<p>"I only want to comment on the issue of costs to go far away to college. Parents are often NOT used to airplanes and see those distances and freak. But air travel works differently than car, shrinking the time and distance dramatically. To drive to Florida takes your family days and motels overnight, but for you to fly is a matter of hours and can be gotten at a discount."</p>
<p>However, if she goes to college that far away, depending on the parents' income and work schedules, it could be difficult or impossible for them to drive her and her belongings to college and participate in orientation activities (which now usually include activities for parents0.</p>
<p>If the colleges require incoming students to do a summer orientation well before school starts, that would be an additional cost and inconvenience.</p>
<p>Summer and times like Thanksgiving and Christmas are high seasons for people to be traveling to Florida, so it's likely airfares she will not be able to snag a low cost airfare.</p>
<p>Also, Florida is a hurricane state, and some campuses close when there are hurricanes. Students then go home. Would her parents be able to afford the extra cost of getting a last minute ticket to get her home? Would she have made friends quickly enough to be able to go home with them fall of her freshman year if a hurricane strikes then?</p>
<p>Many students who travel a distance away to college can only afford to go home for Christmas and the end of the school year. Would she be OK with that even if she had to stay on campus because her friends lived too far away for her to stay with them?</p>
<p>If she gets the grades and scores to be able to get excellent merit aid, that may sway her parents to her side, especially if she has also demonstrated a lot of maturity and good decision making in her personal life.</p>