My daughter is 18, completed her first year of college. She’s smart, but truly lacks common sense. We’ve known this for many years. She doesn’t seem to understand simple things that even her sisters 12,11, & 7 understand. She chose to go to a college that offered her a full ride, plus a stipend which is 5 hours away. We were only responsible for snacks and dorm supplies.
We text or talk daily.
First semester went ok, second semester, she did horrible. Like Ds and Fs only. Her answer is I don’t know what happened, I had headaches and my back hurt! She went to dr. on campus a total of 5 times. Well, she’s lost her scholarship and I’m not only disappointed, but I don’t think it’s fair to help “fund” her education because she had the scholarship and wasted it. I don’t want to waste my money either! They will allow her to come back to school, but she can’t get loans and has no way to pay for it. Whst do you think is reasonable? I’m so mad at her I can’t even stand to see her coming.
Since first semester was ok but her grades crashed second term, I’d wonder about the possibility of depression, a breakup, or an assault. You heard from her daily; did you get a sense of anything going wrong?
If I were in your shoes I’b be more concerned about what happened and I’d me worried that my kid had some serious problems. If you said she was in a very rigorous engineering school and so she tanked in very difficult classes that would be re-assuring. I’m not getting that sense from your post. What do you think happened? I’d want to figure that out with her first before deciding how to proceed and “I don’t know” would not cut it with me.
Sounds like it’s time to come home and attend a community college perhaps.
I don’t know what your next move is, but I’m so sorry to hear this has happened. As the parent of a kid counting on his scholarships, I can empathize. Does the school have an appeal or grace period? And I echo the above regarding her overall health - did something happen, which she needs to deal with separately? I don’t think you can rationally decide your next moves unless you understand this piece.
She should find out her options for getting the scholarship reinstated. If she retakes the courses at a community college, will they let her replace the grades? Is there any way to get the scholarship back? If not, that school is no longer affordable. My kids are in that situation and they know they can’t go to the current schools if they don’t keep the scholarships, eligibility for federal loans and grants. It’s just the reality.
You need to let your daughter lead the discussion. What does she want to do? What does she think is the problem?
I have no magic solutions, but coming from a just finished freshman whose worst fear is being in your daughter’s shoes, I just want to offer you my sympathy. Also, a few questions:
What is her major?
How many classes was she taking?
What classes was she taking each semester?
Does she play video games?
I would be angry, too, but it’s not the most useful reaction. So it might be a good idea to postpone discussing the problem with your daughter for a few days and do whatever helps you the most to process the anger and calm it down some so that you can address the problem in a more objective way. I know this is really, really hard. But what’s needed here is a detective, and I don’t think you can be a good detective until you’ve gotten the anger mostly out of your system.
Obviously something went wrong. It may have been something drastic like a mental health problem or an assault. Or it may have been something relatively simple that had more of an impact on your daughter’s grades than she anticipated – like making some good friends and spending too much time fooling around with them instead of studying, or taking harder courses in the second semester than the first.
Your daughter may need to go somewhere else to continue her education (most likely a community college for a while, with a transfer to a four-year school later if she does well). But before she does that, the two of you (and maybe her other parent) need to sit down and figure out what went wrong so that the next time will be better. And if there is a serious issue to be addressed (like depression or a serious anxiety problem or migraines), maybe it would be best if she didn’t continue her education immediately.
Either something happened physically, emotionally, or with her mental health, in which case I am so sorry and believe your best bet is to make some appointments over the summer and have her enroll in community college to give herself a chance to regroup…
OR
She knows exactly “what happened” and it involves a little too much fun and not enough work, in which case my advice is to have her come home, get a job and enroll in community college.
I know a fair number of people who have returned home to gather themselves together and attend community college for a semester or three. Some kids need to do that. The reasons she had trouble second semester will become clear to you soon enough.
Thanks so much for your sincere concern for her. Her major was social work. She had 18 hours her first semester & 16 the second. Because she completed so many AP and and dual enrollment classes in high school, she went in as a sophomore.
My opinion is, she discovered the social world. She got a BF and doesn’t know how to prioritize. I told her, she can get a job and work or go to Jr. College the summer, but I’m not paying. She used the money she was saving for a car, to pay for summer classes.
She keeps saying well what do you guys expect me to do. It’s done, I screwed up. But I’m so mad I honestly can’t think straight. I feel like she lied to me as we talk every single day and she never ever said I’m failing. Honestly, because she lacks common sense, she really may not have known. My son is 19, in college at a different school and had a very similar problem, however, he called and said mom/dad I need help before he got bad grades. She didn’t.
Maybe. Maybe not. Because final exams or final projects often account for a very large percentage of the overall course grade in a lot of college courses, students sometimes truly don’t know how they’re doing until after the semester is over. It doesn’t help that a lot of times you don’t get letter grades on assignments. You get some number and you get told what the median was. It’s hard to interpret that – does it mean you got a B minus? Or a D? Sometimes you can’t tell.
