<p>I'm wondering if the cost of coming home either for a long weekend or vacation is now becoming an issue for any of us in choosing a school.</p>
<p>My son wants to be able to come home more often than at the end of a semester so his list of college choices will have to take into consideration just how long it takes to get home and how costly it is.</p>
<p>We're in central MD and I'm wondering what geographic areas outside the mid-Atlantic we could possibly consider. Do any of your kids take trains back and forth to outlying colleges or some combination of transport? Some of these trains take at least as long as simply driving! Some airports are way more expensive to fly in and out of than other hubs. THe pinch of driving home depends on what the current price of gas is--rather volatile lately!</p>
<p>Just wondering how this aspect of going away to school is being dealt with by various families.</p>
<p>D is 600 miles away. Her airport is nearly 2 hours from school. Because of all the logistics, the time she would actually be home after traveling to and from school does not make it worth it timewise or in the "keeping up with homework" area to come home for a weekend. S is 3 hours away and quite honestly, he can get a ride home on Friday and go back early enough Sunday where it wouldn't cost him much in money or homework time. So, yes, if your child wants the option of coming home on some weekends, distance should be a consideration.</p>
<p>We're early in the search process, but we are starting to conclude that "airplane" schools will be impractical for Son. Distance and travel time really aren't the issues. It's the cost. Our savings have really taken a hit recently and we've got to look at ways to stay within a smaller budget. </p>
<p>We're also in Central Maryland (Carroll Co.) and used to use "is it near a Southwest Airlines airport?" as one way to tell if a faraway school was reasonalbe for travel purposes. It's nice having all those cheap fares out of BWI.</p>
<p>I will miss having my daughter at home at Thanksgiving this year, her first year away at college, but Christmas will come soon afterwards. Sigh. </p>
<p>I really envy my sister, whose daughter is at college 80 miles from her. Mine is 1376 miles away, and although she and I are both within 40 minutes of a major airport, there are no direct flights. Her reasons for choosing this particular college were compelling, so we are okay with the decision. And she loves just about everything about college - thank heavens she is not homesick and wanting to come home for visits. The flights are both expensive and time consuming though.</p>
<p>I hope my 14-year-old son will have an easy-to-find major and choose a closer school.</p>
<p>My freshman class is FAST learning the value of a carpool.</p>
<p>For Thanksgiving, I'm flying...bought my ticket months in advance to save money. It's an easy flight because I get to fly into Long Beach over LAX and fly JetBlue (my favorite airline). However, I have to take a shuttle to the airport and I recently found out that I can't leave my car at the shuttle pick-up point for more than 72 hours, so I had to find someone to drop me off and pick me up. Hurrah for making friends fast who can drive!</p>
<p>For Christmas, I'm driving home with 3 other girls and we're all splitting gas costs at an attempt to save some gas money.</p>
<p>My S is a soph and attends college 725 miles away in Colorado. There is an airport in the town that has direct flights to our city in Texas, but NO SW Airlines or JetBlue so it is expensive. He is (1) not coming home for Thanksgiving, (2) is driving with other kids to ski at Winter break and (3) has other plans rather than coming to our city for Spring Break. </p>
<p>Last year (which now seems to have been in a different universe due to costs and economy), he wanted to come home at Thanksgiving, but by Winter and Spring breaks he had figured out that he didn't really want to spend a lot of time with the parents doing "old" stuff.</p>
<p>I wish I had been very directive about her staying within a 2-3 hour car drive. We live in New England, so her choices would have been extensive anyway. Unfortunately she's a 10 hour car ride away, and now wishes she were closer. I bet that the financial crisis is leading a lot of people to re-think their college wish-lists. That might be a good thing. The whole process has gotten so complicated, with huge numbers of choices and variables, that having a more limited number to choose among might be a relief to the kids.</p>
<p>Besides planes, trains, and automobiles, don't forget buses.</p>
<p>If you live near a major metropolitan area and your student attends a college within a day's drive, there will often be a charter bus traveling back and forth from the college to your area for the official college breaks. Ask around. Ask on the college's Web site here on CC, for example.</p>
<p>My daughter will be coming home this weekend for Fall Break on a charter bus. She goes to an upstate NY school, and we live in the Washington DC area, almost 7 hours away by car. The price of the bus is quite reasonable, and we consider it safer than finding a ride on a campus ride board.</p>
<p>One thing to keep in mind, if Southwest Airlines is an option for you, is that they have a much better deal for frequent flier miles for college students than for anyone else. They get a free trip for every 3 or 4 they fly, so that saves a bit. When you sign them up for the "Rapid Rewards" program, you need to make sure to specify that he/she is a college student.</p>
<p>Southwest is great for college students. DD already got one free round trip last year that I let her use to visit a friend she would not otherwise have been able to visit. You could always make them use the free trip as one you don't have to pay for. With enough advance notice they are still pretty cheap, too. We book as soon as she knows her schedule. If we guess wrong they are the easiest to make a change, no penalties. She actually gets home faster than her brothers that went to school on the east coast. She flies in 3 hours, they drove in 5. So I would let "being on a direct SW route" be an OK parameter for a search.</p>
