Any parents tempted...

ByeByeSavings
Wed, 14 Dec 2011 15:19:27 +0000

Hi, original poster here, been away from CC a couple days & I’m enjoying everyone’s comments now. (especially Alynor’s… if I had been eating anything I would have spat it all over my monitor laughing over the rice and beans remark). As far as getting kids thinking about college goes, I realized the other day that it was the exact family dynamic we get when its time to plan vacations. Mom (that’s me) basically spends hours over days on the computer researching the options. Then while trying not to intrude too much on TV time for H, S, & D, bounces ideas off of them:
“So guys, are you ok sleeping in a rented teepee on a platform for four nights? Otherwise we can do a hotel but it’ll mean a shorter vacation.” Hey, are you guys ok with not doing any Disney parks this time? 'Cos the Island of Adventure package is really a steal and we don’t have to wait in any lines." “So, guys, this might be the only time you ever go to Europe, should we do Italy or Ireland? Alright, since you don’t have a preference let’s do Ireland because the weather will be better in July. How many castles is too many?” And so it goes. It seems to me they agree to whatever because it will get them back to watching TV more quickly than anything. OK, some of you are thinking I am probably an overbearing mom and they know if they suggest the opposite of what I secretely want I will browbeat them until they say my preferred choice is best, but I really don’t think I do that. Anyhow, when my daughter was watching old Friends episodes the other day I asked if I was Monica Geller, and she said I wasn’t. And I wasn’t even standing in front of the TV. My son says it’s just that I plan such great vacations, they don’t need to be involved.

Anyhow, back to the college thing. We do slowly gain ground. S wants a big nationally known school, doesn’t have to be elite as long as it is well respected. Oh yeah, and they have to want him for their sports team. D apparently wants to be around interesting people, at least some of whom should be intellectual, and the campus should be pretty with a cool town within reach. They are a junior & sophmore respectively and I know it’s WAY early for her to seriously start thinking college. For S however, for recruiting we are right on schedule and well, I’d really like to save some time when we visit some of these schools by bringing D along too. But S & I did an NY trip a couple months back to take in Cornell and Binghamton and I didn’t force her to go along. (He took a buddy and I got to listen to them talk about which girls were potential homecoming dates for four hours straight. Don’t know if I feel honored or sick.) If D decides in a couple years she wants to see Cornell I’ll just have to eat at the Moosewood Restaurant a second time.

@KKMama, my prior post about the state schools was kinda toungue-in-cheek and I’m sorry if I offended. The truth is I liked the school a lot more than I thought it would. Everyone looked happy and I saw quite a few kids wearing their school colors. If my kids KNEW, just KNEW that they wanted graduate school I think I’d begging them to go that route to set aside the $ for the next round. What haunts me is another college search site that has a pie chart for each school stating how many students would attend it over again. The schools in the PA state system have depressing figures like 50%. For some its worse than 50%. Places like Colgate and Penn score an 80 so obviously you’ll always have some people that for whatever reason, the school didn’t click for them.

@HudsonValley, I’m with you 100% on the going-away thing. All too soon kiddos will be entrenched with mortgages, 50 hour office jobs, lawns to mow. They are likely to settle here just out of inertia. This is their big chance to go experience Boston/Austin/Denver! And as for gap years, D is so all over the map about how she might want to live that she should really take one. Maybe two.

Final comment, I was intrigued by the several parents who are turning the leftover money over to their kids, if any. Last year when I worked out how much I felt H and I could spend, I floated the figure in front of the kids. Assuming we have no family financial crises over the next several years, we are willing to foot the bill for a certain cost of attendance. If kiddo chooses a less expensive school/bags a partial scholarship and the figure is less than the aforementioned number, they will receive a large portion of money back towards a worthy cause (down payment, grad school, NOT wedding). H and I will pocket the rest while congratulating ourselves for raising thrifty kids. If on the other hand their dream school is over that figure, we will borrow some and they can borrow some up to a point. But there will definetely be a ceiling beyond which NO degree with worth that kind of debt!