College move-in day is fast approaching for our firstborn. I am experiencing a veritable casserole of emotions that change from one hour to the next. In two weeks, a minivan loaded with Kleese’s and college provisions will head to Memphis, Tennessee. Less than 48 hours later, that same van will return to Wisconsin with one person less. Four will travel down. Three will travel back. This math astounds me every time I think about it.
The Notes app on my phone reflects the emotional casserole, as I type in things like, “Stop at Post Office”, “Buy Milk”, “Teach Jack The Meaning of Life”, “Take Dog to Vet”, “Remind Jack How to Tie a Necktie” “Remind Jack to Shake Hands Like a Real Man”. As if I can squeeze whatever life lessons I forgot to pass on over the past 18 years into the next 360 hours.
I. Can’t. Even.
Above all, I am bursting with excitement for the adventure that lies ahead for Jack. And my heart pleads hopefully that he fully grasps the enormity of the opportunity that lies ahead and takes 100% full advantage of it. So for Jack and for the scores of soon-to-be-college-freshmen and their families, let me sum it up by saying this.
Don’t forget to be awesome.
College campuses these days are a chock full of opportunities to become your best self, from premier workout facilities to ready-made dining buffet options. From dorms and classrooms full of the coolest, most diverse group of people you could ever hope to be friends with, to acres of activities, intramural sports clubs and special-interest groups you can join.
On more than one occasion, I’ve said that by the end of freshman year, everyone should have a full social calendar, a brain full of new information, a new hobby and rock-hard abs. There will never in your life be another time like this. You are on your own, with no one but yourself to take care of, most likely with financial help from your family (or maybe they’re footing the bill entirely). Your entire existence in college is about making you better academically, and in all other aspects, as well. Take full advantage and be awesome!
In case that guidance is too general to be practical, here are a few ideas:
Be the first to put your hand out.
Photo by Redd Angelo
No, I don’t mean asking for a handout. Although asking for help when you need it is a critical skill to develop. But chiefly, I mean two things. First, get out of yourself and put your hand out to meet someone new. Get over your self-consciousness. The reality is, they’ll be grateful that you flinched first. Shake their hand, say hello and ask them about themselves. Then truly listen. When you arrive on campus, you’re new and you don’t know anyone. Yeah, that’s daunting. But you’re just like everybody else. Everybody’s new and looking for new friends at college. There will never be a more important time or an easier time in life to meet new people. Take full advantage of this and be the first to say hello. You know, “to have a friend you have to be a friend”, and all that really true, smart stuff your mom told you when you started kindergarten. It’s all still true.
Secondly, I mean be the first to put your hand out to help someone else. College is a time to focus on yourself, yes, but there’s more to life than you being a kick-ass you. Look up and out. Look around you. When you see someone who needs something you could offer, do it — whether it’s an invitation to sit at your table for dinner in the dining hall, or help with a heavy box up a flight of stairs. You’re an adult now. Be a good one. Be a helper. It’s also a great way to meet friends, by the way.
Work out.
Photo by Keit Trysh
Why the heck not? Rock-hard abs can be yours.
Find the exercise facility that no doubt comes with your tuition and make a commitment to yourself to spend time there within the first week of your arrival on campus.
Not a gym rat? Fine. Go online or to the Student Services Center and sign up for one of scads of intramural activities or clubs on campus. Extend yourself. Learn a new sport. Gain a new hobby. Pursue an existing passion in a new way. In the process, you’ll meet others you’ll have something in common with. And you’ll be on your way to breaking out of your comfort zone, which is key to being awesome.
Bolt out of the blocks.
Usain Bolt explodes out of the blocks, and you should, too. If you’ve ever seen a sprinter who got a rough start out of the blocks at the sound of the gun and was unable to recover, you know what I mean. In college, your first semester is CRITICAL for establishing routines as a student and establishing the tone and tenor of your college career. Explode out of the blocks and make it count. The first semester starts with the first day of the first week of the first month. Start strong for a strong performance.
