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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Well the applications have been reviewed and my DC is excited about one of his choices and is about to put a deposit on his choice.  So now it is time to think about how we manage the practicalities of his college years.  I wecome advice on what parents of a new college Freshman should know such as:

How do we decide which meal plan--set number of meals per week, Flex Dollars, or a combination?
My DC will have personal expenses in addition to tuition., books, room and board--how is reasonable for us to contribute and how should we do so
Should we add our son to a credit card?
How do we continue to get access to his academic performance in real time?  And Should we?
What other practical advice would you give us? [/quote]

I preface all advice with the caveat that it depends on your child.

Meal plans - a lot of times it is easier to add money if it’s not enough and you lose money if you don’t use it by a certain timeframe.  See how flexible the school is with unused meals/money. We only had the option of unlimited or unlimited plus adding in a bunch of extra dining dollars if living in campus dorms. Since dining points don’t roll over - we went with the less expensive option knowing we could add more dining dollars later.  My cousin’s son is at a school where the unused dining dollars roll over.

For books, tuition, room and board etc that’s a personal financial decision - just be up front with your kid before they accept so they don’t pick option A thinking you’ve got this and suddenly after they’ve committed you tell them they need to pay.  We’ve been up front that books and spending money are on them and we cover tuition and room and board up to a certain budget.  Above that amount they have to contribute.

Credit card - if you do set a low limit to start unless you know your kid is the type to ask permission first and only use for intended purpose. I remember commiserating with to co-workers that my kid was spending all this money on the credit card for outings etc and even though I was transferring from their account they were spending faster than their budget and was one of those “hey I am not the only one”. They looked at me crazy and said there was no overspending because there was no credit card to overspend and I realized that was the answer.  My kid now has a sort of prepaid (where you can add money) and their checking account for Venmo etc with a limited amount of money moved from savings.

Academic performance in real time - on the fence.  I’m sort of inclined in hindsight to have asked for access but not use it unless it’s to verify at end of semester. They have to figure it out and live with the consequences if they don’t.  However, you might want to protect yourself from your kid getting in over their head and getting incomplete in classes and really low grades and not being honest with you until it’s a day late and tens of thousands of dollars later.  My one kid in high school would turn things in late and lie about completing assignments when asked so … and a co-worker said she failed out her first school and maybe was using money the parents thought they were paying for college.  My co-worker got it together eventually but it took awhile and included a transfer to another school.

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