<p>I am so ashamed that I can't afford college for my child. My child has decent grades, not all A's, spent a year on scholarhip in China, and got accepted to all of the colleges in which she applied. The problem is that I did not work for years and was in debt for college myself and in debt due to not getting work once I finished college. I did find work about 3 years ago but now all the colleges want me to pay about 80,000 total. They all want me to get loans for that amount. I am still in debt for college and to credit cards and I don't have a retirement. I am told to send my daughter to community college but this has me in a spiralling depression. How can a mother that managed to go to college tell her child that she can't afford to send her to college? I could get that debt but then how could I send my other children to college? I am so upset and I feel very alone. Everyone thinks that because I have a degree (I earned it at the age of 32) that I have a ton of money. None of the college are looking at our debt ratio (although if I tried to get a loan I am sure they would notice this). What should I do? Should I just accept that she goes to community college or should I take out 80,000 in loans? I figure I am never retiring anyway but I am so ashamed. I just don't know who to talk to because everyone thinks community college is ok. It is ok but it is not ideal, especially for a child that is fluent in chinese and very gifted.</p>
<p>What year is your D in school? You should start looking for schools where she can get a lot of merit aid. There are other topics here on CC that discuss this. Even if she goes to CC initially, perhaps later she could get a good merit scholarship to go somewhere else. Your D sounds like she has good skills. Don’t give up hope. And, no - CC is not something to feel ashamed of. You’ve done the best you could and I’m sure your D is proud of you.</p>
<p>it’s not worth the debt.
there are PLENTY of gifted students at ccc’s and are looking to transfer within the 2-3 years that they are there. There is no rush for your daughter to leave home so soon, you will miss her when she’s gone anyways.</p>
<p>First, stop being ashamed. You are not the only who cannot pay for her children education. Majority of the parents cannot.</p>
<p>Second, there are many 4-year college choices that would not cost 80K.</p>
<ul>
<li>Depending on where you live, your daughter can attend state school to which she can commute.</li>
<li>Depending on your daughter’s stats, she can apply to schools where she can receive large merit.</li>
</ul>
<p>Your daughter can contribute to some of her education, by getting Stafford loans and working part-time through the year and full time during summer.</p>
<p>If your daughter did not apply to schools that match above criteria, she might consider to take a gap year and reapply to schools that meet the criteria. (Do not let her take classes to preserve freshman status for merit aid).</p>
<p>I suggest that you post on Financial Aid board and include your daughter’s stats. There are several people there that can recommend appropriate schools to apply.</p>
<p>ETA: And there is nothing wrong with starting at community college. Many smart kids do.</p>
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<p>I guess it’s too late to advise your D to apply to those schools for which she is at the tip top of the applicant pool.</p>
<p>Every year, some of our very top students make decisions based, in part, on financial realities. Two years ago, the Sal went to a small, only moderately selective LAC…she earned a full tuition scholarship, so she only had to pay for room and board.</p>
<p>A top student from last year is commuting to a local state U. EVen without merit money, the cost is about $9000 a year.</p>
<p>My son spent his freshman year at a private LAC. Due to some issues, he dropped two classes. Cost for 10 hours: $20,000 (including room and board). The next semester he took 10 hours at the local cc. Cost for 10 hours: $650.</p>
<p>My father dropped out of high school, started at a CC and ended up earning a hard-sciences Ph.D from UC Berkeley.</p>
<p>I started at a CC and am now working on an MS at Indiana U.</p>
<p>Never let anyone tell you or your daughter that CC is an obstacle to anything.</p>
<p>She is a senior. We applied but no college offered her more than some small 2,000 merit scholarhips. One college took off 17,000 per year but still expected us to take out 80,000 in parent plus student loans.</p>
<p>Thanks Polarscribe. I am trying to be upbeat about this but I really thought with my daughter’s talent she would get a little more scholarhips and we would just take out maybe 30-40,000 in loans.
I figured I would just sell my house in 12 or 15 years and pay off all my kids student loan debts, but 80,000 was more than I bargained for.
