[impendia]

> tons of cheap regional schools

Where?

I teach at the University of South Carolina, where tuition and fees are over $10K a year. To my knowledge, the same is true of all the other four-year colleges in the state (Clemson, College of Charleston, Lander, USC Upstate, The Citadel etc.)

Not as outrageous as private school tuition, but it's still a very substantial burden, especially when you factor in food and housing as well.

My impression is that this is quite typical for the US. I would be delighted to learn that I am mistaken.

[paulmd]

The "one weird trick to graduate on the cheap! colleges hate him!" of choice these days is community college.

Have fun trying to get your credits to transfer. I had trouble getting credits to transfer from the Air Force Academy to a state college. They want you to do them there. They would take them as generic credit hours but it was an uphill battle to get them to actually satisfy graduation requirements (which are the real thing that keeps you from graduating, you will already have enough credit hours).

[lunchables]

I've always heard that you should complete your AA at community college before transfering for your bachelors as it's a lot easier to transfer with the entire degree than trying to translate individual credit hours between schools.

So first two years cheap at community college for an AA/AS then you only have two years for your bachelors at a more expensive school.

[souprock]

I was charged more than that for a public university in the 1990s. In a few years I paid for that, my wife's similar loans, and a new car. I also got married and had my first two kids.

So it looks cheap to me, assuming the housing isn't insane. I think there is a reasonable assumption that a person gets loans, chooses a sensible major, and actually graduates.