<p>No distance limits set here either. DD is across the country. She knew, when she made that selection, that she would be flown home only twice a year, and the likelihood of us coming to parents weekend was zippo (time change and travel time would make it much longer than a weekend event…never mind the cost). She (and we) is very happy with her college choice. She is going to be a senior and we just made our reservations for our SECOND trip to the college…for her graduation.</p>
<p>Not that it should stop anyone considering schools far away…Our D1 pointed it out to D2 - if she were to go to a west coast school, her life would be more likely to center around west coast. The reason is her friends would be out there and more likely to get internships out there too. I think that’s the case with D1’s college friends from west coast. Most of them stay out east during breaks, even summers, because that’s where their friends are. We are lucky we live in the NE.</p>
<p>I appreciate all the great feedback. As far as the cost of airfare and other travel expenses, we have considered that in the equation. A few of the schools have said that they would likely provide some type of non-need based merit aid since my D is out of the region, which might offset the travel costs but that is not our primary consideration. Our biggest priority is finding the right college where my D feels she will thrive and we can accept the location. I also agree that any school needs to be a direct flight away and within an hour of the local airport. </p>
<p>Like some of you that have responded, we live in Connecticut which gives us the luxury of several airports to fly in and out of in NY, NJ and CT. The one thing I find continually fascinating is the perception that my D and many of her friends have that a school along the east coast is closer than a school in the midwest, regardless of actual distance. We have flown into Cincinnati, for example, a roughly 1 hour and 45 minute flight and my D thought it was much further than flying into Charlotte, which is about 2 hours. I thought it was just my D until all her friends started agreeing. It is tough to fight perception.</p>
<p>Just for the record, I personally hope she chooses a school closer to home for many reasons but I want her to make a decision based upon how she feels she will fit into a certain school more than anything else.</p>
<p>We did not restrict the kids, but the understanding was that we would only fly them home 2x per year: Christmas and for a summer break. If they chose a school that was a day drive there and back or an Amtrak option they could come home as often as they wanted.</p>
<p>We live in California. Both daughters choice a school in NYC. Couldn’t get further away unless they crossed an ocean. n I see one for 2 weeks in the summer, thanksgiving, christmas and spring break. About 5weeks. Her life is there, her “home” is here. My other daughter leaves in 4 weeks. Knowing her, her life will be there as well. </p>
<p>i never expected my kids to always live near us, the parental units. I moved away. my husband moved from europe to america when he was twenty. Its not a bad or sad thing at all. </p>
<p>My oldest only applied to ONE California school, and one oregon school. The second only applied to east coast schools. NYC was calling. And they couldn’t be happier. So the flight takes a day. Its okay. it is what it is. </p>
<p>Both my daughters are not at all worried about only coming home for a few breaks.</p>
<p>“Don’t forget to add the cost of shuttle/bus/taxi from airport.”</p>
<p>We luck out on that expense. Our daughter’s school provides free transportation via shuttle bus for students to the local airport/train station/bus station at the start and end of all scheduled break periods.</p>
<p>It is funny about distances. I knew someone from NY who wouldn’t send their kid to college in Maine, but Buffalo was no problem it never occured to them that Buffalo was further away.</p>
<p>I was pleasantly surprised at how easy it is to fly to Pittsburgh, but the summer thing worked out so that son is in California! (with many classmates) :eek:</p>
<p>We never gave distance a thought. We live in the Midwest and I always assumed that my son would go to the University that is 40 minutes away. Instead, he wanted an urban experience and narrowed the field to schools far away. He will be attending Columbia so a direct, two hour flight will get us there or bring him home fairly reasonable and the reward of the experience of living in NYC will far outweigh the cost [both financially and emotionally]</p>
<p>S was looking at some grad programs. There was one that was not easily accessible either by train or plane, though in actual mileage, it was not that far away. Both in terms of travel time (including changing from one mode of transport to another) and cost, it was practically as long as his direct flight to LA and more expensive! My trip to Chicago a couple of months earlier took less time but was nearly twice as expensive. It pays to investigate and not rely on distance alone.</p>
<p>I’m feeling fortunate that my S2 – who did a high school year abroad in France – decided on his own that his geographic parameters are east coast north to Boston, south to DC and south of I-90! We are in Connecticut.</p>
<p>Planning visits in the next few weeks to NYU, BU, and GWU … and then we are done looking!</p>
<p>Our West Coast D went to an East Coast school where a change of planes was necessary to reach. Shrug. Was never a consideration. She went where the fit was best and none of us ever looked back. </p>
<p>Were the travel logistics sometimes annoying? Yes. Requiring more planning? Yes. More expensive? Yes. And so?</p>
<p>I think being able to drive to one’s offspring’s college is one of the most over-rated criteria I see mentioned. </p>
<p>We actually had an informal rule: no school within 200 miles. With your shield or upon it.</p>
<p>Was good prep. She’s now working on the East coast. Good chance grad school will be there when it comes. We deal.</p>
<p>She’s coming home for 10 days in a couple of weeks. <glyph of=“” snoopy’s=“” “happy=”" happy"=“” dance=“”> But knowing that she’s where she needs to be to do what she wants to do makes it all worthwhile.</glyph></p>
<p>I think it depends on the kid</p>
<p>Oldest cousin went 10 hours from home
His brother goes to school in Scotland.