I really worry that the world is not her oyster now…</p>
<p>Would she consider taking a gap year, earning some money or exploring an EC, then reapplying with a focus on getting merit aid? Does she have a 4 year option as part of the Ohio system? I see no shame in not being able to afford a dream school when there are good options. You are in a state with great schools, so getting a degree won’t be an issue. Your own D can borrow a certain amount to cover tuition and commuting costs.</p>
<p>Hugs. My kid just graduated from the local CC. If your kid can, encourage her to ace her classes, join the honors program or honors society if there is one, Phi Theta Kappa society, take classes with good profs - there are online rating sites that can guide you away from especially difficult or unreasonable profs - take challenging options (my kid took Japanese, for example and enjoyed that peer group, and took a mythology class wherein they read nothing but Greek plays) and generally do whatever she can to maximize the experience. We had a good CC experience. If your kid is flexible, there are transfer scholarships out there, though not many. But some are very good.</p>
<p>I went to high school in a city that was not wealthy. Not a lot of kids were college bound and we received basically no advice from our GCs. It was a big deal to go away to college anywhere. Very few kids went to private schools. If they went to college at all, most either went to the local cc or the local commuter U.</p>
<p>One cool thing about being on Facebook is learning about the great things that these students from modest backgrounds had achieved. There is even a nice handful or two of graduate degrees from Ivies and other prestigious Us.</p>
<p>The top graduating senior at Berkeley in 2011 started at a community college:
[Top</a> graduating senior a rags-to-academic-riches story](<a href=“http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2011/05/10/medalist2011/]Top”>Top graduating senior a rags-to-academic-riches story | Berkeley News)</p>
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CC ‘is’ college. Plenty of people start in a CC and then switch to a 4 year school and do fine. Don’t let your negative thoughts about a CC, including not even considering it a ‘real college’ come across to your D in the event she ends up going to one. It’d only negatively affect her own thoughts of the CC and make her value it less and could even impact her performance at one.</p>
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Why is it a choice between two somewhat extremes? What about commuting to a local state U if there is one? That cost would be well below $80K and would be a 4 year college from day one.</p>
<p>Our D also started in a CC. Did your D apply to any in-state Us? Sometimes their tuitions are quite reasonable & your child could save living expenses by commuting. </p>
<p>One route that can be FAIRLY inexpensive is to have the child attend CC & then transfer to in-state U. Our D had 3 semesters at local CC, which allowed her to explore a lot of different courses and have very small classes with great instructors. She then transferred & will be graduating in about a month!</p>
<p>As a community college teacher, if she ends up going that route, have her sit down with a good academic advisor who can guide her to the really good teachers. A tippy top student with AP credit might be able to finish the CC degree in about a year. There also are Coca-Cola scholarships for the very best CC students and that would make a big dent in the last two years of college costs. Additionally, your CC probably knows about scholarships kids get when they transfer out. Good luck, and keep in mind that there are plenty of us whose children did not pick the most prestigious school because of the costs involved.</p>
<p>I teach at CC. My mythology is reading one Greek play, the Iliad, the Odyssey, The Aeneid, Gilgamesh and Beowulf as well as Joseph Campbell for a critical background.</p>
<p>I am also teaching a course in Psychoanalytic Literature in which we are reading Freud, Kafka, Shakespeare, and Emily Dickinson.</p>
<p>My comp classes are reading poetry, Hamlet and The Joy Luck Club.</p>
<p>My colleagues are amazing teachers, and or classes are capped at 25 in all disciplines (even intro psych and science.) </p>
<p>We have sent kids to NYU, Yale, Columbia and Sarah Lawrence recently. (These are just my students.) (As you might guess from this we are in the NYC area.)</p>
<p>The only drawback is the peer-group. There are some serious students, and some kids who are not. If your child keeps focused, she will end up in a very good place.</p>
<p>Please stop feeling ashamed. You raised a child who has done well and has already had the broadening experience of being in China. If she keeps up with her Asian studies her employment opportunities are limitless. Mandarin is the new English I hear.</p>
<p>Give yourself a break. Take everyone out for an inexpensive dinner. Look at the local CC and meet a few profs.</p>
<p>Your D has a bright future.</p>
<p>PS I consider myself an awesome teacher.</p>
<p>My daughter did get into Ohio State but with room and board (because of the distance) the cost still came up to over 25,000 per year. She did not get any assistance other than the offer for us to get Parent Plus Loans and she qualified for 7,500 in loans. She got into Wittenberg, Miami, and many out of state colleges. All has some scholarships for her grades but all wanted us to take out very large loans.</p>
<p>Thank you mythmom, I was not insulting community colleges but I am worried about her losing that edge that you seem to need to suceed anymore. Since she is so smart and so good with languages I am worried that she needs a better named college to suceed. My son wants to be a weatherman, I don’t think it matter what school he goes to for that. I guess that is what I am worried about, it is not the CC it is that she will lose that “edge” when she applies for jobs. I worry there might be a stigma attached to her and that I have hurt her in some small way. I guess it is hard to understand but the world is so competitive now, and I guess I just wanted her to be at the top. I think you only get one chance and you have to grab it. CC will be good for us to save money, it will be good for her because the class size, but in the end I worry that I will have crippled her career goals (she wants to work for the State Department). I have really been freaked out that if I don’t take on a massive debt for her that she will hold that against me later.</p>
<p>The CC attendee who transfers to the state U or some other 4 yr college ends up with the same degree from that college as everyone else. There’s not some kind of special indicator that they went to a CC first. I don’t think the job opportunities are any less for the transfer student who does well versus the 4 yr attendee who does well. </p>
<p>I’m not saying it’s not desirable for various reasons for the student to start at the 4 yr rather than transfer - I’m saying it’s not required or necessary.</p>
<p>Her best bet may be to take a year off and reapply. How are her scores?</p>