{"id":514,"date":"2007-01-19T07:27:10","date_gmt":"2007-01-19T13:27:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.ocularfusion.net\/?p=514"},"modified":"2022-01-02T07:38:46","modified_gmt":"2022-01-02T12:38:46","slug":"college-economics-101","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ocularfusion.net\/?p=514","title":{"rendered":"College Economics 101"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"img_0079.JPG\"We’re off to Searcy, Arkansas today to give Number One Son, who turned 18 yesterday (Happy Birthday Number One–don’t forget to register for the draft!), one last chance to look over Harding University before making the decision about where he will spend the next four years of his life.<\/p>\n

We’ve told him that this is his first Big Decision as a budding adult and that we’re for the most part butting out. Our strategy is that if he chooses one and then hates it, he can’t blame us–or so we think. He’s applying to Harding, the University of Alabama and Davidson College in North Carolina. He’s got some nice merit scholarships from the first two and won’t find out about his acceptance to Davidson until late March. Davidson is a very cool school, but very expensive even if he does get accepted.<\/p>\n

Unlike his younger brothers, Number One has vague memories of what it was like when our family barely had two pennies to rub together. As a result, he’s always been pretty parsimonious with his funds, and I’m guessing the Big Decision will be affected by that tendency. Sure, he’s apply to three colleges, but for all intents and purposes it might as well be two.<\/p>\n

And he’s not alone. This report in USA Today<\/em><\/a> indicates that in one survey of those college students who are not attending their No. 1 choice school, 52.6% were accepted but opted not to attend. Of those, at least 20% cited “financial reasons” for attending their 2nd or 3rd choice schools.<\/p>\n

I can recall going through similar decision-making in April, 1980 when I turned down offers from 3 so-called “Southern Ivies” to attend Harding where I was able to graduate with no debt. That gave me the financial freedom to take out a modest amount of student loans for optometry school (the monthly payback for which was comparable to a small, compact car) and choose the practice mode of my choice without significant financial baggage.<\/p>\n

That is not the case with many students whom I encounter today. I’m familiar with one young fashion design major from a Christian college who is saddled with nearly $90,000 in debt, much of which was channeled through the school’s financial aid office. I know it’s a “Christian” school, but I can think of only word to describe that practice–immoral.<\/p>\n

As an adjunct professor with the UAB School of Optometry and the University of Alabama School of Medicine, I also encounter many 4th year professional students and young interns who are staring at six figure debt as they attempt to chart their future course. Needless to say, such financial ecumberance often leads them to choose higher paid specialties over primary care or modes of practice other than their first choice.<\/p>\n

Perhaps the first rule of College Economics 101 is “minimize your debt in order to maximize your future options.” It’s nice to read that at least some students are learning that lesson before they even get started.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We’re off to Searcy, Arkansas today to give Number One Son, who turned 18 yesterday (Happy Birthday Number One–don’t forget to register for the draft!), one last chance to look over Harding University before making the…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23,48,32],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-514","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-current-events","category-family","category-harding-university"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ocularfusion.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/514","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ocularfusion.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ocularfusion.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ocularfusion.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ocularfusion.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=514"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.ocularfusion.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/514\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9811,"href":"https:\/\/www.ocularfusion.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/514\/revisions\/9811"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.ocularfusion.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=514"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ocularfusion.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=514"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.ocularfusion.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=514"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}