<p>I think one of the things that is unsettling here is looking down the road. How does a parent help a student become employable? Most business people I can think of are not mean but they sure as heck are not accommodating of the employee who 1) doesn’t show up and 2) isn’t ready to work (because of meds/eats or whatever else). </p>
<p>It is worrisome because I can think of two late twenties males that are unemployed and dang near unemployable simply because they have no track record of keeping a job. “Under treatment for depression” and “no job history for 24 months” isn’t what charms an interviewer – particularly in these tough economic times. </p>
<p>Somehow the student has to get the message that the student has to do everything in his power to succeed. Even if that means hiring the gorilla down the hall to come turn off the computer at 2 a.m. every night — one may have to resort to strange and unique solutions but solutions the student must find.</p>
<p>Here’s an idea for those parents who own the computer that DS/DD has at college. Set up a script so that the /etc/hosts file is changed at midnight to one where the entries for known social networking sites, etc used regularly by your student for time wasting are changed to 127.0.0.1. Make it only accessible to those with sysadmin privileges on the computer (owner, not DD/DS). Only the truly desperate will trudge through the snow to use Facebook in the wee hours; it is generally just a distraction, like flipping TV channels. Of course, this won’t be effective for the EECS students out there, but the bulk may be stymied long enough to fall asleep. I’m working on a script now for Mac, and I’ll be happy to PM it after testing :).</p>
<p>Astrodeb, I owned my computer in college. Ain’t no way I would let my parents screw with the settings or decide what I could or couldn’t use the computer for. There’s also no way that I would give them admin rights and not myself.</p>
<p>I think that any college student isn’t ready for college if they can only function if their parents follow through on astrodeb’s idea about controlling the student’s computer.</p>
<p>bigtrees, I think we are talking about students who clearly need some management help. You are right as far as most students go. I wouldn’t touch my S’s computer in part because I could balls it up royally. He does some of his best work at 2 a.m. But he is hanging in there, eating and getting to class (mostly!). OP’s kid is sinking fast and needs help. </p>
<p>Anything you have seen to help students get their face out of Facebook and on to college life?</p>
<p>Honestly, my parents let me go when I graduated from high school. They told me the dollar amount per year they were willing to fund for college, and let me decide where to apply, where to attend, what to major in, whether or not I wanted to work while in college, how many years I should take for college, etc, etc. They basically treated me like an adult. That’s in stark contrast to many other parents.</p>
<p>They always tried their best to answer questions if I called or e-mailed.</p>
<p>I thought it was nice. I felt like an adult and could make my own decisions as an adult would.</p>
<p>Yes bigtrees your situation is what occurs most of the times…and as a parent part of your kids learning to stand on their own two feet is to essentially give them more and more freedom and more and more responsibility as they journey from young teen to young adult. If a student “fails” at some point you yank the chain, go back and repeat that particular lesson. You can be book smart and life dumb or as my kids would say “the dumbest smart person I know.” Clearly that process is broken for the OP’s son. So now they have a 19 or 20 year old that isn’t handling the freedom and responsibility for whatever reason and begs the question for the OP, now what? I totally disagree with the poster who talked about computer monitoring etc. as that is simply continuing the propping up part of the scenario which clearly isn’t working.</p>
<p>Bigtrees, we get it. You don’t have Aspergers. Lucky you. Congratulations.</p>
<p>I’m not sure how much applicability your comments have to students who do have Aspergers, or their parents. Aspergers isn’t caused by bad parents, or parents who coddle their children. It seems to be largely genetic.</p>
<p>While it’s true that parents of Aspies probably managed their children’s lives while the kids were in high school, that’s not why the kids are failing in college. True, if the parents hadn’t helped their kids in high school, then the kids wouldn’t be failing in college-- because they wouldn’t be in college, having already failed in high school.</p>
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<p>So what do you suggest, Northstarmom? Let’s for the moment assume that this student could function in college with fairly severe scheduling provided by someone else, and not otherwise. Would that student be better off in college, or not? If not in college, where would this bright Aspergers student belong?</p>
<p>In the case of the OP, I think the parents should stop paying for college and allow the student to go his own way for a few years. He might decide to reenroll in school and figure out a way to suceed this time (by hiring an executive function person, by not subscribing to the internet, by not joining a frat, etc) or may decide that college just isn’t for him.</p>
