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Respected Contributor
Posts: 2,916
Registered: ‎03-14-2010

Re: Best College Graduation Present Ever

From what I read (can't remember where) a group of these students have pledged to give back $100,000 to the college over the next 5 years.

Now that's paying it forward in real time!

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Registered: ‎03-22-2012

Re: Best College Graduation Present Ever


@occasionalrain wrote:

His money to do with as he pleases. I would have chosen differently if this money were mine. 

 

My parents paid for my education but had I been in a situation that meant borrowing and going into debt, I would have done two years of community college that is incredibly inexpensive. The first two years are basic 101 core classes. None are those required for one's major. I would have then transferred to a lower priced state college.

I have to question the decision of those who chose to incur a fortune in debt just to attend a private expensive university when what matters most is one's graduate school degree. To me, it's want versus need.

What I'm finding most disheartening here are the unkind shaming posts aimed at a poster whose opinion is contrary to those who put themselves forward as, "good caring", people. Just as bad are the posts making accusations of another's motives, feelings, and reasons for their opinion.


They made their decision, and he made his. What I find most disheartening is that anyone could find fault with some else's generosity.

"The good thing about Science is that it's true, whether or not you believe in it."
Neil deGrasse Tyson
Respected Contributor
Posts: 4,565
Registered: ‎09-15-2016

Re: Best College Graduation Present Ever


@cherry wrote:

Well I don'tbelieve you. You are just plain nasty about this. There is no bigger picture except you are pea green with envy

 

Only in this forum would someone take a kind and generous act ,and try to turn it into a subversive action

 

 

 

 

 

 


Believe what you want but please explain why I'm green pea with envy? I believe there's value in paying for your education, it's an accomplishment, important & shouldn't be dismissed. I'm happy for every grad who earns a degree but for anyone to sweep in & pay their way just because they're lucky to be in the so called right place at the right time, no. I'm not green, I don't want a car & I don't want anything given to me, I'll earn it. 

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Registered: ‎03-09-2010

Re: Best College Graduation Present Ever


@kitcat51 wrote:

 


Believe what you want but please explain why I'm green pea with envy? I believe there's value in paying for your education, it's an accomplishment, important & shouldn't be dismissed. I'm happy for every grad who earns a degree but for anyone to sweep in & pay their way just because they're lucky to be in the so called right place at the right time, no. I'm not green, I don't want a car & I don't want anything given to me, I'll earn it. 


@kitcat51, out of curiosity how do you feel about parents paying for their child's education?  Should the child have to repay the parents?

The eyes through which you see others may be the same as how they see you.
Honored Contributor
Posts: 15,627
Registered: ‎01-06-2015

Re: Best College Graduation Present Ever

I don't know what the tuition, room and board, and fees are at Morehouse. But I can't imagine anyone could work two jobs to pay for it and still graduate debt free. College costs have skyrocketed. When I went to college I worked part time and took out loans. There was nothing less hard working or honest about me doing it that way. I also commuted and worked inside the home for my Mother while she worked. All of that with a straight A avg for my last two years. My loans were so small compared to what people have to take out now. I made payments on them for years until my Mom generously paid off the balance.

 

For anyone who questions how deserving these students are-think of the freedom they have to take a job based upon being debt free. Or to volunteer for a year. They might take a job and benefit countless others in that line of work, a job that pays less than what they would have had to take with debt. Or volunteer and end up making a huge difference in the lives of others.

"You call him The Edge, I just call him The"
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Registered: ‎01-06-2015

Re: Best College Graduation Present Ever


@2blonde wrote:

I'm just shocked at all the negative responses to this man's generous gift.

 

It seems that some people are determined to find negativity in everything.


I'm not shocked, sadly. I had thought about starting a thread about this, then I thought about what some of the responses would most likely be, and that it would probably end up going poof. So I said nah. 

"You call him The Edge, I just call him The"
Respected Contributor
Posts: 4,565
Registered: ‎09-15-2016

Re: Best College Graduation Present Ever


@Marp wrote:

@kitcat51 wrote:

 


Believe what you want but please explain why I'm green pea with envy? I believe there's value in paying for your education, it's an accomplishment, important & shouldn't be dismissed. I'm happy for every grad who earns a degree but for anyone to sweep in & pay their way just because they're lucky to be in the so called right place at the right time, no. I'm not green, I don't want a car & I don't want anything given to me, I'll earn it. 


@kitcat51, out of curiosity how do you feel about parents paying for their child's education?  Should the child have to repay the parents?


Oh brother...there's a real difference between your parents & a stranger paying your way but if a parent wants to be paid back then they should be. A commencement speaker shows up, it's free I'm paying your way...horray!!!! So last year grads are paying, what a bummer. Will next year grads get a free ride or will the speaker be a cheapskate? You either see value, accomplishment & importance in paying your debt or you don't... can't help with that.

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Re: Best College Graduation Present Ever

I have black family members @ocassionalrain. I am related to  Emmett Till ,and I have had a belly full of nasty cracks ,and insinuations about black people

 

As far as nasty cracks go ,I think you are quite selective  about what you see ,done  by whom...remember someone named Meghan?

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Registered: ‎03-09-2010

Re: Best College Graduation Present Ever


@CrazyDaisy wrote:

@suzyQ3 wrote:

I think it would behoove those who criticize this gift to do some research on how school loan debts are strangling so many people.

 

From the article in today's LAT about this gesture, one student did the math. He will be paying half his salary for many years in order to pay off his debt.

 

In the weeks before graduating from Morehouse on Sunday, 22-year-old finance major Aaron Mitchom drew up a spreadsheet to calculate how long it would take him to pay back his $200,000 in student loans — 25 years at half his monthly salary, per his calculations.

 

In an instant, that number vanished.

 

Mitchom, sitting in the crowd, wept.

 

“I can delete that spreadsheet,” he said in an interview after the commencement. “I don’t have to live off of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. I was shocked. My heart dropped. We all cried. In the moment it was like a burden had been taken off.”

 

His mother, Tina Mitchom, was also shocked. Eight family members, including Mitchom’s 76-year-old grandmother, took turns over four years co-signing on the loans that got him across the finish line.

 

“It takes a village,” she said. “It now means he can start paying it forward and start closing this gap a lot sooner, giving back to the college and thinking about a succession plan” for his younger siblings.

 

Morehouse College President David A. Thomas said the gift would have a profound effect on the students’ futures.

 

“Many of my students are interested in going into teaching, for example, but leave with an amount of student debt that makes that untenable,” Thomas said in an interview. “In some ways, it was a liberation gift for these young men that just opened up their choices.”


 

This calculation should be done by every student BEFORE they take out loans.


@CrazyDaisy, maybe or maybe they have rough idea anyway. Regardless, if they don't take the chance because of the amount, then college would be primarily for the wealthy.


~Who in the world am I? Ah, that's the great puzzle~ Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland
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Re: Best College Graduation Present Ever


@cherry wrote:

I have black family members @ocassionalrain. I am related to  Emmett Till ,and I have had a belly full of nasty cracks ,and insinuations about black people

 

As far as nasty cracks go ,I think you are quite selective  about what you see ,done  by whom...remember someone named Meghan?


@occasionalrain 


~Who in the world am I? Ah, that's the great puzzle~ Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland