“(er, weird) that I’m actually more worried for the OP about the weather in upstate NY, right across the water from Toronto, than I am about any added debt.”
Yeah not gonna lie but that is tremendously weird.
+1 for accurate Seattle expenses.
Well, I would NOT be very worried about the extra $200 per flight from Seattle 3x year for 4 years, plus Uber and plus trail mix and maybe some turkey jerky too. 
It’s easy not to worry about debt if YOU and your loved ones aren’t on the hook for it. It is very worrying to the rest of us.
Sushi- all due respect, a families debt tolerance when Parent A has been working for the same company for 18 years and Parent B has been working for a different company for 15 years, and they are both in good health and under 55 is QUITE different from the OP’s family situation.
You are very cavalier with other people’s money. There are risks that people take when they are 53 and sending their first kid off to college that are absurd 10 years later, especially with a non-working spouse.
You really need to dial it back. You are talking to a teenager who although mature for her age, doesn’t have the life experience or financial knowledge to casually throw out “oh sure, an extra $200 for a flight from Seattle (times two kids btw) plus ubers”. For all you know, you’ve just spent the 2K for this family which represents the annual premium for the dad’s life insurance policy. Something which he SURELY cannot go without at this point in his life, with two kids in college, a home with no equity and a big mortgage, and a non-working spouse.
@HImom That’s not it at all. I worry about debt just as much as the next person, but I do so, because I know my complete situation. I don’t know yours and I don’t know the OP’s.
I’m just not a great big fan of complete strangers telling a 17-18 year old kid that the world is collapsing, her choices are bad and giving her answers to questions she never asked and all based upon extremely limited information transmitted 2nd or 3rd hand to an Internet forum.
Without knowing the complete picture, we’re just throwing darts in the dark. I just advocated talking to her parents in more detail and seeking local financial guidance. And it appears everything is OK now.
IMO, the OP seems to have handled the entire thread with aplomb.
As Forrest Gump once said, “That’s all I got to say about that.”
Does Rochester have Uber? I thought Uber was blocked outside of NYC.
- “I don’t know yours and I don’t know the OP’s.”
So maybe stop telling them that taking on a ton of debt is just fine???
and 2) “I’m just not a great big fan of complete strangers telling a 17-18 year old kid that the world is collapsing, her choices are bad…”
I don’t see people in this thread saying this. I see people in this thread telling her that she has a number of affordable options like UH or CC and transfer, or gap year and re-apply, and that she’ll be totally 100% fine if she goes with any of those plans. I see people giving a lot of well-thought out, financially sound and sane advice that jives with both reality AND OP’s goals in life.
“IMO, the OP seems to have handled the entire thread with aplomb.”
I agree completely, somewhat in contrast to the rest of us 
This thread is about OP, not any individual poster. We deal with the info we do get, raise questions.
@blossom
Seriously, you’re reading my words and just making a ton of assumptions and misrepresentations. The OP seems to have handled the situation with her parents. I’m not cavalier with anyone’s money. I haven’t spent a dollar of their money. I think you should dial it back. It’s an internet forum. I’m not writing checks for the OP’s parents. My advice was seek a financial professional who can see the entire picture.
The dad and mom aren’t dumb. The kids are smart. The OP seems to have situation under control. Relax.
Lol, your “we don’t know” includes not knowing the parents’ savvy. As soon as that surfaces, watch the thread lose steam. Til then, posters are bringing up issues to consider.
That simple.
@CourtneyThurston You should reread the thread again. Several pages ago, the OP seemed a bit “put off” by some comments about her educational choices and she even said to stick to the original topic regarding finances.
@lookingforward Yes, I agree. Lots of issues to consider. Even the ones the OP has said was none of our business.
Just dropping by between classes, I’m really grateful for all the advice from everyone and their experience, since yknow, I got into Cal less than a week ago and was really excited about leaving for college and also had no idea how finances for college was going to play out.
I made this thread because I was conflicted about which college to choose based on finances, because I got my financial aid packages, and my top choice gave me $0, and the other two choices gave me some. I looked through some other threads about whether Cal was worth it, alums say “name recognition is real”, “best experience of my life”, “Cal rules at stem”. I thought these were my only options but now I have many options thanks to everyone, and knowing that puts me at ease. However, as a 17 year old (I turn eighteen in June!) who has been stuck on Hawaii for eleven years, I do have hopes of leaving Hawaii to explore during college, and my parents would like me to too, but I will ensure that this is financially feasible because my hopes for “adventure” are not worth ruining my parents financially.
