OP said the rules were being changed and asked how decisions were made. I answered.
Deletedā¦because I was responding to an off topic post.
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To answer the original question for both of my kids, my wife and I were passengers in their process. For D1-- she took a flyer and applied to 1 school. For D2 she was weighing offers from several and we made it clear that we could make the math work at all of them. Beyond that it was her call. We were not the ones that were going to spend 4 years living with the consquences of the choice
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For us it was a joint decision. I am not spending $320k on a mistaken choice.
One of mine was convinced NYC was perfect for her. Absolutely no adult who knew her well, and who knew NYC, thought so. Her perspective on the city ( where I had lived as a young adult) was formed from a few brief visits organized and financed by us, which were not particularly representative of NYC college life. As parents we vetoed it rather than allow her to make an expensive mistake which we would pay for. Years later, she concurs that an urban education would not have been a good fit.
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We worked with our kids in terms of choosing where to apply. Fortunately, they chose schools that we were in full agreement with. I have to say, they did a good job of vetting schools before they sent applications.
Once the applications were sent, the decision about where to matriculate was up to them. We had already agreed on the college choices and the costs to attend.
I will add that neither of our kids chose the least costly option, and like the OP, one of our kids got a HUGE scholarship to a school to which she was accepted. But like I said, we had the discussion about costs before applications were sent, and we did not say that they needed to follow the money. Both kids really chose their colleges well.
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OP didnāt change the rules midstream. They always said cost was a factor. But even if they didnāt, they get to change their minds based on the new information theyāve been given. It sounds like they thought theyād have several ~$30k-$36k/year schools to choose from. What theyāve learned is that the delta is $34k, not $6k. The responsible behavior to model is to gather the new information, reassess, and come to a decision based on all the facts they didnāt have at application time.
OP, my first degree was in broadcasting. Nobody I worked with earned more based on the name of their school. I have a relative who still works in one of the countryās largest markets. Itās tough to get a staff (full-time with benefits) job. There are a lot of daily hires (part-time, short-term, with no benefits positions). The people who are hired all earn the same amount. Where they got their degrees doesnāt affect that at all. A lot of the staff they know came from state schools.
If you donāt tie up all your money in tuition for undergrad that will make it easier to help fund summer internships. If your child changes their major (as many do) they wonāt be tied to an expensive school, and you may be able to help with grad school if they end up wanting to go that route. It sounds like heās got several good choices. I would take the more expensive schools off the table.
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No, they didnāt say cost was a factor and the lowest-priced school won. They said, this is the budget. They ran the NPCs and let the kid visit. Iām not saying that a Florida school isnāt the best choice and yes, cost should be considered, but the higher price school shouldnāt be off the table because another school came in a lot lower. This isnāt like a parent lost a job or there was some sort of financial catastrophe. The means are there and the kids got accepted to a school in budget.
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They reassessed based upon new information. I would hope we all would do so as we learn more about the options.
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Yes, and I noted that with my daughter, that would happen in her situation as well. What I wouldnāt say is sorry, all your other schools are off the table because you got a full-tuition scholarship. Saved money could be beneficial for grad school etc., but the fit and education and experience may be better at a more expensive school that we can afford.
Cheapest isnāt always best.
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They reassessed bcuz they didnāt know the bottom would be near free. Then they saw $150k in difference that could use to support their lives. But as OP said they could swing itā¦with sacrifice.
Sounds like UNF is close to home. That would save on transport at holidays. Lots of benefits.
But your son isnāt motivated. Where can he thrive ? Can he thrive if u r close and he comes home etc.
Does Hofstra have an accepted student day with possible overnight visit ? I know many on here say itās a suitcase school. So that might impact a decisionā¦ie u want to be with others every day, not just 5 days.
Do both have a college radio and tv station ? Are there opportunities for everyone if they do ?
Not an easy call. Well it could be. If you decide the $$ are too large , explain it. He may be sad today but he will totally get it in 10 years. U can show him the messages people are writing about costs and the outcomes from the major.
I went to Syracuse for BJ. My dad handled the $$ fine as he could afford and I enjoyed my time but always wished in retrospect that I went to a cheaper public school and saved him some dough. I worked at espn for 9 months on a 70+ hr a week job, paid for 40 and have been in the business world sinceā¦including an mba. Btw it took me a year after I interviewed to get that ācontractā job at espn. I worked in a Vegas casino sports book during that year. A bj degree is near useless if u donāt make it (hence the double major requirementā¦I did historyā¦hence I got into sales bcuz with a history degree the options are limited too). But 30 years later itās worked out. Hofstra, btw, requires a minor in the liberal arts with journalism. Not sure about UNF.
