I absolutely have NO idea how people are affording the cost of tuition and books for their children. Thankfully, Jbird is attending an in-state two year college where the tuition costs are relatively minor (around $1500 for 15+ credit hours per semester). If he had attended a public high school the tuition wouldn't cost us anything due to the Hope scholarship program (must maintain a B average) - and we'd get $100 toward the cost of books. However, because we homeschooled J, he has to maintain at least a 3.0 for his first year of college and then we will be reimbursed for the tuition money we've paid out. Which is what we are hoping to achieve by the end of the fall semester - he currently has a 4.0.
However, the book costs are crazy. Today I had to go pay the tuition and while there decided to get more of his books. I'd already doled out close to $200 on two classes. So I did not expect the cost of today's purchases - $400+. Give me a break! We still will have to adjust his schedule during drop/add and then buy more books.
I looked at the school I first started attending back in the 70's. Tuition costs are now over $36,000 per year - not including books of course. No wonder these kids are coming out with loans over $100,000. Absolutely crazy. I read about the girl who just graduated with over $70,000. in loans and is suing her college because she can't find a job. I wonder if that would work retro-actively with me - now that I can't find a job in my profession? Right - nope.
Lillium,
Have you ever tried ebay for the books? My son had luck getting quite a few of his text books on ebay. Couldn't hurt to look with those prices. The books are almost always more than the cost of the course... go figure...
Posted by: ulli | August 03, 2009 at 06:02 PM