<p>OP wrote:
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<p>Could you please provide your supporting data that “many parents do not want to discuss finances with their kids”? Whenever there is a new comer to the forum, I think one of the first advuise given is “talk to your senior about how much could you afford”. </p>
<p>We talked to both our kids very early in the game: we could afford this much. If you want to go to school X, you need to get this much aid and or take out these much loan.</p>
<p>I don’t understand why so many parents do not want to discuss finances with their kids.</p>
<p>A variety of reasons…</p>
<p>1) Some have no idea that college costs as much as it does.</p>
<p>2) some assume that their “honors student” will get a big scholarship (ignorant of the fact that many schools don’t give merit scholarships AND that high test scores are also needed.)</p>
<p>3) Some are embarrassed that they don’t have much saved for college.</p>
<p>4) Some assume that only the rich won’t be given big grants for financial aid.</p>
<p>***
I also don’t understand why so many 4.0/+2100 SAT kids cannot understand why the EFC is important to know when building the application list.*</p>
<p>Is it a sense of entitlement on the kids part? You know – “I’ve worked so hard for the last 3 years that I deserve my dream.”**</p>
<p>Yes…there is a sense of “I’ve worked so hard” and therefore money should NOT be a consideration. They seem to forget that at every school the top 10% are hard workers…so there are thousands and thousands just like them. </p>
<p>**
And finally, why are Guidance Counselors avoiding the financial discussion?
I don’t expect the GC to demand to know an EFC, but I DO expect the GC to tell the kid that it is as important of an aspect as crafting the essay. **</p>
<p>This is a big mystery to me. They should know that most schools can’t meet need. And that many families can’t afford their EFCs.</p>
<p>Why should finances be the GC’s job? Shouldn’t it be the family’s job to determine finances? How much need the school offers is usually on the school’s website. Our GC is responsibly for 500 kids with approximately 150 seniors. It’s a bit of invasion of privacy to expect him to know the financial well-being of those students. I do wish that he steered my high stats daughter to applying to a “high Ivy” for financial reasons in addition to the list of LACs she requested from him, or list some LACs that offer merit. But, he did his job of giving her a list of match schools, it was my job to figure how I would pay for it.</p>
<p>When D was beginning her junior year in HS we met with the college counselor at her HS (that wasn’t her title , but it was what she did). The woman specifically told me that if I lived in a neighborhood where the houses sell for $x (they did then!) and our family income was $y, we should not expect need based FA. I don’t know how she guessed, but the #'s she quoted were right on target. I thought then and still think now that she did us a huge favor by being so honest.</p>
<p>The thing is, whenever I tell this story (without the #'s) to anyone IRL, they roll their eyes. So many people I know just think that “scholarships” will fall out of the sky and hit their kids. </p>
<p>The HS has an annual Financial Aid for College night, but many people don’t bother to attend.</p>
<p>The part that I struggle with is how much FA will we see in DS12’s 2nd year of college. That is when we will have two kids in college at the same time. We could afford the high EFC for one child for one year, if we knew we wouldn’t have to meet that number times 2 in the second year. How can we predict? That is the hard part. We have been clear with our kids that we can pay the equivalent of our in state tuition and everything else; estimated high at about $25K per year. For 2 kids it is $200K total. If our EFC is say, 40K then we could afford 40K for the 5 years they will be in college. However, how do we know that it will go that way? </p>
<p>Year 1 = 1 kid in college, Years 2, 3 and 4 = 2 kids in college and Year 5 = 1 kid in college. I don’t want to be in a position that we agree to the 40K bill in year 1 assuming that the total bill will be the same $ but this time for 2 kids. How do we know? As an added stress, years 6, 7, 8 and 9 = our 3rd child’s college years where we will have the same 100K for his education, but he will be the only one is school.</p>
<p>I really love poster #8 assumption about income in CA and NYC. Typical generalization and total BS. The NYC metro area has about 25 million people. Like we all make 100K!</p>
<p>
Because the only useful college list is a financially viable list … so a GC that throws schools out that are never going to happen for a student is justing everyone’s time including their own … understand the families EFC and the parents response to the EFC is the only way to set a quality strategy and to make a quality list</p>
<p>Some parents don’t look much into school costs until after the student has it narrowed to a few favorites. Some assume costs are lower than they really are. Neither is a good plan, but they do exist.</p>
<p>I was one who hesitated to discuss my finances with my child. My reasons were that my finances are my finances, my child may not grasp that all money earned isn’t avail for him(even if we say so), and lastly because in high school my child probably has not yet learned discretion as well as I’d like.
Nevertheless, despite our hesitations, wife and I did come up with a way to handle it.