Photo by William Stitt
College is full of freedom, which is a double-edged sword. It’s less structured than high school by far. No one will be dragging you to class. No one tells you when to go eat or what to eat. No one will tell you when to study, when to party or when to go to bed.
Mom’s not here. Dad’s not here. Setting your schedule is your job. If you don’t control your time, your time will control you. Before the first day of class, sit down and give some thought to what you want a typical week to look like. You get to choose, but be intentional about it. Don’t just let it happen to you.
When will you get up and when will you go to bed? When will you be in class and when will you work out? When will you eat and when will you study? You don’t have to know every detail, but in general, think through what routine will work for you on a regular basis and block it out in your calendar. Literally put “meetings” on your calendar for yourself that say “STUDY” “EAT” “WORK OUT” and “PLAY”. Then stick to it. Modify it as you go, but always have a scheduled plan.
Far too many freshmen get to fall break and wonder where the first two months of college went, as they stare midterms in the face and wonder how they’ll ever catch up. If you let that happen, catching up could feel so daunting that you fumble your way through the rest of your first semester. You don’t want to be in “catch up and make up for” mode for second semester. Start strong and you can avoid all that pain.
Say yes to something new.
Photo by Martin Schmidli
You will encounter people who grew up very differently from you. You will have the opportunity to learn a new language, embrace a new hobby, learn a new dance, travel somewhere you’ve never been, play a game you’ve never played. There’s never been a better time in your life to try something you’ve never tried before. As a dad, I’m coaching my son on how to say NO to lots of things that will tempt him at college. But I also want him to say YES to something that could open up his horizons and make him a better version of himself for having gotten out of his comfort zone.
Be a good neighbor.
College typically comes with a really big price tag, colossally huge opportunities and very small living quarters. Be a good roommate. Be considerate. Pick up after yourself. Shower and brush your teeth. Wash your own dishes. Do your laundry before it walks off on its own. Take out your trash. Be polite. Watch the noise. And generally, be the roommate you’d want to live with. While it sounds like common sense and no one should ever have to say this stuff to a college freshman, it’s the simple things that can make for miserable dorm living if you don’t act like a decent human being. Don’t be that guy. Meanwhile, I’ll be hoping that your roommate reads this, too, and takes it to heart.
Photo by Nina Strehl
You’re about to learn more about yourself than ever before. And you’re about to have more opportunities than ever before to become a better you. Give some thought to the future you that you will meet on college graduation day and what you hope you will have accomplished and become by then. Then now, today, do something your future self will thank you for.
Above all else, don’t forget to be awesome. For awesome college planning insights and answers to your toughest college planning questions, Schedule A Free Consult.
Photo by John-Mark Kuznietsov US News & World Report reported earlier this week that more students are choosing an in-state college, with the driving factor being tuition cost. A mom quoted in the article said, “We are avidly looking at in-state colleges specifically because they are more affordable.”
Are they? Often times, yes. But not always. When planning for college if you do your homework, you’ll find competitively priced out-of-state options for students ready for a change of scenery. Some students simply want to forge their own path out of state. Or they want to choose a college near where they will ultimately work and live, with access to networking, internship or apprenticeship opportunities during college years that will yield returns when they graduate.
There’s nothing at all wrong with choosing an in-state school. (I did it twice.) But when searching for colleges, first do your homework, explore options, consider all factors and make sure you choose the best-fit school for you.
I’m always in favor of getting the most for your college dollar.
When conducting your college search, I help find hidden gems and high-value colleges that will reward you financially for your achievements. No one would accuse me of throwing caution to the wind when it comes to money, least of all my wife and sons who chide my thriftiness.
Above all, I want to help each student to research, find and earn merit aid at their best-fit college, their “University of You”, including a well-informed decision making process about this six-figure investment. I advocate strategic, intentional, well-researched decisions versus default choices.
Not even looking at out-of-state schools based only on un-researched assumptions about price, merit aid available or other factors, goes against that grain.
