My daughter been working part time and paying her own cell phone bill since she was 15. Why would working part time in college be harder than that. I think working and going to school teaches them time management and work life balance. And paying for things like their cell phones and books teaches them about fiances.
Maybe because, at least in some situations, that’s the only way to make college affordable. Even with the modest origination fee, I think that subsidized loans can be a pretty good deal, if upfront money is tight.
“Skin in the game” is all about getting the kid out of the nest successfully. We spend all these years putting a lot of our own skin into the game, and it would be a shame to push too hard and be the cause of a crash out of the nest instead of a successful soar.
I agree that it’s not necessarily the same push needed for every kid.
We’ve told our kids that we are able/willing to cover (roughly) tuition and fees to our local university and they can commute. Earning merit scholarships allows them to have more options. Being able to work at a job and earn more options would be fine too.
Kid #1 earned some full-tuition merit scholarships, and chose an OOS private school. Her skin in the game after that has been keeping that scholarship. As it became clear that keeping the scholarship was manageable, she has taken a job and begun to pay for some of her own expenses, is applying for RA position to cover her own room and board, looking for a summer internship, etc. She has been willing and even eager to do this. The financial responsibility is slowly transferring to her. We had a talk before she left home for college about options if she was unsuccessful at keeping that scholarship—come home, commute to local U to finish college. That was the skin in the game for her. We would support her but there were realistic limits.
Kid #2 is in the application process now and has earned similar choices as kid #1.
Kid #3 is a freshman in high school, has observed how those good grades have paid off for his siblings, and is beginning to set his own goals. The talk with him is about keeping his own options open by doing as well as he is capable of in school. We can’t magically afford any school he wants without scholarships. That’s just the facts.
If I had a kid that couldn’t earn the merit scholarships, just didn’t have the grades but was a hard worker, the choices might be narrower, but our willingness to offer support would be the same. For a kid who hadn’t worked hard in high school I would be inclined to set clear expectations for grades, at the local university, or even community college at first. Kids who aren’t willing to work at earning a college degree can work at a job until they change their mind about school.
I never understood why a fear of all loans is a good thing.
OP, I agree on skin in the game but that skin varies by student. My older D received a full tuition scholarship. Her skin in the game was keeping it while we paid for room and board. My younger D could have received the same scholarship but wanted to attend a different school with a lower amount. She had to take out some loans for her part while we paid room and board plus some. My S will probably go to a local U (who knows that the prices will be like in three years). We’ll see what the budget will allow at that time.
@itsgettingreal17 , great point. My D has worked 10,000 times harder in high school than I ever did, and because of that she has already been awarded scholarships, the highest of which is $80,000. It will take her at least a few years post grad to earn that kind of money. I also definitely think all kids should have some kind of job while in college. I did, and it was manageable. My job paid for my books and car insurance, which I needed to get to school. If my parents had required me to pay my own tuition, there is no way I could have gone to college, even though I attended the local state university. I simply didn’t earn enough money as a waitress/day care assistant, etc… If the OP can’t afford to send his child to college, that makes for a different story, but it seems that OPs stance is that his child should pay tuition because it is an adult responsibility.
@BelknapPoint A student taking out student loans because it’s necessary is quite different than a parent requiring a student to take out loans merely so they “have skin in the game.” I was talking about the latter. My daughter understands what a gift a debt free education is. She doesn’t need loans to appreciate that. And she’s worked all through high school, pays for her car insurance (and saved up for her car), and most of her discretionary spending. Student loans wont teach her anything I haven’t already instilled.
My daughter wanted to go to a school that costs more than I had budgeted. I told her she needed to take out a gov’t loan (that’s the $27K over 4 years). I thought that was plenty of motivation for her. Luckily, I was able to cover the rest and all is good. So I think a little skin in the game is good, but alot my not help (and may hurt).
I think a lot depends on the student involved. My oldest does not need to have skin in the game to appreciate her education and take advantage of her opportunities. My middle child, on the other hand, wouldn’t appreciate a college education we were providing. That’s why she’s not in college - she doesn’t want to be and we’re not going to push her until she’s ready and will take advantage of the opportunity. I had total skin in the game back when I went to college. At least it was reasonably possible to do it all on your own back then - I really don’t think it is anymore - but I missed out on a lot of opportunities and experiences because I couldn’t afford them or I didn’t have time because I was always working. That’s not what I want for my kids. It would not be reasonable for me to expect my kids to pay their own tuition and fees. Our state flagship is over $20,000 a year, in-state, for tuition and fees alone. That’s too much to expect a student to pay, IMO. They could go to community college and then transfer, but if I could afford to pay the tuition at the state flagship, why make them take that route?
