She has actually made this exact point on a few Facebook posts in response to criticism. I do see her point. It would not be my style to post either a touchdown or a report card, but this seems to work for her and her family (she posts a lot about her kids, and they cooperate with it.)
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My D24 is ditto and will never talk to us if we even mention her grades or class rank to even the closest of our friends or family.
Forget about posting on any kind of media 
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Yes you have a good point. Our HS/town is obsessed with its football team so it gets lots of eye rolls too. A bunch of the kids were actually upset when the football team did well this year because then the team would get even more disproportionate resources and attention than they already get. They are literally called heroes and a small number of the āfootball momsā are really something LOL.
Over-the-top sports bragging just seems silly and mostly harmless to me. I do feel bad for some of the parents/kids who might see the academic stuff because I think it makes people feel a bit more self-conscious than the sports stuff does. I think most people realize HS sports donāt affect adult life much, whereas the grades/college stuff can feel painful to some.
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Thereās a ceremony every time a kid gets offered an athletic scholarship, academic scholarshipsā¦ not so much.
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Just wanted to make a post to express thanks for all who post here and offer info and support. Iām feeling blessed and relieved that the last of 3 kids just got an ED acceptance to her dream school. So glad to be over the finish line (until possible grad schools?)! Iām wishing the best success and happiness for all the other parents of ā23 and their kids and that all the kids end up where theyāre happy and can thrive.
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Thank you for the tip!
All the talk of bragging reminded me I can brag to you guys since I canāt mention this to people in real life.
23 won a conference athletic award!! This is a big deal because 23 had some health challenges that put a dent in their abilities in their sport. They worked on this issue and overcame it.
In addition to the conference award, 23 won one of the two coachās awards. 23 was SHOCKED to win a conference award.
Itās about more than bragging for me. This is a parent loving that their child learned they can be resilient and strong even when things are hard. We could be supportive but they had to be the one to overcome the health situation. They also gracefully handled the disappointment of missing out on recruiting due to the health situation.
This past season, they took on a leadership role and motivated the younger players and rallied them. This was also a big deal for a quiet kid with some challenges.
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Only got to see my daughterās end-of-year (college) transcripts, because I had to submit it to the insurance agent for the āgood-student car insurance discountā - who was also the only person other than myself to ever see them.
Iāve never ever been comfortable sharing high school grades/report cards, SAT/ACT scores, AP scores, etc. to other local parents. Too many parents are genuinely relieved about kids having achieved various successes through occasional struggles, it never felt right to ātopā them and basically āshut downā any conversation.
Besides, when the occasional academic awards were officially handed out, with a subset of school invited, people figured out on their own who was repeatedly called back on stage.
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My kid would have killed me.
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I donāt think those are precisely parallel, though.
The parallel to the report card would be a montage of all of the kidās receptions over the entire season, and that would be a bit much.
(Coming from a school district where there isnāt a celebration announcement every time a kid gets an academic scholarship, but there really arenāt any for athletic scholarships either.)
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Academic records are private. A game with a large audience is not.
My kids would be mortified, and I have never seen one of my college kidsā report cards! But also, if you have a kid in MIT, you really should be secure enough to be able to be quietly proud lol.
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Eh, Iām not particularly troubled by a parent wanting to brag about their child, even if they do it in a way that I wouldnāt. I guess I find it lovely that they are proud of their children and willing to look a little silly (or more than silly) celebrating their childās accomplishments.
Remind me of parties Iāve attended where a husband or wife tells stories about their spouse that would have you believing the spouse walked on water, or multiples both fish and wine daily. Seeing people love someone else like that is always sweet to me.
Then again, I am pretty liberal with the block/mute button when I canāt handle hearing from someone onlineā¦for whatever reason. Maybe that is another option instead of continuing to read someoneās feed when it causes such a strong negative reaction.