In advance of his college selections, we gave S a dollar figure we’d pay each of 4 yrs, and then he could choose any school he wanted, and any debt left over after our gift was up to him.</p>
<p>Geogirl: I have the same situation. EFC is EFC. It’s not “times 2.” It’s basically EFC divided by number in college. Eg, if EFC for one kid was 20k, when 2 are in coll, each would be roughly 10k. More or less, dep on you circumstances and whether one kid earned more than the other, etc. Next, my D1’s FA barely changed for soph year. Tuition went up, she was expected to contribute a bit more from summer job and work-study, but our hit barely changed. (Could just be her school.) This is one of the questions that also stumped me when I was researching.</p>
<p>It is not always easy to figure out whether or not a school provides merit aid or if the merit aid only goes to a handful of students. Finding out which schools give “good” merit aid to a lot of students is tough. For my second son, we found out at a college visit that a school his brother received a good offer from, now only offers need-based aid. </p>
<p>While I don’t think the GC should talk specifically about finances, a GC could inform parents that if they are looking for merit money the student should target schools where the student is above the range for scores and/or grades. The GC should also know which schools do not ever offer merit aid. It certainly would have helped us when going through the process the first time that certain schools do not give any merit money (not talking Ivy league) even if a student has a high GPA and is an NMF. Our HS does a financial aid night, explaining some of this, but I still think it is hard for parents to understand that their student may still be “gapped” at many private schools and expected to come with more than their EFC based on FAFSA.</p>
<p>
And don’t forget that the costs of colleges are rising at an astronomical rate. If they continue to do so, by year 9 the basic in-state cost may have risen to $35 or $40K. All the more reason to stress to all 3 of them how important it is to get good grades, take challenging courses, and do well on the SAT and/or ACT. </p>
<p>We really had no idea how bad it would be back when DS started hs. You can only do so much with them as far as pushing and his grades are lower than they should be, but fortunately he did very well on both tests, so he is a good merit $ candidate. Now all we can do is pray. For DD (2013) we can point at the ghastly figures and say “it’s up to you girl”.</p>
<p>Thank you Lookingforward. Mom2 - good info. My nightmare though is how do you find out and <em>really</em> know that a private college will honor the whole EFC number; especially when year one, they recieved 40K from a parent and now are only getting 20K. I just could not look at my DS12 and tell him we didn’t understand that Private U wasn’t going to give him more aid just b/c his sister is in school now, and we can’t afford to pay for year 2, time to transfer to the state school, even though you love your school. So much to learn!</p>
<p>Geogirl, in a situation like yours, where you are hesitant to commit to the private school for fears of what happens when child number 2 comes along, I would call the school’s financial aid department and have a conversation with them about it. This is a common concern and the only way to <em>really</em> know is to ask. Of course whatever they say is not cast in stone but it will give you an idea as to what the school is likely to do.</p>
<p>Thanks 2Gs4me. I think we will just have to see what happens during the application process. A verbal “commitment” over the phone for aid in future years doesn’t seem like a good bet to me. We’ve already had a pretty frank discussion about how we will do the best we can, but we think that our number is our number. I also don’t want him taking on huge debt. So, even if we pay the EFC, then he will have to take on the 7to 9K in federal loans. I’d like to say we’d pay those back for him, but with 3 kids I just don’t think we would be able to. He really wants to go into the Peace Corp after college and then decide on which direction his life will go; grad school, med school, work. Starting life 40K in debt is not my idea of a good start. Ultimately, that will be his choice.</p>
<p>Yes, college is much more expensive than the good old days when I went. The other gotcha in the college costs equation is the number of years it takes to get a degree. My son goes to Cal Poly SLO. MechE department head held a meeting with the students and parents during move in weekend a few years back when he was a freshman. He told us that the department 4 year graduation rate was 15% and quite a gasp went thru the audience (ie. the parents). He then quoted a 85% graduation rate after 4 years and 2 quarters. My son is now a senior and, yes, he is on the “5 year plan”. Couldn’t always get into the classes he needed was the biggest problem. It will probably only get worse with all the CA budget cuts. Given that most living arraignments are for a year and they are a major portion of the cost, you’re really stuck for the cash at that point whether it is 5 years or 4 and 2 quarters. </p>
<p>When my daughter was looking at schools, I paid a lot closer attention to the 4 year graduation rates. Ended up with her going to a private engineering school. She got a fairly good merit scholarship (which she wouldn’t have at a state school). It brought the cost down to not a lot more (per year) than the state school and as long as she really does graduate in 4, be much less money than the 5 year plan at a state school.</p>
<p>Ill admit I was one who mistakenly thought most schools followed similar FA policies and had no clue about the CSS profile or guaranteed merit aid and only found CC in December of Ds senior year. My biggest regret is that she was/is my best student of my 3 and hardest worker so all I missed learning for her wont be as helpful for D2 and S BUT I do now know to avoid CSS schools if they require the NCP form and applying early where it matters.</p>
