<p>"51 percent of American college students decided this year to live at home"</p>
<p>That's an amazing statistic. Should we believe it?</p>
<p>Students</a> choosing Mom's house instead of Animal House : page all - NorthJersey.com</p>
<p>I expect it is higher than that because all evidence indicates that more students commute than live on campus. I’d file it under “not news”.</p>
<p>My kids all preferred to live at home and commute to life in the dorms. They liked the ‘dramaless’ environment and home cooking.</p>
<p>Maybe it’s because an increasing number of students are going to community college first?</p>
<p>I know that I was stunned at the statistic in our area that over half of grads from one of our high schools were going to CC. And we don’t live in a working class area.</p>
<p>Simple economics, I think–a lot of families can’t afford the total COA and going to college locally and living at home is one way of getting that degree as inexpensively as possible.</p>
<p>Around here most kids live on campus. I don’t know of any students who attend 4 year colleges that live at home. Our kids are required to live on campus for at least 2 years, preferably all 4. There is a lot to be learned through that drama, etc. that translates into the business world!</p>
<p>Many kids around here commute and live it home. It’s both for economic reasons and because they want to get away from the dorm scene.</p>
<p>I have a good friend whose son has actually come home and he is transferring to a school close to home so that he can commute. The partying just wasn’t working out for him - not that he wasn’t having fun, it was just “too much” all the time and he wants to get away from it all and focus on other things.</p>
<p>We are seeing a few kids preparing to transfer back to schools close to home, and in a few cases, money isn’t the issue. In two cases, dorm life is proving to be rather unappealing. One male and one female have come to the conclusion that sharing a room, lack of cable and video game surround sound, cafeteria food and strange people do not compare to mom’s coking, queen-size beds, familiar friends and access to their cars is preferable. In our state the degree will still say Purdue whether the campus is in West Lafayette or Gary and a bad roommate or lack of a car has taken its toll.</p>
<p>Dorming and mom’s house aren’t the only options. I remember living in an off campus apartment for less money than a dorm, sharing a bathroom with only one other person, and learning to cook. It was a great learning experience.</p>
<p>I live at home. It just made more sense for me because too much of my day-to-day life involved stuff in my hometown (which, for the record, isn’t really a “small town”). When I began college, I had an active leadership role in a community organization that required me to be readily available, plus I had work both semesters. I still work (no longer involved with the community organization–where some people had a hard time understanding that their organization had any impact on my college/social life), and I still commute. Sometimes, the drive is a challenge, but it’s worth it to drive to and from campus than to find myself returning to campus at scary hours. </p>
<p>And yes, this does imply that socializing isn’t the easiest thing when you commute for work/family reasons.</p>
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<p>Why would it not be believable? Most college students attend the local community college or local state university, so, for those who just graduated high school, living with the parents is an obvious choice.</p>
<p>On the other hand, it may be surprising to many on these forums, as these forums are a bubble of students aspiring to HYPSM or looking to go away to some perfect fit college somewhere.</p>
<p>Not surprising around here - thousands of kids are choosing a couple of years at Community College to save money. Also, a surprising number in the state flagship moving back home after one semester in the dorms to save money. It’s the economy. Kids will give up “Animal House” to prevent the build up of excessive student debt.</p>
<p>Some of these kids just sound spoiled. Some have legit reasons though</p>
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<p>My first reaction is one of surprise but I live in a bubble where there is an expectation kids will “go away” to college. However after layering in part-time students, community college students, and students who attend local state schools the stat does not look that surprising.</p>
<p>Like many of these articles/lead comments giving one isolated statistic is near useless for any reasonable discussion. How about showing the historical numbers for this stat since WWII? (which would give us some perspective of if this number is unusual or not)? Or better yet how about historical trends of the sub-groups? (part-time, CC, commute to state U, and commute to private). I know it’s not as fun or headline grabbing to provide contextual data but it certainly leads to more informed and accurate discussions.</p>