9780132365703

"The College Solutionhelps readers look beyond over-hyped admission rankings to discover schools that offer a quality education at affordable prices. Taking the guesswork out of saving and finding money for college, this is a practical and insightful must-have guide foreveryparent!" -Jaye J. Fenderson,Seventeenrs"sCollege Columnist and Author,Seventeenrs"s Guide to Getting into College "This book is a must read in an era of rising tuition and falling admission rates. Ors"Shaughnessy offers good advice with blessed clarity and brevity." -Jay Mathews,WashingtonPostEducation Writer and Columnist "I would recommend any parent of a college-bound student readThe College Solution." -Kal Chany, Author, The Princeton Reviewrs"sPaying for College Without Going Broke "The College Solutiongoes beyond other guidebooks in providing an abundance of information about how to afford college, in addition to how to approach the selection process by putting the student first." -Martha "Marty" Ors"Connell, Executive Director, Colleges That Change Lives "Lynn Ors"Shaughnessy always focuses on whatrs"s in the consumerrs"s best interest, telling families how to save money and avoid making costly mistakes." -Mark Kantrowitz, Publisher, FinAid.org and Author,FastWebCollegeGold "An antidote to the hype and hysteria about getting in and paying for college! Ors"Shaughnessy has produced an excellent overview that demystifies the college planning process for students and families." -Barmak Nassirian, American Association of Collegiate Registrars and Admissions Officers For millions of families, the college planning experience has become extremely stressful. And, unless your child is an elite student in the academic top 1%, most books on the subject wonrs"t help you. Now, however, therers"s a college guide foreveryone. InThe College Solution, top personal finance journalist Lynn Ors"Shaughnessy presents an easy-to-use roadmap to finding therightcollege program (not just the most hyped) and dramatically reducing the cost of college, too. Forget the rankings! Discover whatreallymatters: the quality and value of the programs your child wants and deserves. Ors"Shaughnessy uncovers "industry secrets" on how colleges actually parcel out financial aid-and how even "average" students can maximize their share. Learn how to send your kids to expensive private schools for virtually the cost of an in-state public college...and how promising students can pay significantly less than the "sticker price" even at thebeststate universities. N

Foreword	p. xv
Introduction	p. xix
Capturing Financial Aid	p. 1
Where Is the $$$?	p. 2
Looking for Cash in the Right Places	p. 5
Using Financial Aid Tools	p. 9
Financial Aid in the Real World	p. 13
A Peek Inside a Financial Aid Office	p. 17
Winning the Financial Aid Lottery	p. 20
Maximizing Financial Aid	p. 25
Maximizing Financial Aid, Part II	p. 30
Appealing the Verdict	p. 34
Capturing Tuition Discounts	p. 39
The Race for Cash	p. 40
The Inside Scoop on Merit Money	p. 44
Academic Freebies	p. 49
Creating a Buzz	p. 53
Playing the Gender Card	p. 59
Finding Great Academic Fits	p. 63
The Hidden Truth	p. 64
The Knock Against U.S. News & World Report	p. 67
The Rankings Antidote	p. 71
Research Made Easy	p. 77
Grading Academic Departments	p. 83
Grading Academic Departments, Part II	p. 91
The Value of Undergraduate Research	p. 97
Grading Professors	p. 101
Overlooked Academic Choices	p. 105
Stop Hyperventilating	p. 106
The Allure of Liberal Arts Colleges	p. 109
What Makes Public Liberal Arts Colleges Special	p. 114
Teaching Versus Research	p. 118
Learning in a Crowd	p. 121
Exploring Community Colleges	p. 127
Considering a Community College	p. 128
Why Community Colleges Are Popular	p. 130
Is Your Local Community College Any Good?	p. 134
Getting Credit for Your Work	p. 139
College Admissions Nuts & Bolts	p. 143
Knowing When to Do What	p. 144
Grading College Counselors	p. 150
Ditching the SAT	p. 156
Writing Your Way into College	p. 162
Visiting Campuses	p. 167
Acing the College Interview	p. 170
Getting In at the Last Minute	p. 173
College Diversity	p. 175
Diversity Blueprint	p. 176
Economizing for College	p. 183
Shrinking the College Tab	p. 184
Shrinking the College Tab, Part II	p. 188
Freebies and Best Buys	p. 191
Capturing Private Scholarships	p. 196
Navigating the Student Loan Maze	p. 201
The Student Loan Fiasco	p. 202
Student Loan Primer	p. 206
Disappearing Discounts	p. 211
Private Loan Perils	p. 213
Default Debacles	p. 218
Maximizing College Accounts	p. 221
A 529 Primer	p. 222
College Investing Cheat Sheet	p. 228
The Perils of Cashing Out College Accounts	p. 233
Grading Financial Advisers	p. 237
The Folks Back Home	p. 243
Parents Behaving Badly	p. 244
Getting Grandma to Help	p. 250
The College Solution Chest Sheet	p. 253
Resource Guide	p. 259
Index	p. 267
Table of Contents provided by Ingram. All Rights Reserved.

