S06.E12: Flying, Applying And Rassling Gators

[ItCouldBeWorse]

Just now, ams1001 said:

So would that qualify as fraud? I mean, we know they're not above such things, anyway. Doubt they'd be prosecuted but if the school found out they'd probably revoke his acceptance.

Yes, you can't have someone else (re)write your essays, sign your name, etc.  But they'd never find out.  (Unless the essays were amazing and his grades in writing-related classes were not, which would raise flags.)

[mythoughtis]

42 minutes ago, ItCouldBeWorse said:

But they needed to keep him close to home in order to keep him on the show,

He’s barely on the show.   The writers know absolutely nothing about Illinois. We have several state universities. Some  of which are well known for their computer  engineering degrees.  Not  just U of I( which is more expensive than  the others).  All of which would have financial aid, reasonable costs and jobs on campus Some  on Amtrak routes - which would mean Mark could be  home often. 

[ItCouldBeWorse]

On 5/20/2024 at 8:14 PM, mythoughtis said:

He’s barely on the show.   The writers know absolutely nothing about Illinois. We have several state universities. Some  of which are well known for their computer  engineering degrees.  Not  just U of I( which is more expensive than  the others).  All of which would have financial aid, reasonable costs and jobs on campus Some  on Amtrak routes - which would mean Mark could be  home often. 

Then I guess they needed Darlene to be a martyr and Mark to be miserable.

I'm a little surprised they also didn't have Mark talk about how easy his classes were/how he wasn't being challenged/how his classmates didn't take school seriously.  THAT would have made it more poignant that he couldn't attend U of C.

Edited May 22 by ItCouldBeWorse

[b4pjoe]

On 5/18/2024 at 11:05 AM, ams1001 said:

Well, she said she found the application saved on the computer he gave her, he just never submitted it, so I'll grant that all the pieces were there (and maybe they assumed he was just applying as a freshman....until I remembered that one of them specifically said he was accepted as a transfer. So never mind that. 🙄) But I'll assume that his essay was already written, at least. Maybe he also made a video.

(Which...pretty dumb to give a computer to someone without wiping your data first. Especially in this family who clearly can't be trusted.)

My parents had way more money to send two kids to college than Darlene ever will (unless she wins the lottery and doesn't do something stupid with it) and I got a lot more financial aid than Mark ever seems to find himself eligible for. My brother did the community college then transfer to a state college route (with an extra year at the state school because of prerequisites he needed to take for classes he transferred...), while I did four years at a private out-of-state school. My parents paid about half and I had a grant from the school, a campus job which was listed as "work-study" but was really just for spending money, and loans. When my brother graduated the year before me my grant was cut by about 75% and I had to take out an extra loan for my senior year. My parents also helped us after the fact (in the form of Christmas gifts earmarked for loan payments) and we both paid off our loans well before the 10-year payment schedule that they set up (mine were done in about seven). I do recognize I'm quite lucky in that regard and a lot of things are different now. (This was in the mid-90s; costs were lower, in actual dollars it was roughly around $20K including room and board, and now it's about $51K for the upcoming school year, but I don't know how that compares when you factor in inflation and whatnot since then.)

I googled U of Chicago tuition and it looks like a student living on campus is looking at about $94K for the 2024-5 school year with tuition, room and board, and other fees. According to USNews.com, "The average need-based scholarship or grant awarded to first-year students at University of Chicago was $65,176." (Looks like that was for 2021.) They also have a chart of average costs based on family income, which Darlene would certainly be at the lower end of. Since she and Ben are married, I assume his income would also be factored in, so maybe they'd land in the second or third tier, because clearly that store wasn't making him rich and neither will this magazine venture.

And now I feel like I have probably done more research in five minutes into the U of Chicago cost structure than the writers of this show. I could be totally off-base.

I still think that Darlene would have done better to keep the good-paying job with benefits and room for advancement, let Mark apply for whatever financial aid he's eligible for (which even then would certainly be more in the real world than the writers think) and take out loans to supplement the rest, and then help him pay off the loans later, with her good salary, which would most likely also come with a few raises by the time he finishes school. (Plus he's planning to go into a field where he has a good chance of making decent money once he gets a job, right?) She could start setting aside a little from each paycheck in a high-yield savings account for that purpose so it would grow faster in the meantime. Set up a direct deposit and she wouldn't have to even think about it (which would be best since these people can't see a pot of money without blowing it on something dumb). Make a big up-front payment toward the loans and you have a cushion for future payments, too. I did that with my Christmas gift money; my second payment was $3500, and while I continued to pay the monthly amount (sometimes more, occasionally less if something else big came up), my statements always said I owed zero for the month because I was ahead. Darlene could easily have started saving now if she hadn't quit a decent job before she even started.

(Speaking of blowing money, I assume Dan didn't get a refund on the plane tickets after deliberately doing something stupid to get him kicked off when he had a reprieve from the first stupid thing. The guy was an ass but he should have either left it alone or called a flight attendant. I wonder what that cost him, then they would have spent at least another couple hundred for the bus tickets (I googled and found, "You can expect to pay from $110 to $319 for a bus ticket from Chicago to New Orleans."). Plus hotel and the music festival and food and I'm guessing this trip cost more than his thousand or so that he had left over to burn. Also wonder where the flight crew was during all that and why they weren't keeping an eye on the troublemaker after the first incident. I mean, he wasn't exactly being subtle about taunting Dan.)

They should hire you to write the final season! I'm guessing they couldn't afford you though! 😁 

[Ottis]

On 5/15/2024 at 10:03 PM, Snow Apple said:

Thank god Dan didn't remortgage the house to pay to Mark's tuition

 

On 5/19/2024 at 2:00 PM, One Tough Cookie said:

That's the kind of thing I was expecting him to do  It would have been a huge mistake on his part

Financially speaking, it actually would have been smarter to refi the house 4 years ago when rates were 2.5% (or lower for 15-year loans). And then keeping his mortgage at that very low rate (not paying it off) and instead using the insurance money to invest in an index fund would have almost guaranteed a better return than paying off the house. Then he could pay it off later when he wanted.

For a family that constantly complains about being cursed and making bad decisions, they consistently handle poor news badly. Mark is continuing the tradition.

The insults from the guy behind Dan were more intelligent than anything the Connors do.

 

 

 

[One Tough Cookie]

On 5/18/2024 at 3:11 PM, mythoughtis said:

ecky was well aware of Mark’s financial situation. What possessed her to send in his application

She's a Conner.

enuff said