(MONEY Magazine) – We're all familiar with what's been happening to college prices. My four years at Princeton (class of 1964) cost less than $12,000, while my daughter's four years at Oberlin ('94) topped $90,000. And prices are expected to keep rising 7% a year well into the next century. Not surprisingly, as our exclusive survey shows (see page 6), 66% of students take campus jobs to help with the bills. Consider, for example, what four MONEY Guide staffers did as students. At Hamilton, writer Lesley Alderman babysat for the dean's children, cleaned houses and served as a demonstrator for a modern dance class while the instructor was pregnant. Reporter Derek Gordon worked as a clerk in the periodicals room at Brown's library and in the school's career services center. Reporters Elaine Richardson and Marcy Lovitch put in 35 to 40 hours a week at their schools' daily newspapers. As editor-in-chief of the Daily Illini (at the University of Illinois at Urbana/Champaign), Richardson managed a staff of 150. Lovitch worked as an editor at the Temple News. "My socializing suffered," she says, "but since a lot of friends were at the newspaper, I was able to work and play at the same time." As our survey shows, Lovitch was an exception. Most students who work more than 10 hours a week are far less satisfied with college than those who work fewer hours. The message for parents: Take on as much of the financial strain as you can. This MONEY Guide can make it more bearable. For the fifth time, we rank the 100 best values among colleges (see page 14). We explain smart investing strategies (page 44), how to cut costs (page 36), negotiate for more financial aid (page 58) and borrow wisely (page 56). What can parents expect in return? More than you might think. Observes project editor Steve Gelman (Brooklyn College, '55): "Watching your kids when they're small, observing their curiosities and kindnesses and budding skills, you always allow yourself the conceit that they will grow up to be happy, accomplished, interesting people. In college, that's what happened to mine." His son Mitch earned his degree from the University of California-Berkeley in 1985, his daughter Jan from the University of Colorado-Boulder in 1986. Mitch is now a Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter at New York Newsday, while Jan is an associate editor at Selling magazine. "The kids became adults I admire," says Gelman. "For a parent, what could be better?"