<p>2prepMom & others,</p>
<p>Could anyone tell roughly what % of these elite BS students take SAT/ACT prep courses? Somehow I assumed that these were super-smart kids in rigorous academic programs who didn’t need them much. But I’m realizing I might be wrong.</p>
<p>@SharingGift - At my kids’ school it’s a fairly low number. The college counseling office recommends against it; they do suggest using a book to prepare. Whatever the student decides to do, they suggest doing it in the summer so as to not interfere with schoolwork.</p>
<p>2prepmom’s list is great. Just a heads up that only her 1, 2 and a percentage of 5 and 10 are covered by most FA. I think travel might be covered for students on full FA.</p>
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<p>None of these tests measure smart, only preparation. Choate offers a variety of test preparation options on campus by contracting with a test prep company that provides on-site, classroom sessions for various exams. For example, they offer a Sunday-only program for 14 weeks or a Sun/Tues/Thurs program for four weeks for the ACT. Fifth and sixth form students (fourth formers by request) have access to The Official SAT Online Course from the The College Board as well as a three-hour workshop for the PSAT. Sessions offered by the test prep company are fee-based with FA available.</p>
<p>Those who opt for such test prep would incur these costs at home, so I wouldnt consider them additional BS costs.</p>
<p>Thanks for finding this thread for me SevenDad. I think I must have seen it a few months ago when it popped up because I just looked at my proposed budget/spreadsheet for boarding schools and I had calculated about $10,000 for personal expenses, mandatory fees, shuttles to/from the airport (I called a few schools and asked them the costs of shuttles), 4 r/t plane tickets for son, and 2 r/t plane tickets for me, husband and sibling. </p>
<p>When I filled out the PFS I was thinking purely of tuition when it asked what we can afford to pay, but we don’t have an extra $10K lying around either. I wonder if when schools look at how much we say we can afford to pay, they also consider some of those expenses in that cost like school’s mandatory fees, etc. So for example if I said we can afford to pay $20,000 in tuition, will they say okay, you pay $15,000 in tuition because they think we’ll need the other $5,000 to cover part of the expenses? </p>
<p>I guess I’ll find out next month if and when we get any financial aid from schools. I’ve filled out the PFS for the last 9 years for my child’s current school so I’m really familiar with the form and process but it’s a day school. I hope I didn’t screw up and offer to pay way more than we can for the boarding schools. Oh wait, that last line should go back to the worry thread. :)</p>
<p>Taurus Mom: If it makes you feel better, we’ve never seen much connection between the amount we say we can pay and the FA offer. Some years the offer is lower than what the PFS says we can afford, sometimes it’s higher, and it’s never the amount we name. I think the school just does its own calculation and offers what it offers. I’m pretty sure that they consider total cost (including flights vs. drives) in their calculation.</p>
<p>And Choatie Mom’s post reminded me that Exeter also provides a free online test prep service to students. I don’t know how many kids actually use it, but it’s there for them.</p>
<p>Exeter college counseling recommends SAT/ACT test prep. I think I saw that 60% of kids at Exeter participate in some such program. Exeter does provide a free on-line course, but the dedication needed to complete it completely independently may be the challenge there. </p>
<p>I’m hoping my D will follow the excellent CC advice on SAT test prep, and she has decided not to do a structured course (too much time spent on areas she may not need help with), but an organized summer review of the College Board SAT blue book with supplementary study as needed. We’ll see how that goes…</p>
<p>2prep: I admit I haven’t looked at it all that carefully, but I thought I remembered that the plus of the program was that you could plug in PSAT test scores and it would specifically customize to the child’s weak points? Or maybe it was plugging in blue book test results…anyway, might be worth a look. </p>
<p>Test prep for my kid happens almost entirely on vacations–no time to squeeze that in at school without going completely loco.</p>
<p>classicalmama - thanks that does make me feel better. At our current school, they never ask a parent to pay less than they offer to pay. They figure if you think you can pay it you must be able to. But a lot of different things factor into boarding school costs so I’m glad to hear that financial aid people consider everything.</p>
<p>Not to set you worrying taurusmom, but as a suggestion to future readers of this thread, when it asks how much you can afford to pay for tuition, I take it literally as tuition and factor in that I’ll be covering multiple airfares, shuttles, etc.</p>
<p>So whatever I think I can pay in total, I subtract all those travel expenses, etc., and put the remainder as what I can afford to pay towards tuition.</p>
<p>Although my children have received very generous FA, the awards have always left me with more to pay than I said I could.</p>
<p>Also remember you can ask a school to reconsider a FA award and the fact that you didn’t factor in significant expenses would be a reason to do so.</p>
<p>Thanks for your perspective alooknac. That was how I understood it - I put how much I think we can pay for tuition alone. I didn’t think to subtract travel expenses, etc. because I take the question to literally mean just tuition. In hindsight I think I should have adjusted the number a bit. </p>
<p>But I’m done worrying about it for the moment. If and when I have actual tuition offers in front of us, I’ll see what our options are and go from there.</p>
<p>Taurus, as alooknac mentioned, you really can ask schools to review your household budget. We made such a request for the reasons you cite, and were rewarded with a revised FA offer (though we ultimately chose a different school). Hang in there!</p>
<p>Probably the biggest driver in additional costs is distance of school from home. </p>
<p>DS had many boarding friends who live w/in a 2 hour driving radius from school. The parents visit frequently as each trip involves only a few gallons of gasoline and no hotel overnight.</p>
<p>For kids who live further away, the cost of hotels n airline tickets can be substantial for Parent Weekend events and for school breaks. </p>
<p>At the extreme end of travel costs are the int’l families. I notice that many int’l parents do not attend the Parent Weekend events. The Int’l Coordinator at DS’s school says some new freshman arrive in the U.S. w a couple of suitcases by themselves. It is just prohibitively expensive for parents to come.</p>
<p>Thanks girlgeekmom. I may end up doing that. And I’m sure financial aid officers are used to dealing with parents who have no concept of boarding school expenses so I will definitely speak up if I think we need to. For our current school we had to submit a monthly itemized budget every year w/ our FA app so that would be easy to provide if I needed to. </p>
<p>As much as I pride myself on having a clue, this is a little out of my realm of experience. For now it’s all so abstract so we’ll see what March 9/10 brings!</p>
<p>+1 to Periwinkle for posting:</p>
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<p>Is anyone else retching over tuition increases for the 2013-2014 school year? We just received the re-enrollment packet from Choate today to find that tuition/fees next year have increased 4.9%, bringing the queasy total to $51,240.00 (boarders) and $39,650.00 (day students). Choate bakes tuition refund insurance into tuition or it would be even higher.</p>
<p>I should probably post this on the Worry thread. :(</p>
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<p>Please don’t comment on how dumb that comment was. Duh. I’m chalking it up to jet lag and old age. I definitely should post the symptoms of the aging process on the Worry thread.</p>
<p>Don’t forget money for parents to travel to college weekend. ChoatieMom, how was it? :-)</p>
<p>@ChoatieMom - we’re in the throes of senior fees. Wish those were just rolled in with the tuition. And to think - in the fall we get to start all over again with college. (sigh, groan).</p>