Like, you live in one state, then you choose a college/university that’s another state and very far from your home. For example, you live in NM then you go to an NC college. Also, if you do go to a college that’s very far, you’ll usually need to rent a house. Does that count as moving out from your parents’ house? When you go back during holiday, are you going back to your home or just visiting your parents? I know that many Americans move out of their parents’ houses after 18 or getting a job. What about this situation?

28 comments
  1. It happens, but not everyone does. For example, my wife went to one on the opposite corner of the country from where she grew up. Meanwhile, I went to one an hour away from where I grew up.

    >Also, if you do go to a college that’s very far, you’ll usually need to rent a house.

    That’s what dorms are for, especially for the first year.

    >Does that count as moving out from your parents’ house?

    Typically, no. At least, not legally. Dormitories aren’t typically a permanent residence.

    >When you go back during holiday, are you going back to your home or just visiting your parents?

    What’s the difference between these two options?

  2. About 80% of college students go to an “in state” school, meaning one in the same state where they have residency. It’s cheaper and logistically easier.

    Note that in state is not necessarily local, nowhere near that many are living with their parents during school so needing a dorm, apartment, rent house, etc… still applies. This is where a lot of college debt comes from, living expenses while you go are generally 2-3x as much as tuition and fees if you’re not able to live with your folks during school.

    So…yeah at 1 in 5 going farther is common enough to not be all that surprising.

    As far as “does it count as moving out” and all that, it’s kind of semantic. I did physically move away for college but I differentiate between that and when I stopped being financially dependent. This is certainly what happens for a lot of the “moving out” at 18, and that trend is in and of itself significantly overstated. Especially in the last couple of decades.

  3. Yes very common but also much more expensive than staying in state. usually out of state tuition is like triple the cost.

  4. Define far?

    But most people go to community college, which is local to your home town. But colleges aren’t normally by most people. It’ll be in dense cities but if you’re in a state with only 3 major cities, that leaves a lot of people who don’t have a local college, and likely would leave or have a long commute to one.

    It is common to go far from home, but not uncommon to stay relatively close to your family’s home.

  5. I played softball in college with a girl from New Zealand, but I wouldn’t say it’s “common,” because if you’re going to school across the country, you’re either an elite student, elite athlete, or you really hate your family.

  6. It happens but in my experience it’s definitely a minority of people. I’m from California and I knew people in my class in high school who went to colleges pretty far away, but it was probably like 5-10% of the class? Many went to the local community college or to the local campus of the California State University. But some people, like me, chose a sort of middle ground, going to a school that was in California but not so close we could live at home. I went to one of the campuses of the University of California that’s about 100 miles (about 160 km) from my hometown. I could go home for long weekends and school breaks but it was otherwise too far for me to go back super often.

  7. Its “common” in the sense that a ton of people do it all the time but I went out of state for college and everyone I met was surprised and wondered what brought me out there even though my home state wasnt far at all.

    It was always a “ayyyy theres another” moment whenever I met someone else from out of state

  8. Yes and no. For those able to afford it (or are willing to take out student loans, or work and study), then yeah.

    I stayed close to home since I knew i would get homesick easily (From San Francisco, went to University in San Jose (50-ish miles away)), whereas my brother went to Ireland.

    My biggest regret was not facing my fears of homesickness and go to University of Victoria (Canada) instead. If i could turn back the clock 6 years, I’d definitely go to Canada

  9. When I went to college I was told a statistic (not sure how true it is) that 75% of students who go to a school that is more than a 5 hour drive from home end up transferring to a school closer to home.

    Plenty of people do go to school far away, but most people tend to go to a school where driving home every once in a while is feasible.

  10. Exceedingly common in Hawaii. There are so many factors that work against high school graduates here that push them out of state. In my college club, we accepted high schoolers as well. Not a single one stayed since we started in 2017. Some came back but not a lot.

    If they don’t move out of state and are not from Oahu, many move to Oahu which is technically kind of moving away in a sense.

    I can count on one hand how many people in my graduating class stayed on island after they graduated.

