<p>We have not intervened, we have had to provide emergency funds in the bank account, but that only happened a few times. S does rely on Dad for car maintenance advice (his Dad is like Mr. Goodwrench, the man loves engines), and S will always call his Dad to discuss car repairs before he agrees to maintenance work. Dad doesn’t negotiate prices or anything, but will make sense of the repairs and offer guidance. I think Dad and step-Mom paid for an emergency repair once too, but I’m not sure.</p>
<p>Oldfort is spot on. These threads always end the same. I am a believer in each family doing what works for them. In some families that level varies for each child.</p>
<p>I have contacted the bursar’s/cashier’s office & gotten them to allow D to withdraw from auditting Ballet & refunded some several thousand dollar charge for withdrawing late & enrolling in >18 credits! Have also helped D get Rx and share info between her doc in HI & the student health center at college, so she could get testing & have reimbursements under her insurance. It’s not easy to coordinate these things as a student, especially with the time zone differences.</p>
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<p>Most of our kids are still pretty young, so I doubt one could say the above with any kind of certainty. I’d say the jury will be out on that for quite a while.</p>
<p>And MY post was written with regard to “extreme helicoptering,” not someone who makes the occasional overture to help out, and I ALSO mentioned that no matter how old we get, ALL of us will need the help of others to solve a problem.</p>
<p>Thinking about the original question . . . Hmm, when would it step in? I’d have to say that I would step in if I saw dire consequences reaching beyond the end of the semester if I failed to do so. Give you an example – I wasn’t this kid’s parent, I was her teacher. She had a very scary roommate. I had dealt with the roommate on an academic support issue and knew her to be what the student said she was. Student kept hearing from housing that she had to wait until X date or Y happened before she could do anything. I saw the potential for dire consequences for this student, not just a few weeks of living with a bad roommate. I made sure a few people hirer up the food chain heard her complaints. I think I would do the same for my d.</p>
<p>Now, my d did have a bad roommate, but she was just a bad roommate. Let her deal with that on her own. And I have to say I can’t imagine a situation where I’d ever step in to the academic area. </p>
<p>Some of you may not like to hear this, but when I get calls from parents (yes, it’s college, and yes I do it calls), it negatively affects my perception of the student, even if the parent starts with something like, “Billy/Susie would just die if he/she knew I was calling”. I hire a lot of the best students to work in an academic support program that I run. Billy/Susie isn’t going to get the job because I don’t want to hear from mom or dad ever again.</p>
<p>“When did you make an exception and intervene? What did you do, and how did it work out? Would you do it again?”</p>
<p>Winter break her first year (and she had only just turned 17), my d. and I were in South India working in the area where the tsunami hit - about 16,000 people died, 4,300 in just one spot (the local fish market, which we know well). We worked on cleanup - including digging out schools, dispensing emergency food, and cremating bodies. Together we wrote a daily blog which (without our knowledge initially) was translated into Italian and published daily in Italian newspapers. Reporters started appearing our our doorstep, and my d.'s Italian (which she had been studying in school) turned out to be very useful.</p>
<p>When she returned to school, all of a sudden, all her first-year classmates seemed very immature, and she had a difficult time initially readjusting. We talked to one of the deans - a fellow Quaker - and asked her to look in on our d. occasionally (they often saw each other on Sundays.) This led to my d’s applying for a grant from the college to return the next summer - to India to document the work, to Cambodia (where she has an adopted uncle who trains child mental health workers), and to Thailand, where monks were being trained in trauma-related activities.</p>
<p>I took care of things in the Bursar’s office.</p>
<p>I only called the college ONE time and it was my daughter’s school. She had a fabulous music teacher (who I actually “met” on this forum initially). When this teacher wasn’t going to be returning, I wanted to be sure that MY kid had a say in the replacement since my kid was the ONLY student who studied this particular instrument…and the relationship was important. The music department chairperson understood and my daughter was the “lesson student” for each applicant.</p>
<p>Oh, yea, also intervened after D had been hit by campus security when she was riding her bike. She was NOT given the medical or other attention she should have and let to make her own way home to her apartment at around midnight, dazed and bleeding with a broken bike. I was VERY upset at how poorly she had been treated and that they had tried to help cover things up for the campus security guy who hit her bike with his vehicle. Not totally thrilled with the response, but at least I tried.</p>
<p>I stepped in to disentangle some health insurance matters. Part of the problem was that he had ignored some notices, and part of the problem was that when he tried to deal with the entities involved they apparently found it easier to blow off a kid and give him the impression that there was no appeals process, which was false. Adults find it difficult to deal with insurance companies, much less 18 and 19 yr olds.</p>
<p>Other than that, he has mostly dealt with his own affairs. Sometimes he asks for advice. Ironically, he is MORE likely to ask for advice now, when he is actually more competent in dealing with stuff. I guess there is no longer a need to prove it. :)</p>
<p>I’m basically with Old Fort on this. Since I am paying for college, you can bet that I will handle most of the tuition stuff with the Bursar. I’ll have him do basic transactions as needed such as change his dining plan if necessary, but I am on top of any billing.</p>
