<p>Are you absolutely certain that it is more expensive? My guy’s prospective college allows merit scholarship to be use for study abroad and there are ALOT of scholarships available for study abroad. It looks like it will likely be cheaper when he studies abroad. Study aboard US should not be more expensive. You simply travel to another state for that.</p>
<p>I’m not sure; I’ll definitely look more into it, but I believe it’s too late to do that for the next semester. </p>
<p>A couple of suggestions. First, things may still settle down for her where she is. </p>
<p>Second, it may be good to investigate a couple of potential transfer options in the mean time.</p>
<p>Third, within practical constraints, it is important to allow the student to control the college decision. Every student is going to have bad days. When those inevitable days come, they will tend to show much more resilience if it is at the school that they chose. If you force them to go to a school, then when there are problems, they will expect you to fix them. That will not be good.</p>
<p>Forth, it is good that you and she are talking. Try to keep that dialogue going. Clear, two way communication with an 18 year old is no small feat, but is very helpful to everyone.</p>
<p><<every student="" is="" going="" to="" have="" bad="" days.="" when="" those="" inevitable="" days="" come,="" they="" will="" tend="" show="" much="" more="" resilience="" if="" it="" at="" the="" school="" that="" chose.="" you="" force="" them="" go="" a="" school,="" then="" there="" are="" problems,="" expect="" fix="" them.="" not="" be="" good.="">> </every></p>
<p>This is so true. Glad @much2learn said this. This is exactly what I told my daughter when she was abound in unhappiness in her first year: “this is the school you chose, so try to like it or figure out how to transfer”. We left all of this in her hands. She needed to find out if her generous merit scholarship could or would be matched by another institution. If no, then she needed to figure out the incremental costs and if it really was worth it to take on debt etc. In the end, she realized the amazing opportunity for an education at a top ranked university was sitting right in her lap and she decided to stay and change her attitude. It’s amazing what a fresh outlook can do for you. Negative thoughts can really bring you down. Focus on the positive and things should work out. The grass is not always greener.</p>
<p>@Ellen94, I saw this alluded to earlier, but want to make sure you understand that colleges like Smith and Mount Holyoke are “meets full need” and are actually VERY affordable to lower income students. In fact, MHC is far less expensive for my daughter than UMass or UMaine (our home state) would have been. </p>
<p>Also, I believe (could be wrong) they just introduced an even bigger incentive plan of financial aid for local students. I’d encourage her to take a class at MHC this spring if at all possible, and see if she likes the atmosphere, keep her grades stellar, and maybe apply for next year. My D loves it there! (And she really disliked UMass when we visited, and has stopped accompanying her friends to parties there because she doesn’t like the culture there.)</p>
<p>U Mass is a very, very different campus experience from MHC, Smith, Amherst and Hampshire. Huge, impersonal, party/frat/sports-oriented. MHC is small, has a gorgeous campus and great sense of community, supportive environment, small classes with lots of personal attention from professors, intellectual environment. She should check it out 
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<p>Her GPA and SAT are within the range, though on the lower end, for MHC, I think, and if she’s done well in her classes at UMAss I think she’d have a shot at least.</p>
<p>It seems like cost is the main concern for your daughter. I think that you would have been able to get the most money from a private LAC. Going public was likely more expensive. Privates can give more money to give for a good student like your daughter. If it turns out that she has lost this opportunity, to make the most of the situation at UMass, I would: have her apply to the UMass Honors College if she is not in. It will be a little more expensive but she should get better, quieter housing and preference for enrollment. I’m surprised she was not offered that. Could have made all the difference. She should be prepared to take advantage of the 5 colleges next year with the lunchtime tip. Look to study aboard (in the US or international) her junior year. Don’t shut down her ideas because you are worried about money until you have the facts in hand. She can also look for a great group for living off campus.</p>
<p>It’s probably going to be hurtful for her to see how involved you are with her brother’s college process and he is looking at nice looking private colleges in contrast. (He should not expect a good deal unless he is a good student). Maybe her brother could ask for her help with the college process. It might take some of the sting out of the situation if they are close and she probably had to learn a lot having to go through it alone.</p>
