Earlier this week I expressed the opinion that even if you can’t fully pay for college, you can still ‘do right’ by your children. I believe there are many life lessons that you can teach to your children even if you can’t fully support them through college, that can help them be successfully in their adult lives. Here are a few things that can help a child do well even if they can’t make it through college with full financial support.

They can learn how to behave. In most cases it doesn’t take a lot of money to teach a child to behave well. Yes, kids can learn poor behavior in schools, but if it’s discouraged and punished at home instead of ignored, it can really help later on in life. If really doesn’t matter how smart a kid is, or how much money her parents can throw at a university, if she doesn’t behave. What good does it do to save up hundreds of thousands of dollars for schooling, only to have your child expelled from high school from cheating? What chance does your child have of getting into school when they’re serving jail time for drunk driving or assault? If we don’t teach our children to be respectful, responsible adults who can get into college and successfully complete it than how much money we’ve saved for college is irrelevant, since they won’t be able to enjoy the benefits of that education.

They can learn to take responsibilities for their own actions. At a certain point we all need to be responsible for our actions. Sometimes I like to read the little career articles on the Yahoo! homepage. I have actually seen a few that talk about parent’s covering for their adult working children, calling bosses and all. Is that really necessary? Children need to learn that their homework, their finances, etc are their responsibility and that there are consequences to the choices that they make.

They can learn that life is not always fair. While it may seem harsh to a fifteen year-old to learn that his parent’s aren’t going to be able to pay for college while his friend’s parents are, the truth is that just being able to go to college is a way to expand opportunities that that many people in the world who will never get to experience. And even some of those from poor, rural areas who are able to eventually make it to America and other nations for college, often walk days just to get to public transportation. Days. Of walking. Instead of looking at the financial support they won’t have, children can look to the opportunities and emotional support that they will have.

So when is all this taught? See, that’s the kicker. These are lessons that kids will learn as they are growing up; they’ll learn them based on how they are disciplined and praised. But they’ll also learn them for observing their parents and other adults in their lives. The truth is education is so much more than college, it is so much more than school. As parents, neighbors, family friends, etc. the children in our lives are watching us, and they are learning from us: getting an education on social behaviors, financial behaviors, etc. If we litter, we teach our children that they don’t have to respect our environment or our communities. If we call in sick and then go fishing, we teach our kids it’s okay to lie, if there’s something else we’d rather be doing. These are the lessons we teach them every day for eighteen years, and they are not going to be easily erased by four-years of higher education. If children are surrounded by loving, responsible, members of their community, they will learn these lessons, they may not always practice them, but they’ll have been exposed to them. College can certainly open a lot of doors, but in and of itself it’s no guarantee of success. And while money can certainly help kids out quite a bit, it’s not a guarantee for creating productive members of society (just look at young adult celebrities).