It’s really astute of you to recognize this. Feel free to come to this board and vent. And maybe you can vent somewhere else, too. It may be a week or two before you can think straight again, but maybe we can help you get there a bit sooner.
First…my free advice. Don’t compare your daughter to her siblings.
What’s done is done. Time to figure out what really went wrong, and address that…and look forward.
Your daughter needs to prove to you and herself that she can regroup and be successful in college.
She has not met satisfactory academic progress, most likely…and won’t be able to get federally funded aid at many places. Each school has its own SAP policy…but it’s likely she or you will need to pay for the upcoming term…at least.
I would suggest figuring out the reasons for this grade drop, and try to form a plan so that this doesn’t repeat regardless of where she goes to school.
It’s going to be a rough time for your daughter and yourself. One thing though - comparing your children gains you nothing. They might have all been raised in the same environment, but they are all different people. Some of them may make more sense to you, true. But comparing them doesn’t really help anything.
Agree about com college. It took me three years of wasting time at CC before I was ready to get serious about college. Thank goodness I didn’t waste my parent’s money by going right into a university. I wasn’t ready, sounds like she isn’t either. And you know her best, it sounds like really has made a mess of things by being irresponsible. I too was irresponsible, plain and simple. I knew it, and I bet your D does too, whihc is why she hasn’t come up with a better reason.
If this were my kid, I would first speak to the school about an appeal process, and if it is possible for her scholarship to be reinstated, or if it is gone forever. Second I would have an in-person, calm discussion with my daughter about what went wrong, what if anything she thinks she could have done differently, and what needs to happen moving forward so that she can be successful in school and/or meet her own goals for herself. Then you can decide how best to support her going forward.
Both of our daughters are/will be attending private colleges on huge merit scholarships. We were very clear with them up front that we could not and would not pay for these schools if the scholarships were lost. It was just a fact. Even if it was illness or something unfair like that. We also discussed what we would do if that worst case happened. We said “you can come back home, live at home, and attend community college or our local state university as a commuter. All will not be lost in terms of getting an education, but there will be some consequences and we aren’t sources of unlimited funds to cover all eventualities.” Even if you didn’t have this conversation ahead of time, you can look at the situation as fairly and realistically as possible and decide how you can best support her moving forward. Lots of kids take a less linear path from the end of high school to self sufficiency.
First, you need to find out whether the issue was due to some type of disability or due to partying./gaming/slacking
A niece and a nephew of mine, 10 years apart, each lost her/his merit scholarship freshman year due to partying. Both sets of parents completely pulled the educational funding plug.
The niece moved in w the mom and got a job and took college courses part time. Despite still not haven’t earned her bachelors degree at 40, she’s managed to move herself up the career ladder by being smart & determined.
The nephew joind the Army and ended up deplying to Afghanistan. He returned to school on the GI Bill and is serious now.
Both the niece & the nephew say losing their merit scholarships was one of the best things that happened to them. It was The Big Wake Up Call.
Assuming that she did not have some sort of mental issue, which seems unlikely given your overall level of awareness, then she simply washed out. I would disagree that her priorities were not straight - it was precisely her priorities which caused the problem.
Although it is a hard call for a parent, I would cut off the college funding. Nothing like a full-time job and paying taxes to recalibrate priorities.
I think working for a year should be an option. She can save money. Learn the value of money and why an eduacation is important. Then you could consider paying some portion of college from half to full if she’s proven herself. Unfortunately, I’ve seen other fail freshman year and go right to community college without lessons learned and the results were poor.
I would see if you could get a breakdown and grades and assignments to see if there are patterns in exams, papers, participation, homework, etc. Any analysis can help to see if it’s an in classroom issue, outside issue, a point where everything collapsed pointing to a traumatic event, etc.
If this were my kid, I would first speak to the school about an appeal process, and if it is possible for her scholarship to be reinstated, or if it is gone forever.
Due to FERPA, likely the kid has to have this conversation with the college. But the two of you should probably have a conference call with the appropriate office on campus once she is at home. I think the answer to that probably is a key in next steps. If I were you, I’d be leaning toward having her at home and going to community college, unless there is a clear path back to the scholarship if you pay for one semester AND she performs.
Regarding the common sense thing… sometimes this is a sign of a learning disability. I have a kid who is pretty high functioning academically, but can barely cross the street without getting hit by a car. She has pretty chronic executive functioning issues, too – can’t keep track of stuff or assignments or to dos very well. And she is really not good at reading people and understanding the consequences of her actions, or understanding why people react the way they do to her. She has been diagnosed with a learning disability, and gets some academic accommodations, but we have also struggled mightily for years to try to help her get some of the 'life scaffolding" in place so she could succeed at college. She is really doing pretty well, but still wobbles sometimes.
Note that your continuing willingness to fund college for her need not be all or nothing. However, if the current college after losing the scholarship becomes more expensive than you had budgeted for and told her during her 12th grade year, then obviously she cannot continue there, even if you are willing to continue funding to a lower level. Of course, D and F grades may change your willingness to continue funding college at even the lower level.