Post-Secondary Support in Washington: College and Trade-School Help After Child Support Ends

Parents start Googling this in the spring of junior year, or the week a Rogers, Emerald Ridge, or Stadium High senior opens a financial-aid portal. The question is almost always the same: 'Does child support cover college in Washington?' The short answer is no, not by itself. The longer answer is that Washington is one of the states that will order divorced or separated parents to help with college or vocational school — if someone files on time, if the young adult is still actually dependent, and if the statutory factors line up. The governing statute is RCW 26.19.090. The trap is RCW 26.09.170(3): unless the decree says otherwise, support ends at emancipation, and emancipation for this purpose is age 18.

This guide is written for Pierce County and Puyallup families who already have a child-support order and are staring at a Bates, Pierce College, UW Tacoma, PLU, or out-of-state bill — or who are the parent being asked to write that check. It is general education, not a prediction of your percentage. If you still need the monthly transfer payment calculated, start with how Washington child support is calculated. If you need to change that monthly number for a younger child, that is the modification versus 24-month adjustment problem, not this one.

Two Different Post-18 Tools: Finishing High School vs. Paying for What Comes Next

Washington has two ways money can continue after a birthday cake with 18 candles. They are not interchangeable, they use different findings, and mixing them up is how people file the wrong packet.

• High-school extension. After an order has been in place for at least a year, RCW 26.09.170(8)(b) lets a parent ask to keep ordinary child support going past 18 so a child who is still in high school can finish. You do not have to prove a substantial change of circumstances. This is still the monthly transfer payment, health insurance, and extras — not tuition.
• Post-secondary educational support. RCW 26.19.090 is a separate, discretionary award for college, university, or accredited vocational school. The child-support schedule is advisory, not mandatory. The court first has to find that the young adult is in fact dependent and relying on the parents for the reasonable necessities of life, then weigh a list of factors, then decide whether, for how long, and in what amount.

A senior who will still be at Emerald Ridge in October can need the high-school extension. A senior who has already been accepted at Clover Park Technical College needs the post-secondary petition. Some families need both, on overlapping calendars. The high-school path does not silently convert into a college order on graduation day.

The Deadline Most Families Miss

Unless the parents agreed in writing or the decree expressly provides otherwise, RCW 26.09.170(3) terminates future child support when the child is emancipated. The Washington Supreme Court treated emancipation for this statute as the age of majority — 18 — in In re Marriage of Gimlett, 95 Wn.2d 699 (1981). If the decree does not already provide for post-majority support, a parent who wants college or trade-school help has to file to add it before the child turns 18. That rule is associated with Balch v. Balch, 75 Wn. App. 776 (1994). Filing after the last support installment was due is usually too late, no matter how good the acceptance letter looks.

Read your order's termination line before you read anything else. Many Pierce County Child Support Orders say support ends at 18, or at high-school graduation if that is later. If the order dies on the 18th birthday, the petition has to be on file before that birthday. If the order lasts through graduation, file before graduation — Washington LawHelp's practical advice is at least a month ahead, so the student knows what help exists before committing to a program. Move-in weekend in August is not a filing strategy.

Division II made the reservation version of this rule concrete in a Pierce County case. In In re Marriage of Cota, 177 Wn. App. 527 (2013), a 2010 modification order said support would end at 18 or high-school graduation except for post-secondary educational support, and it reserved whether that support would be awarded and in what amount. The mother filed after the daughter turned 18. The court held that the reservation was an express provision under RCW 26.09.170(3): it put both parents on notice that support might continue past majority, so the trial court still had authority to set the college share. Cota does not mean you can wait forever. It means a real reservation can keep the door open past the 18th birthday. It is not a reason to ignore the clock.

Two other timing points. First, In re Marriage of Sprute, 186 Wn. App. 342 (2015), held that the request itself is what has to be timely. The parent did not have to get the child-support worksheets on file the same day as the petition in order to beat the deadline. File the petition. Do not let a missing worksheet become an excuse to miss the window. Second, RCW 26.09.170(1) still limits modifications to installments that come due after the petition is filed. Waiting does not rewind unpaid months, and it does not create a college obligation that the court no longer has power to enter.

What the Boxes on Your Old Order Actually Mean

The pattern Child Support Order (FL All Family 130) is where this issue is usually parked when the children are eight. The current form has four basic postures. They are not synonyms.

• Reserved. A parent or non-parent custodian may ask later without showing a substantial change of circumstances, by filing a Petition to Modify Child Support Order (FL Modify 501). The form itself warns that the petition must be filed before child support ends. Cota is why that reserved language also matters for jurisdiction past 18.
• Granted, amount later. The order already says the parents must pay post-secondary support, but it does not set a dollar figure or a percentage. You are not asking whether college help exists. You are asking the court to price it. You still have to file before support ends.
• Granted, with a formula. The order already names a percentage, a cap, or a list of covered costs. That is an existing support term. Changing it is a modification of an order that has not died. Automatic-suspension and student-status conditions still apply.
• Not required. The court (or an agreed order) said post-secondary support is not ordered. Washington LawHelp notes that a later petition can still be brought on a substantial-change theory — but only while the current support order is still alive. After emancipation with no pending petition, Gimlett and Balch are the problem, not the 'not required' checkbox.

