How Much Should Students Contribute Towards College?

We are a middle class family. Our daughter is a senior and is our first child heading to college so we are just starting to absorb the college costs we will be facing. Thanks to Early Action, my daughter already has a few offers from colleges which include music and academic scholarships. We did qualify for financial aid but it is a very small amount. Her best offer right now amounts 80% off of tuition (which is great!) but when you add in housing/food plan, it would still be close to 20K per year. Unfortunately, we do not have a college savings account or much in savings, so we will definitely need to take out loans. Due to a unique music major, local colleges aren’t an option unless it is just to get liberal arts credits in.

I found the below article to be interesting and the main take-aways for me were:

  1. students who are responsible for full tuition often drop out
  2. students who are required to contribute nothing may not achieve at their potential level (may slack off if nothing is personally invested)
  3. students who have to contribute towards college costs are often quite successful because they have “skin in the game.”

My questions relate to #3

How much is the “right” amount or percentage for a student to contribute to college? How did you determine this for your family? Should we offer incentives if she chooses a lower priced college? For example, is it better to expect her to pay a PERCENTAGE of costs so that the lower priced colleges would be more appealing? My initial thought is that my daughter should be responsible for the $5500 Stafford Loan every year (no matter which college) and we would cover the rest. This would result in her leaving college with $22K in college debt unless she is able to work through college to pay some of it off ahead of time. Is that an unreasonable expectation? Or, on the other hand, should we expect more from her?

I know it’s late in the process to be examining this, so I am hoping some experienced parents can give some guidance and advice. Thank you!


Every family is different. We decided that we would ask our kids to each take out a $3k loan each year.

You’ll get a different answer from every poster/response. People will offer what they did like it is THE way, but honestly, it’s about what works for you.

Asking the child to pay all her own books and personal expenses is common
Books, personal expenses and the direct loan amount is common
Books, personal expenses, and the subsidized portion of the direct loan (if you qualify) is common.
Personal expenses only is common
Taking just the direct loan is common.

And there are a few posters who cover everything and give an allowance for personal expenses and food that makes me wish they’d adopt me.

Really, your personal financial situation is going to dictate a lot of this.

I would encourage you to stop looking at and thinking about percentages- nobody can pay their mortgage with a percentage, or buy groceries with a percentage- and look at ACTUAL costs per year.

22K in college debt might be a very comfortable loan for some kids and could be crippling for others. We don’t know your kid and don’t know your family. Does she work now and is she thrifty with her paycheck? Has she had ongoing responsibilities throughout her childhood (chores, taking care of the younger sibs, helping grandparents with household tasks) and has she been on top of these? Does she understand that you live on a budget and does she show signs of doing that once she’s on her own?

You know your kid. I’ve seen new grads going broke on $100K per year, and new grads paying back their loans, every month, on $32K per year. What signs of maturity and financial knowledge has she shown so far???

80% off tuition- if you can’t afford the 20%, what’s the point ?

Yes, it’s a little late in the process to be considering costs and her part. But at least you are.

The college loan goes up from 5500, to 6500 2nd year and 7500 for 3rd and 4th. Then, even with a good job, it’s tough for kids to pay back. But that’s what we had them do. Some day, we’ll pay a large chunk of that for them. Not yet. None of this was because some article (by a loan company, no less,) said having skin in the game was important. It had to do with what we could afford, on what schedule. And what the great college option was, for each.

Also, many colleges ask for a ‘student contribution from summer earnings,’ often around 2k or so. They had summer jobs that paid well. We split that contribution cost with the kids and then split the cost of big gear like their laptop (which, for ours, “needed” to be a Mac.)

Re: parent loans, be careful that you can afford this, know how you will pay this back and that the timing works for you. Payback on the Parent Plus starts roughly Feb or March of first year, then goes up as each semester’s disbursements are made. I think you can delay, but that only increases interest accumulated over time. Meanwhile, you’re still trying to put together the other costs you’re paying out of current income.

