Dealbreaker: students required to live on campus for 3 or even 4 years

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If you are doing semester or more abroad it’s very helpful to have housing that fits with that. Move out end of fall and not return until September.

No way would OP allow study abroad. I find it funny that OP is going on and on about independence and everything when she's a completely overbearing parent who has probably robbed her kid of most independent thought

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You sound like a ninny OP. Hopefully, your kid is smarter than you. You must be financially illiterate. Do you really want your kid to take on a lease + expenses that a roommate bails on? I am a professor + countless students have come to my office crying that their roommates left them holding the bag on a lease.

+1
This is exactly what happened to one of my kids. Four guys in a house, one of them decides not to come back to school. He refused to pay his share of the lease (that he had signed). We could have taken him/his parents to court, but no one wanted to go through all of that so we split that kid's rent between the remaining three and paid it that way. I was so furious, but there was really nothing we could do. I wish our son had decided to remain on campus.

I have not read this whole thread, but are you guys freaking kidding me with this? Back when I was a jr/sr room and board was pushing 20K at my university, meanwhile i lived off campus in a crappy neighborhood with multiple housemates for a little over $250 per month (rent + utilities) and whatever the cost of ramen, pasta, and frozen vegetables works out to be.

[Anonymous]

Didn’t some universities offer rebates for housing and R & B when they sent kids home last year? I bet the apartment owners didn’t offer that benefit.

One of my kids went to a SLAC and dormed all 4 years , but had a single room for 2 of those years. He was an athlete and didn’t want to grocery shop or cook. As a parent, I was happy to not rent a U Haul and travel 6 -7 hours in the car with a bed and misc furniture. Packing up the sedan and delivering the kid is much easier for me.

[Anonymous]

Colleges vary wildly in terms of what the type of on-campus housing offered. If OP's kid's only concept of on-campus life is two men crammed into an 11 x 12 room with a communal bathroom, then of course he wouldn't want to live like that for 3 or 4 years. Encourage him to research a little more carefully and maybe he can eliminate colleges that offer prison-cell like housing for juniors and seniors. Many will have apartments or at least suites with single bedrooms and semi-private bathroom, but some won't.

There is nothing inherently wrong with valuing a comfortable living space. My DS's school had very basic dorms and lame on-campus apartments (two to a tiny bedroom and furnished with dorm furniture) so he moved into a cheap off-campus apartment. He didn't enjoy sleeping on a rickety old twin bed 5 feet off the ground (his room was so small he had to keep his desk under it) and now he doesn't have to.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You sound like a ninny OP. Hopefully, your kid is smarter than you. You must be financially illiterate. Do you really want your kid to take on a lease + expenses that a roommate bails on? I am a professor + countless students have come to my office crying that their roommates left them holding the bag on a lease.

+1
This is exactly what happened to one of my kids. Four guys in a house, one of them decides not to come back to school. He refused to pay his share of the lease (that he had signed). We could have taken him/his parents to court, but no one wanted to go through all of that so we split that kid's rent between the remaining three and paid it that way. I was so furious, but there was really nothing we could do. I wish our son had decided to remain on campus.

I have not read this whole thread, but are you guys freaking kidding me with this? Back when I was a jr/sr room and board was pushing 20K at my university, meanwhile i lived off campus in a crappy neighborhood with multiple housemates for a little over $250 per month (rent + utilities) and whatever the cost of ramen, pasta, and frozen vegetables works out to be.

Great way to live.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You sound like a ninny OP. Hopefully, your kid is smarter than you. You must be financially illiterate. Do you really want your kid to take on a lease + expenses that a roommate bails on? I am a professor + countless students have come to my office crying that their roommates left them holding the bag on a lease.

+1
This is exactly what happened to one of my kids. Four guys in a house, one of them decides not to come back to school. He refused to pay his share of the lease (that he had signed). We could have taken him/his parents to court, but no one wanted to go through all of that so we split that kid's rent between the remaining three and paid it that way. I was so furious, but there was really nothing we could do. I wish our son had decided to remain on campus.

I have not read this whole thread, but are you guys freaking kidding me with this? Back when I was a jr/sr room and board was pushing 20K at my university, meanwhile i lived off campus in a crappy neighborhood with multiple housemates for a little over $250 per month (rent + utilities) and whatever the cost of ramen, pasta, and frozen vegetables works out to be.

Great way to live.

NP. Agreed! Look back on those years of my life with great fondness.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Our family is narrowing the list of reach/match schools, and as part of this process, we are closely reading about the details of 'student life.'

It had someone escaped our attention that DS's #1 and #3 choices require students to live in on campus, in assigned housing, for 3 and 4 years, respectively. One of these schools goes on and on about how nobody is likely to get an exemption from that rule (unless you're married with kids, significant ADA issue that can't be accommodated, etc.). What the hell?

On a whim I went down his 'Maybe list' of 15 schools and I see that the 3 year requirement is not a rarity. The notable exceptions are giant state schools and/or California schools. Why would a university mandate that their 22, 23 yr old students live in little dorm rooms, potentially with a roommate, and have curfews, alcohol bans, visitor limits and so on? Not to mention limits on having a pet, having a car, and more.

They mandate it because dorms are a cash cow. They charge outrageous rates for old buildings that were long ago paid off.

They do not make money on dorms or meal plan. Not a dime.

Snort.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You sound like a ninny OP. Hopefully, your kid is smarter than you. You must be financially illiterate. Do you really want your kid to take on a lease + expenses that a roommate bails on? I am a professor + countless students have come to my office crying that their roommates left them holding the bag on a lease.

+1
This is exactly what happened to one of my kids. Four guys in a house, one of them decides not to come back to school. He refused to pay his share of the lease (that he had signed). We could have taken him/his parents to court, but no one wanted to go through all of that so we split that kid's rent between the remaining three and paid it that way. I was so furious, but there was really nothing we could do. I wish our son had decided to remain on campus.

