S has reported in from his orientation, and he got his first-choice schedule. AP courses for: Calc BC, government (fall semester), economics (spring semester), stats, and biology. Dual credit English. Digital art & animation class for his fine art requirement. And early release. He’s been very lucky and has never had a schedule issue, and I’m glad he didn’t end up in AP art history (his listed fine art alternate) instead of digital art & animation. From what I’ve heard the AP art history class at his school has an excellent teacher and is very well-taught, so he surely would have learned a lot and likely would have enjoyed it but it’s a LOT of work and very challenging. I think he’ll enjoy the digital art & animation class more since there’s a CS element, and the workload will be much lighter. Art is definitely not in his wheelhouse so he really didn’t need an AP art course to add stress in his senior year.
Good point @ShrimpBurrito. When S was away at UTD for five weeks this summer, our food and utility bills did go down.
We’re headed down to Miami (FL) today for a tour tomorrow. We only live about 3hrs away. Florida Tech is our hometown college and she has zero interest staying home. I don’t want her to either since she considers me her personal asst. She needs to get tossed out of the nest and learn to fend for herself a little bit. D and I toured a couple of years ago but my H has never seen the campus. He’s going in with a lot of preconceived notions regarding safety and the city. We loved the campus and atmosphere when we toured last, so we’ll have to see what he thinks. He’s sold on her going to OU so we’ll see what he thinks of UM on the table
Re: UNM and the NMF / Regents Package
NMF and Regents are $18,337/year.
Yearly COA is like so:
Tuition & Fees: $6,950.00
Teal meal plan: $3,800
Traditional double room: $4,890
Books & Supplies $1,080.00
Total (not including travel and incidentals): $16,720 with $1,617 left over.
A suite single would be $5,690, and a private bedroom in one of the on-campus apartments is $6,390.
Teal is the cheapest freshman meal plan. It offers 24/7 access to the dining hall, 50 dining dollars and 3 guest passes. 24/7 means you don’t have to track swipes. If you want a cup of coffee or an ice cream, go right on in. Students often study in the dining hall for access to coffee and snacks. Higher meal plans offer more dining dollars and more guest passes, or you can buy dining dollars separately.
Frugal shoppers can probably come in under $1,080 for books.
Freshman NMFs (but not Regents) also get a $600 technology allowance on top of the NMF package.
The Amigo includes a $100/semester stipend on top of the OOS tuition waiver, and I’m not sure if that’s included in the $18,337 or not.
Disclaimer: 2016-17 numbers
@ShrimpBurrito So true. Our D has been away at a residential program at UCSD this summer and the decrease in costs at home are pretty substantial. Food and gas but also is not getting hit up for spending money is the biggest. While on campus she has the “poor college student” mentality and is barely spending a thing. When she gets back home I’m sure it will be back to her old ways of eating out, shopping, movies concerts etc. She dropped her club sport this summer so at least that will be a substantial chunk we are saving.
Re: UNM
@DavidPuddy and @crazy4info COA numbers from '16-'17 are two posts above.
Tuition has gone up by $100/semester.
Here are links to the updated meal plan prices and housing options. The residence halls vary a little bit in price, so you have to check each one if you want to-the-dollar accurate numbers. I’m linking to Hokona, the honors dorm.
http://lobocard.unm.edu/Dining-club-plans/meal-plans-2017-2018.html
https://housing.unm.edu/residence-halls/hokona-hall.html
https://housing.unm.edu/living-on-campus/rates-and-payment.html
Today’s Essay Procrastination Effort by 2018 Son:
“What can I use to wash velour?” he asked me.
“What do you need to wash that is velour?” I asked, stumped.
“I need to wash the velour parts of my computer headphones.”
So, he is in the kitchen, up to his elbows in soapy water, washing headphone thingies. He looked it up on Youtube.
Instead of writing a 650 (MAX)-word essay.
@HeliMom74 I really shouldn’t laugh, but I am. =))
Also, here in north central Oklahoma, we just had our 8th or 10th earthquake of last 24 hours.
@HeliMom74, your son could probably write a hilarious essay about his creative efforts to avoid starting his essays!
The utility drop while S’18 was gone was dramatic. The July water bill was 2/3 of the June water bill. That said, I’m all for him taking showers after 7 hours of marching band practice in August.
Here in our SoCal desert, we woke up to 85% humidity with a forecast high of 104. We’ll take your quakes if someone will give us our dry heat back.
A couple years ago, in the span of an hour or so, we had an earthquake, a thunderstorm warning, and snow.
What, no locusts? Pshaw! 
I didn’t know Oklahoma gets earthquakes? Is this a result of fracking?
@HeliMom74 Remember a few years ago when a tornado supposedly knocked down enclosures to a tiger rescue? IIRC, tigers weren’t actually roaming the streets during the massive storm, but they might have been.
It’s a banner day in OK when there isn’t a weather warning of some kind.
@melvin123 Depends on who you ask. 
Seems like the objective answer is “probably.” I’ve experienced SoCal quakes and OK quakes. They are very different. OK quakes are LOUD.
So I’m visiting my sister at her beach house in Long Island, and I ran into one of her neighbors. Boy, what an advantage and disadvantage to be from one of these expensive NYC suburbs. The neighbor’s D will be a freshmen at U Penn Wharton next month, and the mom knew kids who go to so many of the schools that my D is interested in and she had so many insightful comments. Being from AL, I don’t know anyone who goes to those schools. Everything I’ve learned is from CC. I’m sure, though, that the competition for those kids to get in is fierce, since colleges won’t want too many kids from any one HS or geographic area. This mom had gotten a consultant for her D starting freshman year of HS, and that consultant helped her pick out her ECs and summer activities, and the D did go ahead and start her own non-profit that was amazingly successful. This is just another world from mine.
@ShrimpBurrito what you said was fascinating, so I did a quick google search and saw that scientists think it’s from injecting the brine wastewater from the fracking process into the ground, which they think has lubricated some of the long dormant fault lines, causing them to move. The article went on to say that they’ve decreased the volume and depth of the wells, and the earthquakes have lessened. SO interesting that you hear a difference between a So Cal quake and an OK one.
The earthquake a few hours ago sounded and felt like a cement truck crashing into the north side of my house. Over the years, as the earthquakes have become more commonplace here, cracks in foundations and walls have really increased. We had an earthquake policy through our homeowner’s insurance until this summer, when our carrier dropped it. (Many major carriers in this area have done the same.) The deductible was so high it would only have helped if–GOD FORBID–an earthquake gutted the house.