@whataboutcollege ugh. I hear you there. Tuition increases is 2.5%, but room and board is quite a bit higher as he’s upgrading to a suite. Overall increase is 4% which is what I budgeted for and yes, the extra funds help!
@eandesmom Hope your son is able to find a job that suits him better. Congratulations on the OOS grant! D17 didn’t get her $1,000 alumni scholarship renewed either.
@michiganbuckeye Wow, I’m in awe of 2 calculus courses over the summer!
After a 4 day 2,000 mile drive (1 day of which was spent at Yellowstone NP) DH moved D17 into her dorm this morning and is flying home tonight, having left D17’s car with her. She had to go back 3 days early for outdoor programs leader training, so her 2 roommates won’t be moving in until this weekend. I thought saying goodbye for sophomore year would be easier, and in some ways it was, but I’ve still felt pretty blue about it ever since they left on Saturday. I’m happy for her, I’m just finding letting go to be harder than I ever imagined.
Just moved D17 into her apartment. We had a lot of fun shopping for essentials and setting up her room. We exchanged a long hug goodbye. I am excited for her but will miss her, too. I know I’ll see her in a few short weeks when I go for a reunion planning committee meeting. It will be great to see my friends and visit with her too.
@michiganbuckeye My Dd had a similar experience this summer. Her advisor gave her horrible advice and told her she should take 400 level accounting class through a specific online program. The course was nothing more than an 800 page textbook divided into assignments and exams. No support. No lectures. Nothing. She basically taught herself the textbook. She did that plus worked all summer. She got to class yesterday and the course she took online didn’t even cover everything she needed in a prereq. 
She is annoyed. Now, she needs to teach herself whatever she didn’t learn this summer.
On the positive side, she loves her apt and her roommates and her entire living situation. She also has an accounting internship at a local firm for the academic yr.
Perfectly describes DS’s summer on-line linear algebra course.
D17 flew back to school by herself this morning. A seemingly long summer made her icthy to get back. She is moving into a sorority house and will start the first classes in her major this semester. She took one of my suits ( no longer fit me) with her. Imagining her interviewing in an official navy blue suit for professional jobs/interns feels a little unreal. Hoping for a great sophomore year!!!
S17 flew back yesterday. I am not sure what it entails, but he is a team leader for freshman orientation. Classes don’t start until the Thursday after Labor Day. He was excited to get back to campus, which makes the good-byes for me much easier.
S17 flew back yesterday as well, moving in today and classes start tomorrow!
S17 moooved in Friday morning but is spending the weekend home since we are only 30 minute drive away (shorter without traffic.) He is on the 8th floor in a nicely renovated Jester West hall. He will go back after dinner today. His classes start Wednesday. Fortunately, he was cleared off waitlists and got all the classes he wanted - microeconomics, probability theory, programming, and another math towards Math with Actuarial science major.
Quarters are so different! S17 just got home last night from his summer research. He has a month of being at home before he goes back! His classes don’t start until October 2. He visited us a couple weekends over summer, but it will be nice to see him for an extended time.
He loved his research project and got great feedback on his work from his mentors. He especially loved being at JPL and working with the planetary scientists there.
Sounds just like the multivariable course he look while in HS from a remote community college. It was one of those access code math classes.
@Ynotgo - Yes, the quarter system seems to make both the academic year and the summer seem longer (in a good way). D is on her way back from her 9-week long internship in Wash DC. While her regular classes don’t begin until the end of September (the 24th), she’ll only be home for a week before heading up to Oregon to spend 3 weeks at a theatre festival (a 2-unit special seminar for sophomores). It’s hard to believe that everyone is heading back to school already!
My D goes back on the 9/8. She hasn’t been doing anything except sleep and watch TV after her internship ended 3 weeks ago or so. She made her boyfriend send her a hand written letter which he did at the beginning of the summer and she never returned the favor even with all the free time.
She now plans to Concentrate (major) in Astrophysics instead of Neuroscience though she can still get a Neuro certificate and do her Senior Research in it if she decides to go to grad school in Neuro - kind of hedging her bets. She’ll probably know by the Fall as she’s taking an Astro class in Research Methods which includes a mock proposal for the future James Webb Space Telescope (Hubble replacement). Apparently some people love it and some hate it.
D received an invitation to join Tau Beta Pi. Is this something worthwhile?
@whataboutcollege Definitely! Congrats to her!
@whataboutcollege Yep, it’s a legitimate engineering honor society. I joined way back in the day (Michigan Alpha Chapter)…
@chercheur @MSU88CHEng Thank you!!! D said she will go to the meeting and find out more. Way back when ( in business school) I dismissed an offer ( forgot which society) due to the fee involved 
Now that summer jobs are winding down, our focus is starting to change towards back to school in a few weeks. S17 worked nearly full-time and had jury duty, so that has kept him busy. We’re hoping he can maintain the momentum he had freshman year. This will be S15’s last year, so there will probably be a lot of changes by next June. We will be moving the boys in on consecutive days in a few weeks, so we’ll get to enjoy lots of LA traffic. Ugh
S17 went back 2 weeks. Oldest son and his gf took him up. He’s with the same roommate and is in a really nice suite.
He’s been thinking about dropping down from the BFA to the BA but that would required finding a minor and he can’t find one at his school he’s interested in pursuing. He loves his school and doesn’t want to transfer, but the art based classes are killing him. He loves the theater and is doing well in the lighting stuff so we shall see. The good thing about being at a SUNY is that I am not going to be plunged into bankruptcy if he needs to take an extra semester or even year to figure out what he wants to do and I have told him so. Beyond that, he will have to take out loans or work and save up, but I can manage 5 years.
He got a job a few hours a week for spending money. Over the summer, he took his required gen ed math class at CC (he’s dyscalculic but earned an A!) and had an internship with a film company. The owner liked him so much he actually paid him at the end of the summer.
@whataboutcollege , I believe the fee is still there. D didn’t want to join because of the fee and time commitment. The incentive is that they have past tests for almost all engineering subjects 
Hi to all the fellow parents! As most of your kids are back to school, hope they have a great start of the school year! For those who hasn’t started school, enjoy the last days of summer holiday!
I am a little anxious about Florence’s path. Dd has a car and I am hoping the U will cancel classes early enough for Dd to leave without getting snarled in evacuee traffic. Her internship gave her a huge project due by next Monday. I told her to forget the internship. No way I want her staying if a cat 3 is hitting the area. We lived outside of Columbia when Hugo went through and it was awful. No power for 3 weeks, trees down everywhere…