<p>Our move-in was fairly drama free. I think, in part, it was because it was both H’s and my alma mater and we were leaving S in familiar surroundings. We brought all his stuff in and H took himself off to the student center for coffee while we unpacked. I made up the bed while S put his clothes away and put his posters up. H came back as we were finishing. We all kind of stood there for a minute, then S said “I don’t think there’s anything left for you guys to do.” We hugged goodbye and I got a little choked up, and we left. As we were waiting for the elevator, I looked down the hall and S was out there with his droid phone taking photos of the door with and roommate’s name on school pennant signs. There was a family picnic that evening, but S said “That’s not for people who only live 45 minutes away like you,” and we had to pick S2 up at football practice!</p>
<p>
My Ss share a finished attic bedroom/mancave. S2 had talked about moving some furniture around and bringing a desk up there. In one of his calls home, S1 asked if his bed was still up! I was like “Of couse! You’re at college, not banished to Foodcourtia!” As an Invader Zim fan, he liked that.</p>
<p>My Ds college has a parent orientation - move into dorms in the morning, welcome by the president, a wine/app social and dinner on the lawn. The next morning is an opportunity to have breakfast with the launching child and the college photo opp as they ‘sign in’ to the school. The kids are welcomed into their orientation pods the first evening and then they’re pretty much gone. IIRC we kind of saw her in the morning (she ate with her pod) and we took photos as she signed in. Then we hugged and she went off to finish orientation and we headed out for home. </p>
<p>Some parents were really carrying on, but the kids were gone, so there wasn’t a whole lot they could do. Things cleared out pretty quickly. It was nice to see the campus, see who her initial friends were, but we knew it was the start of her time and we were better off making it quick. </p>
<p>This year, she is working orientation and had to be at school a week prior. We did a dump and dash last Friday and were home that evening. Much easier.</p>
<p>Any college you are seriously planning to attend, you and your parents should visit BEFORE you accept an offer to go there. If the first time you see it is when you and your parents show up to move in all kinds of things can go wrong. If the college is ‘too far’ from your home to visit ahead of time, think about what you will do during Holiday’s and in the summer between academic years. Will you own a car and drive back and forth, can you afford to fly, is that practical, etc.? I think a lot of these things should be discussed as a family long before the day you move in. Then there is less of the ‘I thought we would do this…’ since you never had those honest discussions ahead of time.</p>
<p>Update:</p>
<p>Here is the link to the Times’s Letters to the Editor from today (Aug. 29) about this article that I posted last week:</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/29/opinion/l29college.html?_r=1&ref=letters[/url]”>http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/29/opinion/l29college.html?_r=1&ref=letters</a></p>
<p>Interesting…</p>
<p>We never went to any of the drop-off parent events cause it’s not not something we’re interested in so our drop-offs were literally a drop cart and haul, run to the store, return, say good-bye. I would think a nice parent only meet and greet is about all that is needed for parents that are interested, maybe a campus tour for those that haven’t seen the campus and are too far away to visit on parents weekend. It seems odd to me that college/unis have to “tell” parents when to leave the campus. With both of ours they were very anxious for us to depart so they could get on with their experience and we were happy to comply and happy for them. We scheduled vacation for he drop-offs and enjoyed leaving the campus and starting our vacation.</p>
<p>Well, I thought the two to three day orientation period for parents at my daughter’s college was a good idea. Many parents are paying a small fortune, and travel hundreds of miles to get to a school and drop off children they will not see until winter break. It is nice to know the people who will be responsible for your child’s security on campus and surrounding urban area, and the people who will care for your child should they become ill. Also good to be aware of people in charge of helping your child develop a resume and hook up to internships, grad school, and jobs, especially if they do not choose to follow well-trodden paths to medical school or law school. (And good for parents of those students to meet with pre-med and pre-law advisers.)</p>
