Save Some Money
Susie Madrak at Suburban Guerrilla calls a post about parents going whacko over their children’s sports: Investment Counseling. Parents are trying to use sports to help get their kids into the “right university”.
Folks, rich or poor, the best move you can make is to send your child to a community college for the first two years and get the basics out of the way. The first two years are to prepare you for the real work in your major that normally starts in the junior year. Taking the general courses and getting an associate in arts degree at an accredited community college will help your child succeed when you have to pay the big bucks for major university courses. Let the child learn to read and write at the college level without incurring a huge debt load.
Among the many things he touches on in this post , Michael Bérubé tells you that university English departments use teaching assistants and adjuncts to teach the lower level courses, not the full-time faculty. That’s the system used by all of the big universities.
You can transfer after the first two years, and the institution on the bachelor’s degree will still be a major university.
Give your child a chance to figure out if they want to go for a higher degree, if they have the skills needed, and if they can adapt to the college environment at a much lower cost. It will also give you another couple of years to find the money.
