College tuition and taxes

The irs doesn't care how you split it while you claim her as a dependent. If the tuition gets paid, you can claim the portion the irs allows.

We claim our college student.

We pay most of his expenses for school. He has a part time job, but it's only about 8-10 hours a week. He's there on a merit scholarship and is an engineering major. His job is to keep his grades high and keep his scholarship and work towards grad school. He has a job because we feel that he should have some skin in the game. That and the fact that he just does better when he's busy, rather than having an endless stretch of time to get things done.

DS pays for personal entertainment (movies, video game purchases, Target runs, baseball games, dinner off campus, etc.) We pay all of his transportation to/from school, including plane tickets/Uber/taxis/luggage fees. I don't ever want money to be a reason he can't come home, and he's at school 1,300 miles from us. We also pay if he goes to a relative's house for the weekend and takes an Uber there. Again, because I don't want money to be why he can't see family that's close to his school (and a $25 Uber ride is an entire shift for him.) We give him $10 a week for incidentals like toiletries, laundry detergent, cereal for his room, etc. But his meal plan reflects that as well. He's on campus 99% of the time, but we only pay for an average of 2 meals a day. He usually just has cereal in his room and he works for one of the cafes on campus and gets a free meal each shift.

Remember that if you take out any loans, they should be in your student's name. Debt forgiveness and company benefits will only pay for the STUDENT'S debt, not the parents' debt. You can still make their payments, but the loans themselves should be in the student's name.

Yes, you can claim what's allowed. We have had 3 in college at the same time--one just graduated Summa Cum Laude with two degrees and a minor in May. We pay/paid everything for them. Our CPA itemizes it all for us. Now we will only have two to claim as the one that graduated has had a job since graduation and now lives on her own. I don't see it helps a whole lot but I guess whatever we can claim helps at least in some small way.