<p>I know few examples when kids just went back to live at home.</p>
<p>My D has only applied to OOS schools, the closest being an 8-hour drive, and most > 1000 miles. She was adamant that she wanted to go far away.</p>
<p>As graduation grows closer, I sense a little softening in that stance - but maybe that is just wishful thinking on my part. At any rate, it’s too late in the game for a radical change.</p>
<p>Most traditional-aged college students attend school within easy driving distance of their parents’ home. It’s always been a minority that completely uproot themselves from family and friends to attend a school in a far-away location. I think that number rose between the time I went to school and recently, but the recession is probably going to play a part in driving down demand for the far-away school experience. For that matter, even schools that are not (or are no-longer) commuter-oriented often don’t provide much of a ‘permanent’ home environment for their students – because many of them will be back at their parents’ homes for the weekend. ‘Commuter college’ vs. full-blown expensive ivy-like experience is, among other things, a class marker. </p>
<p>Wanting something better for your kid than what you had - I think that’s a pretty common feature of parenting. At the same time, the far-away experience is not an unmixed blessing. Many 18 year olds are not really all that ready to be flung out of the nest to make their own way. Even the ones who succeed at it often do so at great cost- it’s hard to make friends, learn your way around, deal with roommates, shopping, laundry etc. and most people don’t become comfortable in their new surroundings instantaneously. </p>
<p>My oldest is at a school about 1500 miles from where we now live, and my h.s. senior is likely to be at least 500 miles away (probably more like 900). I think it will work out well for her, and it has worked out well so far for my son, but I also see why it’s not necessarily a universal good thing.</p>
<p>“Why is being farther away necessarily ‘more’?”</p>
<p>Probably because most prospective students who choose a school close to home do so in order to keep partially living their hometown life instead of fully investing themselves in college life. With about 3,000 colleges in the country, and say, a dozen within an hour of you, the odds that your ideal college would be that close would be around 250 to 1. But if the nearby college is UCLA, that reasoning shouldn’t apply. Most UCLA students would have chosen UCLA regardless of the distance.</p>
<p>When and how did the idea arise that the “best” college experience involves going to a totally unfamiliar place where you have no ties to your past life?</p>
<p>My daughter is at a college seven hours from home. As it happens, one of her closest high school friends chose the same college. They didn’t plan this; it just turned out that way. But I think it has been very nice for both of them. They have maintained their friendship, while at the same time doing very different things in terms of both academics and extracurricular activities. Next year, which will be their junior year, they are both part of a group who will be sharing an off-campus apartment. I see nothing wrong with this. Was I really supposed to tell my daughter to ditch a valued friend in order to have the “classic” college experience?</p>
<p>Similarly, a young man in our neighborhood fell in love with a university halfway across the country and was delighted to be admitted there. The university happens to be less than an hour from his grandparents’ home. The student and his grandparents did not ignore the fact that they would be near each other. Instead, the grandparents enjoyed attending some events at the university, and the student spent some of his college breaks, especially the shorter ones, at his grandparents’ home. Yes, this is not the classic totally independent college experience. But it was nice for everyone concerned. I don’t see anything wrong with this situation, either.</p>
<p>I don’t think that people have to completely cut themselves off from their past in order to grow up successfully.</p>
<p>D1 went to college 40 miles away. Freshman year she came home 4 or 5 times during the semester; she’d bring roommates to our house for dinner, which we enjoyed, and they’d all go back to the dorm at the end of the evening. Freshman year, she also asked us to bring her coats, boots, or other clothes that she left at home. Dh’s office was in the city so she would go in there and pick up her stuff and often have lunch with him. By the time D1 was a senior, we rarely saw her.</p>
<p>Having done so myself, I think that going to college within an hour of home is fine, as long as the student takes advantage of the college experience. I went to a HS which sends a number of students to a nearby ivy yearly and most students aren’t willing to turn down an acceptance because of its closeness to home. Being close has its advantages – move in and move out is much easier when you can make multiple trips; you can get off campus for a quick weekend or even a quick errand/dinner. I thought there were disadvantages too. I would have loved to look forward to moving in to a different part of the country, rather than just thinking – I have to drive 45 min down the street tomorrow to move in. I also would have loved to be able to fly home for breaks to a different part of the country with different weather/local happenings that were new to me etc., rather than being picked up by my parents or taking a commuter train that I had taken hundreds of times before. For those who enjoy being in new cities and exploring them, college can certainly be less novel if you’re in the city that was right next to you growing up. </p>
<p>Despite being so close, most students only went home a few extra weekends per semester compared to those from across the country – it’s not like they were at home every weekend and going to the local HS parties or anything. Many students actually took a much stricter position and never went home except for the standard college breaks. </p>
<p>I only knew one student personally who I thought could have benefited from going further away. He had had a very successful HS life and was very popular in our hometown, so he kept taking advantage of that comfortable situation rather than struggling a bit at college. It was a bit extreme – lived in a dorm w/ his HS best friend for all 4 yrs; home every weekend and sometimes even for dinner during the week; went home for all the prep days before exams to study there; parents expected him to attend all family events still, including cousins’ sports competitions, extended family celebrations; intermittently went back to his HS job in the hometown rather than getting a comparable job at school though many were available. At the time I envied how welcome he was back in the hometown, but I soon realized that people just viewed him as a HS student and they viewed the others who had “gone away” to school as adults.</p>
<p>Going “away” to college is more of a state of mind than a function of actual distance. When I attended Pomona, it felt like a world away from home even though it was only 30 miles. And while there, I knew several students in the dorm who were from Claremont. And even though their families lived within blocks of campus, they embraced the fact that they were “away” at college, and minimized their visits home to underscore that aspect. One of them even wrote letters home to let his folks know how he was doing!</p>
<p>I agree with the other mom who pointed out that LA is so varied by area that the Westwood//UCLA area may be very different from her home town. I think you have to take the quality of schools into considerations as well as distance (and financials.) UCLA is a place where you can make your own life, for sure. People I know who went there are big boosters and there is something to be said for the ‘connections’ to be made for Californians especially.</p>
<p>But my daughter did the big away to East Coast experience and it was terrific for her. She is so grown up, becoming a seasoned traveller. She has been accepted to grad school at UCLA, but still is interested in the away experience though, but I cross fingers it may work out. College is a pretty ideally protected environment to experience a new area, and experience life away from parents at 18.</p>