<p>Here is my dilemma: I have 2 kids both college age. One is a junior, one is a freshman. The agreement for college was that they do 2 years of community college first, then transfer. I simply cannot afford 2 away at college at the same time. I had to take a pay cut at my job last year after two years of no raises, health and car insurance premiums have doubled on top of many other things. Same situation many of us face. Any money we had set aside has vanished due to job losses and medical issues. Our EFC is 22,000 a year split between the 2 kids. Best I can do is about $10,000 between the two. My kids are average students so no merit awards. When it came time for my son to register for community college he just kept putting it off until I finally came to the realization that he hated the thought of going there. I thought we came up with a plan that works for all. He could go to a nearby public university and save money by commuting and staying home. He was all onboard at first, but now says it does not feel like college that he feels like he is just a visitor there. I don't think he wants to return next semester. All we do is argue and he just says he hates living at home and just wants to be gone. I am not sure how much he is loving going to college. He says he wants to live on campus, but I think it is more because he just wants to move out, than that he really wants to be in school. He has yelled at me and told me I signed him up for college without asking him. What advice can you offer? Should he sit a semester out and work full time? He loves his money and hates not having a lot of money. He would take money any day over going to school I know. He has no patience to realize an education will take him much further down the road than the immediate gratification of a little more money. I feel incredibly guilty for not being able to provide more for his education. Due to financial difficulties I can not get a parent loan either. I don't want him to be maxed out on student loans either. Any advice would be greatly appreciated.</p>
<p>What is your son doing on campus beyond his classes? It might be time for him to explore clubs or activities so that he can meet other students and start to feel connected.</p>
<p>I agree with Silicon…your son needs to explore other things happening ON campus. He shouldn’t have to feel that he has to come home immediately after classes end. Joining clubs that are of interest is an excellent idea.</p>
<p>Our kids were very aware what we expected post high school. They did NOT have to go to college, but if they chose not to for any reason, we excepted them to have a full time job AND contribute to the household expenses. This included any expenses associated with using one of our family cars. </p>
<p>What does your son plan to do if he does NOT return to college next term? If he really doesn’t go back, he needs to have an alternate plan of what he DOES plan to do. </p>
<p>Hopefully as he becomes more involved with oncampus activities, he will feel more involved with the school. He should check…maybe there is actually something for commuters.</p>
<p>marid - You do not need to be feeling guilty. If your son is not ready and doesn’t want to be there and would rather get a job, let him. Hopefully, he can come to his own decision about the need for a college degree. I would make him finish the semester and move forward from there. My brother started college and then decided he’d rather work. He spent a year welding submarines and realized that was not what he wanted to do as an adult. He went back to school, finished, got his CPA and has his own very successful accounting business. Your son may just need time to mature and decide on what he wants for his future.</p>
<p>ETA: I agree with thumper1 that your son should be expected “to have a full time job AND contribute to the household expenses.”</p>
<p>First: You have nothing to be ashamed of. Your son may wish you had more money, but you are obviously doing your best for your children. You have no need to apologize for not going hugely into debt to finance your son’s education.</p>
<p>Your younger son wishes he could go away to school, live on campus, and have his parents pay for all of it. That’s nice. I wish for world peace-- doesn’t mean I’ll get it. </p>
<p>Since your son is not invested in going to college right now, you would be wasting your money sending him. I think you should take him up on his desire to work full time. Let him work full time and let him pay you rent until he can afford to move. If he has a car let him pay for gas, car payments and insurance. Explain that you are willing to invest in his education if he is willing to work, but if he wants to be an adult with a fulltime job he will have to act like an adult with a fulltime job. </p>
<p>At a later date, he may be ready for college; at that time, you can figure out how much you can afford to contribute.</p>
<p>My sister has a son attending community college and she gives him enough money for him to share an apartment with others to defray costs. That might be an option for your family. Your son could also get a part-time job to further defray costs.</p>
<p>Last night I was at my son’s apartment on campus and it was very noisy. Lots of kids walking around, hanging around, on roofs. They looked like they were having fun going to and fro and otherwise socializing. This was until 2:00 AM. Nothing rowdy that I saw and very little overt drinking. That’s something that you really don’t get at community college though living on your own in a college area can give you the feel.</p>
<p>It seems there is no point pushing him to go to college if he doesn’t want to right now and is eager to go to work. I would just encourage him to finish this semester with decent grades so he has those credits under his belt in case he changes his mind, which is very possible, after a year or two.
