No experience, but I know for the City University of New York, a child of divorced parents is a considered a resident of NY if he or she lived for the last 12 months with a parent who was a NYS resident. There’s a 19 page document regarding determining eligibility for resident tuition rates and there are a lot of exceptions for people who wouldn’t ordinarily be considered residents to pay resident tuition rates (such as a child of an employee of New York City or of a City agency who is required to live outside New York City in the performance of his/her official duties , or someone who attended a NYS high school for at least 2 years and graduated from that school if they begin at the university within 5 years of graduation)
My niece moved in with her boyfriend who was already attending college, right after she graduated from high school. (Parents were* not *impressed). She worked until January, then apparently qualified for residence status after 6 months in Oregon. So she got a major discount for waiting 6 months. Of course, she lived there year round since she and bf had a place rented there, so I guess technically she really was a state resident from then on.
I know people who move ahead of time, before high school is out, while staying in their own high school for their senior year claiming that it would too hard to change over in he middle of the school year. They get their six months and go on in.
I personally find the whole thing kinda jingoistic. I don’t get why it isn’t based on distance. It’s not like state residence matters to people anymore–everyone thinks of our part of Arkansas as “South Missouri,” really. My accent is even more Missourian than Arkansan.
Because the state university is supported by state taxes?
And: distance as the crow flies or as Google Maps says? Does that mean that places like U Hawaii Manoa need to stop participating in the Western Undergraduate Exchange because some of the participating states are too far away? Yes, two counties in different states may have more in common than to the rest of their state. That’s why these programs are set up, another state’s school may be more local than the nearest state school. I know someone from Duluth, MN who went to U Wisconsin-Superior, 6 miles away. I guess there’s also another university nearby, slightly closer and in Minnesota, but you get the picture.
There’s more than some truth to it. The military has three types of residency, if you will: 1) Home of Record, 2) State of Legal Residence, and 3) Physical Residence.
For #1, that is established when the person enlists or is commissioned. It used to be permissible to change the Home of Record upon re-enlistment, but that law died some time ago. The Home of Record is what the government uses to determine certain transportation allowances.
For #2, that is initially the person’s Home of Record and remains that until they report to their servicing personnel/administration section and complete a form declaring that they now have a different State of Legal Residence. There are many reasons why someone would do this, one of which would be to take advantage of a difference in tax rates. The key thing to remember though, is the “losing” state and the “gaining” state both get to determine the validity of the declaration. That could very well end up with the losing state saying the member is trying to skip out on taxes owed and the gaining state saying the member is merely trying to get in-state tuition.
For #3, that just so happens to be wherever the person is stationed. There are some laws, both federal (I think) and state (I know) which grant some benefits to members of the military based on physical residence regardless of the member’s state of legal residence or home of record.
For tuition, while the member’s on Active Duty and in one of the states that extends that benefit to such members, there’s no reason to change the legal residence: the member already qualifies for in-state tuition.