@mjrube94
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I never understood the “skin in the game” argument. Assuming (as most kids on here seem to be) that the child is a strong, serious student, why would they need to pay for school themselves in order to incent them to do well? They didn’t have “skin in the game” in high school, yet got good grades and scores, were involved in activities, etc.
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I understand your viewpoint, but there’s some other considerations:
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when kids are in high school, parents are still around often keeping things in line…curfews, etc.
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when kids are in college, all the distractions and no parental supervision can get the best of them. We’ve seen tippy top students “go off the rails” once they don’t have any supervision. I’ve personally seen one student totally blow his parents’ tuition money for 2 semesters, when he had been an A student in high school. There are many similar stories here on CC.
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high school is usually free, unless the student is attending private, so any troubles don’t end up costing most people tons of money.
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kids often underestimate the sacrifice parents make when spending a good % of income/assets on their college education.
But there is a huge difference between a student’s paying for
Thanks for all of the replies.
I was curious to see the reactions of various people. Although my post said that my kids would be responsible for tuition that doesn’t necessarily have to be their “skin”. But I do think it is a good place to start. My rational for paying for room and board is that if they still lived at home I would pay for those costs (obviously not as high). Those costs also seem to be somewhat universal around the country since those costs are usually anywhere from $10k to $14k per year. The tuition is where the real costs are and hence where the lesson could/should be.
Lets face it private schools throw a lot of “merit” scholarships out there. They really are not scholarships but more like coupons. A full tution scholarship is a really merit scholarship. If tuition is $35K and the school gives you $35K then you “earned” a scholarship and you must keep up the GPA requirements. That is some “skin”. But these $15k scholarships where tuition is $35K is really a coupon dropping the price to $20K. Is this scholarship really “skin”? It depends but I think in most cases no hence they should have some financial skin in the game. If they did then maybe this society would think twice about taking out all of these loans to pay for college.
$27K in Federal loans is still a lot of $$$ but I look at it like buying a car. Is it smart to take out a 10 year loan for a car? No. Then why take out a 10 year loan to pay for college? Pay it off in 4 years like a car loan. It is a much better investment than a new car and I have no problem with my kids staying home four more years after to college to pay it off if that would help them.
I purposely didn’t post my entire situation because I wanted to see how people would respond. IMO some people have it correct…it depends on the student and their situation. My son is going to a state school. He made that decision because of the costs. I just feel that every college student should have some financial interest in their college education. It is a life lesson.
I have spoken to many of my son’s friends in the past two months and a majority of them don’t really understand the ramifications of a $100,000 COA for four years of college. It is really scary. Many of them aren’t worried about it because their parents will pay for it. I just think it is a wrong message.
My son’s “skin in the game” was a frank discussion that he should only look at colleges that offered merit aid that (with or without BF) would cover tuition. Luckily he is capable of doing so. Otherwise, he would have to live at home and commute to our flagship as debt is not a wise option given the economy.
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Lets face it private schools throw a lot of “merit” scholarships out there. They really are not scholarships but more like coupons. A full tution scholarship is a really merit scholarship. If tuition is $35K and the school gives you $35K then you “earned” a scholarship and you must keep up the GPA requirements. That is some “skin”. But these $15k scholarships where tuition is $35K is really a coupon dropping the price to $20K. Is this scholarship really “skin”? It depends but I think in most cases no hence they should have some financial skin in the game. If they did then maybe this society would think twice about taking out all of these loans to pay for college.
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Private tuition is often more than $35k these days…
Even with a $10k-15k “coupon”, where is your child going to come up with $20k per year???
Don’t get me wrong, I understand that you don’t want to pay $100k+ for each child, but I think you need a BETTER strategy…
Tell your kids that you’ll pay $10k-$15k per year which can be used towards their school costs.
Then tell them it’s their responsibility to come up with the difference using: summer job, part-time school year job, co-op, $5k per year student loan…AND VERY LARGE merit scholarship (like full tuition merit or nearly full tuition).
I don’t see how another strategy really would work unless they commuted from home.
School costs are:
Tuition
School fees
Course fees (these are like lab fees that get charge for nearly ALL classes these days…and can be an add’l $200-700+ a semester!)
books
dorm
meal plan
Flex dollars/Dining Dollars
Look those all over and figure out what amount you will pay “per year”.
Help each child find appropriate schools with huge merit for THEIR stats.
As I’ve posted elsewhere, my kids are eligible for full tuition remission at any school in the state of Maryland system. This is a result of DH working for the system for 26 years. They grew up knowing that this was our main contribution to their education; if they want a different school, they will need plenty of scholarships! They also knew up-front that their goal was to cover room and board via merit. We would cover fees and books. We also pay for cell phone, transportation to our home in the Midwest, car, insurance, and gas.
