It was supposed to be a quiet and uneventful Christmas.  Our family had been through a rough couple of years with various family members having had serious health issues and we were still twitching from it all.  Just about the time we were getting for the year to change from old to new, the call came that my mother’s health had taken a bad turn  - and off to Florida I went with some of my siblings. We’d been in a similar situation with my father years before so we were better prepared this Read on...

Parents might focus on tuition and room and board prices and ignore another culprit that makes school more expensive: staying in college for longer than four years. It’s a common problem, according to the National Center for Education Statistics.  Just 41% of full-time students attending college for the first time earn their bachelors’ degrees in four years. Extra time at an institution is expensive.  For 2019-2020, the average costs for college tuition and fees are $10,116 (public, Read on...

Crises of any kind usually require all of our attention at once. After the immediate emergency or threat passes and the brain stops pinging, reflection is possible; such was the case for me in the months following September 11, 2001. It had taken a while for the shock to wear off, but when it did, my perspective was irreparably altered and my sense of urgency was acute – for a time, anyway. On that fateful day, the World Trade Center was quite a distance from my midtown office.  I (along with Read on...