Who Pays for a Child’s College Education Following a Massachusetts Divorce?
All parents have a legal obligation to financially support their children up to the age of 18. Even beyond that point, many Massachusetts parents will pay for their child’s college education. Of course, if the parents are in the process of getting a divorce, the question of who will pay for the child’s college tuition and related expenses can be a point of contention.
Can a Judge Force You to Pay for Your Child’s College?
Massachusetts law does authorize a court to order a parent to pay for the undergraduate college education of a child over the age of 18 who is living with, and remains principally dependent on, either parent. Generally speaking, such orders are only appropriate when the child is already attending, or about to attend, college. In other words, if the parents divorce while their child is still in elementary school, the judge typically will not obligate one parent to pay for a hypothetical college education that may occur several years down the line.
Making Sure You Are Both on the Same Page
Ideally, the parents will agree in advance how they will handle their children’s college expenses if and when the time comes. Yet legal disputes may still arise if the parents have differing interpretations over what they agreed to. For example, one parent may assume that both parents agreed to share the costs of sending the child to a state school, while the other parent believes their agreement covers any public or private university.
Indeed, one of the seminal Massachusetts cases on this issue, Mandel v. Mandel, involved just such a scenario. In this 2009 case, a mother and father agreed as part of their divorce settlement to each pay for one-half of their daughters’ “college education expenses.” A decade later, their oldest daughter enrolled at Roger Williams University, a private school. The father balked at paying, claiming that he “never ever intended the college expense provisions to require payment of private university expenses.”
The Appeals Court of Massachusetts ultimately concluded that absent more precise language, the parents’ separation agreement required each of them to pay 50 percent of “reasonable” college expenses. In determining what was reasonable, the trial court had to consider a number of factors, including the cost of the school, each parent’s financial resources. the child’s academic abilities, and the programs offered, among other things.
Contact a Peabody Divorce Lawyer
Another key holding in the Mandel case was that a parent should not wait until after their child has chosen and enrolled in a college to object to the choice of school or its cost. This is yet another reason it is important to negotiate issues such as paying for a child’s college upfront during the divorce process. Our Peabody divorce lawyers can advise you on this and many other issues. Call Reade Law Firm, PC, today at 978-767-8383 or contact us online to schedule a consultation.
Source:
scholar.google.com/scholar_case?case=6254314772387426615