Every family is different. Families know usually whether their child is invested or not regardless of financial contribution of the child. Within a family, they may make different decisions. as children are different, family finances change over time, school offers differ, etc.

Maybe one child got a fabulous merit offer because of great grades. Should they also be forced by family to contribute $3K because the family doesn’t trust that they will continue to achieve in college? How about the child who decides, given that he/she will be required by family to put in $3K, to attend a community college instead, cutting costs significantly. Does that child still need to cough up $3K per year? Did the family dissuade child from attending a potentially more nurturing school because of the money requirement? Hard to say.

I personally don’t believe that money is the deciding factor for whether a person decides to achieve in college or not. It may nudge things along slightly but it’s not the deciding factor.

The loans you take out should be those which have the best terms. Sometimes students loans have better interest rate and payback options. On the other hand, kids are stuck with student loans for the rest of their lives - even bankruptcy won’t get rid of many student loans.

As for paying back - depends on what you want for your kid, and what your plans for yourselves are. You want your kid to be independent, but you also want them to be able to actually start their lives. You also evidently have other kids, and will need to help them as well, and you want to be able to retire eventually and not be a burden on your kids, so any loan burden that your kids have now may be a burden that they will not need to bear when they’re older and have kids of their own.

Now, you write that your kid has a specialized music major. There’s some good news and some bad news. The good news is that your kid is likely to be focused and won’t really need to have any other incentives to finish. The bad news is that most jobs for music majors are not such that they would be making a lot of money, so that paying back student loans would be more difficult than if she was, say, an engineering major.

So, in my opinion, if your own financial situation will allow you to pay back the loans fairly easily, than don’t burden your kids with debts as soon as they start their lives. However, if it would be just as difficult for you as for you daughter, all you are doing by taking loans is deferring the cost of the loans, since your daughter will be paying for them later anyway, or, dumping at least part on her siblings.

There is also that sibling issue - what impact will your taking a loan have on the prospects of her siblings? While I’m not one of the “every kid gets exactly the same amount” camp, it would not be fair that other siblings would have less of a choice than your daughter had because you’re still paying of her loans.

That being said, $22K in college debt is manageable for most people who are earning $30K-$40K a year. Even low paid music majors make at least this much, so requiring your kid to reduce your debt burden by taking on that much is not an unreasonable expectation at all.

This sounds like two different questions:

  1. How much should our student pay, given our financial situation, and
  2. What is a good amount for students to pay, for motivational (or other) reasons?

Since there are parent financial limits in this case, I would just stay with that myself. Just say, “if you want to go here, we can pay this and you have to pay that”, or similar.

Our kids covered books, spending money, and any internship expenses if they chose not to live at home and work over the summers. I don’t think it is unreasonable to ask a kid to take and be responsible for their federal loans on top of that.

^ On CC, a number of families encourage their kids’ commitments to college by setting expectations, in order for the parents continuing to foot their share. Eg, B average, full schedule. Many parents do watch grades, one way or another, have the talks, if things seem to lag.

@lookingforward The “^” doesn’t work if four people chime in at once :wink:

Lol, @damon30 . It was after Dusty Feathers but is general enough.

Like others, I see the financial aspects as a family matter, something that can shift depending on family circumstances.

My D takes out her loans, contributes a minimum of $3K of summer work earnings, and is responsible for all her books, gas, and spending $ during the school year.

It depends so much on the kid and the family. I would never use “should” I would use needs. Our gifted kid did not need incentives to do college, I can see where others need to have “skin in the game” for motivation. We could pay and son acquired our frugal habits so there were no spending issues. Others would need to rein in spending habits. Others need financial help like I did. I wish I did not have to work in college and could have spent more freely. Tying money to grades would not work for our son, he did what he wanted to do in classes independent of getting grades (honors grad so obviously had above a 3.5 at his school).