Sister is two hours away</p>
<p>I want to be at least 10 hours away…my sister wants to be within two</p>
<p>We got out a map, drew a 300 mile diameter circle with our hometown at the center, and told S1 that he had to pick a school outside the circle. He’s happily 2500 miles away and didn’t even look at a college within 1000 miles from home.</p>
<p>There are definite drawbacks in having a child go to school that is not within a few hours driving distance. We, too, have had occassions when we wanted to get there very quickly. When you are restricted by air schedules and sheer distance, there is no way that you can get there as fast as you can to a place where you can hop in your own car and drive. </p>
<p>Having said that, my current freshman is at a school where we need to transfer flights or drive 90 miles from the nearest direct flight airport to access. He loves it there, and we took the chance, though, yes, it was an issue we discussed. If it were not clearly his first choice, he probably would not be there.</p>
<p>So, yes, it is a factor. It costs more, takes more time, puts you at the mercy of plane schedules, etc. How much of a factor depends on your family and student. Many, many kids end up going away for a term, a year, even farther as one poster writes (child in Australia).</p>
<p>We as parents did not stipulate a distance limit but did, with the kids, discuss aspects of location. Among those was whether they would want to be flying home for Thanksgiving break. D decided she wanted to be able to come and go without spending time in airports at hectic travel times, and ended up in a school in New England a five-plus hour drive from our Mid-Atlantic home. She came home (generally by train) only when the dorms closed. </p>
<p>Son ended up, mainly because his fit criteria limited his search, just under 100 miles from our home. He wanted a small liberal arts school that offered a stong engineering program and there was one school in particular that fit his needs very well, and was his clear first choice. It happened to be within two hours of where we live. All the other schools he applied to were much further away – several further than where D went. Frankly, I saw the location of his top choice as a very mixed blessing and told him that if he went there, we did not want to see him home other than for school breaks. “Make the most of being THERE!” was our mantra.</p>
<p>It has turned out great. Son has never expressed an interest in coming home for a weekend other than when the school is on break. He is heavily involved in his school activities and has really bonded with the campus and the community. </p>
<p>One bonus is that H and I can attend his music performances on campus with no hassle. Another bonus is that S can get together with some college friends who are from the region during the summer. (D knew no students from our area at her college so her friends were all at a distance; she never saw them during the summers.) H and I feel more connected to S’s college experience than we were to D’s. Neither kid’s school had a spring break that coincided with Easter. D would spend Easter on campus and so did S, but we as a family were able to travel to S’s campus and spend just Easter day with him – attended an on-campus service, went out to dinner in town. </p>
<p>So we feel that we are getting the best of both worlds with S’s location.</p>
<p>My son definitely is in a very different community from where we live. His roommate freshman year was born in Hong Kong and his sophomore roommate was born in Guyana, so it is not like he isn’t having his horizons broadened. </p>
<p>Anyhow, I do think the “gotta go to another side of the country” push *can *be an arbitrary and artificial standard. Fine if that choice works for a family, but I do not at all feel it is appropriate to suggest that it is *automatically *a superior choice. Just like you shouldn’t necessarily rule out a school because of significant distance, IMO you shouldn’t rule out a school simply because it happens to be fairly convenient.</p>
<p>I think everyone’s comfort level is different…some want to place restrictions based on the drive time , others ease of other transportation modes. For me , it was easy…I was perfectly happy with the choices of my two college girls since it is a easy flight away and not all that bad a drive ( though we fly them or me more often than drive )
My neice wants to attend a college that is in a remote area that gets hammered by snow…no airport nearby , don’t know about buses. I think it is about a 7 hour drive, weather permitting. I would’ve had a much bigger problem with that than the situation we have</p>
<p>Does anyone fear that if their kid goes to a college far away from home, that the kid will be more likely to end up living permanently far away?</p>
<p>^^No fear. Counting on it.^^</p>
<p>I agree with what someone above said about non-stop vs other kinds of air travel. Our kid goes to college across the country. There are no non-stop flights from her nearby airport to our nearby airport. So what! It’s a long trip anyway…a layover at an airport isn’t that big of a deal (and sometimes saves money when making those reservations). DD knows that she will be spending a whole day traveling when she comes home. BUT you know…when we drove only two hours away to get her brother, it was still an all day ordeal (except it involved a parent…not just the kid traveling). To be honest, it’s a lot nicer and easier for US to just pick DD up at the airport. DS did take the bus…but the bus stations are not all that close to where we live…it was almost (ALMOST) easier to just make the drive to Boston.</p>
<p>We have already made DD’s airline reservations for Thanksgiving and Christmas…and for her annual summer trip home which is actually next week. For Thanksgiving she is only taking a shuttle to another part of CA…but even those prices have doubled since 2006 when she was a freshman. Her Christmas trip is $450 round trip vs $299 when she was a freshman. AND there are far fewer flight choices than when she first enrolled. If your child goes far from home…just start looking for airfares early especially if they have to travel on a busy holiday weekend (what are schools thinking of that they have classes beginning Jan 4…kid have to travel on an EXPENSIVE holiday weekend to get back…so stupid…why couldn’t classes start on Wednesday!!).</p>
<p>But this is a family decision. Some families and kids are more comfortable going afar…others closer.</p>
<p>Definitely depends solely on kid. </p>
<p>DD went to school 60 miles from home, but because of horrible metro traffic and traffic within Manhattan it took two hours to get to her dorm.</p>
<p>Sounds too close? Maybe for some. But she enjoyed having us take her to lunch when she was stressed.</p>
<p>She was not overly dependent. She went to school in London and will be returning for a year, which is okay too.</p>
<p>She liked seeing all the relatives in Manhattan (I don’t.)</p>
<p>S went to a school four hours away by car. I liked being able to visit him in one day round trip if I felt like it.</p>
<p>I guess some would think we were overly involved. We are a close family. We were able to see him in King Lear (did not have the title role) and singing Carmina Burana and the St. Matthew’s Passion (high points of my life.)</p>
<p>However, if either of them had elected to go to the left coast or anywhere in between that would have been okay, too.</p>
<p>Every situation has its pluses and minuses.</p>