Bottom line, don’t write off a school that lights your fire without doing your homework first.
I’m into busting college myths. The myth echoed in the article is, “In-state is always far less expensive.” In this post, you’ll find a few myth-busting examples of universities whose out-of-state tuition competes on price, and none of them are in Wisconsin. It’s not an exhaustive list. There are many hidden gems among more than 2000 schools across the country. Even if you don’t have a 30 on your ACT or a 3.8+ GPA, out-of-state tuition can be very affordable for you at these solid colleges and others.
Photo by Madi Osias
University of Mississippi, Oxford, MS Average ACT: 25; Average GPA: 3.54
“Ole Miss” delivers more Big 10-esque Rah-Rah than you can shake a stick at. If Georgia is the UW-Madison of the South (and it is), Ole Miss is the UW-Madison of Mississippi. The motto at The Grove (area near football stadium) is “We’ve never lost a tailgate.”
Ole Miss’ published merit aid matrix starts at 3.0 GPA (3.5 is more typical). Sticker price for out-of-state tuition is $22K. (Never stop at sticker price). A 3.0 GPA plus a 30 ACT earns you $12K/year in merit aid. Even with a few points shy of 30, you can get close. I initially tuned into this university when I was doing a college search for a student looking for school spirit and solid academics, plus a change of scenery.
Miami University, Oxford, OH Average ACT: 28; Average GPA: 3.76
From Oxford, MS to Oxford, OH. Miami University (aka, Miami of Ohio) is a shade easier to get into than UW-Madison but on par academically. Usually when you drop off from the flagship university in a state, there’s a perceivable drop-off in competitiveness (and often cache). That’s not the case with Miami of Ohio versus its big brother in Columbus. It’s a medium-sized public university which holds its own as a well-known, well-respected university on a national level. Like UW, Miami has a solid business school. And they have very few graduate students. For those in scientific fields of study, this means research opportunities for undergrads.
I tuned in to Miami when working on a college list for a student who’s really interested in sports marketing, and it’s really highly ranked in that program. And when I did the “can we afford this” sniff test, Miami passed with flying colors for that out-of-stater.
Oklahoma State University, Stillwater, Oklahoma Average ACT 25; Average GPA 3.52
OSU has been listed by the Princeton Review as one of 50 “Best Value Colleges – Public”. And Oklahoma State was ranked number 23 on the Forbes list of “Best Value Colleges.” And Oklahoma State University is one of the highest-rated vet schools in the US. The town of Stillwater is a little more than an hour west of Tulsa or an hour northeast of Oklahoma City. With nearly 24,000 students, it is the flagship university of the Oklahoma State System. A 25 ACT plus a 3.0+ unweighted GPA earns you merit aid that’s a sub-Gopher price tag when compared with Wisconsin resident tuition at the University of Minnesota. Earn a 30 on your ACT and you’re within a grand of UW-Madison in-state tuition at this OSU.
University of Wyoming, Laramie, Wyoming Average ACT 25; Average GPA 3.48
In a recent Myth-Busting Monday video, I highlighted the value of the University of Wyoming. Check it out for info on this high-value college. Laramie is 2.5 hours from Denver. This is a great location for outdoor lovers. It’s a solid college choice in a scenic setting that beats the pants off Colorado for affordability for out-of-staters.
State College of New York (SUNY) System: EX: SUNY Binghamton Average ACT 29; Average GPA 3.7
Want to head east for college without the Ivy League price tag or single-digit admission rates? The SUNY Schools are well-represented on Forbes list of America’s Top Colleges. It’s one of the best public higher education systems in the world, second only to the University of California system. Unlike Wisconsin, New York doesn’t have one big flagship like UW-Madison. If you took out Madison and redistributed its student population across the other Wisconsin state colleges, that’s SUNY/New York. Admittedly, UW-Madison is going to rank higher than any SUNY school. If I was picking a player, I’d pick UW-Madison. If I had to take one TEAM, I’d take the SUNY team. They have a whole network of a hybrid between a UW-Madison and a UW-LaCrosse or UW-Eau Claire. LaCrosse and Eau Claire get ranked highly in regional system state rankings. If you plan to settle outside the Midwest after college and are looking for higher brand name recognition SUNY delivers. The SUNY System is a really top notch system, especially in terms of sciences. Some of them have D1 sports. Some don’t.