I just found the tangents going off about “why get engineering degree if you’re going into business”, “I think you’re not well prepared for engineering majors”, “why didn’t you take AP calc/math SATs”, etc were not really relevant to my original question. I may make another thread about that, maybe I’ll take a math class at CC over the summer, whatever.
Oh and @TQfromtheU idk about uber in NY, maybe lyft? Idk, I like using public transportation mostly. I don’t drive and definitely not going to get a car in college anyway haha
There is so much going on in this thread that I have a hard time keeping up - I have no idea how the OP is managing!
I think really, her post (#478) stuck out as the best takeaway for others
"I wish my dad tells me things. Maybe he doesn’t have to tell me everything about finances but it would’ve made it a lot easier
Parents of future applicants reading this please at least give your children an idea of the family’s finances…
My base budget (out of salary) annually may be higher than the $2500 estimate I made, may be not, I wouldn’t know. "
I don’t know how to bold things but seriously - parents, tell your children what’s up before they apply!
I was debt averse from the beginning of the college journey. Thank goodness, because life played us a really rotten hand DS senior year. So it only involved some slight pivoting for us rather than major rethinking. What OP is trying to deal with is way more than a pivot and I feel so very bad for that.
@jql2017 I applaud you for trying to wade through this all on your own. It’s not easy. This college stuff is really so very hard -especially financially - and especially for high stats kids who have been led to believe that all college things are theirs for the asking. I genuinely can not imagine what it is like with only partial knowledge of finances.
Mostly, I just want to applaud you and wish you luck and sort of send you a virtual hug.
My only question really is - what are your sister’s thoughts on all this? It sounds like you two are in some ways tied together as far as decisions go but that you are left with the heavy lifting as far as trying to think through logistics.
I hope all of you (entire family) are able to sit down soon and really gain clarity soon because I can not imagine what you are going through right now.
@jql2017, I’m sure everyone here wishes you and your twin the best. We are just trying to help make suggestions to help you achieve it without undue debt.
I know UH is not your 1st choice, but I hope you and your twin will tour it and talk to profs there with an open mind about how they can help you, especially with the exchange programs, honors program, honor societies and more. You and your twin would have a lot more resources to do internships and do these exchange programs since the family won’t be as financially stretched.
@delilahxc Thank you I’m doing fine, it’s just an extra worry added on top of usual senior year ones (upcoming exams, prom, graduation, etc.)
I was just thinking that, I was told “Your only worry is GETTING ACCEPTED by a good college, leave the finances to the parents” so I did that. I studied, did ECs, wrote my essays, chose my colleges based on rankings for my major among other things, like my preferences for setting (urban), geographical location (New England area or west coast), diversity, and all that. Well now I did it- got accepted into Cal, which I would have LOVED, and now I’m being told I can’t go. Which sucks, but it’s okay. I’ll live.
As for my sister, idk if I mentioned earlier, she applied to all the same schools as me (except tufts bc they didn’t have statistics) and recieved same decisions except Cal, which she got waitlisted at (there were tears. Imagine being a twin and being denied from a college when your sister with same stats get in. It’s even more difficult not to take that personally). So she just wants to go to a college where she will be happy at. And I’ve been talking to her about finances, so she agreed to do what is only financially feasible. I don’t think she is going to accept spot on the waitlist though. She has a preference for UW over UR because of it’s location, and I do too, but she agrees that if they give us more FA it’s better to go to UR esp because the UW competitive majors. She knows UH is a possibility/alternative as well, but hopes to make the other colleges work because four years may not seem like long to you all, but it’s very long to a 17 year old, to be spending it on the place we’d been planning to leave after HS for years and years
We’ll be fine
@HImom thank you, I will be sure to check UH out more. We’re somewhat familiar with it, since we had piano performances regularly at the Orvis auditorium, and a close friends’ parents are professors there
Not wanting to convince you to avoid either (systems engineering is one of my degrees), I’d recommend thinking a bit more broadly about degrees in this area as there is significant overlap with operations research, applied or pure math or data science. Likewise, while I mostly hire tech staff for development, I occasionally hire people to do data analysis and we would’ve considered degrees from any of those areas as they all signal relevant aptitudes. I suppose it might matter if you have your heart set on designing industrial automation, but I suspect that’s unlikely.