That the concern raised by local businesses that their children can't get into the local universities and that their workforce is perturbed and wants to move away so as to be closer to these children, and this is a problem for industry ... that isn't this just more helicopter parenting? I mean, my kids are little, I know. But I'd like to think that by 18 they would be capable of moving to another city, living in a dorm, not being within 30 minutes of me. I'd like to think that *I'd* be ok with them moving away at 18, especially to a place like a dorm where there are people to help, people who realize kids are on their own for the first time. It seems to me to be the perfect place to try out a young person's independence, right? In a place full of other young people, supported by other young people and others who are used to young people trying out their independence.
One thing I haven't ever considered, up to this point, is relocating my family so as to be closer to my child in university.
But you never know, I guess. You never know.
1 comment:
Definitely another manifestation of helicopter parenting. It's a thing now, apparently, this continuing to hover anxiously over undergraduates old enough to vote, drink, etc. -- I haven't read about the particular complaint you mention, but I have read articles about US universities where they have to schedule special Frosh Week activities for parents so that the kids can actually, y'know, meet their dorm-mates and do regular Frosh Week things (and so that the school can at some point say, look, parents, you need to go home now), and war stories from teaching faculty about parents who phone or email them to kvetch about their kids' marks (or to demand to know what said marks are, which profs aren't legally allowed to tell them because the students are legally adults). University websites now routinely have "for parents" pages. I don't know at what point some of these parents plan on letting their kids have some independence, but I hope the kids aren't too stunted by the time they do to actually take that independence when it's offered :P
Now, if the parents were complaining that they can't afford the local universities and still make their mortgage payments, that I could see (I have no idea what tuitions are like out where you are, but here in Ontario they're like a runaway train -- still nothing compared to private unis in the US, of course). But seriously, moving to a different city to be near your university-age child?
Besides, maybe university-age kids like to have somewhere stable and familiar to come home to in the summer. I know I did.
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