<p>Remember, the OP’s son didn’t want to apply for college, didn’t have a good freshman year, and is skipping classes and exams sophmore year. I don’t think college is the right place for the OP’s son.</p>
<p>Cardinal Fang, I doubt the OP knows the answer. Clearly where this student is now is not working. Can the student be successful in any college…I would guess that is a big unknown right now…the family might have some ideas based on some of the suggestions in this thread and some of the other threads of parents with kids who struggled in college and their own experiences with their son. Bigtrees I think most would agree that the student shouldn’t continue without some sort of solution or course of action.</p>
<p>I’m sorry, I missed the part where the OP’s son didn’t want to apply for college. Which post was that?</p>
<p>I also am dubious about letting the kid flounder for a few years in hopes he’ll get better. If tough love and abandonment were the strategy most likely to succeed in making a person with Aspergers have better executive function, then I would support it-- but I don’t believe we have any evidence to back that idea. Underemployment is not a good in itself. If underemployment in Aspies led to future success, then great, but usually it leads to more underemployment. </p>
<p>In this particular case, in the short term, I agree with NSM that the kid should leave school now. He’s going to be kicked out anyway, so he might as well leave of his own accord. Then the whole family can work on ways to make him function better.</p>
<p>I see. You assume that the kid didn’t want to go to college because he procrastinated on his applications. Bad assumption, or at least a nonstandard definition of “want.” Those of us who have the unfortunate tendency to procrastinate know better. For example, right now I should be going for a bike ride, but I’m procrastinating by writing this message. But I really do want to go for a ride, and I will enjoy it very much as soon as I start pedalling.</p>
<p>But, off I go! See you in a few hours, after I ride up the mountain and back down again.</p>
<p>It matters what the definition of procrastination is. A kid who procrastinates beyond what his/her parents think is reasonable, but gets the apps in on time without the parents forcing them to, probably really wants to go to college and is ready to go.</p>
<p>A kid who procrastinates and misses deadlines may want to go to college, but probably isn’t ready for it.</p>
<p>Also, many people want to go to college for the wrong reasons. They may want to party, live away from home, have a chance to make more friends, but not be particularly interested in studying.</p>
<p>My older S – who got his apps in on time only because I stood over and forced him to – wanted to go to college because he thought that was the only way to get a decent job, he wanted to leave our state, and because he wanted to live again in a city with lots of professional sports teams. He also cheerfully flunked out of college. He sees that college year as a success, though, because the team he most loved at his college won the national championship.</p>
<p>Younger S procrastinated about college apps, too, and I stood back and watched. He missed all of the deadlines of colleges that interested him. Then, during a gap year with Americorps, he got his applications in – on his own dime – and with no help from me.</p>
<p>He’s a junior on deans list student in the college of his choice, and has taken great advantage of the academic and social opportunities there.</p>
<p>Both sons have ADD or ADHD, and some organizational problems, but as is the case with smart people with ADD/ADHD, when they really want to do something, they can hyperfocus and organize themselves.</p>
<p>I would advise you to TOTALLY assume that Asperger’s is the cause of your son’s college woes.</p>
<p>I have a college freshman with Aspergers. Not at an Ivy, but at a good school. He had good HS grades and scores, and is scary smart. I had absoutely no reason to believe that he would be unable to pass normal college classes.</p>
<p>The last few weeks have been among the most eye-opening in my life. I’ve learned that almost everything I’ve been told - don’t be a helicopter, take away the safety net, boys are just like that - is totally, absolutely wrong for a college student with Asperger’s. He absolutely needs a coach or parent to be the coach and he may need it for life. Hence, CF’s wheelchair ramp analogy - no matter how old or smart the guy in the wheelchair is, he’s not going to climb a flight of stairs in that chair.</p>
<p>There must be success stories out there somewhere but I’m not aware of any - in real life or in my virtual CC life - where the bright child with Asperger’s makes it through 4 year college away from home without failing one or more classes, being sent home, taking a medical leave, losing merit aid, moving back home to go to community college, or a combination of the above. </p>
<p>The stories I’ve heard are all shockingly similar and when I speak to experts, they say all the stories they hear are the same. The thing is, these are all very bright students…quite bright. And they are not succeeding in college.</p>