5 qualities of successful students that have nothing to do with intelligence
I spend most of my waking hours sitting across the table from a high school student. Typically, they have big dreams. And most of them have the determination and pure grit to do what it takes to achieve them.
What distinguishes the students I see succeed is less about smarts and talent than it is about 5 qualities that each of us has the CHOICE to possess.
They’re curious.
They’re teachable.
They’re interested in others.
They can laugh at themselves.
They get back up again.
Successful students are curious.
Educators are well aware of the need for curiosity in learning. In an article I read from Empower 2017, a conference for educators, developmental psychologist Wendy Ostroff said, “The best, deepest learning happens when you’re generally curious.” In Ostroff’s talk, she cited studies that show that pre-K kids (between 2 and 5 years old) ask 76 questions per hour on average. But once children enter formal school, that number drops dramatically. K-1 students ask around 2 to 5 questions per hour, and by 5th grade, questions are virtually absent.
Successful students are curious
Ostroff advocates modeling curiosity to help students cultivate curiosity. Show them how it’s done. So if I am curious and demonstrate and model curiosity as a parent, this helps my child developcuriosity and learn how to nurture their curiosity and use it to learn new things.
The same article talks about curiosity flowing naturally from the subjects we’re most interested in. This is why one of my first tasks as a college planner is to get to know the student across from me and find out what makes them tick, and then tailor my coaching and even the teaching examples I use, to their interests. It works.
Successful students are curious.At home, this plays out in finding out what makes my sons tick and encouraging them to go deeper on those topics, on their own. When my son Joe asks a question about how he can translate his passion for athletic shoes into a career someday, even if I know the answer, I say, “That’s a really interesting question. I wonder how you could find the answer to that.” And I try to really praise him when I observe him demonstrating curiosity, pursuing the answers to his own questions and finding success in nurturing his own curiosity.
Successful students are teachable.
Successful students are teachable.
You’ve probably heard the saying, “When the student is ready, the teacher will appear.” It’s attributed to Buddha Siddhartha Guatama Shakyamuni. Opportunities to learn are all around us, but we must be ready to receive the teaching. It starts with humility. In order for me to be teachable, I have to admit that I don’t already know it all.
Some of the students I find to be the most teachable are athletes who are used to paying attention to what their coach has to say. They’re coachable, teachable. They come to the table with an attitude of openness that I have something to offer them that they don’t already know. They’re receptive to new information.
In trying to cultivate teachability in my own sons, I often ask the question straight out, “Are you teachable?” When I’m less patient, it comes out as, “Are you ready to listen, or not?” But on my best dad days, I’m frequently reminding them, gently, that others have lessons to teach them that could benefit them – even those they don’t agree with on everything.
Successful students are interested in others.
Successful students are interested in others.
Being interested in others goes hand in hand with curiosity, teachability and humility. It’s about maintaining a sense of wonder about the world around me, appreciating that others are different from me and understanding that these differences can enrich my life.
A friend of mine marvels when he asks a teenager, “How are you today?” and the student responds, “I’m doing well. How are you?” It’s sad, but he says that his observation is that this is rare. Much more common is that a teen will respond with a one-word answer, “Good.” With no reciprocal “how are you?” question. Maybe cultivating interest in others simply starts there.
I love working with students who have a passion for working with people who are different from them in some way, whether it’s volunteering or simply extending their friend group beyond people just like them. I love to hear a student describe they’ve pushed past apparent differences to discover something unique and special about another person, and to empathize with their perspective or situation. Empathy is key to cultivating interest in others.
Successful students can laugh at themselves.
Successful students can laugh at themselves.