<p>I liked meeting with my child’s freshman adviser and professors in several departments she found interesting, and getting to know the RA’s and others involved in housing. Not to mention the learning center where she would be going for help with academics. We took advantage of tours of various campus facilities (including the main library) and went to a fair that showcased various groups involved with campus life. There were information sessions for parents that addressed many questions that most parents would have wrt college life. We even exchanged contact information with other parents.</p>
<p>I do not think that our presence on campus for these few days made our child less independent during the following year, but it did make us less worried and less likely to harass her with nagging phone calls asking questions that had already been answered during orientation. And, we felt confident of knowing who to contact were we to have concerns, and the types of information we might expect.</p>
<p>Sure, my parents just dropped me off at college and left right after move in, but I do not think that this was a better experience than today’s students generally get or even one that encouraged more independence. I might have gotten much more out of my own college experience had my parents had the opportunities to become informed that are given to today’s parents at many schools.</p>
<p>I like the shorter orientation structure that allows parents (and students) to pick and choose which information sessions to attend.</p>
<p>As I mentioned before, some schools over-do the ceremonies. Others find the right balance.</p>
<p>I was much more at ease understanding the housing, transportation, meals, book buying, registration, business office after going through some of these sessions. I was confident he would be okay, but it was nice to know some of the basics. It was also nice for the younger kids who would be following in his footsteps in short order. </p>
<p>When my son got a pretty vicious stomach flu second semester, I was also glad that the Parents Handbook was available to let him know the closest clinic without me trying to google it. </p>
<p>Let’s face it - some of our kids, no matter how independent, still are learning some big time lessons. It’s not always easy to figure out for fully mature adults! </p>
<p>For the prices colleges charge to educate our kids, some sort of orientation for parents should be provided, which can be tailored to the individual needs of the student. There are kids who have learning issues or physical mobility issues, or special programs they will be involved in that would be beneficial to educate not just the student, but the parents, as well.</p>
<p>What it the ‘right’ level of parent orientation involvement will vary based on the school and the preferences of the parents/new student. I doubt there will ever be a one-size-fits-all formula. For those traveling from a longer distance, it would be helpful if the college indicated which of the orientation programs are ‘recommended’ vs ‘optional’. This would also make clearer how much time the parents are expected to be in attendance, allow for appropriate travel planning and avoid the apparent awkwardness mentioned earlier about college orientation programs which had tacky sounding ways of telling the parents to leave.</p>
<p>I’ve got to say, frazzled2thecore’s constant reference to “child” makes me roll my eyes.</p>
<p>No need to roll your eyes, RS. Your comment comes up from time to time on this forum, and one of us p
atiently explains, as I will do now, that when we parents use the word “child” in the context of a Parents Forum about our high school and college age kids, we do not intend to be condescending. But these offspring ARE our children, and that is a valid way of referring to them at this age. We are not implying childishness on their parts, simply that they are our teenage or 20-something year old children. No disrespect intended.</p>
<p>RSBuletz:
While I understand your point, I look at it similar to the way momofsongbird does.</p>
<p>Our two children are in their 20s, and my wife and I will sometimes use the word child (our older child’s college, or we have one child <here> and the other child goes <there>). We never mean it to imply childishness. </there></here></p>
<p>I never gave it a thought to how the use of “child” might be received. Maybe you do have a point.</p>
