<p>Calmom~
Apology not necessary, but accepted. On the internet, tone is indeed a difficult beast to tame. I didn't feel your "daddy" reference was hostile, rather unduly judgmental and belittling. No matter. I took only slight offense -- my skin is much thicker than that. And by all means stand by your opinion; I'll stand by mine too. As I thought was clear, I was specifically referring to lending a very particular and limited type of assistance -- as master of my trusty, but rickety old typewriter. It's mine ... we have a wonderful long history together ... and while my daugher puts my typing to shame, nobody lines up type on an old IBM Selectric better (or quicker) than I do. Whiteout? Editing tape? I don't need no stinkin' whiteout or editing tape. :) All composition is up to my daughter. All essays and attachments are word processed (by her). However, if I can pitch in and type a form or two -- using her handwritten draft as a template -- well I see no harm in it whatsoever and feel good to relieve some of the stress that these kids have in the application process which is generally far greater than the stress level we faced while applying to college (1975 for me). As others have alluded to on this thread, it can be very valuable for kids to receive a little help with the nuts and bolts from the people who care the most about them -- namely their parents. I can't help my daughter with her calculus homework anymore, but I sure can teach her a thing or two about setting up a checklist and a filing system, managing correspondence, and balancing her checkbook. Shouldn't parents be involved in their kids' education too? I think so. I'll have no involvement four years from now when she's applying to Grad school, but I think she'll have a framework to manage the process based on snippets of wisdom, here or there, imparted by the 'rents when she was applying as an undergraduate. Not to belabor the point, but we're talking line drawing here and I think most intelligent parents are very aware of the line and stay on the correct side of it. "Too involved" parents (whatever "too involved" really means) bug me too. Any slight offense I took was probably related to being wrongly (in my opinion) lumped with a stereotype I abhor. Where we differ factually is that I think my kind of assistance -- and the kind of assistance brought up by many others on this thread -- is the furthest thing possible from being "too involved." We all see things differently though, eh?</p>