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I'm watching last night's Parenthood (yes, I realize it is fictional ). SPOLIER ALERT Haddie gets into her dream school, Cornell. Her parents discuss the cost and urge her to keep her options open. Bottom line is they can't afford to send her. So, should they be able to just say "no", or should she still have the option of going if she's willing to take out loans to pay for it? Who gets to decide, and is a HS senior able to understand the burden of coming out of school with 10's of thousands in loans?
I watched the episode myself and thought it was unrealistic. First of all, Ivy League schools give out more scholarship money than state and small private schools, so she might be paying the same tuition as she would at the Berkeley college her parents suggested. For instance, if you're accepted to Harvard and your parents make less than $60,000 you receive free tuition.
Second, you can't tell your child they can't go to a particular school. You can tell them you won't pay for it, but in the end it's up to them to decide where to go and whether they'll apply for scholarships, or work, or take out loans or do a combination of these things.
My mom had no money to give me for college, but never limited my choices. In the end I chose to go away to an in-state school because I got a full scholarship, but had I gone out of state and taken loans she would have supported me as well.
I will support my children's choices while warning them about the consequences of taking out large loans and encouraging them to apply for scholarships. I can't fully fund their education, but I don't think most middle-class parents can pay $100,000 to $200,000 for a four-year degree even if they've invested in 529 and other college savings plans.
Not questioning your reasons, but there are a lot of ways to handle that. One of my siblings is reasonably well off financially and has one child. The sibling could easily afford to write a check to cover the costs. Instead, they chose to have their child take out loans to cover any amount that was not already covered by scholarships. The deal was that if the child graduated and maintained a sufficient GPA, then the parent would pay off the loans. If the child didn't graduate or failed to maintain the GPA, then they would be responsible for repaying the loans.
I think that was a good way to strike a balance between helping set your child up for the future, but also making them take personal responsibility for the choices they make. My sibling wasn't going to finance 4 years of partying and a 2.0 GPA.
Your sibling is very wise. I'll bet there child won't take 5-6 years to earn a 4-year degree.
We had our three research colleges with an eye towards what they thought they wanted to study, then had them make sure they met the entrance qualifications. At that point, they applied wherever they wanted to. We didn't do any tours until they had acceptance letters. Only one completely changed his mind about where he thought he wanted to go after seeing the campus.
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Originally Posted by golfgal
What would you have done if he didn't like any of the schools once he got on campus? To me this seems a little backwards. I can see doing a second visit to the top 2 or 3 after they are accepted to help with the final decision.
Mattie, I see us visiting campuses the same way you did, although I wouldn't be averse to including campus visits on other family trips.
Golfgal, I'd worry that the opposite would be true--that a kid would fall in love with a school and then not be accepted. I guess if you know your kid meets all the basic criteria you could visit with confidence.
Mattie, I see us visiting campuses the same way you did, although I wouldn't be averse to including campus visits on other family trips.
Golfgal, I'd worry that the opposite would be true--that a kid would fall in love with a school and then not be accepted. I guess if you know your kid meets all the basic criteria you could visit with confidence.
That is where the conversations about money and reality come in. You can do a lot of research online before you start visiting colleges. We haven't visited any schools where they couldn't get accepted. Notre Dame is a hit or miss because they have 25,000 applicants for 2000 spots. Our son knows that, he knows there is a good chance he won't get in and he has a back up plan for that. We also don't want him going through his life saying "what if" if he doesn't apply too. If your child is a reasonable person, they see the math in front of them and understand what a "reach" school means. ND has EVERYTHING he wants, loves the campus, loves the culture there. It's a perfect fit for him...but if that doesn't work out, he has 2 other schools that are a very close second to that and would be fine going to any of them.
They have a great search engine where you can narrow down college size, location, program availability, town size, etc. The "at a glance" page tells you the acceptance rate, 29% at ND for example. I then go to the ACT/SAT page to see what the "average" student looks like there. We've ruled out a lot of schools that have average ACT scores of 18-22, for example.
I also started a thread on the College page here about "Is this a good school". It's been very helpful wading through all of the information that has been mailed or emailed to us about various schools. They all look good in their literature but it's a nice place to ask for personal experiences.
We have also had people we know in real life suggest schools or in one case "forbid" us to take our son to that school . That was very helpful and saved me 10 hours of driving .
What would you have done if he didn't like any of the schools once he got on campus? To me this seems a little backwards. I can see doing a second visit to the top 2 or 3 after they are accepted to help with the final decision.