A silent order is the dangerous one. If the decree never mentions post-secondary support at all, you are in the Gimlett/Balch box: file before the child turns 18, or the court generally loses the power to add it. Do not assume 'we always talked about college' is a provision in the decree. It is not.

DCS Cannot Order This — and the Student Usually Cannot File It

A Division of Child Support administrative order — a Notice and Finding of Financial Responsibility, a Notice and Finding of Parental Responsibility, or an Initial Decision and Order — is not a superior-court Child Support Order. Those administrative orders end at 18, or at 19 if the child is still in school full-time. They cannot include post-secondary educational support. If that is the only order you have, the first job is to get a superior-court support order. Then you can ask that court for college or vocational help. DCS can still collect a superior-court post-secondary order once it exists. It cannot create one.

Who files is also narrower than people expect. The petition is brought by a parent or a non-parent custodian. The 19-year-old who just enrolled at Pierce College Puyallup is not the usual petitioner. Washington LawHelp is blunt: only a parent or guardian can file; if that person cannot file because of death, jail, or abandonment, the student should talk to a lawyer. Do not wait for the child to 'be old enough to handle it.' The deadline is on the parents' order, not on the student's class schedule.

Step One: Is This Young Adult Still Dependent?

RCW 26.19.090(2) starts with a gate, not a worksheet. The court has to determine whether the child is in fact dependent and is relying on the parents for the reasonable necessities of life. A 20-year-old with a full-time job, an apartment in Tacoma, and a one-class night schedule is a different case from a full-time Pierce College student living at a parent's house in South Hill and working 12 hours a week at a grocery store. Washington has allowed post-majority support for dependent children for a long time — Childers v. Childers, 89 Wn.2d 592 (1978), is the older constitutional case — but dependence is a current fact, not a leftover from the parenting plan.

If the court finds the young adult is not actually dependent, the analysis stops. There is no college percentage to argue about. That is why a petition filed with no evidence of housing, food, transportation, or the student's own earnings is a weak petition, even when the parents clearly expected college when they were married.

The Statutory Factors — and What 'Intact Family' Actually Means

If dependence is established, the court exercises discretion on whether to award support, for how long, and in what amount. RCW 26.19.090(2) lists factors that include but are not limited to:

• The child's age
• The child's needs
• The expectations of the parties for their children when the parents were together
• The child's prospects, desires, aptitudes, abilities, or disabilities
• The nature of the post-secondary education sought
• The parents' level of education, standard of living, and current and future resources
• The amount and type of support the child would have been afforded if the parents had stayed together

Those factors are why a four-year private university, a two-year program at Bates Technical College, and a welding certificate at Clover Park are not the same case. They are also why 'I never went to college, so I should not have to pay' is not an automatic defense — and why 'we always said the kids would go to UW' is evidence, not a decree. The intact-family factor asks what this household would have done, not what a generic middle-class family does. A parent who saved 529 money, toured campuses, and paid for SAT prep while the marriage was intact is in a different proof posture from a parent whose only evidence is that college is expensive.

The court may refuse to order any post-secondary support if the parents cannot actually pay it. Discretion includes the word no. Ability to pay is not the same as a worksheet maximum. It is one of the reasons a complete Financial Declaration (FL All Family 131) still matters even though the economic table is only advisory.

How Much: Advisory Schedule, Accurate Incomes, Then Discretion

RCW 26.19.090(1) says the child-support schedule shall be advisory and not mandatory. That does not mean the court can ignore income. In re Marriage of Newell, 117 Wn. App. 711 (2003), held that even though the table is not a required college number, the court still has to calculate each parent's income and the presumptive proportional share of combined income before it decides how to split education expenses. In re Marriage of Kelly, 85 Wn. App. 785 (1997), is the usual citation that the court may order either or both parents to pay. Skipping the worksheets and picking a round number because 'college is different' is how an order gets sent back.

What the order actually covers is a drafting problem as much as a percentage problem. Typical categories are tuition and mandatory fees, books and required supplies, and room and board. Some orders include a modest personal-expense or transportation line; some do not. Scholarships and grants usually reduce the remaining need before the parents' shares are applied. Student loans are not the same thing as a scholarship — a loan is debt the student (or a parent) still owes. A clean order says which resources come off the top, whether unsubsidized loans count as the student's contribution, and whether a parent who claims the student on taxes has to share the refund that follows.

