The nightmare came to life the night before Aisling came home. From the minute she'd applied for the J1 last February, from the hour the plane left for Newark Airport in June, her mother had imagined all the terrible things that could happen to a 19-year-old on her first visit to America.
Her daughter and a friend were returning to New York after a short holiday the day before their flight home. But plans to meet the new American friend who was going to put them up overnight in the Bronx came unstuck when floods delayed their train until 2 a.m. Forgetting everything they'd learned during a very happy summer about how to survive in the Big Apple, the girls hopped on a subway which they'd been told would bring them close to their destination.
It didn't. It led them straight into a rundown neighbourhood where roaming gangs of lively youths were celebrating some sporting victory, hanging out of circling cars yelling cheerful obscenities at each other. The girls, conspicuous not just because of their Irish complexions but also because of their very large suitcases, couldn't find a taxi that would take them anywhere in the Bronx and were debating what to do when a squad car drew up and rescued them.
Luckily for Aisling's mother, she didn't hear about this until her daughter was safely home in Dublin Airport, a little over 24 hours later.
So was she glad her daughter went to America for the summer? Was it worth the frantic worry for a week or so in June, until her daughter found work and a place to stay? Worth the frequent reverse-charge calls, the record telephone bills because she and her husband were so anxious to keep in touch with their daughter?
Did other parents who gave their sons and daughters their credit card "just for emergencies" live to regret their concern? One girl called her father to explain that she'd paid for dinner for 12 one night when the restaurant wouldn't take cash, and she would definitely send him the money after collecting it from everybody, but couldn't figure out how to transfer it.
Another phoned her mother to explain how she'd had to use the credit card to buy some jumpers in San Francisco, which suffered record low temperatures in June.
When it comes right down to it, what most parents want to know about the J1 experience is "will it at least be self-financing?" and "will my child be safe?" (Most students finance the airfare by taking a loan arranged through one of the three recognised agencies which organise J1 "summer student" working visas. The return flight usually costs around £500 to £600, on top of which the student should bring between £400 and £600 cash. Most parents start off expecting that the student will earn enough to pay back the £1,200 or so.)
But at the end of a long, sometimes anxious summer, even those parents whose children came home with empty pockets and big debts reckon it was a valuable growing-up experience, especially for students who have never lived away from home before.
"She'd never lived with a group of other people, never really been away on her own," says one dad who is philosophical about the financial aspect of his daughter's J1 summer. From that standpoint, he laughs ruefully: "It was a disaster.
"She's generous, and brought home loads of presents for everybody, which we'd told her not to do. She'd borrowed £1,000 to go, earned between $5,000 and $8,000, most of which went on rent and food and presents, and arrived home with $170. But she plans to pay off the £900 debt herself by getting a job this winter."
Even a mother whose daughter's J1 summer cost her and her husband around £2,000 reckons that the summer was an excellent experience for her daughter. She and her husband paid the air fare (£530), a month's rent in advance on an apartment in San Franciso (£400) and gave her the £600 that US immigration insists each student has if he or she hasn't lined up a job in advance.
Internal flights to get to San Francisco from Chicago (her point of arrival), telephone calls, creditcard withdrawals and the like added another £500 to the overall cost. It was hard finding work in San Francisco, and their daughter's eventual net earnings were just £300.
"But the summer had a great impact on her," says her mother of a young woman who had not had to fend for herself much before. "She had to negotiate coming home on her own, through various airports. She had to cope with food bills, paying rent, all things she'd never done before."
Parents whose memories of working in the States for the summer go back 20 and 30 years may be shocked by the idea that this Irish rite of passage - the college student's equivalent of going to the Gaeltacht - could cost them money. In the good old days, kids went there to make money - and often came back with fistfuls of dollars that went a long way in the days when the Irish cost of living was a fraction of that in the States, and the rate of exchange more favourable.
It's not that Irish students can't make money there: it's just that they have to work very hard for it (possibly taking at least two jobs), and they have to learn how not to spend it. One mother reports how two days before her flight home, her daughter had close to $2,000 left after paying off her loan. When she stepped off the plane, she had less than $200. But it seems that students who know they'd better not come home if they can't at least pay off their debt somehow manage to do so. As for safety, Aisling's experience seems to prove the point that in the US, as here, the time you're vulnerable is when you let your guard down: with a summer close to New York City behind them, she and her friend hadn't checked out for themselves how safe they might be in the Bronx. (They weren't.)
But apart from that, their parents were impressed with the way their daughters had coped with finding a job and a place to stay within five days of arriving in the US. In their case, the job provided the place to stay, by far the best deal from a financial point of view. So what advice would be useful for families who are likely to experience a J1 summer for the first time this year? It would be helpful to talk to parents and students who went to the States last year, to get their advice while the whole experience is reasonably fresh in their minds. Students will get an idea of the kind of place they'd like to go to - seaside resort or city - by listening to other people's experiences.
Come next week, when students can apply for J1 visas, this might help to concentrate their minds on exactly where they want to go; that might make it possible for them or their parents to book some kind of accommodation in advance. Organising a job in advance is the ideal situation, and quite possible if students determinedly use the handbook they get once they book their flight - it lists people who have employed students.
The other way is to look out for US companies who recruit students on Irish campuses in early spring - students' union offices will have information about this.
Come June, it is much less scary for parents - and students - if they have accommodation promised, and better still, a job and accommodation to go to. For those of you who have read all this wondering "Who are these crazy hyper-parents?" be warned: by next summer, it could be you.