Wow. This one takes courage. Not just for students, but for all of us. I’m working on this one. When I screw up, my first instinct if often to berate myself for the mistake and then shut down and not want to talk about it. I find that the most successful students can laugh at themselves. They don’t take themselves too seriously. They’re okay with being human and understand that making mistakes and doing dumb things is part of getting better.
At home, this is really tough. Because when my son does something unwise, it triggers fear in me as a parent. Fear can lead me to amp up and try to simply avoid the screw-up from ever happening again, instead of pausing to empathize with my son, “Wow, I’ve sure done that before and it was no fun.” Even make a joke about it, and then ask, “What would you do differently next time?” Or, “What did you learn?” Certainly, I require him to experience the consequences of his own actions. But I try to let the consequences themselves do the teaching, and come alongside him to go easy on himself and laugh at himself as he learns from his own mistakes.
I’ll pick on my wife here, because she said I could. Our son Jack loses things. Keys, paperwork, his wallet, pretty much anything not attached. He inherited this trait from my wife. She admits this openly. And through her being willing to laugh at herself, tell a joke on herself in front of our two sons when she’s just spent an hour looking for the glasses that were on her head the whole time, she gives Jack permission to laugh at himself when he does the same thing. So what used to be a source of family tension has become a private joke between them. Now when Jack loses his keys, he’s much more able to be patient with himself, laugh at himself and say jokingly, “Mom, why’d you pass these genes on to me?!” To me, that’s a good example of cultivating the ability to laugh at yourself.
Successful students get back up again.
Successful students get back up again
This is key. The most successful students I see are those who get back up again. It starts with being willing to risk failure. It involves expecting that failure will happen as you try anything new or outside your comfort zone. And it involves being willing to get back up again and keep getting up until you succeed.
I work with students to improve their ACT test scores. In many cases, they’ve already taken the test once, and they didn’t earn the score they’ve hoped for. But they’re willing to try again. They get back up again. There’s nothing more rewarding than celebrating success with a student who’s achieved their goal after multiple attempts. The hard-fought victories are the sweetest, and they teach the student priceless lessons about what they’re truly capable of.
Resilience is essential to success in high school, in college and in life. We do our kids no favors by padding their egos when they deliver less than their best result and letting them stop there.
Listen to the story of any successful entrepreneur or athlete. One of my favorites is the podcast, “How I Built This”. The path of great companies like Whole Foods, Five Guys, Rolling Stone, Barbara Corcoran is littered with false starts, failure and in some cases, not going to or dropping out of college. But they didn’t stop. They got back up again. And their resilience ultimately earned them success. It’s the same in the students I see succeed. They’re willing to risk failure. And they get back up again.
There are a hundred other qualities I observe in successful students, but these five are among the most common that distinguish students who succeed. These qualities have nothing to do with GPA or an ACT score. And they’re qualities that all students, and all of us, can develop the mental, spiritual and psychological muscle to use well.
Your social media account may say something about your character when you apply to college
You are responsible for and in control of your character.
You can work your tail off throughout high school, earn stellar grades and boost your ACT test scores. You can create the ideal balance of Reach, Target and Safety schools and craft a slam-dunk college essay and whiz-bang college application that captures attention of your top-choice colleges. But at the end of the day, there will still be elements of the college applications process that are beyond your control.
But Character is one thing that is always, ALWAYS within your control both in college planning, and in life. You are 100% responsible for your Character. One source defines character as the way an individual uniquely thinks, feels and behaves. Another suggests that character is, “the mental and moral qualities distinctive to an individual”.
Legendary UCLA basketball coach John Wooden said, “The true test of a person’s character is what they do when no one’s looking.”
Colleges may pay attention to social media accounts when reviewing student applications
What do you do when no one’s looking, or when you think no one’s looking? What do you say when you think you know who you’re talking to, but you realize later there were others listening in? Or people who caught wind secondhand later on? Social media and the whole digital world makes this whole scene mighty murky, because of powerful buttons that all too easily Share, Forward, Invite, and Screen Shot.
