I have no idea, but sure don’t remember it the last time I started a new thread! I am guessing I also never started one from my iPhone and I never read in landscape, so would have never noticed it. I try to avoid reading much from my phone as it is not the easiest; only 3 of my bookmarked thread show at a time, so I only use it for a quick read.
Jym, I don’t think anyone is calling for an unmoderated free for all. But it does seem feasible to establish a system where the Cafe is more lightly moderated than the rest of the forum.
The main problem on forums without moderation is toxic bigotry and overt nastiness. Having more relaxed moderation in terms of things like debate or off-topic posts will not turn us into reddit or 4chan.
There were some who suggested a sub forum (eg one about COVID) be unmoderated except for rudeness or insults or attacks (I am paraphrasing). The comments that a forum is only as kind as the least kind poster (again paraphrasing) is a great point.
Do the TOS say you have to stick strictly to the topic? I know some folks like to police that a lot, but I was wondering about the TOS. Seems like wandering off topic is pretty much the norm on discussion forums.
As many have already said, I support moderation and think the moderators generally do a decent job. Yes, there have been times when a thread has been closed or comments deleted tat didn’t seem necessary to me, but that may the price to pay to keep discussion generally civil. Compared to so many sites, discussion here is intelligent and thoughtful, with very limited name calling.
I also don’t want to see moderators not allowed to participate in threads. I would miss MLH if she could not participate. It also sounds like for controversial or close calls, the moderators get a second opinion.
I am confused. Is the “ask your questionn” now the way to start a thread? I did not know that so thanks! As others have asked, when did that happen?
I have participated in lots of threads, but never taken it to a PM group discussion. Did not know that was possible.
Re: “blog type threads”.
Quite frankly, some of the threads that have influenced, educated and affected me the most have been these. Sistersunnie, latetoschool donnaL, (I cant remember her name but the mom in Alaska who posted right after her husband had died after being hit by a drunk snowmobile driver and she had no idea what to do next). HisGrace, the young student in NorCal who sought out advice for years . or the funny ones, heck even the crazy thread about curmudgeon and his daughter’s decision to forgo Yale for Rhodes and then the hilarious move-in thread. But them I’m old and maybe not the demographic sought now.
But yes , I like the personal threads. If they’re boring to the majority they slip beneath the surface.
This may turn into a mega thread and I am having trouble figuring out the focus!
This IS off topic but again, the most recent upgrade was a disaster. The “majors” forums are hard to access. If you google “college confidential” and the browser finds the “talk” address there is no way to access the major forums.
My last post here!
Recently I interviewed some long-time users of the site. (They are free to out themselves, if they want. 
The people I’ve talked to have made life-long friendships on the site. That’s not our goal, of course, but it’s a natural by-product of a healthy community working together. And I should say the people I talked with are still active in other parts of the site besides the Parents Cafe.
Between reading this thread and talking with users directly, I’m getting a pretty good picture of this community. Like any group of people, there are bound to be conflicts and disagreements. But it’s somewhat rare for people to form a community like this and I don’t want to kill the goose that lays golden eggs. I went poking around for the [DC Urban Moms feedback](College Confidential's costly theme | Jon Quixote) because I wanted to verify the observations I made were representative. I think we can objectively say the current design is broken.
I have to say I’m curious what changes are being considered and I’m also skeptical. I feel there is an already determined end-point desire - I don’t feel confident that includes the Parent Cafe in a form it is now.
I sure would love to hear a summary @CCadmin_Jon of what picture of the community you have formed.
Many of us have been on C for quite a few years. I have been here 12 . We just naturally have experiences as our kids move through application, the college years and the post-college years, that can be helpful to share. I don’t think the site would be as helpful if only parents of applicants or current college students participated.
I went on the parent cafe only 2 years ago so I was on CC for 10 years without visiting. There are other online forums for things like caregiving elders or kids with disabilities, but many of us feel comfortable on CC so the cafe is a nice feature.
@abasket I don’t think I agree with your assessment of the future of the Parents Cafe.
One thing i think many of us agree on…including @CCadmin_Jon is that the most recent upgrade to this forum has huge accessibility issues.
Plus things were added that don’t make the site a better one…the badges, and the tags. Really not important.
Make this site consistently usable and visible across all devices. Fix accessibility and viewing on mobile devices.
I am sure we could add to the list…and this is after many of the concerns members expressed were addressed.
So Jon realizes the site organization is deficient. So what else is new? The (latest) site revamp was done in June, and since then Sorin has passed our issues on to the “team.” Some changes were made, some were made, but the fundamental issues with the site remain. I’m a little skeptical that the latest hire is going to make a real difference in improving this site. What’s he going to do that apparently couldn’t be done in the past 10 months?
As happened with all the other staff that reached out to us, certain questions will not be answered, and I suspect the future of the Parent Cafe is one of them.
@thumper1 I don’t disagree with you regarding the format. Of course that would be of concern to any staff invested on this site - to create a environment this is user and info friendly.
What gives me pause is the early on in the thread references to things like "too long threads, questioning the age make up of the community, etc. These angles were brought in early on kind of skirting along with the format or more largely focused on, moderation issues.
Not sure if CC’s web analytics have been shared but here is the link…one can see the impact of last year’s site redesign on both page views and unique visitors. https://www.trackalytics.com/website/collegeconfidential.com/
It would be interesting to see the views and visitors broken out by age group.
It seems many teens have left CC for reddit…based only on some posts I have read. When you have a college dean responding to a poster who asked a question about UVA and redirecting that poster to reddit because there are ‘more current UVA students’ there…that’s a problem.
Count me in the camp that values parent cafe, and non-college posts, and finds the site difficult to navigate. If not for “latest posts” it would be unusable. The search function is so poor that when I want to search for a thread, I do a google search with the key words and college confidential and the thread typically comes up on the first page…this does not happen with CC’s search function.
deleted.
I will throw in that I enjoy the site (first posted here in 2005!). Yes it’s somewhat different now (don’t get the badges thing :)) but I still find a wealth of information from thoughtful, informed, extremely smart parents & a lot of useful, individualistic, and caring guidance being provided (to both anxious kids and others!)
Actually the analytics have been shared multiple times by a poster on this forum…in a different thread. This was not shared by the CC folks…but I would imagine they are well aware.
Agreeing with others about the terrible design of the site and difficulties navigating.
Before the latest upgrade, I would go to the Financial Aid forum much more often and share our story in an effort to help others.
It was here at CC that I learned National Hispanic Scholar meant big merit aid at some schools.
The private school counselor told us that the nod was nice to add to the college resume, but “wasn’t worth any money”.
I’m so glad I didn’t take her at her word.
Full ride! We won the lottery!
The Parent Cafe keeps me hooked. I do wish the navigation allowed easier more intuitive discovering of other interesting threads in other forums.
Yes, and I used to share the analytics on that thread, although I wasn’t the one who first discovered the trackalytics site. I hadn’t looked at it in a while, though. I assumed that with the covid threads that traffic would still be trending upwards. I see that is not the case! Yes, I’m sure the PTB are well aware of the downward trend. Just as we are well aware that they are not too interested in making the changes that would make this site better (or at least the way it was before the 05/2019 revamp).
And if the PTB are reading. The ad that appears covering the bottom text of this forum when one isn’t signed in…is what a new poster sees if they come to check out this site.
They see a an ad covering a chunk of text at the bottom of the pages. They have no way to know that this ad moves to the side when they sign up and log in.
But my point is…who wants to join a forum where a portion of the text is covered by an ad. That needs to get fixed.