  11. I wanted to get as far away as I possibly could, still ended up going to college in my hometown, lol. Going to college isn’t cheap, but going out of State is a lot more expensive. I was accepted to CU Boulder but it would have cost me something like $40k per semester, before rent, or books, or food. I couldn’t pull it off. I didn’t live at home, so I still had to work. I went to Jr college for a couple years before transferring to university, and loans were still the only way I could afford it.

  12. I went to college out of state, and my brother went to an in-state college. I was actually closer to home by 30 miles than he was. Most of my friends who attended college stayed in state but many were “away from home”.
    When I was in college, most of my classmates were from the state but were further from their homes than I was from mine.
    I returned home my first summer but stayed on campus thereafter as I had gotten a job, but I visited frequently. I “officially” moved out my junior year and changed my residence so I could get in-state tuition for my last year.

  13. The tuition thing is a consideration, as some have said, but it depends, I think, on the size of the school or reputation. I live close to UC Berkeley and I’m sure there are loads of out of state students because of Cal’s academic reputation. Or Notre Dame, Alabama, Georgia … places like that with big athletic programs that lots of kids have heard of.

    I went to school out of state at a fairly small college and most of the other students were from in state. That wasn’t even my intent initially. I sorta ended up there (long story).

  14. In 1976 went to a college, in-state, that was 150 miles away. I lived in a dorm the whole time. They couldn’t afford to send me across the country to go to school.

  15. The vast majority of Americans who leave home for college go no more than 500 miles away from home and 50% no more than 100 miles. My kids went 1,500 miles or more. Unless you are living at home with your parents it’s “moving out” no matter how far away you go. Our kids came home for Christmas and in the summers, but after graduating were on their own and stayed in their distant cities.

  16. One of my sons went to college in-state and lived in a dorm, and another went out-of-state and lived in a dorm freshman year and then got an apartment across the street from campus. They were both two hours away from home.

    Another went to school in our city, but lived in the Honors dorms.

  17. Not uncommon. Mine are in the same state but a six hour drive away. The schools up in Northern California aren’t as good for their majors.

  18. It’s common enough, but a good chunk tend to stay in state. That said, things vary by state. California, New York and Florida have good in state financing options along with a lot of decent to good university systems for financing college for residents. Generally, if someone from those states is going out of state, it’s to a top tier school, a school where’d they be legacy (parents went), a great scholarship offer, or there’s a very specific major only offered out of state. There’s also the “school culture” people who just want to go to a specific school that just happens to be out of state (for the sports culture or “artsy” culture.).

    Those options also appeal to people from other states, but there’s also some schools with a solid enough reputation paired with low cost even when taking out-of-state tuition hikes into consideration. Rutgers and the Alabama schools (Auburn and Alabama) fall into this category. The Alabama schools also have the “benefit” that the state’s university system is a bit large for the state’s population, so they take in a lot of out-of-staters and send graduates out of state a lot. This means they have a really wide alumni network (not as strong as top tier big names, but quite strong especially in light of their more average reputation)

  19. I chose my college specifically because it was as far away from home as I could get (and still be in the state), so yes.

  20. When kids move away for college, they usually stay in a dorm/student housing, at least for the 1st 2 years

  21. I went to a college 12 hours/700 miles from home, but it was still in-state because I live in a big state. One reason many of us go to college far away is because independence is a big part of American culture, even as a young adult. Most young people leaving for college want to turn a new page in life and experience new surroundings, new kinds of people, etc. For example I left a warm, dry climate near big cities with a very diverse population, and went to a cool, rainy, nature-filled rural small-town and more racially homogeneous area.

    There was also an additional factor for me that most probably don’t have. Financially it would have been better for me to try and stay home at least for community college, but there was simply no room for me at home. There were 8 of us crammed into a small 2bed/1bath apartment. Someone had to go and make some breathing room.

  22. I grew up in a state well known for exporting students. Most of my graduating class left the state for college, though most ended up probably within a 2-3 hour drive. I went 1,500 miles away myself and lived on campus in a dorm for most of my time there.

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