In June, Harvard rescinded offers to 10 incoming freshmen over extremely poor social media decisions which suggested questionable moral character. In a nutshell, the students formed a subgroup online out of Harvard’s Facebook group for incoming freshmen and proceeded to make racially- and sexually explicit comments. The news made national headlines including CNN and Forbes.
So while (sadly) flawless character won’t necessarily guarantee you a spot at the college of your choice, it’s evident that actions which demonstrate questionable character can boot you out.
And this is the part of the story where people shake their fists in the air, demanding protection of free speech, as they did in response to this news story. Well, perhaps another definition of Character is knowing when having the Freedom to do or say something should be tempered with having the Wisdom not to.
social media matters when applying for colleges
Think it’s just the Ivies who may monitor social media accounts when considering “the whole college candidate”? Think again. A US News & World Reports article earlier this year indicated that “In a Kaplan Test Prep survey of more than 350 college admissions officers in the U.S., 35 percent of officers polled reported having looked at applicants’ social media accounts to learn more about them.” The article indicates that often visits to social media are a boost to the candidate’s appeal, since it reveals involvement in activities they may not have mentioned in their essay, or beliefs and values that are consistent with the college’s ideals and indicate a good fit. The important point is that more and more colleges are considering social media accounts fair game for considering a candidate’s overall fit with the college. And the same is true for potential employers, so young adults may as well get used to thinking twice about what they post on social media.
It’s wise to exercise extreme caution in conversations both on and offline. Be intentional about what you make public via social media. When in doubt, use the Grandmother Rule. (If you wouldn’t say it to your grandmother, don’t say it in social media.)
Think I’m being extreme? Well there are 10 really flippin’ smart kids who made a dumb move that called their character into question. And now they’re scratching their heads, wondering what they’ll be doing this fall, when they’d figured they’d be headed to Harvard. I’ll bet they don’t think the Grandmother Rule is such a bad idea about now.
So as we wrap up this caution on memes, let me put one to use. Stay classy. Whether you’re in San Diego, Wisconsin or North Dakota. You just never know who’s paying attention.
Talking about college and money has probably edged out sex and drugs on the list of conversations parents LEAST want to have with their teenager. Maybe it’s because there’s no marketing campaign to go with it. So consider this a start toward that end. Parents, have the conversation with your kids about college and money!
Avoiding college planning pitfalls means being willing to have the challenging conversation about college and money, who pays for what and when.
Why do families avoid having the college money conversation? Lots of reasons based on my experience with hundreds upon hundreds of college-bound families.
First off, no one really knows what it will cost. We’ve all heard scary news stories about skyrocketing college costs, but we avoid getting to the bottom of what we’re really talking about here. Is it a hundred grand, or a quarter of a million dollars? How much will merit aid lower the cost? What financial aid might we be eligible for? Families are afraid to have the money talk because they feel completely inept and unprepared.
The people who determine college pricing go to great lengths to prevent you from feeling any sort of comfort about, or command of, the final price. Tuition may be $25,000/year, but you really have no idea what you will pay with everything thrown in. In fairness, great strides have been made by institutions of higher learning (with considerable arm twisting from the federal government) to get you a ballpark figure earlier in the process, using tools such as net price calculators.
In its Trends in College Pricing 2014, the College Board reported that the average estimated budget (often called Cost of Attendance) for an in-state public university is $23,410 for the 2014-15 academic year. For a private non-profit four-year college that number is $46,272.
I have heard the following phrases more than once from intelligent, well-meaning, loving parents to their children:
Don’t worry about college costs.
We’ll help you however we can.
We’ll talk about this later, when the time is right.
A friend once told me she didn’t think it was any of her children’s business what she and her husband were doing to prepare for college expenses, because their financials matters are private. I agree that my kids don’t need to know what we have saved for retirement or how much we earn, but I do believe it is in the best interests of all involved to be transparent about expectations and responsibilities.
