I spent about $300 for college tours, $100 for two ACT tests, $60 for an ACT prep class, $200 for college application fees, $5 on stamps for college applications, about $60 dollars in ink to print out draft after draft of college entrance essays, $20 in bus fare to attend college open houses, $150 on long-distance calls to colleges to ask about 30 minutes worth of questions every other day, $100 worth of transcripts, and about $500 on clothes and entertainment to console her when she didn’t get into her first-choice school.

We wanted our daughter to apply for as many scholarships as possible so my husband thought up a little “incentive.” We told her we’d give her 10 percent in cash of whatever scholarships she earned. If she got a $300 award, we gave her $30. Then she felt like there was something in it for her. She was eventually successful getting over $4,000 in scholarships!

I worked out a deal with my daughters before they started school. I told them that I would pay their tuition and related expenses and they would have to pay their room and board. I told them that they could either take out loans or work as resident advisors to cover their room and board. College is a whole package, and you don’t want to do everything for them. They need to learn to live independently and I don’t have a problem with making them shoulder just a little bit of the burden.