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Colleges??

Chickie said:
Don't even know where to begin. My ds is a Junior in HS. Average to below average in grades. Plays Football and Wrestles. Has a IEP. He has mentioned possibly being a teacher/Gym teacher and coaching football and wrestling.

Thinking a smaller school that will accomodate all of the aboved mentioned.

Any suggestions?
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It all depends on how much you have to spend. A community college like COD is super cheap compared to private or even public college. They have athletics and you can see how serious your son is about school. You have to remember too that sending your kid off to most colleges at 18 is pretty much giving them a ticket to party.

I would not suggest for your son to take out student loans so he can be a high school teacher. A college degree is nice, but it doesn't always pay off in the short term and those student loans can't disappear if he ever has to file for bankruptcy.
 
moreforless said:
I would not suggest for your son to take out student loans so he can be a high school teacher. A college degree is nice, but it doesn't always pay off in the short term and those student loans can't disappear if he ever has to file for bankruptcy.
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On another note, however, there are loan forgiveness programs for teachers. If you teach in certain districts, the government will forgive a certain amount of your loans for each year you work in that district.

If you're going to public college (and especially a jr. college), the loans probably won't be that bad. But I would recommend only taking out what you actually need to cover school expenses. I've seen some people use take out school loans and use the money to buy furniture and stuff like that.

If you go the jr. college route, I would recommend trying to figure out where he eventually wants to transfer and make sure that all his credits will in fact transfer and satisfy the prerequisites for his upper-level classes at the 4-year school. When I was in college, many people who transferred in ended up having to go 3 years at the 4-year school (after 2 at a jr. college) because their classes didn't transfer, they had to take extra classes as prerequisites for other classes they needed, or they weren't able to meet the requirement for 300- and 400-level credits in 2 years. If you're not careful about choosing your classes and coordinating with the 4-year school early on, college can end up taking longer and being more expensive than you planned on after going to a jr. college.
 
NIU has campus tours coming up in April...last time I checked it was geared towards HS Juniors & on 4/22. I'm thinking about taking SD16, as she is interested in nursing.

ETA- With our 4 kids, unless they have A's & B's in HS, they can choose from community college or paying their IL public school tuition themselves. I will not chip in .01c for out of state, state school tuition. (IMO, if you're going to spend $30k going to Iowa State, spend $30k, live at home & go to DePaul, kwim?) SD16 has good grades & is a serious student, therefore I will bust my butt helping her pay for it. SD15 has terrible grades, I'm not paying for terrible grades & the possibility of not finishing. DD17 wants to go to pastry school & has bad grades, she can go to JJC's culinary program & if she remains serious about pastry, I will gladly pay for pastry certificates from better pastry schools. DD12- too soon to tell. She wants to go to Brown in RI. She's gonna need to find some type of scholarship help. :p
 
I went to NIU, as well. Far enough away, but not too far.

My son is a senior this year and he has NO clue what he wants to do. He had his heart sent on Bradley, but damnnnn, very expensive. Thankfully, he has decided to go to the jr college here for a year until he can figure out what he wants to do.

NIU does have an excellent nursing program (info for dragonfly).

This post makes me want to get in the car and take a roadtrip to Dekalb !!
 
Am I the only person that thinks community college isn't always a good idea? I think sometimes the kids has to go out on his/her own and stand on their feet. While the tuition price is much cheaper for the community college, the kid misses out on the experience of having to do things on their own.

I'm not saying anything bad against people who choose community college. I am just looking at my 16 year old DS and worrying that he will end up living in my basement!

This kid seems to be clueless on many fronts despite my efforts to teach him how to do his laundry, cook a meal, etc. So with him I wonder if community college would be a bad move since he would still be here acting like he doesn't know how to cook, do laundry, change the sheets on this bed, etc.

For your situation, a smaller college will cost more, but it might be well worth it. I went to Missouri State University in Springfield, Missouri. I went to a small grade school and a small high school, so Mizzou was just too huge for me. While Missouri State is big, they have lots of commuters, so there wasn't tons of kids living on campus. That's something you might want to consider commuter vs. people who live on campus.

Sorry if I rambled too much!
 
Small 4 year colleges also in the COD area:

North Central in Naperville
Benedictine in Lisle
Aurora University in Aurora

Sometimes even with middle of the road grades, the small schools give scholarships that bring their tuition in line with public universities.
 
I have heard from numerous special ed teachers etc--that Western and Southern are the best schools for accomdating IEP etc.
2 of mine have accomodations--one has an IEP and one has a 504--the one with the IEP I was told to check out those two schools--that they really work with kids and Western is smaller than other schools.
We never checked them out-because DD wants to be close to home--she now has to pick a school--just did 2 years with a junior college--and she doesn't want to leave--she is thinking NIU--since it is cloes--but really doesn't want to go away-

Good luck
 
I have a friend who taught at CENTRAL in Iowa--it is a small Christian based school--they loved the area and the community. Central is in affiliation with 11 other schools (Wheaton and Olivette are in their system)
He only left teaching because he wanted to work in his field of study--his wife was not happy because he lost all of the benefits of being a teacher--such as free or reduced tuition!!
I have to say to Marys comment--3 of my kids have gone to COD--it is a GREAT school--but I do think they all would have benefited from going away. Though we went for free (due to income--which was the only reason they went there) I see the benefits their friends had from going away--and with my other kids as much as I would miss them--i would recommend it--I think they do miss out on the entire college experience--as is the case with dd--who wants to stay home--and not go far away==as much as I cry at the thought of her being gone--it would probably be the best thing for her!
 
If we are talking Central--My ds was being scouted by them for soccer this year--the school was in his final 3 choices
 
I have known quite a few families who have sent boys away to play sports and they have had to stay in school 5 or more years because sports took up so much of their time that they couldn't get their classes in.Now maybe wrestling isn't that way but with other sports the dream is making the big leagues so more time is devoted to the sport than studies. My nephew played soccer for St Ambrose and after 5 1/2 years finally settled for a degree in History-and he isn't nor ever wanted to be a teacher. And as someone else mentioned, 4 years away doesn't guarantee a job.
 
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