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<p>To some extent, OP reminds me of several high school classmates’ parents who assumed public universities are the best financial deals and that “all colleges are the same” and thus, confined my classmates to attending the local public colleges even though they were horrid academic/social fits for them. </p>
<p>This was further illustrated when said classmates grew so frustrated after one to two years at the local public colleges that they transferred to private colleges like Reed and Columbia with near/full FA/scholarship packages and found the latter colleges a much better academic/social fit for them. </p>
<p>In my personal case, it turned out my private LAC after a near-full ride was less expensive than attending my local public college even when accounting for travel costs due to distance. Considering the local public colleges when I was graduating HS was almost all commuters and basically “13th grade” for students at the very bottom of their respective graduating regular HS classes, much less the public magnet I attended, it was no contest for me or most classmates back then. </p>
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<p>I have an older cousin who attended/graduated UMass-Amherst in the mid-late '80s. The party/frat/sports/alcohol atmosphere was much worse back then and was the reason why the campus got the “Zoo Mass” nickname. </p>
<p>Despite grinning and bearing it as the oldest of several siblings, his experience was such none of his younger sibs considered UMass-Amherst and ended up attending private colleges on scholarships/FA. And he was an honors student in a dorm filled with honors students. Didn’t help with the prevailing wild party hearty campus culture which disagreed with him. </p>
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<p>This is a YMMV as some siblings in such situations may actually feel more resentment over being asked to provide help to siblings they feel are already much more favored by the parent to the point of getting more than they did. </p>
<p>I dated a woman who is still embittered about not being allowed to attend the exam public magnet I attended after scoring high enough to be offered admission because “You’re a girl and it’s too far away”. </p>
<p>When it was her younger brother’s turn to consider high schools, he was allowed to attend a lower ranking exam public magnet in my city which made things worse between them*. </p>
<p>Especially considering he left that exam public magnet after a week because he couldn’t handle the academic workload/pressure. I can completely sympathize with her perspective as from having interacted with her family, she was a far more academically engaged and stronger student than her younger brother and yet, the family discouraged her and encouraged a less suited younger brother when it came to attending exam high schools. </p>
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<li>He didn’t score high enough to be offered admission to my public magnet</li>
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<p>My older daughter paid the same amount of money per year to our state school, where she lived at home, as she did at Worcester Polytechnic, which is a very pricey private school, living on campus. </p>
<p>We’ll have to apply again and see how financial aid pans out; I’m hoping that we can both find something we’re happy with. </p>
<p>If I was your daughter I’d be furious with you. You don’t seem to want to listen to what anybody says, and you forced her into a bad choice. I suggest you set a budget of what you are willing to pay, and let her work within that. She seems much more on the ball.</p>
<p>When you got the financial aid offers after she accepted admission to UMass, were any of them the same cost or less than UMass? She really should call the colleges she had been accepted to which offered good aid. She should also visit them. What more do YOU need to be “happy” with a school other than it being affordable? Your daughter is the one who will be attending and it’s her happiness which counts as she’s the one who will be working hard to get a good education and needs to find a college which meets her needs. She’ll always be your daughter no matter how many miles may be between you. Support her.</p>
<p>@Ellen94 There are a lot of very experienced parents here who are trying to be helpful, but I am afraid that all of this advice probably seems more than a bit confusing to you.</p>
<p>If you can tell us what the situation is now, what you and your daughter are planning to do for next steps, and what questions you still have, we may be able to be more helpful.</p>
<p>I completely understand that you are doing your best to support your daughter, but that this situation is difficult and unfamiliar to you. How can we help?</p>
<p>You certainly don’t have to share, but it would seem to me that part of this battle is over you for some reason wanting her in arms reach. </p>
<p>Much2learn says it well - how can we help?? Or have we helped??</p>
