I didn't want to hijack the Living in a Car thread, but this is kinda-sorta related-
My 25 year old daughter will graduate with a Bachelor's Degree in Respiratory Therapy in early May. This venture was 100% financed by my wife and I and my daughter. She did work pretty much all the time she's been in college in some form or fashion and you could say she had two jobs at one point and that was during a very critical time. She mostly worked at restaurant-type places but also worked for the college athletic department as a trainer (taping up ankles, etc) while she was a Kinesiology major. She worked more or less to have some spending money and help augment her groceries, gas, etc. My wife and I paid the heavy costs.
First two years, tuition, books, campus housing/meal card - $10,000 per semester, except for the last semester of the first two years tuition assistance from the Athletic Trainer job knocked about $2500 off of that $10k.
Next year about $5k in tuition for both semesters, housing was about $500/mo, $125 in utilities, $200 in other expenditures, so about $15k/year.
She changed majors, had to take some other courses/classes, etc., applied for nursing and respiratory therapy programs, accepted to both. Chose RT. This was 5 straight semesters. Tuition was $6k/semester. By now, it's 2022 and housing is off the charts, so is food, car insurance, etc. The last 5 semesters were about $50,000 in total expenses plus whatever she spent with her earnings from working a part-time job. This includes housing, food, meds, car insurance, maintenance, fuel, tuition, supplies for college, utilities, etc., so probably somewhere along $60k total.
All told, about $130k total for her degree. She has accepted a position at a local Children's Hospital. She will work one month on day shift and then work night shift from then on. Base rate of pay for day shift is $22.66/hour and there is a $5/hour differential for night shift, where she will make $27.66.
This hospital is in a downtown urban area, a larger city and I don't want her driving 30+ minutes each way before/after a 13-14 hour shift. We've found her a 1-bedroom, ~700 sf apartment that is adjacent to the hospital....she simply has to walk out of the apartment building, down about 1/2 block to a hospital employee parking deck, where she can then traverse through that deck up to a walkway and through another deck and another walkway to the hospital.
Rent is $1500/mo, not including water, sewer, garbage, plus internet, power. Parking is included. She won't have to pay $40/mo to park in the hospital deck.
She will not make enough to live on with a Bachelor's Degree and 5 semesters of high-intensity training, education and hospital clinicals already under her, performing life-saving techniques. After $130,000 in college education expenses at a "State school", one of which most or all of you have never heard of. We will have to continue to help her out with monthly bills until she gets a year or two under her with work experience and possibly a few more certificates of training in life-saving techniques.
Nurses are about the same. I think the same hospitals in the area are starting RNs at a couple dollars more.
Something is really out of whack with college education, cost of college and living expenses today. So before you make all those lovely college campus visits, before you sign your kid up for a college education, before you commit to financing that college/party experience, know that the cost probably isn't amortizable over their careers.
