Would you have had kids if you couldn't

Avatar for cindytree
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-28-2003
Would you have had kids if you couldn't
1589
Wed, 09-03-2003 - 3:31pm
Would you still have had children if you knew you might not be able to pay for their college education? I'm not talking about providing food and shelter and needs of minor children and paying bills in general. Just about paying their way through college.

I guess I'm still astounded at the attitude that surfaced at another thread implying that if they couldn't pay for college, they wouldn't have had children. Of course, I'm a lazy, selfish mom at home who isn't working while some of my kids are in school so maybe my opinion doesn't count. Maybe I SHOULD take up scrapbooking to make my existence more worthwhile! lol

In any case, it is an interesting question considering that, under that reasoning, Oprah Winfrey shouldn't have been born. Give me time and I can come up with a whole list of highly successful and respected people who have impacted us in positive ways that wouldn't have been born had their parents decided that because they couldn't pay for college, they wouldn't have children.

How has the college issue influenced your decision to have children, if at all? Do you think it is an important criteria in the decision?

Cindy

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iVillage Member
Registered: 07-21-2003
Sun, 09-07-2003 - 8:14pm
I may suck at math, etc., etc., but I am of course, no example of the Weston school system. I didn't go to school here. I do have a pretty good idea of the the reputation your school had based on your example though...

How in god's name did I manage to graduate from college cum laude? I guess it was my good looks...


Edited 9/7/2003 8:24:49 PM ET by islimshady

iVillage Member
Registered: 07-21-2003
Sun, 09-07-2003 - 8:16pm
That's what I thought.

So are you going to reveal the dirty little reputation?

Avatar for virgogirl914
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-25-2003
Sun, 09-07-2003 - 8:24pm
None of his friends from high school went into the military that I am aware of. . .the more affluent of his friends went to college (yes, and ended up dropping/flunking out within the first year) and the ones who didn't go to college went into the work force.

iVillage Member
Registered: 07-21-2003
Sun, 09-07-2003 - 8:27pm
Oh, I thought everyone had friends who enlisted in the military. According to some here, I'm entirely full of crap for even suggesting that there are entire communities that don't enlist. What do you know, it was unusual in your husband's community too.
Avatar for virgogirl914
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-25-2003
Sun, 09-07-2003 - 8:45pm
Um, no. . .he was living in a military community during HS, but that isn't where he enlisted. . .it wasn't unusual.

You said 'his friends'. . .not everyone in his community.

He had a small circle of friends. . .all of whom either went to college or into the work force.

He rebelled and actually left home, came to stay with me, we decided to get married and found out I was pregnant. He enlisted in the Reserves a month before we married and 3 months before our daughter was born.

He came home from Basic for her birth, then from tech school when she was 3 months old. He went into Active duty 4 years after enlisting.

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
Sun, 09-07-2003 - 9:30pm
I graduated from a class of 927 seniors. There were over a hundred of us that enlisted into the various branches of the military from my class, but I didn't happen to know any of them other than by sight/name.

However, many of the folks I went to school with in Zweibruecken ended up going into the military; I just didn't know they didn't until years later, like when I met one at DLI, when I saw two others at the commissary in Katterbach, and then later at our school reunion (our school in Zwei wasn't big enough to have reunions for specific class years; we just have mass reunions and have tables for those who attended in the 70s and then in the 80s (the classes of 90 and 91 sit with the 80s crowd, because after the air force base was closed, the school was shut down).

At my 20th reunion from my school back in the states, I learned that several folks that I *did* know from high school had later enlisted, particularly two folks whose parents lost their jobs when JI Case and International Harvester closed and they could no longer pay for their college.

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
Sun, 09-07-2003 - 9:35pm
You mean, my keen ability to add 10 numbers and divide the total by 10? (the Magical and Mysterious Means of Devising an Average). It's really not as tricky as you seem to think, but it does, of course, help if you use verifiable data to start with, instead of pulling the numbers out of your colon.

Or perhaps you're referring to my unnatural ability to type a phrase into a search engine, such as "Weston, CT" + demographics and obtain information posted by the Weston, CT Chamber of Commerce?

Or how about my ability to click on a link in someone else's post and then read the website that appears?

(Any and all of which were the basic skill set necessary to have learned the ACTUAL graduate data for Weston, CT, instead of the imaginary numbers you were throwing about).

Avatar for taylormomma
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-23-2003
Sun, 09-07-2003 - 9:39pm
It tells me like in the rest of the country, kids are more likely to go to college than they were in the past. You think this is unique to your town?
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
Sun, 09-07-2003 - 9:45pm
Yes, she is leaving a whole segment out, not everyone that enlists, enlists directly out of high school. I enlisted when I was 20. Some of the students that that are listed in school statistics as being college bound could have enlisted. Those statistics are based on the intentions of the students upon graduation, not necessarily on what actually happened or on the fact that things may have changed later. If someone would have told me at 18 when I graduated from high school that 2 1/2 years later I would be in basic training, I would have told them they were crazy.
iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
Sun, 09-07-2003 - 9:54pm
Out of my Czech Basic Course class at DLI (of 24 students), only 5 of us enlisted straight out of high school. 3 of our class were NCOs who had changed their MOS, 5 of us were recruits straight out of high school. And the rest of our class was composed of folks who either had a degree or had a significant amount of college credits to their name already. And one woman was just 6 months shy of her 34th birthday (the maximum permissible age for enlistment) when she joined up.

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