<p>Ellen’s daughter has come home several weekends already. It may be the case that Ellen knows her daughter and knows that she needs to be close enough to come home some weekends. Daughter says she wants to be in a big city, but several of the schools she’s interested in are not urban schools at all. Daughter is unhappy, but that is not all Ellen’s fault. I know a lot of parents who ‘made’ their kids go to the state school because the parent knows best. Even if some of the private schools do cost less, they still might not be the best for this student, this family, because there are economic factors that are hidden at some schools.</p>
<p>I think the OP doesn’t want daughter to switch schools and again be unhappy, and that is a good goal to have as a parent. OP has received a lot of good advice, especially to encourage (and make sure) her daughter takes one or two classes at Smith or MHC next semester. Something. Anything. Just to see what other schools are like, to experience a small school. My daughter who wanted a small school is thriving at a bigger one, and is happy she has so many choices. She just registered this morning for spring, and it was no big deal that one class was full as there are others and she still needs a lot of core classes. Can’t take history at 9? Take it at 11. Can’t get into the English class? Take speech as it is also required. There are good things about small schools, but there are also negatives and not having multiple sections of each class is one.</p>
<p>There is a unique opportunity at UMass to have the best of both a large school and small, and even a variety in the small schools. I liked Smith, but felt it was too small for my daughter especially for 4 years. On the other hand, I loved Amherst. I would have loved to have 5 colleges to pick classes from but my daughter doesn’t care as one math class is the same as another. OP should sit down with her daughter, talk about what she likes and doesn’t like about UMass, and what she hopes to find at another school. Salem State is close to Boston, but not IN Boston (20 miles?). I bet the students rarely go into Boston to just hang out. </p>
<p>I do want her close to home, not necessarily so she can come home but so I can visit her. She would be very happy in California or Oregon; I feel that if she was at a school she was happy at, she’d be coming home less often, as she doesn’t come home to see us but to get away from UMass. </p>
<p>The next steps are going to be touring, calling some of the schools she applied to and seeing if we can get the financial aid offers back, and continuing to look for schools. </p>
<p>Separation and letting go are hard. It’s a good sign that you miss your daughter, but it’s also good to recognize that this is playing a factor in where you’re willing to have her attend. I think that if she was happier at school that your relationship would actually improve as right now she’s unhappy and blaming you for her being at a school she didn’t want to go to from the beginning. I would think that no matter how much she loves a school she attends she’d still want to go home for breaks. Unless she’s already lived in California or Oregon and visited colleges there, there’s no way to know if she’d be happy there. But finding a school which fits doesn’t mean having to go to the west coast. There are so many colleges within just a few hours of where she is now.</p>
<p>Your next steps look good. Spend lots of time listening to her this Thanksgiving break. When she can come up with a list of some things she’s looking for in a college, you can both post here and get lots of great suggestions. She’ll enjoy researching colleges and touring them with you.</p>
<p>I was a party last night and someone said that children are like pancakes. The first one is a little burnt around the edges but by the time you get to the third it’s perfect. Sending kids to college is a learning process for everyone even parents that have been to college because things have changed so much. Come back if you have questions especially about financial strategies. There are many people on CC who can suggest good local schools with great aid.</p>
<p>Coming home for weekends is common in the fall of freshman year and often lets up once they settle in.</p>
<p>I still wonder if there isn’t a way to make UMass work. Why was your daughter so against it in the first place? UMass has a variety of dorm communities: can she switch? Can she get a used car so she can enjoy the area more?</p>
<p>It is so so common to be unhappy in the first semester. I just wonder if she is unwilling to give up a prejudice based on her original lack of choice.</p>
<p>UMass was the first absolute no on our college tour. I was surprised how much we didn’t like it but it made me stressed and depressed. I found it impersonal, unclean and chaotic. I think it is a polarizing place because I know people who loved it. I don’t know why this young woman is not allowed to have opinions or have her opinions valued. Why should she have to stay at a place she does not like? A place they had never even visited especially in light of the fact that other colleges she did like were going to be a comparable cost. The daughter does have a car that she pays for. What is next in her life? An arranged marriage?</p>
<p>Gearmom,she seems to share the same feelings you do about the campus, but I’d be more likely to believe her if she wasn’t so dramatic each time she called. I understand she’s far from happy, but it can’t be as bad as she says it is. </p>