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Only a few days to decide and our family is in a quandry. My son was accepted at UPenn, Georgetown and Duke. There is an $8000.00 difference between one school and the other two (with those both being higher) in the financial aid package. The low offer is of course his dream school. Finances are a concern, but I can't think of anything more important and valuable than my child's education. He has a natural (apparently) talent for languages and has indicated that he would like to major in one or more foreign languages in college. Given this information, "all" things considered, which school would you chose and why. I have not been specific about the financial aid offers from schools in order to get the most objective opinions.

By Amd (Amd) on Saturday, April 26, 2003 - 05:31 pm: Edit

I would choose the cheaper of the three, since finances are a concern. There should not be significant lack of opportunities in the cheaper college compared to the other two, in this set (which are all Ivy/almost Ivy calibre colleges).

By Theasrhs (Theasrhs) on Saturday, April 26, 2003 - 05:55 pm: Edit

It depends on what other debt obligations are included with the offers, and what your -- and your son's - comfort level is with taking on the additional responsibilitiy of $8,000 per year.

That's $32,000 for the four years -- maybe. Or maybe the school will change its offer each year, leaving you with a somewhat larger sum at the end. It will probably be a relative change should the school offer less in each succeeding year, but you should, perhaps, find out directly from the school what their specific practices are. Not their average practices, but their specific practice in your case.