It's all so scary, and we're only on our first

We are about 3 hours away from U of I. CC would be of no value as he likely has already taken most of the math and core classes available there. U of I offers little to nothing to middle class white kids, male or female. Even merit is mainly need based. If family income is over $99K (and for Chicago and surrounding suburbs, this is not a lot), you don’t qualify unless you are in an under represented group.