CC is filled with stories of kids (particularly sons) who were just not ready for the academic commitment of college at 18, but many find that motivation after a break, or working for a while and growing up.</p>
<p>We went through this with one of my older boys. He goofed off in HS and then balked at applying to a few of the public colleges here close to our home. He decided he wasn’t ready to leave home and go to college and wanted to get a job instead. He actually moved into a apartment with some friends and was working at a construction company. It lasted exactly 1 year before he decided he hated it and went back to school at our local CC. He has just transfered to out in state public as a computer engineer major. I worried day and night about this kid. He is now 24 and finally getting it all together.</p>
<p>My family was in the same situation, and the option to commute to a university was not available to me, in our family it is community college or nothing and you are on your own after that. I was extremely bitter about it for my first semester or two. Living at home felt extremely degrading, and I felt like I was being forced to stay a high school kid while all my friends got to grow up. I felt IMMENSELY left out when everyone was talking about where they were going to school at the end of senior year, and especially when everyone went on and on about how awesome their dorms were and I was still stuck at home. I felt cheated and lied to and like I’d worked as hard as I could in college for nothing, and commuting is extremely hard on your social prospects so that is frustrating to begin with. I blamed my parents for everything I was feeling since they were the ones with the checkbook and they had to be the bad guy and tell me that it was CC or nothing.</p>
<p>But before too long, I matured and I grew out of it. I realized that I was not entitled to an education on my parents dollar, that my parents were doing the best they could and were very generous to provide me a community college education and a car to borrow to get to classes. I was lucky that I had even that. And I stopped complaining. I still hated my years as a commuter community college student and I do not look back on them fondly, but they go by very quickly. Two years is nothing. And the opportunity to go to a real university instead of a community college can really make all the difference, and you even went so far as to give him that. Don’t let your son make you feel guilty. You should never be made to feel guilty for doing the best you could with what you had, you are not the one that brought the economy down and you are providing your children an education. Your S will realize that in time. Right now he is very upset and not mature enough to deal with his emotions with much grace. That will change soon. You had to be the bearer of bad news about your financial situation with your S and so he is blaming you and you are blaming yourself, but the way things are right now is not your fault. It just is what it is, as with many families in this day and age.</p>
<p>Thanks for the words of encouragement so far. He does work a job which pays for his gas to and from school, his loving of eating out and any other expenses he incurs. He won’t give the job up because he really likes to have extra money. He is terrible at saving though. So the job fills in for the extra time that he is not in school. He had wanted to join a fraternity until I told him he was paying for the costs. That was okay with him but he would not have had time for it so he decided not to. He was a late bloomer, and late to mature. I am fine with him taking a semester off, working or even moving out if he wants too. But, if he does quit school next semester he will work full-time and pay rent. When he sees how his friends are moving on in school maybe he will grow up and make a plan. I will keep you posted!</p>
<p>I think I’d sit down with him and explain that you’d love to give him everything he wants, but that you don’t have it to give. Ask him to talk with you about some solutions to what is obviously a problem for him. There are alternatives—he can continue at school and live at home, which he hates, or leave school and go to work, and save money to move out. He may be able to come up with another alternative- working part time, going to school part time and living with several room mates, perhaps? I don’t know what will work financially or what would give him the sense of independence he wants, but getting him to come up with what is workable, within your budget, is the way I’d approach it. In no way would I put up with being yelled at- and I’d make that very clear.</p>
<p>Put the power and responsibility in his hands. You know what you can afford. That part is not negotiable. It’s up to him to make his life work with the support you are able to provide , one way or another. </p>
<p>And please don’t feel guilty. He has been given a perfectly good opportunity to get a college education without debt, yet he doesn’t want it right now. That’s really ok. But it’s certainly not your fault that you can only provide a ride on the education train in Coach instead of First Class. The end point is the same. Many of us (me included) took that coach ride and did just fine.</p>
<p>College isn’t for everyone. If he wants to push it aside, let him do so. Just make sure he understands that you won’t be financing his sleeping on the couch and playing video games all day.</p>
<p>marid</p>
<p>Only you know what rules you want to set, but I’d caution to choose your words carefully and explain your reasoning.</p>
<p>If I were him, I would not understand my parents willingness to pay R&B just because I was in school. This may come across as punishment to him. I’d suggest giving him at least a semester before charging rent or an agreement that he pays you a set amount and you put a side a portion for him to save up for a down payment on a place of his own. This would allow him time to find a full time job.</p>
<p>No need to feel guilty – many of us are in your situation.</p>
<p>^^I agree. I understand the reasoning for paying rent, but I’d probably not do that if he is saving up for his own place, he had a full time job, and he wasn’t spending money carelessly. I get the sense that he would save up quickly to earn the way to his own place. If that doesn’t seem to be happening within a reasonable time frame, then I would talk about contributing to the household by paying rent.
