Going to college after completing high school is more than just a popular choice for many young adults in the United States: it has become an expectation. As a parent, you naturally want to help your child in any way possible. But wanting to help your child is not the same as being legally required to help him or her. As your son or daughter reaches adulthood, you might be wondering whether you are required to pay for his or her college education as part of your child support obligation.

There is no clear legal answer to this. In Illinois, there is no law that specifically states that a parent must pay for college expenses as part of his or her child support agreement. However, the Illinois Marriage and Dissolution of Marriage Act includes language that gives a judge the right to order that an individual parent contribute to his or her child's college costs. This section of the law also gives judges the power to determine how much a parent must pay. This is known as non-minor support.

If you have been ordered to make non-minor support payments for your adult child or your child will become an adult in the near future and you want to understand how non-minor support works, contact an experienced child support attorney to discuss your concerns and get a professional opinion about how the law may be applied to your individual situation.

If you are a parent currently going through a divorce, your child likely has opinions about the divorce and how it will affect his or her life once the process is complete. Depending on your child's age and personality, he or she may be quite vocal about these opinions. One of the issues that your child may be most vocal about is his or her custody arrangement after the divorce.

In Illinois, the court may consider a child's desire when determining custody, but the child's desire cannot be the only factor that determines custody. Much larger issues, such as each parent's household stability and current financial health, carry much more weight in the court's decision regarding a child's custody arrangement.

Getting a divorce and having to work out a custody arrangement for your child is stressful. Talk to your child about the custody evaluation process before it begins and answer his or her questions in a positive, age-appropriate way. If you need guidance with starting these conversations or how to handle sensitive subjects with your child, talk with an experienced family attorney or counselor to get a professional opinion about how to approach these subjects with your child.

The Illinois Marriage and Dissolution of Marriage Act is a law that covers general family-law related topics within the state of Illinois. While many topics fall into specific realms, such as divorce, division of assets, and and child support, some aspects of the law do not fit neatly into a single category. In order to handle these topics, the state created a “Miscellaneous” category of family law issues. Here are five more examples of the resulting hodgepodge:

1. The Illinois Department of Healthcare and Family Services is responsible for supervising the state’s child support enforcement programs. Specific responsibilities include making advance payments to any county included in the program so that the county can enforce payments, and monitoring local programs to ensure that the payments are being enforced.
2. In some cases where child support payments are made directly to the clerk of the court, the clerk cannot locate the payee. When that happens the clerk may invest the payments in an interest-bearing account, but only until the payee has been located. Any interest or capital gains accrued do not go to the payee, however. That money goes to a special fund.
3. Employers, labor unions and telephone companies are sometimes required to provide information concerning putative fathers and noncustodial parents so that the state can establish a child’s paternity or establish, modify or enforce a child support order. This information includes the parent’s physical whereabouts, the parent’s place of employment, and the parent’s salary, wages and health insurance information. The request for information must come from a public office, and the request must receive a response within 15 days.
4. When a divorce judgment includes provisions for maintenance payments, the court may attach a lien to the obligor’s real estate to secure the payments. In other words, you cannot legally sell your property and give clear title to the buyer without staying current on your maintenance obligations. The court uses judgment liens to make sure that you make these payments on time.
5. If an obligor owes more than $10,000 in child support, is delinquent in payment of an amount equal to at least three months of support obligations, or fails to pay the child support annual fee for a three-year period, the court may order the clerk to make that information available to consumer reporting agencies. The court will also direct the clerk to publish the obligor’s name and address in a newspaper of general circulation in the area in which the obligor resides, if the obligor resides in the county in which the clerk holds office. However, the clerk must first provide the obligor with notice of intent to publish.

Our experienced  Kane County divorce attorneys know the ins and outs of the state’s marriage and divorce laws. Contact us today for a consultation. We can assist those in the St. Charles area.

The Illinois Marriage and Dissolution of Marriage Act is a comprehensive law that covers divorce, legal separation, division of marital assets, child support and other related issues. Some aspects of the law do not fit neatly into a single category, which is why the state legislature lumped those issues into a “Miscellaneous” section. Here are five examples of the resulting hodgepodge:

1. Who gets possession of the family home is often a dispute during divorce proceedings. In fact, either party may file a petition seeking the other party’s temporary eviction while the proceeding is pending. The court will grant the petition if continued occupancy by both parties jeopardizes their (or their children’s) physical or mental well-being. There must generally be an opportunity for a full hearing on the issue.
2. Bigamy is a legitimate ground for annulment or divorce. However, the existence of multiple spouses has financial complications. If you married someone, in good faith, and it turns out that this person was already legally married to someone else, you can still petition for maintenance (alimony). But your alimony rights cannot interfere with the rights of other spouses. That means you might end up with less money than you otherwise would have received absent the bigamy.
3. Families receiving public aid may also be awarded maintenance, child support or both in a divorce judgment. However, the court will require payments to be made directly to the Department of Healthcare and Family Services or the local governmental unit responsible for their support, depending on the type of public aid the family receives.
4. Child support payments are often made through a middleman. In Illinois, the specific middleman often depends on which county the divorce action is filed in. For example, if the county’s population is less than three million, the court may order child support payments to be made to the clerk of the court. If the county’s population is more than three million, the court may order child support payments to be made to the clerk of the court or the Department of Healthcare and Family Services.
5. Divorce, like marriage, is public record. A certificate of dissolution of marriage must be filed with the state Department of Public Health. A declaration of invalidity of marriage (annulment) must also be filed with the department. While the person petitioning for dissolution or annulment must prepare the form, failure to comply with this requirement will not invalidate a judgment of dissolution of marriage or a declaration of invalidity of marriage.

Generally, only a child’s parents or legal guardians have the authority to make decisions regarding the child’s care and well-being. To a certain extent, that authority even extends beyond the grave. Illinois law permits parents and guardians to appoint standby guardians, which allows them to decide who will care for their children if the worst happens. A standby guardian is someone who would immediately take on the care of minor children upon the passing of the parents or guardians.

You may appoint a standby guardian in your will, but the law does not require the designation to be made this way. There are other legal forms that you can use instead. However, the content requirements are the same, no matter the type of document used:

1. The document naming this guardian has to be witnessed by two competent adults (older than 18); and
2. The person appointed to be this guardian cannot be a witness.

(Keep in mind that there is a difference between personal guardians and estate guardians.)