Bingo.
^^maybe so for many . . . in my sons’ circles I have seen some teens still pretty connected to their families and wanting to stay that way, which I think is fine. And if they want to branch out that’s fine too.
The Preview comment resonated with me because I couldn’t wait to leave home for college, and wanted to stay every summer LOL (though I didn’t). It seems different today for some reason. It seemed like Preview staff from UF were alluding to that idea too.
Colleges asks student to reflect, problem solve, and work at the edges of knowledge. It demands growth. Obviously there are many stressors on contemporary college students, but I suspect that social media (time waste, lack of real human interaction, simple messages) is a big one. The ease of the internet belies the complexity of what they need to do.
I am teaching a novel that I have taught on and off for at least 25 years. Students like it, and so I have liked teaching it. Most of the current class, however, are not doing a good job of it. Now it might be the particular class, it might be that a few are trying to read it online (too complex for that), but I suspect that it is that their diminished ability to struggle with the written word. They can read and write if it is not too hard, but they believe that it shouldn’t be hard. That is a problem in college.
Computers and cell phones have been such a time-saving boon for students in some ways, but in others they are the instruments of slavery. When D’s foreign language teacher came to our NE high school from a more laid-back part of the country, he commented that here the school uses the media to beat kids up. What he meant was, there is never an acceptable excuse for dropping the ball. You didn’t get the Spanish homework because you were out sick? Sorry, you should have texted a friend who could have taken a pic of the worksheet and sent it to you so you could have done it between trips to the toilet to vomit. Also, teachers now don’t always announce the homework in class. They will post it on google later, they say. The only problem is they don’t tell you by when. So the student checks at 6 PM after sports practice and there’s nothing up. He goes in to school the next day and lo and behold he doesn’t have his homework. Automatic 0 grade. Turns out the teacher posted it on googledocs at 9PM. I kid you not, that has happened to friends’ kids. So there’s never a down time or hour after which the kids can unplug. Heck, the school now regularly uses the phone remind system to text kids notices after hours. “NHS meeting tomorrow at 6:45AM in the cafeteria!” Teachers might even use the remind system to say things like “Bring a toga for Latin class today.” My own D has gotten notices just like that at 6:45 AM–ten minutes before her bus comes! I think it’s a really stressful environment.
@mamalion - interesting insight. Even I, who have always been a reader, seem to struggle with longer, more complex novels now. I just don’t read them as often. I can’t imagine having grown up with the internet. 
@TheGFG - I agree with you on the many methods of communication and the problems you see sometimes. My son had a professor through dual enrollment who used the school’s online platform, LinkedIn, school email, etc., to administer the class. My son (not a reader) would get frustrated with this, though he coped.
@SouthFloridaMom9: I agree that teens wanting to keep strongly connected to family members is a positive thing. But it sounds like the UF speaker was talking about attachment at a level that can be quite unhealthy.
“Cradles that rock themselves, crib mattresses that vibrate.” With LIMITED human interaction. All those baby swings and such were banned from my house when I was raising my kids. They soothe your child into passivity.
@cameo43, I can’t speak for UF (obviously) but my take-away was “hey parents, this transition can be hard for some students so be prepared”. UF has a great program called U Matter We Care and I think they were trying to help parents (this was a parents/guardians-only session) discern when a call or email to UF was in order, and when problems are more adjustment-related. And this is the first generation to be so connected by technology. To me, as a parent, it was comforting especially at a very large university where it’s easy to be a number. Ultimately it seemed they were trying to give context to this generation as opposed to when many of us went away to college.
I thought UF did a great job with all that. They encourage you to let your kid grow, and not panic at every text-of-doom, but then they also have resources for stuff that may stop a student in their tracks. And then they helped us parents that yes, you are going to hear from your students more than your parents probably heard from you, thanks to technology. And it’s all OK.
This thread makes me think, again, of the book The Fourth Turning (which I first learned of on CC). The book is criticized to an extent but I do think it’s interesting in the broad sense that human behavior runs in cycles.
Maybe our kids’ kids will be the full-on free-rangers. 