Can you hire get a third party tester? Where I live, you can get a third party tester. They often have a setup where you book two time slots back-to-back. The first time slot is a practice run through the course when you can ask questions and the tester can give hints or pointers. Then the second time through is the actual test. It is less nerve wracking because you have just driven the course and know exactly what to expect.

A physical therapist, physical therapist assistant, and personal trainer are different roles with different levels of training. A physical therapist has a medical degree, the other roles do not require medical degrees. A physical therapist assistant helps you perform the exercises prescribed by the physical therapist but does not prescribe treatments directly. Physical therapist tend to focus more on helping restore function in someone who has a health issue. Personal trainers tend to focus on people who are already healthy but want to be more fit. These are really broad strokes, and there is a lot of crossover. Both types of people tend to use similar exercises, especially for core work. Insurance may cover appointments with a physical therapist /physical therapy assistant, but probably won’t cover a personal trainer. In my very limited experience, the actual title or role of the person is less important than whether or not the person is a good fit for you specifically. I think self-education is also really important. Learn the different muscle groups in your area of concern and the different ways they work. Learn the vocabulary for describing their movement. Learn the purpose of each exercise your therapist or trainer gives you so you understand why you are doing it. Learn what are realistic goals in realistic timeframes and how to measure them. Learn to really listen to your body so you know when it is time to stop and when you can do a little more without causing problems later. Tell your therapist everything about your medical history that might impact your situation. A goal of gaining a specific number of pounds of muscle mass is really hard to measure. If your weight goes up or down, you can’t easily tell how much is muscle versus something else. Try to come up with incremental goals that are easier to measure. For example, do you want to be able to lift/carry heavier things? Or do you just want parity between your two sides?

My area has not made any significant improvements in public transit, but I like the idea of public transit. When I fly to a major city, I no longer automatically assume that I will rent a car. I even picked my hotels in part due to their proximity to public transit. - Having an app is essential. I expect the app to have maps and route times. Unless service comes every few minutes, I except the app to tell me how long I will have to wait at a stop. - I expect to be able to pay with my phone or by tapping my credit card. Do not make me buy a physical transit card or pay with cash. - I use Uber/Lyft to supplement traditional public transit. Sometimes I use these services for the “last/first mile” to get to/from the stop. Sometimes I use these services because I want faster service or have a lot to carry. - Having bike rentals as part of a mobility plan is really hard to pull off. I was able to use bike rentals for transit in NYC, but in all the other cities where I have rented bikes, it was just for local entertainment and not transit. - Pre-covid, the public transit system for the nearby metropolitan area offered free rides for all students during the summer. Getting the pass required some paperwork, and it was a pain proving that my homeschooled kids were elegible, but I thought it was a good plan. This was not for kids to commuting to school since it was free for them only during the summer. - In my local social circles, taking public transit is unheard of. Everyone drives. Moms are afraid of public transit and refuse to consider it. - In addition to safety concerns, people are resistant to public transit because when you have a car, the main benefit public transit offers is that you don’t have to deal with parking. In comparison, public transit has several disadvantages: longer trips, having to deal with transfers, more walking, difficulty taking “stuff” with you, paying per person, etc.

One of my current hobbies is napping. It took me a while to get over feeling like napping was a waste of time. Now I simply enjoy my naps. I have a few other hobbies that are more active than napping. I am good enough at one of them that it turned into a job. However, I am really, really bad at most of my hobbies, and that's okay. I do them because I find the activities personally fulfilling in and of themselves.

Hard to say. How full is the flight? Does paying more to select your seat come with other perks like getting to board a little earlier? How important is leg room or proximity to bathrooms to you? Most of my recent domestic flights have every seat filled, and getting to board a little earlier than other ensured that I got to keep my carry-on with me. Other passengers who boarded at the end had to gate check their carry-ons and pick them up at baggage claim. On the other hand, my daughter’s recent international flight was fairly empty. She got an entire row to herself, and other people did too. I usually sleep on long flights, so sitting next to family on the flight itself isn’t a big deal. From what I’ve seen of other people boarding, both choices (pre-selecting seats and sitting together, and not pre-selecting and sitting apart) are common. Can you get the tickets now without paying more to pick a seat, then decide later?

If you buy a car from a dealership, be prepared for a hard sell on financing, extended warranties, etc. For us, dealer financing was a better rate than our bank, but the hard sell and outright lying by the finance person was disgusting. The finance guy snuck in an extended warranty that we didn’t want and it took multiple visits to the dealership to get it straightened out.

