Choosing OHSU = Choosing 200K Debt?

[Lshapley]

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What is the deal here? They don't give you your aid package until June! That is just crazy. Especially with the expected tuition hike. If you choose OHSU, are you supposed to just assume that, regardless of "need", you will be carrying that much debt (at least), especially if you are OOS?

I guess I could live with those facts, but here is what really throws me for a loop though. USNews reports that 80% of the students receive grant or scholarship aid (well above average), and the average debtload upon graduation is about $120K (nicely below average). What is going on here? About 70% of students should be receiving IS tuition, but that still doesn't add up to that lower debtload. By my estimates, $120K should be the normal IS debtload, if all loans, and about 190-200K should be the normal OOS debtload.

Can someone help me out here?

 

[Lshapley]

Oops, I meant to post this in pre-allo...I think that is where it technically belongs. I guess I will leave the fate of this thread to the MODs!

 

[MadameLULU]

Moving to pre-allo as requested.

 

[onemoreyear]

Maybe OHSU (like Dartmouth and it's low average debt) has a bunch of students who can pay tuition without large loans. I don't know.

 

[wjustice]

Hey, nice job on the OHSU acceptance! I don't know about those grants you mention, but you probably do have to consider parental or personal contributions some people will bring. I have sort of wondered before what percentage of med school matriculants are able to contribute some ammount of money to pay for med school to bring down debt average. I don't really have any money saved up, and I'm mid-twenties, so according to my calculations, even at my state school, I think I'll be coming out with 150-160k of debt. Kind of depressing, but oh well, I guess!

 

[Lshapley]

Well, I am thinking about the contributions a little bit. I just don't think that Oregonians are that much richer than the rest of the country (am I wrong?) According to my calculations, if everyone lived only on loans then the ave. debt would be 194K. This isn't too far off from many other schools. The IS tuition isn't that low (30K). For comparison sake, this is the same average debt that a graduate from Robert Wood Johnson in NJ would expect. Everyone there gets IS tuition (about 26K) and I'm sure many of them come from families with some means (Jersey is the richest state in the union).

So, back to the original question...what gives???

 

[wjustice]

So you're saying that the average debt load for tuition plus living expenses should be $194k for OOS, right? I still wouldn't be too surprised if a third or so of medical students have parents who are wealthy and pay a significant ammount of their kid's expenses. Those sorts of contributions could drive down the debt average quite a bit. It's not like everyone in med school comes from a wealthy background, but I have noticed that a lot of people at med schools went to top-ranked private schools, and my observation as an alum of one of those schools is that a lot of people there are wealthy.

 

[Lshapley]

ugh. I guess I am hoping against hope that you aren't right, but really after doing tons of searching online and talking to the finaid office, I really don't see any other explanation besides the one you are providing. Part of my was just hoping that the magical financial aid fairy would show up sometime during first year and make some of the future debt go away. Oh well! I'll just go back to counting my blessings that I was even accepted at all!

 

[Lshapley]

So you're saying that the average debt load for tuition plus living expenses should be $194k for OOS, right?

Actually, my very rough calculations have 212k debt for OOS and 188K for IS. Taking into account 70% IS, you get an average student debt of 194k. USNews has this figure around 125k. N.B., there are a ton of assumptions I am taking into account in my calculations.

 

[DrMidlife]

Fundamentally, those debt load numbers report what happened 5 or more years ago with COA.

In the '05-'06 MSAR (with '04 matric data), OHSU instate tuition was $21k w/$3462 fees. OOS was $31,500.

'06-'07 MSAR reports from '03-'04 LCME survey and '04-'05 AAMC survey: Resident tuition 21840, nonres 32760, fees 2663, average scholarships/grants 5524, average loans 13819, COA minus tuition 18615, avg '04 grad indebtedness 124486

'07-'08 MSAR: resident tuition 24100, nonresident 34101, fees 2802, avg schol/grants 5637, COA minus tuition 18988, avg debt 140507.

(Thank you for giving me a reason to not feel completely ******ed for buying & keeping the last 4 MSARs.)