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Introduction IntroductionA curious story appeared in The New York Times one day about the university that's the academic equivalent of the Yankees. The article captured the concerns of faculty, who worry that the teaching taking place at Harvard University isn't meeting the school's own vaunted standards. In fact, a professor lamented that some undergraduates, after spending four years at Harvard, don't know a single faculty member well enough to ask for a letter of recommendation.Hmmm.One student, who was interviewed, suggested that undergraduates ought to know that professors are too focused on research to put much effort into what happens in the classroom."You'd be stupid if you came to Harvard for the teaching," a Harvard senior and a Rhodes scholar told the Times reporter. "You go to a liberal arts college for teaching. You come to Harvard to be around some of the greatest minds on earth."And he had more to say: "I think many people (at Harvard) spend a great deal of their time in large lecture classes, have little direct contact with professors, and are frustrated by poorly trained teaching fellows."Concerned about the quality of Harvard's undergraduate education, a small group of the university's professors cranked out a report that advocated for institutional changes that would place greater value on teaching. Whatever happens, Harvard's institutional angst about what occurs in its classrooms is hardly going to dampen its star power among high school students. And that was true even before Harvard unveiled an incredibly generous financial aid policy that has dramatically cut costs for families who make even $180,000 per year.So why have I begun this book by sharing something that should embarrass Harvard? Because the incident aptly illustrates one of the primary reasons why I wrote The College Solution: A Guide for Everyone Looking for the Right School at the Right Price. When many families begin their college search they assume that the Ivy League owns a monopoly on the nation's best schools. Unfortunately, the media perpetuates this nonsense. A ridiculous number of books on college are dedicated to cracking the Ivy League even though the only ivy that most kids are going to come into contact with will itch and require calamine lotion. A mere .2% of the nation's incoming college freshmen end up at the eight Ivy League schools.What plenty of teenagers and their parents don't realize is that there are many, many schools scattered across the country that will provide an education as good as or superior to the one they'd receive at the most elite East Coast schools.Rather than worship at the Ivy altar, The College Solution is dedicated to the 99.8% of students, who head off to the thousands of other colleges and universities in this country. It's about time that a book is dedicated to everybody else's kids--and there are millions of them out there. The book contains advice for teenagers who are blessed with the brilliance of theoretical physicist Stephen Hawking as well as all the typical kids who would fit in quite nicely at Lake Wobegon.One of the book's overriding aims for this eclectic group of teenagers is this: helping them find the best academic matches possible, whether public or private, for the least amount of money. Parents and students, who use the book's road map, will discover that college costs can be far lower than they imagined and their college options are more plentiful than they ever would have believed.Many families, for instance, assume that they can afford only an inexpensive school--perhaps the state university or community college that's nearby. The affluent, meanwhile, assume that t

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College Solution, The: A Guide for Everyone Looking for the Right School at the Right Price

College Solution, The: A Guide for Everyone Looking for the Right School at the Right Price

0132365707

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