Educators working in schools acim podcast that separate the responsibility for postsecondary education planning from other tasks within the guidance office gave more positive assessments of their schools’ ability to provide post-high school planning assistance for students of all ability levels. From a list of planning activities, students and young adults rate guidance counselor meetings as the most helpful (although they rate parents and teachers as more helpful with planning overall).
Parents rate college campus visits, closely followed by meetings with guidance counselors, as the most helpful activity. Meeting with their child’s guidance counselor is the only planning activity that parents of General/Voc Prep students are as likely as other parents to have done. While virtually all current students report having regularly scheduled meetings with guidance counselors.
Only 74% report having had a serious discussion with a guidance counselor or teacher about their plans for the future. Only two-thirds of the young adults surveyed reported that their high school offered regularly scheduled guidance counselor meetings.Discussions about access to higher education often focus on financial considerations, and many of those surveyed expressed concern about college affordability and financial aid.
Nearly three-quarters of parents surveyed say they are discouraged by the rising costs of college, but very few (only 7%) say their child won’t be able to attend because of costs. Roughly one-third of students and parents say that it is likely that money will be the determining factor in whether or not they (or their children) go to college. About one half of students and fully 68% of parents say that money will determine which college they (or their children) choose.
Three in ten young adults report that money was a very significant factor in determining what they did directly after high school, regardless of where in they live. Students who went on to a two-year college, technical or trade school were roughly twice as likely as those who went to four-year college to say that money was a very significant factor. Most students (78%) express a willingness to take on loans in order to pay for college.
While most parents (72%) support the idea of their children incurring debt to finance college, fewer (59%) are willing themselves to take on education loans for their children. Although most students and parents report that they will need significant financial aid to pay for college, some do not believe that they will qualify for scholarships or grants to help pay for college. Parents who did not go to college and parents of General/Voc Prep track students are more likely than others to believe that saving for their child’s college education would jeopardize the family’s eligibility for financial aid.
