We need this like a hole in the head right now.

College tuition hikes, to the tune of about 20% on average, are in place all over the country, effective immediately. For parents and students out there who have just paid the first larger bill, feeling the pinch has hit home. Families whose college kids must pay their own tuition are hit the worst, because percentage-wise it’s such an enormous part of what they could possibly be earning as waiters or bartenders.

Some states haven’t enacted the tuition increase, but plan to soon. Adding to the problem is less availability of financial aid, scholarships, and student loans.

The silver lining is that college kids I speak to and teach are potentially interested in tuition. Instead of just their usual obsession with entertainment news, they’re talking about both. Granted, hip hop star Chris Brown, who beat up his superstar singer girlfriend Rihanna, still evoke more passionate discussions, but tuition is on their radar.

Let’s take advantage of their piqued curiosity, even if it is in their inimitable partial continuous interest sort of way. (e.g. Their ears flare slightly and their eyebrows raise at the mention of tuition increase, while they continue to read their email).

Getting them to understand and grapple with tuition hikes can teach them about living with their means as cost variables change, while income stays the same or gets reduced. It can also teach them about budgets and prioritizing spending.

The biggest challenge isn’t explaining it all, it’s getting their undivided attention.

I had no luck when I just put a dollar amount on the increase. “It could be $600 extra, but it also could be $6,000!”

Flatline.

I tried upping the ante by running through the whole scare scenario: “It’s threatening the ability for some kids to continue their education, or do so without needing a job, or even extra jobs. And of course those jobs are harder to find.”

Still a flatline.

Then something occurred to me. A price tag is something they’re far too used to “coming up with”. If your teenage son wants a Wii, he’ll find a way to come up with $250, or he’ll shove it in that Christmas or birthday level of present. Your 20something daughter who “needs” that Chanel purse will do the same with that sticker shock $500 price tag (on sale now, making her even more greedy for it).

So I tried speaking in percentages. “People need to devote another 22% to this item. That’s like being told one day that your “A” grade in a class is now suddenly a “C”, unless you can solve this puzzle….”

They looked up! Ladies and gentleman, we a collective pulse!

Triggering math class and the dreaded grading system worked because they understand if they get 20% of something wrong they’re in the B- C+ range. Also, it turns out that they’re not threatened by percentages like they are with money. Grades are one thing, stuff they want to buy is another.

Kids are used to pie charts, so to move things along I made one of an entire family budget. I started with all other pie pieces being the same—particularly the amount of income coming in—just to keep it simple.

I told them that in order to increase the college pie piece by 22% we needed to reduce other pie pieces by the same amount. They could take some of the percentage from multiple pie pieces, or just one.

I went further: In order to save 22% more for college tuition, we actually need to earn an additional 30%, which will be eaten by tax.

At the mention of the tax, they were aghast. It was too much, too overwhelming. I almost lost them, until I pulled the rabbit out of the hat. There was one chance to avoid the tax: Opening a 529 college savings or tuition paying account. We’d pay no tax. That not only kept them from giving up, but they actually opened their eyes more than half mast. The game was afoot. It was like one of the “free stuff” offers on the Internet they like so much. We were back to only needing to find 22% from other pie pieces.

If you have a puzzle-loving kid in your family, it will be easy to get him or her engaged. If not, try to get them in the headspace by asking which of their friends is suffering from the recession. I overheard a 20-year-old college girl tell this to a friend: “When I went home and visited my old best friend over the weekend, we had to watch movies under a blanket. The house was freezing. They were turning the heat way down.

Be careful to create pie pieces that affect everyone, or they’ll gouge you each time. For instance, don’t make a parent clothing allowance pie piece. Make a family clothing allowance pie piece.

There’s an additional benefit to speaking in percentages. There are many parents who do not feel comfortable telling their kids what their incomes are. (We’ll do a blog on that issue, too, but feel free to chime in now. It’s a very difficult issue with a lot of tradeoffs and repercussions). If you speak in percentages and not dollar amounts, you never have to reveal your income, yet they’ll still grasp the family budget.

And if you’ve never had a family budget, this will get you started.

What are some of the stories you’re hearing from your kids about college costs in the recession?

- Anne

My name is Anne T. Meyers, and it turns out my monogram is fitting because everyone in my family thinks I’m an ATM.

I’ve always known that kids need financial wisdom and good money habits. I should. I’m a professor of journalism, specializing in financial reporting, and have been giving professional financial advice for 20 years. But in this economy, which shines a bright, unforgiving spotlight on personal money habits, it’s time to admit I’ve been living by this rule: Take my advice, I’m not using it.

Kids and money is just one of those battles I always seem to choose not to fight in the chaos of day-to-day family life. It’s true. I get tired, and I cave in, despite the fact that I know better. I know all too well what happens when kids who don’t get money training turn into adults, even if they are good earners (we’ll get to my husband’s inability to return a shirt that he never tried on and which doesn’t fit later).

Time to break the bad habits.  If you can’t manage discretionary money when you’re making a few dollars mowing lawns or collecting allowance, you’ll never be able to live within your means when you’re a millionaire, either. I owe it to the kids.

And there’s no more putting it off.  As a parent and a teacher in this economy, my charges include overgrown kids just out of college looking at a dismal job market, kids in college, and teenagers growing like weeds and getting frighteningly close to college. Aside from teaching at a university level, I’m also the Secretary of the Board of Trustees for a day school.  Part of my job there is to enhance the school curriculum with my writing and financial experience. Oh, and one more charge: my elementary school kid, who is well on her way to forming some greedy habits.

It’s to the point where I feel like I’m harming them all, at every developmental stage, by not teaching them. In fact, it’s a great time to teach them because the examples of bad money habit consequences are everywhere.

Besides that, who can afford to be an ATM anymore? We’ll all go broke if we don’t instill a little discipline. So this blog is going to be devoted to test-driving money-saving strategies with kids, discussing what we’ve tried that worked and what didn’t, and looking at some financial tools that can not only save money, but help adults-in-training earn money and build credit.

Let’s hit the kids where they live. My father, a mathematician, once said: I don’t understand why they bother to teach math by any other means than using money. From the very first time a toddler watches a grownup purchase a toy, he has a riveted interest in money. And if you keep that money math lesson relevant, every kid will transform into a master number cruncher.

Indeed, I was taught addition, subtraction, multiplication, algebra, geometry, and calculus all at the mall.
So we’ll be looking at money issues that kids (some in adult bodies, but we know better) can directly relate to. Here’s a glimpse of upcoming blog discussions:

• Preparing for college tuition hikes
• Learning to discuss finances with the whole family
• Establishing credit for your teen
• Picking family vacations the kids will love (without breaking the bank)
• And so much more

If you have any topic ideas you’d like us to tackle, leave us a comment.