I'm keeping my base 10 blocks because they make me happy. I'd ditch the clock, play money, and counting bears. They do not make me happy. For the others--do the nostalgia and future play value (not educational value) outweigh the space and effort of keeping them? If not, release them so they can bless another family.

Thanks for the clarification. I’m a bit ambivalent about how to consider sticker price. I think that costs should be a factor in choosing a college. But sticker price for college currently has very little correlation to the actual final price of attendance. And it is very hard to tell the actual final price of attendance until after you apply and see what scholarships and financial aid you get. I guess this is another family difference. My kids have know since they were young that applying for a program, getting into a program, and actually attending a program are three very different things. Just because you apply and get accepted into a program does not mean you get to attend said program. One of my daughters was ten when she really wanted to attend an exclusive summer program. I told her she could only go if she got in under certain conditions. She got in, but not all of the conditions were met, so she didn’t go. End of story. No hard feelings. Years later when she was a bit older, she wanted to attend a different exclusive summer program that was also financially out of reach. She applied, got in, but still no scholarship. But she was really resourceful and found a way to attend anyway that did not place a financial hardship on the family. If I hadn’t let her apply, she would have missed out on both the program and the experience of figuring out how to make the program financially possible. For me, not letting my kid apply at all would be more of a dream crusher than telling her that we cannot afford it, which she would have known all along. But every kid and every family is different. Some parents might have a harder time telling their kids no. And some kids might have a harder time hearing no.

I am very sorry for being insensitive. I do not mean to be. I very much believe that there are things that are much, much worse than $100k of debt, and I am very, very grateful that my daughter and I are able to take on this debt, even though we are not sure *how* it will be repaid. (I am 100% sure that it *will* be repaid, just not how. If nothing else, my life insurance will cover it.) But the repeated sentiment on this thread is that people should not incur large debts, and that people who do take out large loans for college should have just looked harder at alternatives. My point is that it is possible to have “looked hard” and still decide that large debt is still the better choice. And I am grateful that loans were available to give us that choice. I guess that my experience is much more limited than I thought. I know families that outwardly appear to want and expect their kids to go to elite colleges, but every single one that I’ve had private conversation with expressed concerns about financing college and considered alternatives. This did not always stop them from incurring debt, but it was not done lightly. Even the family that took out a second mortgage to pay for a child’s dream school did so only after carefully consideration.

Wow. I had no idea. I guess the parts of College Confidential where I lurk are different. I can easily picture a kid having a “dream school or bust” mentality. I find it hard to believe that they were universally encouraged in this mentality, but I can also imagine the kid ignoring any voices trying to temper that mentality, especially if the parents feed into it. Maybe I just tend to not hang out with people who are financially irresponsible. This is like my kids’ private high school. They put a huge emphasis into attending college and getting into top colleges. But even so, our high school tells kids to think about finances and have safety schools. But this is a case where the kid/family *did* consider a more affordable option. They just decided against the more affordable option. That is very different from not even considering other options. I think that school admins restricting kids to in-state publics is a horrible idea, worse than pushing ivies. I am okay with parents doing so, since parents usually have to pay the fees. But in my opinion, high school admins have no business restricting kids from applying anywhere.

There *always* is a less expensive option than going to college. Who are these people who go straight to high-cost, private school options without considering other schools nowadays? I have never heard of anyone doing this, not even the people I know who could afford high-cost private school for their kids without taking out any loans. While the kids might have ended up at high-cost, private colleges, there was always a discussion of other options. I think high schools still push college a lot, maybe too much, but they don’t direct kids to only high-cost private colleges.

I don’t view college this way. I personally decided that college has value in-and-of-itself, not just for its potential to increase earnings. How much value varies from college to college and person to person. A house has value beyond the physical shelter it provides. A car has value beyond its ability to transport someone to and from work. Thus people borrow money to get more than a bare-bones house or car. A college education also cannot be repossessed or foreclosed upon. What you get from a college education/experience cannot be taken away (short of brain damage). Once you have a degree, that degree is yours for the rest of your life. I have family members who had to flee situations with nothing but the clothes on their backs and the knowledge in their heads. I believe in investing in oneself, even if the financial incentive isn’t obvious. Absolutely. However, just because that middle ground exists doesn’t mean that it is always better than 100k+ of debt. I get that 100k+ of debt sucks. But when the alternatives suck more, I supported my daughter taking on the debt and shouldered some of that burden myself by co-signing. And I am grateful that we have that as an option (interest and all) versus having to go with a suckier option. It isn’t as if I could manifest a better option into existence. For those of you who cannot imagine a situation worse than $100k of debt, may you realize how fortunate you are. To those of you who would not be able to take on $100k of debt, may you never want to.