I have not read this whole thread, but are you guys freaking kidding me with this? Back when I was a jr/sr room and board was pushing 20K at my university, meanwhile i lived off campus in a crappy neighborhood with multiple housemates for a little over $250 per month (rent + utilities) and whatever the cost of ramen, pasta, and frozen vegetables works out to be.

I’m not sure what your problem is, but you clearly have one. Welcome to the 21st century.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You sound like a ninny OP. Hopefully, your kid is smarter than you. You must be financially illiterate. Do you really want your kid to take on a lease + expenses that a roommate bails on? I am a professor + countless students have come to my office crying that their roommates left them holding the bag on a lease.

No one said there will be a roommate. You must be just plain illiterate.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You sound like a ninny OP. Hopefully, your kid is smarter than you. You must be financially illiterate. Do you really want your kid to take on a lease + expenses that a roommate bails on? I am a professor + countless students have come to my office crying that their roommates left them holding the bag on a lease.

+1
This is exactly what happened to one of my kids. Four guys in a house, one of them decides not to come back to school. He refused to pay his share of the lease (that he had signed). We could have taken him/his parents to court, but no one wanted to go through all of that so we split that kid's rent between the remaining three and paid it that way. I was so furious, but there was really nothing we could do. I wish our son had decided to remain on campus.

I have not read this whole thread, but are you guys freaking kidding me with this? Back when I was a jr/sr room and board was pushing 20K at my university, meanwhile i lived off campus in a crappy neighborhood with multiple housemates for a little over $250 per month (rent + utilities) and whatever the cost of ramen, pasta, and frozen vegetables works out to be.

I’m not sure what your problem is, but you clearly have one. Welcome to the 21st century.

Is everyone made of money on the 21st century?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you are doing semester or more abroad it’s very helpful to have housing that fits with that. Move out end of fall and not return until September.

No way would OP allow study abroad. I find it funny that OP is going on and on about independence and everything when she's a completely overbearing parent who has probably robbed her kid of most independent thought

Hi, the real OP here. DS has already studied abroad during high school! In fact it was actually that experience living in a dorm that turned him off to dorm living.

It's so odd how many people are projecting that I'm smothering when I've said multiple times on this thread that it's my teen who is driving this. He gets to make the final decision. Maybe you don't like my tone or my audacity in questioning 4-year campus living for adults. So be it. That's not the same thing as a hovering mommy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you are doing semester or more abroad it’s very helpful to have housing that fits with that. Move out end of fall and not return until September.

No way would OP allow study abroad. I find it funny that OP is going on and on about independence and everything when she's a completely overbearing parent who has probably robbed her kid of most independent thought

Hi, the real OP here. DS has already studied abroad during high school! In fact it was actually that experience living in a dorm that turned him off to dorm living.

It's so odd how many people are projecting that I'm smothering when I've said multiple times on this thread that it's my teen who is driving this. He gets to make the final decision. Maybe you don't like my tone or my audacity in questioning 4-year campus living for adults. So be it. That's not the same thing as a hovering mommy.

DP. So find schools that do not have the on-campus living requirement. Why are you having such difficulty with this?

[Anonymous]

Went to an Ivy. Lived on campus for three years (required). Seniors could live off campus but all the off campus options were immediately adjacent to campus.

I would think most elite/better colleges require a significant on-campus residency. I will admit when I applied to college back in the day it never occurred to me to even think about off campus. I assumed I would be in the dorms all four years and it just turned out that seniors had a tradition of living off campus (with the above caveat that we were so close to campus, and some of us closer than some of the dorms!).

Most LACs would have all four years on campus, methinks. My sister went to AWS and lived on campus all four years.

Why would you want to prioritize living off campus? At the mercy of landlords and in grotty cheap student flophouse apartments?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you are doing semester or more abroad it’s very helpful to have housing that fits with that. Move out end of fall and not return until September.

No way would OP allow study abroad. I find it funny that OP is going on and on about independence and everything when she's a completely overbearing parent who has probably robbed her kid of most independent thought

Hi, the real OP here. DS has already studied abroad during high school! In fact it was actually that experience living in a dorm that turned him off to dorm living.

It's so odd how many people are projecting that I'm smothering when I've said multiple times on this thread that it's my teen who is driving this. He gets to make the final decision. Maybe you don't like my tone or my audacity in questioning 4-year campus living for adults. So be it. That's not the same thing as a hovering mommy.

Why would he assume that the rules he didn't like in high school (curfew, no visitors) would apply to college dorms?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you are doing semester or more abroad it’s very helpful to have housing that fits with that. Move out end of fall and not return until September.

No way would OP allow study abroad. I find it funny that OP is going on and on about independence and everything when she's a completely overbearing parent who has probably robbed her kid of most independent thought

Hi, the real OP here. DS has already studied abroad during high school! In fact it was actually that experience living in a dorm that turned him off to dorm living.

It's so odd how many people are projecting that I'm smothering when I've said multiple times on this thread that it's my teen who is driving this. He gets to make the final decision. Maybe you don't like my tone or my audacity in questioning 4-year campus living for adults. So be it. That's not the same thing as a hovering mommy.

DP. So find schools that do not have the on-campus living requirement. Why are you having such difficulty with this?

+1 It's good your son has clear ideas of what he wants, although he may want to research more on the specifics of what 4-years-on-campus actually looks like (e.g often not a little dorm room). There are many options where students move off campus, but probably means he'll need more of a big state school. Residency requirements are pretty standard for LACs. The reaction you are getting here is to the huffy/offended/overreaction to the fact that some schools have these requirements. There's no one right way to organize life on campus so find a school that fits what you want.