Hm. Collegevine shows C26’s reach as a “hard target” with a 35% chance, but Niche says their profile is better than 48% of accepted students. I assume that is the ones who report to Niche and not the universe of accepted students? For all the others it’s lower than collegevine but still in the likely/safety kind of area other than one where it’s more of a target. Where it definitely falls down is the Cal Polys, because it doesn’t seem to take major into account even though it asks for it. For example CPP is above 89% of students, but arch is impacted there and C26’s GPA is well below where the cutoff has been the last few years.
Ok so C26 is officially in Musical Theater. Also looks like they have a new babysitting job - they got contacted by the parents of one of the kids they were counselor for at the art camp, 2 bookings lined up already!
School has started off fairly slowly this week, at least homework-wise, but looks like things start ramping up from next week. There’s also a calc quiz in the calendar for next week already.
Just returning today from 2 weeks abroad visiting exchange students throughout Europe. It was amazing. Saw all the things. Spent all the nights catching up with kids (now adults!) that lived with us in the past. Learned valencia is too hot to consider retiring to.
But d26 brought her laptop. And never used it.
AP lit assignment was due last week. And she’s not even gotten started on college essays.
We pick up our newest student tomorrow. And D26 is working like 48 hours this week so I’m sure she’ll be a wreck getting it all done. Sigh.
Random question I quickly searched on here, but couldn’t figure out where to look. I’m starting to dive into the costs of D26s top 5 schools to get a better sense of what we’re looking at in terms of different full list prices (I know, she could get merit at some places, though some on the short list don’t give merit or give very little which it is unlikely she’d get). I’ve noticed that what they list for health insurance varies pretty significantly. My question is, if my kid is already on our health insurance, do we have to get the school health insurance too? Does the answer change depending on if the school is in state or out of state?
In my experience, you can opt out of the university health insurance if the student already has insurance. I have also opted out of tuition insurance when that is offered.
We have successfully opted out of student health insurance for D22 every year, but check each college’s policy closely - some have particular requirements that your family insurance must meet in order to “qualify” for the waiver. In our case, the student’s existing insurance must have a deductible of no more than $5,000/yr to be considered sufficient to waive the school’s insurance.
If your insurance will cover the student you should be able to waive the student health requirement. We did this for D19 OOS. I believe some insurance schemes do not cover other states so it depends on your insurance.
As noted above you will need to actively waive it each year, the waivers don’t roll over.
Edit: you may also want to check where providers are. Our insurance had a zip code locator that was useful. D19 was in Manhattan so there were tons of options for each type of provider. When she sliced her finger badly on a night out (needing stitches) it was a blessing that she could access any one of a number of ERs close by - she had the insurance list with her on her phone. If your students ends up in a smaller town etc it may not be as easy to access providers. I do note D19 was still able to access campus health services too though.
We nearly had a “whoops” moment when C26 was told yesterday they had not added their recommender on Maia! Luckily the teacher contacted them rather than just dropping them, lol. They’ve only asked for one as all their colleges that need LORs only need one (so it would have been a disaster if they’d just been dropped). The teacher is taking C26 again this year too (for AP2 Phys) and has said the letters will be ready by end-September. School says official NM commended notification will come later in September too. Sooo as long as the essays are finished by October sometime all should be on track for the EA applications - the earliest deadline on their list is 1 Nov.
Re: health insurance, we had D24 opt out of her college’s health insurance. She had to submit proof of health insurance by a specific date. And the opt-out is something you’ll have to do each year.
Also, one thing to keep in mind re: any maintenance medications that your kid might take (i.e., meds that they take on an ongoing basis), check with your health insurance ahead of time to confirm what requirements or rules they have re: filling maintenance meds through whatever home delivery/mail order pharmacy you’re required to use…not all of them with automatically ship out of state without a special approval on file ahead of time. We had to do this w/D24. In her case, the special authorization allows her to get the maintenance meds filled at a retail pharmacy near her campus.
We have a high-deductible policy that only offers coverage in our state, so unfortunately we have to purchase the school’s health insurance at my D22’s school.
She does still have emergency coverage out-of-state on our policy, but that doesn’t meet the school’s requirements to waive it – it has to be full coverage.
Every school is different- most let you opt out if you have coverage and require “proof mom coverage” in order to do so. For my S24, our OOS insurance only covers ER visits (with a $400 co-pay) or Urgent care at a stand alone urgent care facility (not like a minute clinic or an urgent appointment at Student Health) so he opted for the $750/semester Student Health Insurance to make sure he is able to utilize student health without issues. If he were to go to ER using our OOS insurance, he would only be covered for services provided in the ER. For example if he broke his arm, they would cover that ER visit, but any follow up with ortho would not be covered, nor and surgeries, etc. God forbid he ends up in an ER he can use ours as a secondary coverage. Call your current insurance and ask what their policy is for out of state and see what they do and don’t cover.
While not part of the concern for the medical fee waiver, also a good idea to check what is covered for your kids for mental/behavioral health and dental.
And be sure your kids know how to access medical and dental care, understand how to look up a provider and know about copays and how insurance works.
Somehow with my very independent and savvy kid, this was a missing part of my parenting curriculum. I think he struggled a bit with making an appointment and bringing or scanning in the wrong card.
Yes, using medical providers on their own is something students need to navigate! D19 had a photo of the insurance card on her phone. Our insurance or FSA (my husband’s employer so I don’t know exact details) has payflex cards (I think the name changed),and we gave one to D19 for any deductibles that might be needed or worst case she could use her credit card. (I got her a credit card guaranteed by my account to use for school stuff - easy for her to buy what she needed, less admin for me, and she had a very decent credit score by the time she left college.)
I think it’s good to have them practice stuff like this before they leave home, including practicing making actual phone calls to set up / confirm appointments.
Sometimes you do still have to talk on the phone… I was on the phone today with two different provider offices and a pharmacist.
I found with both my kids that it was helpful to coach them in how to make this type of utility customer service phone call. Seems like a simple thing but flummoxed my kids at first.