Forgot to say, congrats on paying off your student loans early! That is a major accomplishment! Enjoy knowing that you no longer have that hanging over you. And thinking how you are going to address you kids college finances is a smart move. Many people in this thread have happy stories of kids with little to no college debt due to scholarships, family assistance, and other choices. But there are no guarantees. As much as I would have liked my kid to go to an in-state college with a tidy scholarship, it just wasn’t going to happen that way for her. And that is okay, because that is not who she is, and I love her as she is.

I think this is an issue of financial knowledge. When we got our mortgage for our house, it was very clear that the interest would cost multiple times the original loan amount. Every month my credit card statement says how much I would have to pay in interest if I made only minimal payments, and again it is many multiples of the original amount. The same goes for our car loans. I think that paying more in interest than the original principal is just part of having a loan with a hight rate or a long term. Variable interest rates on loans scare me. I’m sorry you had to go through that. Do you feel you were misled into taking out those loans? Given your family dynamics, do you feel you could have done differently? That was an awful burden for your parents to put on you. One of my goals is to not be a burden on my kids. One of the reasons why I am a co-signer on my daughter’s loans is to let her know that I am there to help her with her burdens, and not the other way around. One of my friends has a daughter who took out a student loan in secret by getting a different family member to co-sign. It caused lots of drama and stress that my friend didn’t understand until her daughter fessed up years later.

Any four year college that didn’t offer a major that interested my daughter was an automatic bad fit. My daughter has a very narrow list of majors that would be good fits. (I am not going to say her major because the exact major is not important.) This cut out a lot of colleges. Any college that did not or would not have accepted her were bad fits. Large colleges where DD could easily get lost in the shuffle were also bad fits. Having to take classes with profs who had no idea who she was due to the volume of students would have been a bad fit. We only considered colleges in the USA. For this particular kid, going international would be a bad fit. We also crossed off colleges that looked like a good fit academically but were more expensive and had significantly worse graduation rates. She did not apply to any “for-profit” colleges. I thought the business model was too risky, and they mostly got bad reviews anyway. There were a few other colleges that I had my daughter look at that she decided were not a fit for reasons that she could not fully articulate, but they would not have been any more affordable so it wasn’t worth digging deeper. We took into account other factors, such as location, campus culture, proximity to family, etc. But those factors were minor compared to those listed above. Even after taking everything into account, her current college is not a perfect fit. But I don’t think a perfect fit exists.

Thanks. I also admit that I am in a unique situation where I can co-sign on massive loans for my daughter and still sleep well at night. I understand that other people might not be able to do so.

Maybe. But I have never borrowed money for travel or a hobby. Other than co-signing my daughter’s loans, the only debt I have ever incurred have been for my house and cars. I try to avoid debt in general, not just because of timing of repayment and phase of life. Thank you. I would not have let my daughter take out the loans without me or my husband as a co-signer. This is also part of my financial plan. This is also part of why my DD has loans—I would not jeopardize my future financial needs for her college education, even if I could. My peers never talked about student loan debt, and I didn’t see evidence that student loan debt made any difference in their lives versus mine. I think personality had a greater impact on life choices. I do not expect any of my DD’s loans to be forgiven. For me, attending a college that is a good fit was more important than debt. If a college is a bad fit, why attend that college at all? For my DD, there were very, very few colleges that could have been a good fit, and they were all out-of-state. When I was considering colleges for myself, I was lucky that almost any college would have been a good fit, and I could follow the money to a place I had only seen in a few glossy pictures. DD is different. This is me. I don’t feel guilty for not being able to help my kids graduate college debt free. Both my husband and I got zero financial help from family for college. My kids have no grandparents who could help financially. My husband and I are not in a position to gift money outright to avoid student loans. But I am in a position to co-sign loans and ensure that loan doesn’t go into default in the future if my daughter cannot make payments. That is a gift I can give to her and that she can accept. I don’t look down on community college. DD and I considered it, and she did take some community college classes before leaving for her current college. We discussed having DD live at home, take community college classes, and work a part time job. We discussed it many, many times. She could have done it, but we ultimately decided that taking out large loans to go to her current college was a better option for her. Absolutely there are many ways to parent. In my particular case, I decided that co-signing on my DD’s loans is within an acceptable amount of risk. One of the reasons why she has a fixed rate loan for a longer term (versus a lower variable rate with a shorter term) is because I don’t like risk. Both my DD and I also agreed that this particular financial arrangement (me co-signing on her loans so she could go to this particular college) was the best choice for our relationship. Other people may not be able to comprehend why I think this was the best choice for our relationship, but they do not know the details, and I am not going to share them. We had a similar philosophy during k-12 education. But it became clear that no matter how much we poured into K-12 education, it was not going to be enough for this particular kid to go to a college that is a good fit without incurring significant student loans. I don’t think anyone on this board would ever wash their hands of their kids and send them on their way just because the kid turned 18. And recommending that a kid take out large loans is not sending the kid on her way—even if you think that is bad parenting, the act of making the recommendation and having the recommendation accepted is still being an involved parent. I spend a ton of time researching too. I did not come to the conclusion to have DD take out large loans without a massive amount of research. Doing research is no guarantee that the best option overall is an option that doesn’t involve large loans. I am posting about my experience because it seems like no-one else has a similar experience. My kid’s loans are an order of magnitude larger than what other people are posting. No-one else even comes close. Yet, her loans are not the result of predatory practices, lack of research, uninvolved parenting, or vague hopes for loan forgiveness. I don’t expect others to be in the same situation as me, but I want to let y’all know that this situation exists.

