Since founding Student Debt Diaries almost 18 months ago, I have received hundreds of emails from people across the country. Although most individuals who email me have student loans themselves, I also receive numerous messages from parents of children with student debt. Usually, parents reach out to me in order to discover ways that they can help their kids with student loans. However, a few parents have discussed their financial struggles and other issues that prevented them from assisting one child with educational costs as much as another. Although I am no expert on relationships between parents and their children, is seems self-evident that parents should equally help children with educational costs.
In practice, it might be difficult for parents to provide the same educational assistance to one child that they provided to another kid. Indeed, my own parents did not follow the maxim that parents should equally help children with educational costs.
As mentioned previously on this website, I am a triplet, and I have twin older brothers who are around six years older than me. When my older brothers went to college, my family was well-off financially. As such, my family was able to pay for all of the college costs of my older brothers. In addition, one of my older brothers also received some assistance from my family when attending graduate school, although he had to pay most of his graduate school costs himself.
Although parents should equally help children with educational costs, when my triplet brothers and myself graduated from high school, we were on our own when it came to paying for college and graduate school. By this time, my family’s financial situation had changed, and my parents were not able to contribute anything to help pay for our educational costs.
This created some resentment among members of my family, but my brothers and myself understood how our family’s financial situation affected the ability of my parents to help us pay for college. In addition, this financial situation also allowed my brothers and myself to obtain generous need-based financial aid, which helped me graduate from college with very little student debt. However, in some scenarios, if families forget that parents should help children equally with educational costs, tension and animosity could arise.
Of course, it is difficult to predict what your financial situation will be when it is time for kids to attend college. This is why it is critical that families save money over the course of years so that funds are available for all children when they attend college. If parents plan carefully, and do not leave things for the last minute, there is less of a possibility that money will be unavailable when children attend college.
I have also communicated with student debt borrowers who have told me that parents were not assisting them with educational expenses like they did for siblings, because parents disapprove of where that student chose to attend school. Although I understand why parents would want to ensure that their funds are being used wisely, parents should equally help children with educational costs regardless of where children chose to attend school. By the time students are ready to attend college, they are entering adulthood, and are fully able to make decisions about where they want to earn a degree.
My own father threatened to withhold any financial support he might have if I chose to attend a school he did not want me to attend. As it turned out, I was completely on my own when paying for school, and I ended up being admitted early decision to another university and had to withdraw my application from the college my father did not like. In any case, I understand how frustrating it can be for students to be controlled by their parents when it comes to choosing a school, and parents should not use their money to exert control over their children.
It is worth mentioning that there may be times when parents can justifiably help one child more than another when it comes to paying for school. Children may attend different colleges that could cost varying sums of money. For instance, many state schools have discounted tuition costs for in-state residents, and many private universities are more expensive to attend. It might be appropriate for parents to pay the tuition of a child who attends an in-state school and only part of the costs associated with attending a more expensive university.
However, parents should equally help children with educational costs, and should at least give each child the same amount of funds to attend college. Of course, a set amount of money might be enough to totally pay for one child’s educational costs if they attend an in-state college, but might only be enough to partially pay for the costs of someone who attends a private university. Nevertheless, it is important that children understand that they are being given an equal amount of assistance to attend college or graduate school.
As I have already discussed at length, student loans can create much tension between parents and their children. In order to minimize any stress that might arise, parents should equally help children with educational costs. Although this might not be possible due to various financial circumstances, with careful planning, most parents can ensure that they equally help their children pay for college or graduate school.