While he’s living at home I’d certainly have him keep up his regular chores, though, even if he’s working full-time. It’s part of life.<br>
(and if he doesn’t have regular chores, give him some)</p>
<p>Please don’t beat yourself up! There are quite a few young people who would love to live away from Mom and Dad but still have Mom and Dad cover their expenses. College is the way that many young people achieve that! If your son doesn’t want to go to the college that you can afford, I think it would be great for him to work full-time.</p>
<p>That will give him time to mature a little, to figure out better what he would like to study, where he wants to go, and how he can afford it. As a wise poster here once said, “You can’t push a rope.”</p>
<p>If he wants to try working, let him. Perhaps he will find something he loves. Or perhaps it won’t take more than a couple years to realize that he’d get a lot further if he had an education. Just make sure that if he’s working, he’s paying his fare share of expenses - rent, car insurance, cell phone bill, etc. Actually you said he’s dying to move out - well if he gets a job, he can move out.</p>
<p>My brother managed to fail out of 2 colleges and rack up a bunch of student loans with nothing to show for it. He didn’t pay the loans and it ruined his credit rating (and eventually his wages were garnished so he DID pay them). It’s 20 years later and he realizes now that his life would be a lot easier if he had knuckled down and gotten an education. He has a very labor-intensive job, outdoors in all kinds of weather. With a wife and a mortgage he’s kind of stuck. Hopefully your son will realize his choices a lot sooner than my brother, but part of my brother’s problem was that (with the best of intentions) my parents continually bailed him out of his problems. If he’d truly had to support himself at an early age, he’d have come to his senses a lot sooner.</p>
<p>I would personally advise against having him try out a job, because more often than not I’ve found that my friends who decide to “take off a year” end up simply not going back to school at all. Now more than ever, I think that the most important thing to have going into the work force is a college degree - any college degree. It opens up an exponential amount of increased opportunities. </p>
<p>That’s just my opinion.</p>
<p>^I hear what you’re saying. My sister got married when she was 18 or 19, her husband was “taking a year off” at the time. But then he had to work full time to support himself and still find time and money for school. Ten years and five kids later he’s still working on that bachelors degree, and living in complete poverty. His bosses have begged him to just get a degree, any degree, because he is getting passed up for promotions he is otherwise overqualified for because they can’t give the position to someone without a degree.</p>
<p>But at the same time my sister, his wife, DID go straight to school, effed around, flunked out, and damaged her relationship with the family-- ten years later and she is still paying student loans with no degree to show for them. While going straight to school while you have the chance to do so before life gets in the way is ideal, I’m not sure if it’s worth it if the kid isn’t committed.</p>
<p>Definitely true. But I think its better to at least take a shot at a degree than to never try at all. I mean, if you screw around and don’t get a degree that’s on you, but I feel like that is a worst case scenario. I think that most kids today realize the importance of a college degree these days and won’t screw around. I’ll admit, it’s never black and white, and a tough choice to make.</p>
<p>As far as the idea of going into the workforce and hopefully trying out a job or career that he may love, I think it makes more sense to try an internship or co-op to try out a job rather than just ditch school altogether. Right now I’m on an internship that I love, but I’m happy that I have school to go back to and keep my options open.</p>
<p>Perhaps he might be more suited to learning a trade through a vocational-technical school? Those are the jobs that won’t be outsourced as much and he’d be able to have a clear occupational goal in mind.</p>