[ChrisWNY]

You guys complain about tuition and books now, but imagine how bad it could be in 15-20 years (when my kids are applying to college). Though I bet books will be almost entirely replaced by digital devices such as iPads or Kindles, perhaps holographic by then.

Books were $400-$500 each semester when I was in undergrad and grad school 1997-2003. I worked each Summer and saved up to pay for my books, my parents helped me out with some of my tuition (had a good scholarship also) and I worked as a RA which means housing was free, but I had to work for it. I would always sell back my books at the end of the semester, but the credit I got for them was awful...considering a new book would cost $100 new and I'd get like $20 for it used. It was still better than nothing but not by much. And for some reason there were rarely if ever any used books for sale, seems like I was always stuck buying new ones. Now I pay about $4500 in school taxes each year, and my kids won't be in school for 2-3 years. Then again WNY has some of the highest school and property taxes in the entire US.

 

[ChrisWNY]

Dude im not complaining about anything i work full time all year while taking 13+ credits a semester if you think that because im in school i dont pay property taxes ur an idiot.

I don't think anyone made that assumption. The point was that costs only go up from there, but a college degree will certainly help you in the job market so it does pay off. The cost of books will seem meager when you look back years from now.

 

[ChrisWNY]

no one is forcing you. rent

That same thought crossed my mind as well. Problem with that theory is that school taxes and property taxes are built into the cost of rent. You pay it in one way, shape, or form. There's no escaping taxes, *especially* in NYS...

 

[ChrisWNY]

Do you think people with children should pay more school tax than those without them?

Hell no. Nor do I think that people with a litter of kids (more than 3) should be paying the same health insurance rates as someone with just a couple or NO kids at all. If you have 4, 5, 10, 20+ kids, then you should be carrying the tax burden for putting that many kids through the school system. However, we know that policy and sound/reasonable logic rarely if ever mix. The right thing to do would be to set a base tax that everyone pays, and each kid attending a public school raises the school tax rate by some % for that family. That may help cut back on a major dilemma we have in this country - the people having the most kids are the ones who can't afford to have that many. The taxpayers, especially those with few or no kids, are carrying the burden.

People who had NO kids going to school used to get a STAR exemption rebate every year - I enjoyed getting ~15% of my school tax money back, but even that's gone now.

 

[ChrisWNY]

These days only the wealthiest parents can afford to send their kids to private charter schools (unless they are employed by the private school). Just think of it...tuition for private schools is upward of $20k per year (sometimes more). On top of that, these parents are still paying public school taxes for their town or city.

 

[ChrisWNY]

$20k? The all boys school in Rochester (McQuaid) I was talking about is about $10k a year. They consistently churn out some of the smartest kids in the state. Mercy (all girls school) is about $8k a year. Even paying full price, (there are scholarships for lots of kids), pays off. They get LOTS of scholarships when going to college/university. My wife works for a local private school, but we wouldn't get free tuition.

My kids won't be going to public school where I live. I'd rather home school them than send them to the local public school. If we lived in Fairport, Penfield, Pittsford, or another good district, I wouldn't have a problem with it, but there is no way they are going to school where we live now.

I guess private school tuition varies more than what I thought, but it's still a significant expense that many parents cannot afford. From what I have been told, there are at least a few private charter schools around the Buffalo area that cost nearly $20k per year per student (assuming no scholarships).

The problem with public schools is that the quality/performance varies significantly from one district to the next largely due to demographics. It becomes a determining factor when choosing where to live, and there are definitely a number of public schools in the Buffalo area where I would never send my kids (my wife and I chose to live in an area with an excellent public school system). Some public schools rival private schools as far as test scores and student performance, but public schools inevitably have to deal with a greater number of students who don't apply themselves or have very low IQ's. So inherently, private schools tend to weed the bad ones out. However, there are certainly cases of very well-off parents who spawned a "bad seed" and send them all to private schools not caring about the cost...but regardless of that, the number of criminal-to-be's is vastly lower in a private school system.