I think youāll come to the right decision for u. And Iām still hopeful USF comes through. Sounds like youād choose it. I wouldnāt dismiss Hofstra without a solid review. It may be the right school for your son, especially if he can build upon his faculty relationship. But the cost at UNF certainly has to be evaluatedā¦and congrats to him on those offers. Maybe they will excite him to get his game on academically !!
Also look at the classes required. Hofstra has BJ with applicable classes. Does the curriculum at UNF ? On a cursory look it doesnāt appear to although they have āmulti mediaā journalism. You may trace the major to ensure it meets his needs.
Good luck.
I think the OP isnāt being fair to her son to say he isnāt motivated. If he got a full Bright Futures award, heās motivated.
I was walking with my journalism friend today and mentioned this thread. She was an editor and reporter for a daily for 20+ years, won a Pulitzer, taught at a journalism school and now works for public radio producing a daily show. She said Hofstra is not worth the difference but said Syracuse would be worth it if heās aiming for on-air positions. She said nothing behind the scenes makes much money. A women she helped get a job in the top newsroom in our city still makes under $50k after 5 years and works a lot of nights and weekends.
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I thought the same - that if he got the $2K total cost heās doing something right. But letās face it - thereās a lot of grade inflation and perhaps he doesnāt have rigor. Iāll trust the parents assessment. But I also think - for some kids - going away vs. being close to home - that can bring a new drive. Hence I asked - where can he thrive?
Also, having a relationship with the Dean may (or may not) come with some benefits - and as heās asked for students to place by those with ties to the school (and that does happen), he can refer this specific student if the relationship is strong.
Unless they qualify for aid, Syracuse will be, even with merit, at least $25K more if those $40K more.
I canāt speak for today - but the amount of āsuccessesā from the school vs. the overall population is minimal. Yes, they place well across the airwaves - but the batting average still isnāt high.
But if $36K is borderline too much - unfortunately SU isnāt going to be in range.
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Bottom line: I drove a lot in the beginning (freshman, sophomore, and most of junior years) and am now about to back off completely
In the beginning of high school, I did it all. He was extremely averse to talking about college. High school and his classes stressed him out. Even as he began to have major success and it began to look like heād have his pick of excellent colleges, he still refused to discuss it. So I sat down with him and helped him pick his classes. He picked the classes that aligned with his interests (comp sci and engineering) and I made sure he had the other classes he had to have in order to get into the best schools for him. I knew him well enough to know what types of schools would not be good for him (large schools with huge classes and little ability to get to know his professors) and what would be good for him (small classes, a rich club life, ability to make friends (with some scaffolding. DS has Aspergers.) And, of course, the school needed to be excellent for his interests. Pretty early on I zeroed in on Cal Poly SLO and Cal Poly Pomona over all of the UCs and larger CSUs.
Occasionally I felt funny wondering if I was making the right decisions without his input. But he wouldnāt talk about it. We had a SLO visit scheduled for late March 2020, but instead, the state shut down. Iād been hoping that visit would get him excited and thinking about what he wanted. Instead, we got a bunch of quarantine and stress that had him thinking less about college than ever. Luckily, he continued to do well in school.
Finally, late in his Junior year, he started asking me some questions about Berkeley vs UCSD vs SLO vs CPP. I asked him what his top three priorities were. He told me tennis courts (I told him all of the schools had tennis courts), small classes where he could get to know the teachers, and he wanted a social life. I was really relieved because after our discussion he chose SLO as his #1 and CPP as his #2.
Just a couple of days ago DS sat through the Kellog Honors College (CPPās honors college) presentation and fell in love. The one drawback to CPP was that itās more of a commuter school than SLO. But honors college would take away a lot of the potential negatives to that and replace them with a lot of positives. DS has a good chance of getting into SLO (a reach, because SLO is a reach for almost everyone, but still a good chance), but Iām not sure if heād manage to get into the honors college. I donāt know if heāll get into the CPP honors college, but I assume the odds are a bit better.
Right now DS is really enthusiastic about CPP with the Honors College. We donāt know about SLO yet, but we have a visit scheduled for 3/4 (he still hasnāt gone to campus yet. We did CPP in person in December). Weāre at the point where this decision will be all DSās. I feel like I set him up to have what he needed to get in where he wants, but he is the one who excelled in the math, engineering, and Comp Sci classes to show he has the aptitude to do whatever he wants. Both CPP and SLO are excellent schools. Now he just has to decide where he sees himself having the best experience. And that one I canāt tell him.
Heās grown so much in the last few years. I feel like heād have floundered if I hadnāt set up the structure early on and kept him on track. If left to his own devices heād probably have skipped taking Spanish altogether or only done a year to two when 3 years is pretty much the bare minimum for a lot of schools. He wouldnāt have taken an art class since his graduation requirements would have accepted 1 year of a language as an art. Those were the things I made him do. And he didnāt know the graduation requirements enough to know I was having him do things that werenāt required for graduation. I also encouraged him to take AP Physics. He hated me for a bit there, but everything turned out well in the end. Now heās actually grateful and is seeing how many more options he has than a lot of his non-studious friends. Heās super proud of himself.
