gimme - I don't want to work - I am lazy - hehe
phillyburbs.com
College parents should back off
phillyBurbs.com
In coming weeks, as millions of college kids arrive on campuses across the land, professors, deans and other college educrats will receive huffy phone calls or tersely worded e-mails.
These calls and messages will bear bitter complaints about dorm living conditions, the quality of cafeteria food, burdensome class rosters and other problems college kids typically encounter.
The complaints won’t come from the students, however, but from meddling moms and dads who’ve earned the derisive nickname “helicopter parents.”
Like helicopters, these middleaged baby boomer buttinskies hover over their kids, diving down to help them when their child experiences a problem or is less than completely comfortable in his campus surroundings.
Reporter Marion Callahan, who works for our sister paper, The Intelligencer in Doylestown, chronicled the existence of such parents in Sunday’s newspaper. Callahan quoted a college counselor who said she is “shocked” at the number of parents who intrude, interfere, badger, complain and otherwise worm their way into their kids’ college life.
One parent griped to college officials that her kid’s schedule is a burden because class begins at 8 a.m., which is too early for her son to rise.
“Students can’t make a decision without flipping open their cell phone and calling Mom and Dad,” the counselor told Callahan.
Frankly, I didn’t know such noxious parents existed in large numbers and, after reading the piece, would be embarrassed if I had parents like that.
That kind of parental behavior is creepy to me. Alien, too.
I recall my old man’s approach to parenting, which wasn’t so much like a helicopter as it was airplane jumpmaster. That is, he’d push me out at 10,000 feet with some advice: “Don’t forget to pull the ripcord, son.”
People need to walk to the beat of their own drum, he’d say, adding that no one need apologize for living his life on his own terms — within reasonable limits, of course. He never tried to control any aspect of my life, except to occasionally gripe that my hair was too long.
Today, parents like that would be labeled “old school.” Unlike helicopter parents, they respect their kids enough to let them figure out their own lives, choose their own battles and make their own foolish mistakes.
Want a car, son? That’s nice. Get a job and pay for it.
How badly do you want a college degree, son? Enough to pay for it yourself ?
In my case the answer was yes, I wanted to go to college. I spent 5½ years working full time and going to school full time. (No sweat. When you’re 20, the hours don’t seem that long and it’s helpful to work at jobs you enjoy.)
After college, in debt up to my neck, my father offered to pay off my student loans. I turned him down. I told him to spend the money on a new car (which he did).
Today, a parent who tests her kid’s resolve to get through college like my old man tested me would be considered an oddball. But I learned more about myself during those tough years of work and school than I ever learned from someone picking up the tab for me.
If you’re a parent with collegebound kids, here’s some advice. The first day of school drop your kid off on campus, kiss him goodbye and say, “You’re on your own, now. Feel free to fall on your face as often as you like. Builds character.” |
