<p>Has anyone noticed how the books, travel and misc. charges add up to about $3500 for next year? Are these actually what they say they are i.e. misc, books and travel? How is this money disbursed to the student from loans? For example say we borrow in excess of the tuition, room and board so we can cover these misc. expenses.. when loan is disbursed to the school how does D get the excess back to buy her books, etc? That would be about $3500 that should go back to D correct?</p>
<p>I think it varies widely from person to person depending on how you shop for books (buy used online? all from the bookstore?), what classes you are taking (some don't require books at all, others have books that cost $200 or more), how you travel (are you willing to drive 10 hours or will you fly? do you have frequent flyer miles to use up?), how much do you spend on miscellaneous stuff? If you love to shop and go out to eat, you will be spending more. In all honesty, I have no idea how much I've spent on all of these things. I once started to add up what I'd spent on books alone, but then I felt faint and had to stop. J/k, kind of.</p>
<p>I don't know anything about how they gve back the extra money - maybe call the fin aid office and ask?</p>
<p>jenskate: we are just going to take out the full amount and then next year we should be better able to tell what she REALLY needs.. D is pretty frugal. She would also like to get a job if she can on campus - but not first semester.. are there a lot of jobs available on campus? I read somewhere that there were. She works full time in the summer and hopefully will have some money put away for spending when she gets to campus.</p>
<p>It does seem that there are quite a few jobs on campus - some that never get filled. Books can be bought online, borrowed, etc. to save money. My DD spent less than the Rice budget on books last year, but I think it depends on major. We found it worked well that we paid the Rice bill - tuition/room/board minus scholarships and needbased financial aid. DD pays anything else - personal expenses, books, transportation home (she chips in for gas, only lives 3 hours away!) etc. Rice lists her student contribution from summer work and assets to be about equal to the Rice budget for books/personal expenses so it works out perfectly. She's pretty frugal, and has found that Houston has good thrift stores, cheap ethnic food, etc.</p>
<p>Thanks anxiousmom! That was helpful. I think maybe that is what we will do. We can just cover misc expenses as they come up.</p>
<p>Here is the link for campus job postings - most of these are for the summer, but that will change as the school year approaches.</p>