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Weather isnāt a reason to pay/borrow ~$150,000. Are there other children whose college costs have to be considered? Would taking PLUS loans impact your retirement?
It might help to lay out the major requirements for each school so he can compare programs. When one of my children was considering broadcasting we looked for programs with media ethics, broadcast law, a decent amount of production and editing courses, statistics, writing, and a decent variety of electives to round out the major. See what each school offers and lay out a tentative 8 semester plan. Ask the departments which courses are the most popular and which, if any, are difficult to get into.
A lot of students change their major (mine switched to computer science). If your son changes his, does the school have a broad range of others to choose from? Would they be worth the amount youāll have to pay? You might be willing to significantly cut your lifestyle and borrow to fund ~$150k for Hofstraās broadcasting degree, but would you be happy doing that for a different major?
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Families need to set realistic expectations for their kids. Early in the process. Waiting for merit raises the kids expectations. Been there done that. We had to tell my daughter her number 1 was out. She went to her number 2 on half merit. Her number 1 would not of been her best choice looking back. If he goes local then you will also have funds for other things like study abroad etc Iwould assume? Talk about the positives.
I didnāt read this thread but if he has lack of motivation to study etc have you ruled out Adhd or the like? To me this is the biggest factor. To get tested before college to see if there is an underlying issue and to go where he will be supported so he can be successful wherever he lands.
Good Luck.
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We laid out the rules, helped them discover some schools, took them to visit (auditions in my daughters case) and let the decision be up to them. The rules included financial issues and both of our kids are different. One was likely headed to a lucrative field (and did) while the other is a performing artist. For her, we thought it was important to graduate with no debt and to have no pressure to earn expense money while in school which would require a less expensive college (than her brotherās).
For S, we asked him to present us with his final choices and ultimate decision (and why). He chose the expensive one which had ramifications for him. He had to take out the 27k of student loans over the 4 yrs. He had to work summers and during school to fund his entertainment (i.e. beer money and pizza). His other options would have been free (to him) but he justified the expense and effort and we were fine with that. Was a great decision as it worked out very well, had an awesome experience, landed a great job, etc. Now he has to pay off the loans but should easily handle that within 2 or 3 yrs.
D chose a great program for her (city life, conservatory style, quality training) that fell in a certain price range after scholarships. She turned down her ādream schoolā (the one she had been talking about since she was much younger) as it is one of the most expensive in the country even after artistic scholarships. It just didnāt make sense to pay that type of money for an opportunity to receive great training that would still lead to a very unstable financial future. In her world, itās ultimately about the talent, not where(of if) you attended college.
Everyoneās situation is different. However, I believe in setting parameters that include financial limits and letting them get very engaged.
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I heavily influenced the decision about where D20 should apply, in that I was crystal clear from day 1 about what the budget was. Once she had acceptances in hand, I did not offer an opinion unless asked. Because all of her choices were affordable (within budget), I did not try to steer her toward the most affordable option.
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I would ask your son to do some research on Hofstra. Specifically, I would want to know what the internships are, and what jobs recent graduates have. Being āin communicationsā is not enough information for me. A lot of kids here went to expensive state and private schools and got jobs āin communications.ā They ended up doing telephone work for Yelp. Yes itās a perfectly good job, but it doesnāt require a degree from Hofstraā¦with loans (and most of the grads I know quit).
My daughterās friend was a double major in journalism and political science. She interned at well known cable news networks and works in DC. I think the major is fine, but I would want to make sure he has the drive and environment to get there.
My husband was a broadcast journalism major at an average school, and never did any kind of work that remotely resembled his major. Coincidently, there is at least one well known broadcaster who attended the same school.
You gave the green light for Hofstra so it should remain on the tableā¦for now. I would not allow him to attend unless he can produce some very good data- and weather doesnāt count. If attending Hofstra requires parent loans or hardshipā¦ I would tell him no. Personally, I would not send my child to Hofstra unless they were in a program such as BS/MD, direct entry PA etcā¦or if I had very strong evidence that broadcast journalism majors lead to jobs in the field. The numbers noted above (41% ? in communications) do not impress me and I would want to know why those numbers are low. They seem too low for a school that is reportedly ? strong in this field.
What is Hofstra giving him that a Fla school will not (snow doesnāt count)? And will you need loans?
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If he gets into USF the St. Petersburg campus is about 5000 students right on the Bay. This may be a better fits a smaller campus compared to other state schools. ( Same degree regardless of Campus)
New College of Florida is a state LAC small about 800 students right on Sarasota Bay if you are looking for a LAC