<p>Oops…I meant to write…</p>
<p>UTenn is only going to give you aid for tuition, R&B, and books…not for personal expenses and transportation. So you need to compare apples with apples.</p>
<p>Personal expenses are the daily and misc expenses that college kids experience…these can be about $3k-5k per year, depending on the student. UTenn isn’t including any of that in the pledge/promise or whatever it’s called.</p>
<p>Even if UTenn is only 2 hours away, you will have transportation expenses. My younger son is 2 1/2 hours away…because he’s not too far away, he comes home a bit more often than my older son who is much further away. So, lots of gas. Will you have a car on campus? If so, then there will be parking lot expense, car insurance, etc.</p>
<p>“Personal expenses is everything else: clothes, laundry, pizza, comic books, notebooks, printer ink, paper, etc. How much do you spend now for this kind of thing?”</p>
<p>yes to those things and more…however, I don’t know if asking how much you currently spend on those kinds of things will get the right answer. Neither of my kids spent much in high school…however, college is very different…you’re living away…constantly with friend who are constantly inviting you to things…many kids don’t use their meal plans on weekends…college kids can spend 50-100 in a weekend going off campus to eat.</p>
<p>BTW…check out what each school’s meal plan covers in their COAs…many meal plans in the COAs are not covering 21 meals per week…some only cover school days, so kids have to use pocket money for weekend meals and snacks.</p>