<p>Ours are both almost 2000 miles away but with e-mail, cell phones, and the internet we’ve helped our oldest navigate all kinds of things including an operation he needed. It’s a small college so getting ahold of people in administration when necessary is pretty simple. I’m doubtful 3 days on campus would have “added” to our ability to parent long distance, but that’s us and maybe we’re just resourceful? Perhaps, also if they were at a gigantic university I might want some extra time to visit…haven’t crossed that bridge yet. The neat thing about taking your kids far away is you can tack on some vacation and meander your way back home if you drive. After freshman drop-off they can fly back and forth.</p>
<p>RS I have to say I stopped using “child” as a reference for my kids when they hit their teens. We’d say “our teens” or “our kids” or “the boys” now we say “our college kids” but child…not really anymore. I thought child referred to kids between birth and puberty and once they are over 6 ft and over 200 pounds and holding drivers’ licenses hard to call them children…perhaps it’s a state of mind.</p>
<p>Well, I have used kids to define the progeny of my womb, too, but I don’t think of it as a demeaning term. </p>
<p>If you fill out a tax return, it asks for dependent children, too…who just might be in college.</p>
<p>They are my kids and children, know matter how old they are. I usually reference their approximate age when I discuss, but I don’t think if someone said it, I would feel the need to roll my eyes over it. ;)</p>
<p>Not being a goat, I’ve never particularly liked the term, “kid,” and I don’t use it to describe my daughter (as in “my kid.”</p>
<p>That said, my 80-something father recently told me about “the kid” who came to repair their refrigerator and did such a great job. Turns out “the kid” was in his mid-fifties.</p>
<p>It all depends on your perspective.</p>
<p>I’m still my 84 year old father’s child, and have been for over 50 years (this happened to come up last week). The word has two basic meanings- an age/stage and a relationship. My father talks about “girls” but not “boys” when talking about adults- I sometimes yank his chain when he begins a sentence with using the term girl for an adult (making him clarify- questioning that a minor is allowed to do what he states…)- the cumulative little things add up in the role of women.</p>
<p>I like the use of slang/informal language- “kid” likewise has more than one meaning in our society. Language evolves with the usage of the population, thank goodness we are not stuck in the formal structure of past eras.</p>
<p>I would have thought it would be de-rigueur, on a site dedicated to the ‘college experience’, to use the term ‘student(s)’?</p>
<p>I mean, there is already a rather esoteric collection of abbreviations in play, what with all this D, D1, S, S2, H, W, DW, DH, palaver … does this not suffice without the need to resort to the vernacular of; child, children, bairns, brats, kids, offspring, litter, progeny, or whippersnappers?</p>
<p>Of course if we are waiving the approved CC abbreviations then I will revert to using the terms we commonly use at home…</p>
<p>D is the ‘bounty of our union’
S is the ‘seed of my loins’</p>
<p>Don’t you think that ‘child’ is just so last year…?</p>
<p>…& to ‘momofsongbird’…</p>
<p>I’m finding it a little difficult to place you…</p>
<p>What with that seemingly offhand response to RS;
—“Your comment comes up from time to time on this forum, and one of us patiently<br>
explains, as I will do now,…”</p>
<p>You manage just the merest hint of authoritative condescension in an otherwise simple but patronising post.</p>
<p>So I originally took you for a provincial schoolmarm, perhaps even a headmistress…</p>
<p>That was until you weighed in with the Pluralis Majestatis!</p>
<p>“…we parents use the word”
“…we do not intend”
“…we are not implying” </p>
<p>Then I understood…
You are of course a minor member of the British Royal Family.</p>
<p>“No disrespect intended”…?
Au contraire!..We are not amused.</p>
<p>;-)</p>
<p>
This might work fine in general and abstract uses, but not when you’re referring to the particular student who is the spawn of your loins. If I say “my child” when talking about a college student, the word doesn’t describe the referent’s state of maturity, but his/her relationship to me; most fluent English speakers will have no trouble understanding this in context. If I say “my student,” people will probably think that I am a teacher and he is in my class.</p>
<p>The sensitivity on this issue reminds me of one of my favorite C.S. Lewis quotes: “when I became a man I put away childish things, including the fear of childishness and the desire to be very grown up.”</p>
<p>Well nightchef</p>
<p>Why all the abbreviations on the site? D2 S1 etc
There is even a post which introduces the neophyte to this wonderful abbreviated CC world
Lets just call 'em all kids or children and be done with it and forget all the waffle.</p>