[AXOmom]

I get not wanting to nickel and dime your child to death, but it isn't going to kill them to nickel and dime it A LITTLE. The $600 to $800 in pins t-shirts and zaps (wth???) seems WAY high. I mean - these kids have digital cameras and i-phones, why do they need a professional pictures at every event? That seems like a huge waste, but if a parent has it to blow in this economy - good for them.

Jll - Speaking as a parent who doesn't have it to blow and is currently paying off some of our two children's college loans, I get that it isn't as simple as selling something or just figuring out a way to do it, and if you're like me, you gave up lattes and every other little extra you could think of just to get your child in school and help pay for it, but here are some suggestions:

a) If you/she are paying for any part of her schooling with loans and/or grants - those loans and grants will be paying for her housing one way or another, so whenever she lives in the house - they will be paying for that just as they would for a dorm (and the houses are almost always cheaper - don't even get me started on what a rip off dorm costs can be), so realize that while the first year seems like a lot of money - particularly when she is paying new member fees (which won't come up again), it will be much less if she continues.

b) She may not be able to work during the school year (although as was mentioned, my daughter has plenty of sisters with heavy schedules, internships, involvement, etc who still worked), but she can work in the summer to at least pay for the t-shirts, pins, trips, incidentals and maybe help out with some of the other fees.

c) If she can't pay it for it herself while she is in school - work out a plan for her to pay you back when she gets out. We told our daughter she would have to pay for everything sorority related that wasn't involved in her cost of living (which we would have been doing with or without the sorority). She couldn't pay it all during school, but now that she's starting her career and making money - $100 a month, every month until that amount is covered.

d) The incidentals (t-shirts, etc) are fun for them the first year and will probably run you more that year (I still think $600-800 is high and far more than we ever came close to spending, but we weren't at an SEC school). After a while, though, they start to take the attitude, "You've seen one t-shirt, you've seen them all." Mine wasn't buying many incidentals at all by junior year and none by senior (maybe one). She had t-shirts, memorbilia, pictures, you name it, coming out the ying-yang. Most of them are in boxes now.

What does she treasure most? The cards her sisters made for her, her 21-oner book, and the pictures they took on their phones and cameras that she posted on Facebook (none of which cost a dime). The pin is a one time thing and we spent nowhere close to $300 for it.

e) Clothes for recruitment were an expense - she paid for all of these with her summer work money.

I hope that gives you some ideas and helps. I know parents want to let their kids know up front what they can and can't afford. That's a good thing - but at the same time- you don't want to add more stress to an already stressful situation. You did agree to let her do this, so the only thing you can do now is help her figure out how to work it out. At the very least she will understand that you may, in fact, have to nickel and dime it a little, and she will understand she can't have every discretionary item available.