Most of the important criteria search is easily viewed online. We didn't limit their applications to a certain number of schools, but I didn't want the dorms to figure into a decision about where to attend. It really only became an issue with youngest, who thought he might like to see a campus clear across the country. That's when we told him as soon as he was accepted we would go.
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Originally Posted by Marlow
Mattie, I see us visiting campuses the same way you did, although I wouldn't be averse to including campus visits on other family trips.
Golfgal, I'd worry that the opposite would be true--that a kid would fall in love with a school and then not be accepted. I guess if you know your kid meets all the basic criteria you could visit with confidence.
Marlow, we had been to several campuses for things like football games and summer camps, so they had an idea of what type of college appealed to them, urban vs. college town, large vs. small, etc.
The kids figured out very early on that all freshman dorms are pretty much the same and none of them are very good.
Even so, they are going to live there for the next year or more so why shouldn't the dorms factor into their decision. Our kids want to go to a school where most kids live on campus all 4 years so dorms are an important part of their decision....just not so much the freshman dorms.
Fair enough GG. In our case, only one son ending up staying on campus after his freshman year, and that's because his university built a gorgeous apartment complex for upperclassmen.
Living on campus certainly has it's perks. I would rather pay one price than have to deal with rent increases and utilities. In the case of the two younger boys, their colleges have limited housing, and it's a given that you will move off (but very close) to campus after the freshman year.
I dealt with youngest stating he would never consider going to Clemson after attending a summer camp there. He was totally turned off by the dorms. But, this is a boy who has almost always had his own bedroom and bath. There is nothing wrong with a little communal living when it broadens one's world.
My two cents is that parents should be willing to take their kids to visit the various colleges and spend an hour or two reading up about each one their kid is considering going to.
I would also emphasize the costs involved in going to some of these schools
Outside of that, they need to butt out (unless of course they are paying for the full tuition).
I am still kind of sour 10 years later on how things went down in regards to me, college, and my parents. I was not one for academics in high school, but I am a relatively smart guy. 2.3 HS GPA, but a 1230 SAT (out of 1600). Was a laziness issue more then anything.
My parents had long stated that they would pay for the first year of college, after that it was student loans (which is generous and very reasonable). However, they very much pushed me into a private, relatively small, out of state school (because my mom thought I would "fit in better") which cost about $30,000 a year. I went, was pretty miserable, and after the first year transferred into a large state school in my home state.
If I followed my parents heavy handed advice, I would not have the (great) friends I do today, would have had $90,000+ in student loans instead of $25,000, and would have graduated from a significantly worse college. I also would not have had the work/life experience that I do (which I feel has greatly benefited me post college).
I am just not the kind of guy who can take 15+ credits at college while my only income is some kind of $50 a week work study pittance/beer money.
Yea it took me 6 years to finish college at a state college, but I was working full time, gaining experience, and doing it at my own pace. And I feel in the long term that is a big advantage. Basically, I am happy that i did what i wanted to do and ignored parental advice.
So my basic point would be to butt out and let them make up their own minds (but stress the financial impact, and the weight of their decisions)
Last edited by GiantRutgersfan; 01-21-2012 at 03:12 AM..
I'm watching last night's Parenthood (yes, I realize it is fictional ). SPOLIER ALERT Haddie gets into her dream school, Cornell. Her parents discuss the cost and urge her to keep her options open. Bottom line is they can't afford to send her. So, should they be able to just say "no", or should she still have the option of going if she's willing to take out loans to pay for it? Who gets to decide, and is a HS senior able to understand the burden of coming out of school with 10's of thousands in loans?
I have a dd who wants to go to Cornell and I've told her that she's only going if she goes on scholarships. While I think parents do owe their children a college education, I think they have the right to cap what they'll pay for one.
I think high school kids can understand the financial aspects if you explain them. Once I explained to dd that the difference in pay, for a doctor, between graduating from a top school and the one in our backyard with an excellent medical program is about 20,000/year and not worth her coming out of school with upwards of $100K in student loans. I showed her, on a speadsheet, how long it would take her to break even and asked her if she'd rather have $100K in student loans or a house worth $100K more than she could afford if she had those student loans. She got it. Now her plan is to go to the university in our backyard unless something better comes along. She's still hoping for that but knows that she's, probably, going to the univeristy in our backyard and that that is not a bad decision.
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). SPOLIER ALERT Haddie gets into her dream school, Cornell. Her parents discuss the cost and urge her to keep her options open. Bottom line is they can't afford to send her. So, should they be able to just say "no", or should she still have the option of going if she's willing to take out loans to pay for it? Who gets to decide, and is a HS senior able to understand the burden of coming out of school with 10's of thousands in loans?
. That was very helpful and saved me 10 hours of driving 
.
