well that's good.

GhostZ > Twingo Tamer - About to descend into project car hell. 08/31/2014 at 18:09

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(sharing this in case anyone else from other countries want to know how colleges are paid for in the US)

For me, it's all private. The college has their own aid program based around alumni donations. Each college runs their own system, but mine makes so much money (property ownership, they run like 12 different schools, they get large checks from alumni to fund research, they sell lots of books, etc. makes for a pretty large endowment) They probably have some of the highest income of any college in the US) that they have to give most of it away and out in order to still be considered a not for profit college, which gets huge tax breaks (we're talking hundreds of millions a year) from the government. Even some professors get paid over $200k a year.

The system works like such:

Grants are covered by the state, which pays a certain amount to encourage students to come to their state (states often compete for college students, depending on your income level, class, etc.). There are also city grants for colleges in large cities. Each of these have a number of restrictions such as what you can and cannot do to receive the money, as well as a limitation for how long they last (good ones will cover summer expenses, for example). These often aren't based on merit as much as they are on income class, location, family history (if you have family who work with Ford, for example, they offer some great scholarships for sending your kids to engineering programs and are an easy start to a career).

After those, you have scholarships, which are paid by the college to encourage to come to that specific college. If you do something awesome that puts you on the radar for other top-tier colleges, they'll offer you money to come to this specific college. These are merit-based, and are often rare or not very much. Having perfect grades is enough to get you a scholarship at a state university (these are the LARGE 50,000 student universities) but isn't worth anything at a higher-tier university where they want people who make headlines.

Then you have work-study, which is basically enrolling in a job on campus that is restricted by the government (federal, not state, so restrictions are the same across the country). So instead of taking an income (and having to pay income tax on it) you instead work for about minimum wage and it directly pays off your tuition. The goal is to both help staff universities staff themselves with students, get students to avoid dangerous after-school activities, and help reduce the cost of enrollment. However, at my college, student jobs (which are a little more difficult to get, it's a small university and most everything is automated so there's not much busywork to be had) pay higher than minimum wage, so work study is basically only chosen for people who cannot get a job otherwise because they don't have references or experience. I'm in the camp of "I've been working since I was 14, I can get a job" so I have no problem with that.

After all of those are subtracted, you have financial aid . This is where the college takes their profits, and estimates (based off federal applications that are used for every college, called the FAFSA) how much money they can give to students. There, it determines what your family can safely pay for your education, based on your income, how many dependents you have, family size, location, etc. How much financial aid you would need to join the college is a HUGE factor in whether or not you get accepted. Some colleges, like mine, however, are need blind. This means that they accept you without looking at your finances, so wealthier families do not have an advantage.

Colleges then take this number that the FAFSA gives you, and then compares you to other students. They take the total income and spreads it out among the students that need it. Sometimes it is first-come, first-serve, sometimes they deny it entirely after a certain date. Sometimes, if you're late enough, you only get partial aid. Some colleges will also cap their aid to a certain maximum. Generally, you need to be making several hundred thousand a year to receive no financial aid from a university that has a lot of it to give (like mine) but over $150,000 a year, you're only getting a few thousand depending on how large your family is. It also depends heavily on the income distribution of your school, a state college where a student at $75,000/year is considered "rich" is going to receive a lot less aid at that level.

When they get that total amount, then they subtract all of the aforementioned (grants, scholarships, etc.) that you're eligible for, and give you the remainder.

If your family make less than $30,000 a year though, you're pretty much guaranteed to have the whole thing paid off anywhere you go as long as its not a for-profit and it's a need-blind college. So while college at that level isn't free or paid by the government , it's generally covered.

My college's cut-off for having it all paid off is about $55,000 a year, because like I said, they make a shitton of money and have to burn through it. $75,000 a year will pay tuition only, leaving room and food up to you. My college's room and food prices are insane though, so I opt out and use the money to pay for a decent apartment and actually eat very healthily and cook for myself on the same budget. Not everyone can do that, though, and parents often prefer their students to be in the housing because someone else can look after them. For this reason, most colleges require that you live in the dorm (or forfeit financial aid) for your first year or two, just to keep the buildings full.

If you still, after all of the aid and everything else is added, don't have enough to afford it, you have to take out loans.

The government does subsidized loans where you have 0% interest until you graduate (then about 6% afterwards). This limits to around $3000 a year. You can get another $6000 a year with reduced (something like 4%) interest. Beyond that, only extremely expensive private loans from either the college or from a bank, which can be in the double digits interest rates yearly.

For me, grants and scholarships amount to around $10,000 a year, Financial aid covers the rest plus a little more, and I use the 0% loans to pay for food and my apartment. It is not a normal situation, and most students will have to pay for some amount.

So how do people end up $200,000 in debt? They attend a college for $40,000 a year and don't receive financial aid because of their parent's wealth (remember, for some colleges this can be as low as $75,000 a year) and rather than change colleges they aspire to pay for the bill anyway, and take out massive loans which accrue 10% interest yearly, but they fail to get a job out of college and so they let the loans accrue 3-4 years of interest before they finally can start paying them off. By then, what started off as a $20,000/year cost has grown to about $150,000 total, and by the time they pay them off a decade after graduating, they'll have shelled out $200,000.

PatBateman > GhostZ 08/31/2014 at 18:19

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You speak about your extremely wealthy college... Might it be in Austin?

Or when you said "It's all private", did you mean you go to a private school?

Twingo Tamer - About to descend into project car hell. > GhostZ 08/31/2014 at 18:20

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Great reply, thanks.

GhostZ > PatBateman 08/31/2014 at 18:23

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I meant that the endowment is from private donation and operations, ie, the publishing, hospital, laboratories, etc. It is a private school.

duurtlang > Twingo Tamer - About to descend into project car hell. 08/31/2014 at 18:23

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$16k? I paid about €1900 a year when I was working on my Bachelors and later my Masters I believe. I also got €260 a month from the government, as did everyone else who ticked a few boxes (higher education under the age of 30 (I think), living outside of the family home, making actual academic progress). PhD candidates don't pay a dime, they get paid a modest but liveable wage.

And yes, we still complained studying was too expensive. I got my Masters in 2009, so this wasn't centuries ago.

PatBateman > GhostZ 08/31/2014 at 18:30

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Ah. Only Yale and Hahvahd have larger endowments than UT (oil money FTW).

GhostZ > PatBateman 08/31/2014 at 18:37

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That's for the whole UT system, which covers 210,000+ students. My college's endowment-per-student ratio is about 10x more than the UT system in total, including austin. It's not Harvard or Yale, but I'm still lucky to be here.

Twingo Tamer - About to descend into project car hell. > duurtlang 08/31/2014 at 18:44

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In british money it's £9000 a year tuition loan which you pay back, £3'000 living loan that needs to be paid back, £3500 grant from government that I dont pay back and then a £2000 a year grant from the uni for the first two years for good grades and being from a low income family. People with higher income families get a fair bit less, my gf gets less than half I do for example.

duurtlang > Twingo Tamer - About to descend into project car hell. 08/31/2014 at 18:58

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What I mentioned was completely independent of the income of parents, all of it a loan that'll become a gift when you actually get your degree within 10 years. The money stops coming in after the nominal duration of the study, so if you take longer you don't get more. I forgot to mention the free public transportation pass. Those with low income parents get a bit more money, those living with their parents less.

Having said all that, they're changing this to a loan only system for 2015 I believe. Absolutely detrimental to the country as a whole and social mobility in particular in my opinion.

PatBateman > GhostZ 08/31/2014 at 19:20

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You need to rob them and buy a thing.

Twingo Tamer - About to descend into project car hell. > duurtlang 08/31/2014 at 19:20

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They keep changing the cost of study here too, I pay three times more tuition than I wouldve if I started study 2 years ago. I believe my loans have higher interest rates now too.

It's hard to decide whether it's fair or not. I know several people who take dead end courses that arent really all that useful that may have been more successful just trying to find work. I assume thats what the government wants to avoid.

But conversely the job market is terrible here. My roommate is at university simply because he couldnt find a job and was hoping a degree would help no matter what it was. That and he gets money to live on for three years.

Stef Schrader > Hammerfrog 09/01/2014 at 11:27

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I approve of any attempts to off-road a BMW.

The parking bumpers make it even funnier. Silly rally Bimmer, that's just extra weight.

norskracer98-ExploringTheOutback > GhostZ 09/02/2014 at 00:02

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You go to A&M don't you?

GhostZ > norskracer98-ExploringTheOutback 09/02/2014 at 00:12

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Not even close. A/M's ratio is still ~4.4x smaller.

norskracer98-ExploringTheOutback > GhostZ 09/02/2014 at 00:14

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Which state are you in? My only other guesses are Princeton or Stanford.