<p>Ultimately it ended out fine D is extremely happy at our IS flagship and she and I can both share the contribution through loans, scholarships and savings. She did end up as well with some great options that were even cheaper but she chose her #1 and has no regrets now do we. </p>
<p>But in the beginning when D got a few acceptances that came with $15-$25K in merit per year I had no idea some of those schools considered that the only aid theyd give leaving a huge gap, and yet some schools with large COAs gave great packages with minimal loans that made their costs comparable to other options. I was also shocked by our EFC and I had used a few online calculators just made the mistake of doing them at very selective need meeting schools! </p>
<p>My kids all do have a realistic idea of costs and what they should be looking for. We are fortunate that our state has a wide selection of great IS schools and they know that is where they should be aiming, including that they are all getting very competitive, but we will also check out those schools with guaranteed merit, etc when we know better what package they will be bringing to the table in terms of grades/scores.</p>
<p>Parent here with two in school – you can ballpark a PROFILE school’s estimated family contribution as ROUGHLY 120-130% of your FAFSA EFC. Several other folks on CC shared their experiences on other threads, and I have found this worked pretty well for us, too.</p>
<p>For example – if EFC for one kid was $30,000, EFC for two would be around 37,500, which is split between the two kids in college. This is used for the years in which you have two or more in college.</p>
<p>The numbers for each kid won’t be identical – each school has a different summer earnings expectation, and some schools increase that number each year as students get older. If one of the kids in college has a well-paying summer job, that will also affect the numbers, in that schools will expect that person to contribute for of his/her earnings.</p>
<p>Better day for me today :)</p>
<p>Just to clarify my position on the Guidance Counselor – I know many are overworked. </p>
<p>I simply want finances to be part of the talk in junior year. “Hey kids, time for PSATs. And time to tell your folks to run an EFC. Many financial aid packages have loans. Sometimes the loans aren’t enough.”</p>
<p>This would at least plant a seed for the student and parent. It would be especially helpful to those parents who aren’t aware how costs have risen in the last 20 years.</p>
<p>Dad II – my parents didn’t share financial info with me until the third quarter of my freshman year in college, when it was a question of whether I’d get to attend spring quarter. </p>
<p>My kids still don’t know what we make. However, they have known since middle school they’d be expected to contribute, and have seen that we aren’t afraid to sacrifice and live simply to send them to the best school for them. They know every penny I make goes towards college. They actually seem to have inherited some of our frugality genes. 
I will say S1 was truly shocked when I told him that his summer job paid a lot more than my hourly rate.</p>
<p>I’ve talked to lots of well-educated parents (PhDs, graduate degrees, generally working in research or gov’t) at my kids’s schools, and a good number of them indulge in magical thinking about where the money will come from. These are the same parents who tell their kids to apply to HPYSM and the flagship – they’ll “make it work” for the tippy-top schools, and assume merit $$ for the flagship. </p>
<p>Parents who went to school in the late 70s-early 80s also remember that it was possible to put oneself through school without parental help. Those days are gone – my boss was asking me for FA advice the other day. Has two college age sons who did CC arnd are ready to transfer to four years schools to finish their degrees. Can’t get FA, but can’t afford college for them, either.</p>
<p>Given that the kids in these particular programs have some spectacular awards and scores, there is some rational basis for this thinking. Unfortunately, sometimes it also leads to kids winding up at a safety they don’t like that well.</p>
<p>My parents were also loathe to talk about money so it was a shock when I had to leave sophomore year when Reagan cut the pell grant program. I made it back after working a semester and doubling up in the summers, but I think my parents didn’t talk about it because they felt that as a child I couldn’t really put those big numbers in context and it wasn’t my responsibility. We were more upfront with our son about what we could and couldn’t pay but he still doesn’t know what we earn and he never saw the FA forms. What we can and can’t pay was determined by our own plans for retirement and his sister’s future not what the financial aid calculations spit out…on paper we look ot have enough to pay the school fees with no help…BUT we know that we have commitments that aren’t taken into account in that calculation with the sky high EFC so I don’t want son to think t hat the financial aid calculators will tell him/us what we will pay for school. If he saw our combined income he would wonder why he isn’t getting an allowance or has a fancy car.</p>
<p>We are paying full freight at one of hte most expensive schools in the country but S did bring some scholarship money with him. More importantly, my dad, traumatized that he couldn’t pay my school fees, had been saving for decades and his savings are paying the bulk of our son’s schooling. Last, our son is expected to pay for everything but tuition, fees and board so he is much more pressed for money than his roomate who is on a huge FA program. S looks for books on ebay, buys at the thrift store, owns 2 pairs of shoes. That roommate gets an allowance from his parents!? My S is counting pennies and thinking twice before going to a movie or a concert and he is one of a fraction of kids who have no financial aid (I think it is us and t he foreign students!). I am glad we dont share all of our finances with our son because he is learning to be frugal and thoughtful with his spending.</p>