 

[BTC]

How hard is it to establish residency in Oregon? Maybe students really only have to pay 1 year out of state tuition before they qualify for in state.

 

[flip26]

Is there an active "official" OHSU thread, or an older thread with students who would be there now (you could send some PMs in case they still lurk here) or can you appeal to current students to get at least a few anecdotes?

 

[ianian28]

How hard is it to establish residency in Oregon? Maybe students really only have to pay 1 year out of state tuition before they qualify for in state.

my understanding is that simply living in oregon as a student does not entitle you to in-state tuition your 2nd, 3rd, and 4th years. you have to find a resident to civil-unionize you 🙂

 

[LEdaddy]

yeah, no residency status if you are enrolled as a full-time student. Out of curiosity, did you include the ~20% tuition hike in your calculations?

 

[Lshapley]

yeah, no residency status if you are enrolled as a full-time student. Out of curiosity, did you include the ~20% tuition hike in your calculations?

My rough calculations were based on last year's tuition with a 4-5k tuition reduction (I was being generous, because the debtload I saw was so much lower).

When I interviewed, I was told the increase was 11-13%, not 20! Just thinking about it makes my head hurt 🙁 Anyway, with all of that in mind, assuming no scholarships or grant aid of any kind, I would think you can assume about $240k of debt upon graduation. If we all get 5k scholarships, that should take it down to about $220.

So much for a primary care focus. With a debt load like that, OHSU will start producing many more specialists.

 

[clarki]

I haven't posted much on these boards... but I'm in the same situation with OHSU.

I am IN STATE, but I sill calculate the first year total cost of attendance to be $48000, which projects to just over $200,000 over four years assuming 4% increases each year. The finincial aid office and admisions office has been less then helpfull with giving me numbers, so I assumed a 13% tuition increase with the new tort reform.

It is just really surprising. Many out of state schools would be cheaper even without any scholarships. I think where OHSU really gets you are the fees they tack on above there tuition. It looks like no matter where I go, I'm looking at least 160,000 for the schools I'm accepted, so how big a deal is 40,000?

 

[Lshapley]

Well, I am becoming more at peace with the matter after reading these posts and talking to some people. I'm becoming more certain that, whereever I go, I'll have about 200K in debt. I think that Dr. Midlife hit the nail on the head with his diligent research. OHSU's tuition seems to have been climbing dramatically over the past couple of years. I'm fairly confident that we will all get a little relief with those 3-5K scholarships, but in the end we'll be in debt up to our eyeballs. But, really, unless you are super lucky (and good!) and get a nice merit scholarship to attend a school, the debt will be around 200k...maybe even 250k in the end.

 

[LEdaddy]

How do we all get 3-5k scholarships?

 

[Lshapley]

80% of the students receive scholarships, which they can apply for/are nominated for, during the first year. We won't find out how to do that until after we have started classes (perhaps in the spring even). If you search for OHSU in the class threads, a current student talks about this on the class of '11 or '10 thread. The finaid office also told me about these scholarships, but didn't give the percentage (that is from USNews).

 

[WellWornLad]

Talking with the 4th years on interview day, tuition was definitely a sore point. In addition, they had very bad things to say about the financial aid office - basically, don't expect any help there. I think that OHSU may be hiring a dedicated financial aid consultant for the med school, however, so such may not be the case in the future.

The 4th years also mentioned the ~$3000 scholarship - said that you just sign a sheet of paper and that's that, automatic $3000 off.

Lest this post be construed as OHSU-bashing, they were highly enthusiastic about the curriculum and rotations...

 

[sirrileydog]

How hard is it to establish residency in Oregon? Maybe students really only have to pay 1 year out of state tuition before they qualify for in state.

Nearly impossible.
Ed Keenan was very specific about this on the interview: your residency for all 4 years is established the day you send in your application.

 

[cardboardearrin]

So depressing.

Funny how, at first, you're so thrilled merely to be accepted, and then the reality of the $$$$ hits you.