<p>Southwest is great! I fly SW for business whenever I can, and I have a SW Visa that we charge everything on (too bad they won't let us charge those tuition payments!), and I earn 3-4 free tickets every year. I've signed S2 up for his own Rapid Rewards account. I'm thinking about getting him his own SW visa, too. Every little bit helps, although he doesn't charge much now. </p>
<p>He just came home for a 4-day break. Used a free ticket. Of course, he's 1 hr from nearest SW airport and we are 2 1/2 hrs. from the nearest airport. I paid for a limo for him from the dorm to airport. His timing was too tight to be able to take public transportation, but it was still a reasonable trip home. </p>
<p>The only thing is that we weren't able to use a free ticket for Thanksgiving and because I waited too late to purchase it, the SW ticket was no cheaper than a ticket from the local airport.</p>
<p>The way the breaks are, our kid does not come home at Thanksgiving (goes to relatives who are near her college). After Thanksgiving, they have one week of classes and then exams...and then they come home for the Christmas break. It's ridiculous to fly her home and back...and then fly her home less than two weeks later. Crazy schedule!! The cost of air travel was discussed and before matriculating, she knew that trips home would only be at Christmas and at the end of the school year. Entering year three and it has not been a problem.</p>
<p>My kids both have chosen schools 5+ hours away by plane, so they are only allowed to come home for summer and Christmas breaks. For the spring break, they can go see friends & I'll let them have mileage points to buy any ticket for up to $400 (which basically lets them fly nearly anywhere in the lower 48 states). My D has friends who paid $1200 to fly from HI to MA to go to school, so flight costs are definitely something to consider.
I am glad our school lets us charge tuition payments but would be happier of tuition was lower so we could have more $ & more options. The $ from tuition is one of the ways I get the points for them to fly at spring break & visit their friends at other schools & parts of the country.
We are fortunate that a dear friend lives 30 minutes from their campus & they spend Thanksgiving with her. The 1st year, S spent Spring Break on campus because he didn't get organized early enough. Last year, he learned & planned MUCH earlier.</p>
<p>Another consideration is how difficult/costly it would be to come home for important family events--e.g., a wedding, a sibling's bar mitzvah, a grandparent's funeral. I don't want my D to be exiled from the family, so her geographic range for college selection is limited to places within a reasonable distance via train, car or bus. I can't imagine telling her she can't come home more than twice in the entire school year, and I want her to be close enough that I can visit her at least once a year without excessive cost and hassle.</p>
<p>I guess I & all my sibblings went away with the understanding that we would come home just twice/year and it worked OK for us. We were sometimes able to visit among ourselves, but we didn't count on it. My kids are OK with this and it's pretty standard for folks who live in HI. Not all that much is close via car or bus if you're not interested in flagship U or a small U. Trains don't exist in our state.</p>
<p>We were hoping our daughter would find the perfect fit for college and she did. Now into her second year, we are beyond thrilled that it turned out to be only 2 1/2 hours from home!l The local commuter train has a stop at the edge of campus which connects to the Amtrak terminal. She takes the train home a lot, and it's especially nice to not have to fight holiday or winter road conditions. (Thanksgiving especially) With gas and tolls, it's cheaper for her to take the train. On the other hand, it's easy enough to drive for a weekend, to get in a quick visit, and to help her move in/out or for an emergency. We knew we'd deal with the logistics no matter where she landed, but what a blessing now that she's close.</p>
<p>I agree with Singersmom about Southwest. My kids will fly from college ( both in Boston ) back home for Christmas, from Providence to Philly. They have to take the train from Boston to Providence, but it is cheaper than flying any airline directly from Logan.
I did it recently and it was fine..the train and bus were not really less money and takes soooo much longer</p>
<p>It is SUCH AN ADVANTAGE to be close to home. DD came home for one overnight this past weekend. She took Greyhound and the subway home. She is 3 1/2 hours away, and even though it was not top on the priority list a couple of years ago, the fact that she can come when she wants and we don't have to deal with planes and traffic is absolutely wonderful. I strongly recommend keeping that in your sights.</p>
<p>I was happy about Pittsburgh for Mathson when we went for Accepted Students weekend and flights were direct and $150 round trip. They've never been that low again! But it's still easy to fly there. It's a long drive (a good 8 hours with stops) so we just do that at the beginning and the end of the year. So far we've been able to fly him home for Thanksgiving, Christmas and Spring Break. I feel comfortable that if there were an emergency we could fly out quickly.</p>
<p>I think you have to do what works for you and your family. When I was in college some 30 years ago, my parents were in Florida and I went to school in PA. I KNEW I could only come home for Christmas and Easter. I was lucky that my future husband's family was so welcoming to me for weekends and holidays. My 3 children chose to attend college within 5 hours driving distance or 45 minute to an hour plane ride home. The first one came home about once a month, the second one came home a little less. I don't think I'll ever see the 3rd one..he doesn't even call. </p>
<p>That being said, traveling during the holiday season, for example, Thanksgiving has proven to be trying. A 4 1/2 hour drive back on a Thanksgiving weekend has turned into a 7 hour drive because of the volume of traffic and we all know what the airports are like.</p>