Hong, a Gaithersburg resident raised in a double-income home, graduated this year from Montgomery public schools.
She got acceptances from several four-year colleges, including Loyola University Maryland, Catholic University and the University of Maryland Baltimore County.
School days 2011-12
Her parents were willing to pay for any of them. But Hong found herself balking at the expense.
“I didn’t want my parents to spend that money, especially if they didn’t have to,” she said.
Montgomery College beckoned with a merit scholarship, which left her responsible only for textbooks. She is living at home, working at a law firm and saving money toward an eventual transfer.
College officials say the Great Recession changed how upper-income families think about paying for college. It left them averse to debt and wary of paying full price. Families are shopping for value and pressing for discounts.
The Sallie Mae survey may have captured a turning point. Its 2011 edition found that upper-income families spent 18 percent less on college in 2010-11 than in the previous academic year, the first such decline the survey has recorded.
Other surveys have noted a shift in attitudes toward college.
A College Board report last week found that the average amount students actually spend on private four-year colleges, after subtracting grant aid, has been essentially flat over the past five years. A Pew Research Center report this year found that a majority of Americans fault higher education for failing to provide value.
Students increasingly shop for the best college deal.
Admission officers respond by offering merit aid to talented students, occasionally sparking bidding wars.
Some students reap still larger discounts by forgoing four-year residential colleges altogether.
“You could pay for a whole year at NOVA for the amount you pay for room and board somewhere else,” said John Michie, 20, a second-year student at Northern Virginia Community College.
After struggling at four-year Radford University, Michie enrolled at the community college rather than another four-year school.
He was not without financial options; Michie’s father is an IT professional and his mother a substitute teacher. But Michie didn’t want them to spend the money.
“My parents told me, even before the housing bubble, the last thing you want to do is start your life out in debt.”
Community colleges can’t quite match the wall-to-wall experience of residential college. But they cater to collegiate sensibilities, with intramural sports, coffeehouses, activity boards and pillow-strewn lounges.
Outside the student activity office at the main campus of Northern Virginia Community College in Annandale on a recent afternoon, students huddled around low-slung tables playing “Magic: The Gathering.” In a courtyard nearby, three students tossed a football.
Ethan Bovender, 19, sat at an outdoor table with his laptop. A music major from a financially comfortable Fairfax County household, Bovender plans to transfer to Virginia Commonwealth University. For now, he walks to school.
“It’s close and convenient,” Bovender said. He gestured over his shoulder: “My house is right across the way.”
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