Two Division II holdings surprise people who copy a formula from a friend. In Sprute, the trial court was not required to cap the award at University of Washington, Seattle tuition. A UW cap is a common negotiated term. It is not a statutory ceiling. The same case held that a parent's transferred Post-9/11 GI Bill benefits could be credited only against that parent's own share, because federal law at 38 U.S.C. § 3319(f)(3) forbids dividing those transferred benefits. That matters for JBLM households: a GI Bill transfer is usually not a pot the other parent gets to spend. It is a resource that reduces the transferring parent's obligation.

Sprute also treated post-secondary educational expenses as child support for purposes of the economic table when another minor child is still on a worksheet. If college support is ordered for one child and monthly support is still being set for a younger sibling, the court generally should not pretend there is only one child on the table. That is a calculation-guide problem that shows up in the same hearing.

The Student's Job: Enrollment, Good Standing, and Grades to Both Parents

Post-secondary support is not a no-strings stipend. RCW 26.19.090(3) requires the child to enroll in an accredited academic or vocational school, actively pursue a course of study commensurate with the child's vocational goals, and remain in good academic standing as the institution defines it. Support is automatically suspended during any period the child fails those conditions. It is a suspension, not a forever termination. When the student is back in an accredited program, in good standing, and on a matching course of study, the obligation can resume for the remaining term of the order. Dropping to one class, losing accreditation, or sitting out a year without a plan is how payments stop without a new motion.

RCW 26.19.090(4) adds a records condition: the child has to make academic records and grades available to both parents. Each parent gets full and equal access as provided in RCW 26.09.225. For college, that statute limits the records to enrollment and academic records needed to determine, establish, or continue the support. FERPA is why schools will not talk to a parent without a release. A student who wants the money and refuses to sign a records release is choosing suspension. The parent who is writing the check is entitled to see that the conditions still exist.

The pattern Child Support Order also allows post-secondary support to cover the gap after high school and before the program starts. A summer between graduation and a September start date is not automatically an uncovered void — but only if the order actually says so. A self-directed 'gap year' with no accredited enrollment is the opposite fact pattern. Do not assume a backpacking year keeps the obligation running.

Who Gets the Check, and When It Has to Stop

RCW 26.19.090(6) tells the court to send payments directly to the school when that is feasible. If it is not, and the student does not live with either parent, the court may order payment directly to the child. If the student still lives with one parent, the court may order payment to the child or to that parent. Direct-to-school is how you keep a tuition payment from turning into a roommate's rent argument. Direct-to-child is how a 20-year-old in a dorm actually eats. The receiving parent's old 'child support' account is not the default once the student has left home.

The court shall not order post-secondary educational expenses beyond the child's 23rd birthday, except for exceptional circumstances such as mental, physical, or emotional disabilities. Age 23 is the ordinary ceiling, not a suggestion. A disability case is a different record — medical evidence, dependence that is not just 'still in school,' and usually a lawyer. Do not treat a fifth year of a bachelor's degree as an exceptional circumstance by itself.

Pierce County Practice: FL Modify 501, Fees, and Form T

Most Puyallup, South Hill, Sumner, Bonney Lake, and Tacoma post-secondary petitions are filed in Pierce County Superior Court at the County-City Building in Tacoma, in the same Civil Division C stream as other child-support modifications. The packet is the statewide Petition to Modify Child Support set: FL Modify 500 (summons), FL Modify 501 (petition), confidential information sheets, WSCSS worksheets, a Financial Declaration, sealed financial source documents, and proof of service. Check the post-secondary boxes that match the old order — reserved, granted-but-unpriced, modify, or cancel — rather than checking 'substantial change' out of habit. Attach a declaration that actually walks through the RCW 26.19.090(2) factors, plus acceptance letters, cost-of-attendance sheets, scholarships, the student's earnings, and whatever proof exists of the parents' college expectations when they were together.

The Pierce County Clerk publishes a support-only modification checklist. As of the January 2026 clerk fee schedule, filing in an existing Pierce County case is $56 ($36 plus a $20 court-facilitator surcharge). Opening a new case is listed at $310. Cash, debit, money order, or cashier's check; personal checks are not accepted. Fee waivers exist. Court facilitators can review forms by appointment for a small fee. They cannot tell you whether a reserved box saved you, whether a UW cap is realistic, or whether a GI Bill transfer credits only one parent.

Local practice still lives in PCLSPR 94.04. If the matter is set on a commissioner's calendar, confirm the hearing by noon two court days beforehand and e-file a Family Law Hearing Information Form (Form T) listing every document you want read. Miss the confirmation and the motion can strike — which, on this issue, can mean missing the last week the old support order is still alive. Agreed orders are still orders: the worksheets, the student-status conditions, and the payee language should be in the signed document, not in a side text thread.

Post-secondary support is a last-chance filing with a first-chance deadline. The families who do this well pull the old Child Support Order in 11th grade, read the termination line and the reserved box, and get a petition on file while ordinary support is still running. If you are a Pierce County parent watching a graduation date and a tuition portal at the same time, talking with a Puyallup family law attorney before the current order dies is how you keep the court from running out of authority — or how you keep from being surprised by a petition you could have answered with a complete financial picture.