I believe “should” could apply to extras regardless of family’s ability to pay. H and I worked hard to become well paid (physicians) and had the money for college. Mine came up with whatever I needed after scholarships freshman year for the basics and dorm living- don’t know how they managed it. But I did not do so many things that cost money. If I had known I would have the money I now have…

Thank you all so much for your insight and information. When I referenced the 80% I meant that we need to cover 20% of the tuition (in that case about $6,000) which is no problem. But it’s those housing and food costs ADDED to the tuition (most around $14,000) where we will feel the pinch.

My husband and I both grew up with the expectation that we would have to pay for our own college education, which we did (our loan debts were still very low and easy to pay off, however.) My husband still had that mindset for our kids until he realized how much more college is these days.

My daughter is very focused and pretty responsible, so she generally understands budgeting and limits, but that doesn’t mean she won’t struggle in the real world when she leaves the comfort of home. She is quite aware of financial limitations for some music majors. In fact, she has been involved in theatre her whole life but decided not to major in musical theatre after doing some research into the financial struggles of even the best on Broadway. So her music industry/business/commercial songwriting focus is something she is very passionate about, but also something she has learned has more financial opportunities. She does have good taste so she wants to be sure she isn’t a struggling artist. Lol. Although she is very busy with music-related activities and theatre, she does have a job and works hard to save money.

We also have a son (4 years younger) who is very practical and already told us he plans to go to our local state college and live at home because “why would we spend extra money on dorms when we have a great college nearby that offers the majors I am interested in?” So maybe he will be easier : )

I didn’t really expect one right answer as it is obviously different for every family but it is very helpful to hear how you all approached it and that the approach might even vary within your family, depending on the personality of each kid.

Thanks, everyone!

It depends on the family, the kid, and what your finances are.

My kids all take the maximum guaranteed student loans, have to work for their own spending money – and we pay for the remainder out of pocket; parent loans can be dangerous and students cannot take loans outside the GSL amounts without a parent co-signing.

My parents gave me the gift of a loan free education and I was happy to give the same to my kids. They did not abuse the privilege.

We pay tuition, books, and travel back and forth to school (within reason, like we’ll pay to come home at xmas and thanksgiving, but if our kids want to come home for a random weekend, they pay for that). Our kids are responsible for extras. My D didn’t work her first year and we have her a small monthly allowance…which had to last the whole month. She supplemented that with birthday $, Christmas $, and savings from a previous summer job. Her sophomore year she had a job, so we stopped the allowance. We would sometimes give extra money as needed for emergencies or illnesses. My daughter also got scholarships to help with college costs as well.

So…you are saying your net costs will be in the $20,000 range?

Your daughter can take a $5500 Direct Loan in her name…which might already be part of her financial aid package. So…who will pay the remaining $15,000 or so. If you can pay $6000…that leaves a balance of $9000.

Your daughter will either need a co-signer or you parents will need to take these loans.

In terms of the student federally funded loans…she can take $5500 her freshman year, $6500 her sophomore year, $7500 her junior year, and $7500 her senior year for a total of $27,000.

If she plans to be a music major…this will be about $300 a month in payments for about 10 years.

What others do or don’t do really shouldn’t matter to you. You need to realistically look at your family finances, and the costs of the colleges. Then you need to figure out how and who will be paying the balance after financial aid is applied.

For example, our music major attended a very expensive private university which we could fully fund. We didn’t have to because he did get a generous scholarship…but how would that help you? We could pay $40,000 a year or more…and you can’t do that.

So…look at YOUR financial situation…your cash on hand.

Things that were absolutes for us. Our kids had jobs, and paid for discretionary spending, and books. Yes, we gave them some extra spending money from time to time, but we didn’t need to. Both worked…and they started before college.

Please think before you overextend yourselves financially. Every parent wants to give their kids what they feel is the best, but your family finances do need to be considered.