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I suspect that if social network sites were more like what they āusedā to be, or in some idealized version of them, I could understand a bit more about posting such things. What I mean is, there are times that the kid does something and I will then email it out to a select few people (maybe 3 or so folks). Itās natural to want to share things, whether theyāre proud moments or funny moments or I canāt believe they actually thought that was a good idea moments (my dog has a number of these sent on a text thread with my mom and sister). And if our social networks really were networks of our friends, rather than just our FB āfriendsā then it would be much more understandable. Perhaps if others maintain a very limited FB āfriendā group (kind of like the parents in the Toyota or Subaru commercial where the adult kid is horrified that her parents only have 9 friends on FB while she has tons, but the parents are out and about with real friends doing stuff, unlike the D), then perhaps they think that itās socially appropriate to share with that group? But if they have hundreds or more āfriendsā then, yeah, not the best look.
Though I will also say that the point about sharing/praising athletics as compared to academics definitely has some validity. I would just prefer if people said, āmy kid had been struggling with X but with hard work has been able to score touchdown/improve gradesā rather than just being braggy. I think itās destructive to our society when people only share the ābestā stuff about their lives and not the struggles as well.
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Totally agree, @AustenNut. A few years ago I muted or Unfriended all the school parents I had become FB friends with. I had acquired 200+ friends that I had nothing in common with other than our children. I kept my real friends - and got rid of the acquaintances - and it makes for much nicer scrolling to see only people I really know and care about, who really know and care about me and my familyā¦then I took it a step further and stopped posting on FB completely! FB is an opt-in activity and it was easy enough to minimize the posters who bug me. Harder to quit completely but I deleted the app from my phone and that helped to walk away.
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re: coachās awards: two of our kids have won that twice over the 16 years of accumulative high school from a mix of XC, soccer, swimming, dance team, tennis. The kids were immensely proud of that recognition because they knew the person who saw them trying their best chose them. Its an award theyāll remember. good job to your son!
and to @Poochie21 - i rarely post on FBā¦ . i think i average 1.5 posts a year. One thing iāve really liked though is FB groups; iām in a few and enjoy. One group thatās going strong was made from CCās Parents of the HS class of 2020. Weāve shared our kidsā journeys through their senior year being cut short; covid year, and now on to internships, studying abroad, and etc,; and iāve met one person IRL. So; thatās one part of FB i like; the rest not so much.
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I have posted my kids Deans/Presidents list awards. The schools actually sent out a āpress releaseā type of notice I guess for those areas where small town newspapers might print that type of thing.
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I have heard they are quite generous with financial aid but I still donāt think they would have come down to our comfort level. I think their application required an extra essay so that was my sonās red line-not another essay! Lol. If no essay and a free app? He might have considered it. It is a great school, for sure, but Iām fine with the current list and merit coming in is promising-so no complaints here.
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This is an interesting point. Our high school definitely celebrates/publicizes athletic more than the academic achievements.
Our HS has monthly ceremony for signing athletic letters of intent. But thereās nothing when a kid gets a full tuition merit scholarship though.
Celebrating merit-based awards would be hard because as someone else mentioned, athletics accomplishments are by definition āpublicā (thereās a crowd/audience) where academic accomplishments are private, and most schools are moving in a direction where they are even more private. In the last 5 years, our school district first eliminated class rank release, and now has also eliminated val/sal designation as well, moving to a strictly latin honors approach (cum laude etc).
I think normalizing a public celebration of large or full tuition merit scholarships could be valuable, but it would be difficult. The positive is it would create visibility that these options exist where I think thatās sorely lacking today. But some full tuition merit options at schools are need-aware, which could be awkward to celebrate.
Thereās also a disconnect between people misunderstanding the difference between merit and need-based aid. Iāve seen people post on social media āSo proud that my daughter received a 20K scholarship to XXX college!ā where in actuality you know that college has no merit scholarships at all and what they posted was just their need-based financial aid package. A snarkier person than me might reply, āCongrats, you just posted an approximation of your FAFSA NFC on Facebook!ā
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Have you visited UM and the surrounding area? Iām in the DC area and it seems I hear about lots of crime involving UM students on and around campus. I know, I know, thereās crime everywhere. But make sure you do your due diligence outside of what the school tells you.
THIS.
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