One of the most common conversations I have with the families I work with revolves around college costs. So many factors go into what college will cost, not the least of which is which school you choose. We start by breaking down misperceptions, such as “public institutions will always be cheaper than private” (not true), and “we’ll never get any aid, so I’m not even going to fill out the FAFSA”. (Big mistake!) Step by step, we eat the elephant a bite at a time, and examine it for what it really is: a super huge investment that will pay big dividends, if it’s done right.
When it comes to college and money, who pays for what and when?
On or before your child’s 12th birthday, please have this conversation:
“We think it’s important for you to go to college, or at least consider the options you have. So here’s what we’re going to do to help…”
If your child’s older than 12, don’t panic. But have the conversation. SOON.
The answer to this question is incredibly personal. THERE ARE NO WRONG ANSWERS. Don’t avoid having the conversation because of what you assume “most families are doing” or because of your discomfort with what you’re able to do (or unable to do) as a parent to contribute to college costs.
When our oldest son was a toddler, my dear wife and I had a series of conversations about our respective philosophies about paying for our sons’ college education. We had two different philosophies within the same household! My wife insisted we pay for the entire cost of college, including room and board and incidental expenses, because this is what her parents had lovingly and generously done for her.
Then we faced facts about how college costs have changed in the past two decades. And we openly acknowledged that we started having children later in life than her parents, putting us that much closer to retirement, another expensive investment to prepare for.
I then shared my personal feelings that our two sons should have some skin in the game.
Through a lot of dialogue between us, some of it pretty tense, other conversations merely intense, we arrived at a unified position that we could then share with conviction and in detail with our two sons, in plenty of time for them to make their own preparations to put up their share of the costs, or at least make a dent in the first couple of years.
If you ask my boys how much they need to save for college, my older son, who’ll be a college freshman this fall, knows the number to the five-spot. And my younger son, a freshman in high school, at least has a solid idea. He knows what his responsibilities will be, what we’re covering, and a pretty good dollar-amount estimate for each chunk.
Families that fail to address the question of “Who pays for what and when?” risk the collateral damage that is caused by poor communication and the poor planning it leaves in its wake.
Talk openly about college and money and who pays for what and when.
Who. What. When. None of these variables is optional.
Some options could look like this:
“Mom and I will pay for all tuition, fees and books at an in-state public university. Everything beyond that is yours.”
“We will contribute $30,000 per year for four years. If you go somewhere more expensive or take more than four years, you’re responsible for the balance. And no, we will not ‘refund the difference’ if you graduate in three and a half years or choose a very inexpensive option.”
“It’s 50-50 all the way.”
“We’ll pay for everything, but we want you to work at least ten hours per week during college, so you learn how to manage your time, just like in the real world. You can keep what you earn, but you have to work.”
What you’re doing is creating a contract. And it’s acceptable to include a performance clause such as maintaining a 3.0 and making progress towards a degree. Whether or not you put this onto paper is up to you, but the basic premise of “If I do this, I expect you to do that” will go a long way toward eliminating surprises.
Okay, now it’s college money conversation homework time.
A Free Guide to Avoid pitfalls like NOT having the college money conversation, plus 5 other Critical Questions and answers.
In your situation, who pays for what & when? Be prepared for open (and at times uncomfortable) dialogue about your desired “contract” and especially the values you hope it conveys to both student and parents (i.e., sharing in the sacrifice, providing the student with ample options, making sure your family can also cover the cost of other family priorities, etc.)
If you’d like help with the college money conversation, or other college topics like ACT test prep, college applications guidance, merit aid, finding the right college and more, Schedule A Free Consult. Let’s get the college conversation started.
Miami University, Oxford, OH
Oklahoma State University, Stillwater, Oklahoma
University of Wyoming, Laramie, Wyoming
State College of New York (SUNY) System:
So as we wrap up this caution on memes, let me put one to use. Stay classy. Whether you’re in San Diego, Wisconsin or North Dakota. You just never know who’s paying attention. 
On or before your child’s 12th birthday, please have this conversation:
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