There were a lot of factors that are very unique to her and our family. A lot has to do with her personality, her interests, her skills, and her weaknesses. It also has to do with a lot of changes and uncertainty in our family finances in the past four years, and my tolerance for risk. She got a scholarship, but obviously not enough to afford her college without insane loans. I also do not personally believe that the main reason for college is to earn more money. I think going to college can have value unrelated to an increase in earning potential. I went to college on full scholarship (including covering room & board) for both undergrad and grad school. So I have never had any college debt, and maybe I am underestimating how soul-crushing college debt can be. But we discussed the alternatives and decided they would have been soul-crushing for her too.

I’m posting in interest of showing another side. You will probably judge me and my kid harshly. That’s okay. I knew what I was getting my kid into and I did it eyes wide open. She did not, but she was only following my guidance. I am the co-signer on her loans and I plan on making sure that those loans get repaid. She will have taken out over $120,000 in loans by the time she graduates and will be lucky if she can land a job that covers living expenses, much less enough to pay down debt.

I think a big decision is if you can trust people to self-report their comings and goings, or if you need a system where a hall monitor enforces checking in/out. In my old co-op, we had sticky name tags for every kid. Kids picked up their name tags when they checked in. Any leftover name tags meant that a kid was absent. But everyone arrived and left at basically the same time, versus having staggered arrival/departure times. I still think that a system could be built in Airtable or Coda with little to no ongoing monthly costs.

What about a system where you post a QR code that leads to a sign-in form? With this system, you could have people “check-in” other people who aren’t actually on campus, but it could be done for practically free. Our church has used this method for people to self-report attendance at some events. Or if you want, you could have a system where you issue a QR code to each person/family. Then a security greeter on-site would scan the QR codes and note that the person is present. This could also be practically free at the scale you mention, except you would need someone to man the scanning station, and setup is a touch more complicated. A summer camp that my daughter went to used a system like this where they issued each kid their own unique QR code. Kids had to present their QR codes whenever they wanted to check in/out.

Good for him. That will make it easier for him to do guest spots at small local studios that need guys for their spring shows.

What change are you referring to? My dancing daughter says there are lots of changes in people at lots of ballet programs in the US, at the company, second company, and school level. I don’t know enough to tell if it is normal reshuffling of people and we are just noticing it because of myDD’s stage in life, or if it really is an extreme amount of reshuffling.

I think it depends on your goals. Do you want to make it lenient so that he cannot get you for contempt of court, or do you want more strict so that he will raise them in accordance with your beliefs when you are not around? Do you want to protect against a change in religion or against no religion? Do you want a list of what must be done (e.g. going to mass) or what cannot be done (e.g. registering with a non-Catholic church or attending a school that requires signing a non-Catholic statement of faith) In either case, I agree that if and when the child is confirmed, the child should be the one making the decisions. I would not include anything that you do not have a history of doing. For example, if you currently do not attend every holy day of obligation, do not list it as a requirement.

Buy and install a dash cam. It probably wouldn’t have recorded the can since it hit the side, but it might had recorded the impact and you might have been able to get license plate numbers. But I also agree with avoiding a confrontation.