D1 is a student at UMBC with a merit scholarship large enough that she pays for everything school-related. She works summers for spending money. D2 has different interests and may look farther afield. If she comes close to our goal, we’ll help get her the rest of the way.
As with an earlier poster, our experience was that my DH, who had his education handed to him, crashed and burned. I know that’s not true of every child but it was a serious concern for one of ours. (The other one would buckle down and do her personal best if the world were falling down around her!)
Everyone’s situation is different, and I’m sure there are plenty of CC folks who wouldn’t agree about how we’ve handled ours. I do have to say, though, that expecting a student to cover all tuition, unless they are an outstanding scholar, is no longer a reasonable OR feasible expectation.
The parents of your son’s friends could work with them on the ramifications of a $100k COA.
I went to school with someone who, it turned out, was rich. Not just average ‘parents can afford to be full pay’ but really, really rich. We never knew it. She was going to school OOS, she had a car (although it was a Dodge and nothing fancy), she seemed to have enough money to go on a weekend trip or home for spring break, but so did I and I was poor. It didn’t seem to keep her from being a serious student. After graduation we happened to live in the same town, and she had a really nice condo, much nicer than the rest of us had on beginner’s salaries. She had a job, she paid for her living expenses, but clearly there was family money buying her condo. I don’t think she would have learned to be more financially responsible if she’d had to have a student job or live in a cheaper apartment. It wasn’t her real world to have to live like I lived because she was going to inherit a lot of money someday. A lot of money.
My kids are invested in their college educations because they know there is not endless money. They chose smartly to begin with, not picking colleges we couldn’t afford. One has scholarships and her investment is keeping them and she works really hard to do that. The other has to work a job that has a paycheck. We are trying to keep any loans to a minimum as I don’t think they’ll learn financial responsibility by just borrowing to have skin in the game.
That’s what I was thinking…so they get a discount, but how’s an 18 year old supposed to find 80k or so in 4 years if his or her parents aren’t able to manage it?
@itsgettingreal17 wrote
Same here, and I agree. We have X amount of dollars saved for her (and her sister). Her “skin” is covering the gap between what we’ve saved and what she can get in scholarships. We won’t saddle our kids with debt-it goes against everything we’ve taught them growing up. So at most she can obligate herself to whatever the loan amt is they allow the kids without us signing.
It is looking like this means she’ll be a very bright kid at a medium ok school, but I’m thinking if she’s around a lot of other bright kids at an ok school who are debt-averse, that might be a good tribe to be in.
Sounds like you are trying to justify your stance OP, and it seems that most people who have responded think you are being a little draconian. Surely if you want to be fairer, can’t your kids pay the room and board and you pay tution? You really want your children to start their adult lives saddled with debt just because you think its a good life lesson? College is insanely expensive compared to to 80’s when I was there, and even then it was a big expense. A small amount of debt is fine. We plan on having our kids take out the guaranteed loan of 5k a year, so that they will be motivated to get jobs to pay it back. But even room and board at many colleges is about 12k a year. Your kid finishes college with 48k in debt? As an adult, I remember knowing a colleague who, even in her late thirties, was still paying college loans. She had no kids, but did have a mortgage. She was always struggling.
What is your point about merit scholarships? If your kids must finance their own educations, they must do well enough in high school to get full rides, or very large scholarships. If they are not able to do that, they must go into debt because you want to teach them a lesson. Are any of your kids learning disabled? I hope not. My son is, it is unlikely he will be offered merit scholarships like his sister has been. It seems to me that you are trying to prove a point to your kids, but they aren’t going to get that point. Instead, they may well struggle and feel stressed throughout college and their early careers, then realize one day that you could have helped a lot more, but chose not to. I just think that is wrong.
Why?
R&B for one of my kids is $14k per year, and it’s not in a high COL area (I think they overcharge by a lot). For my other child it is about $8000/yr, because she lives in a sorority house. That is a big difference.
I think a better plan for the OP would be to set a budget for each kid and then talk about the different choices, why going to State U is a better than Big Private, but may not be as good as small LAC with the coupon merit scholarship. If the student picks a school with a r&b cost $6k less than a sibling, shouldn’t that student get to use that money for tuition if the family can afford it? Even setting a budget amount might require some adjustments. If you set a budget of $20k when student is a sophomore in HS, that might not be a realistic amount in 3 years when starting college or when student doesn’t get the expected scholarship, or when costs at the state school increase by 5% per year. Or, for the younger sibling who doesn’t start school for 6 years.
If there was a magic formula we’d all use it.