<p>As for those of you who think your 18-22 year old should negotiate a lease alone, are you nuts? Unless your kid has a law degree or rental experience why do think they are qualified to sign a lease with someone who has the experience and maybe had a lawyer draw up the papers? Sure, you can let them negotiate price and stuff, but I sure hope you are reading and explaining it to your kid, and offering advice and guidance. This goes for anything involving contracts or bills. I don’t expect my kid to handle these things without some input, mainly when he is dealing with things where the other party has the knowledge and he doesn’t.</p>
<p>This would also include any type of trouble on campus. A lot of kids don’t know their rights, so I hope if something happens he calls home. Not saying I’ll take care of everything, but I will hopefully guide him so he doesn’t make any big mistakes. They are still learning, at least mine is. I didn’t declare myself “done” when he graduated HS. I consider living at college to be living on their own, but with training wheels.</p>
<p>Disclaimer, I don’t have one of the ultra high achiever kids, just a normal one :)</p>
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<p>I agree with that. Even adults often need professional help when dealing with contracts or other financial matters. That is why we consult lawyers and accountants.</p>
<p>There’s a big difference between offering advice when it’s asked for and stepping in and handling matters for the kid, especially when the assistance is not asked for.</p>
<p>Sure, I would give my kids advice if they asked for it. If I was aware of a situation where I thought they were on the threshold of a serious mistake, I might even offered unsolicited advice. But the ultimate decision for how to deal with the situation would be the kid’s - and unless it was something that absolutely required my action, I would resist letting the kid delegate things to me.</p>
<p>I stumbled into a gray area this fall: D’s Dept has an administrator who’s a “Mom” to them all. I’d met her several times (visit, re-visit, move-in) and she’d said, “Just call me if you’re worried or confused about anything”). </p>
<p>D had some adjustment troubles, and she’s not one to lean on us. I’m glad she wants to be independent, but there have been times that because she is so inexperienced that she hits a wall and ends up in a deeper hole than if she’d asked for help. I’d asked D if she’d been checking in at all with “Mom,” and D said she didn’t want to bother her with her problems.</p>
<p>I did e-mail “Mom” and asked her what her impression was of D as she saw her around the Dept. She reached out a bit to D, even let some of the profs know that maybe D wasn’t quite as perky as she was appearing. She thanked me for alerting her, and again said to feel free to contact her with any concerns.</p>
<p>Later D was furious about some other stuff, and I checked in with “Mom” again. I was trying to make sure I was getting the right info from D, so I could keep up my more reserved “It’ll be OK” approach with her. This time “Mom” did admonish me a little, suggesting that I let D just do what she needed to do … I felt a little embarrassed, and I’m trying not to contact “Mom” unless there is something very serious. I did have contact regarding our coming to a campus event, and she was friendly and lovely. </p>
<p>Really the best thing is knowing there is a “Mom” who is looking out for D. When she’s at school, I really don’t want it to be me that she’s asking for help with things having to do with her life there. She’s doing fine now, and I don’t see that I’ll even be tempted to contact “Mom” with my worries. The last thing I wanted was to become the annoying parent who interferes, and I think I managed to stop before I did (I definitely never want to be Billy/Susie’s mother, especially if it backfires on my kids!).</p>
<p>We had kind of the opposite experience at D1s school. They required that I send an email to the Dean that she had permission to keep a car on campus as a sophomore. Generally they do not give sophomores parking stickers (mostly a parking shortage issue I believe), but D had a note from her athletic team coach that she needed the car to drive car pool for practices. This is a common exemption of the parking sticker rule. Since she is over 18 and it is her car, registered in her name I was a bit mystified as to why they needed a note from me.</p>
<p>Slightly off topic, but in regards to contacting somebody at school. Don’t think your kid won’t find out you asked about them. I got caught in HS when I asked/told the coach something…I didn’t think he’d mention it to son, but he did and son gave me grief.</p>
<p>Fast forward to college football, the coach said NOT to call him about a problem or question and ask them not to tell the kid we called. He said the kid will always know that you called! Also, if kid has problem they are to tell their position coach, and on and on up the chain of command.</p>
<p>I’d really really love to call Son’s RA at his new school and ask him to help Son get more involved and meet people. Son would KILL ME! Also, I met the RA very briefly at move-in day and he would probably have a different circle of people to introduce him to than he would like, so it wouldn’t work anyway. He has met a few, it’s slow going but he is still happy he transferred. Has a Soc. prof who is hysterically funny and history class is no tests, just a lot of short papers.</p>
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I wish I had thought to intervene when one of my kids signed a lease for an off-campus apartment during her senior year, or at least asked to review it. That was a $1700 mistake, and even though things could have been worse, I can think of way more enjoyable ways to spend $1700.</p>
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<p>A friend of mine has a D who was recruited to play a sport at a D1 university. Prior to arriving for her first conditioning camp for pre-season, my friend received a letter from the coach basically saying “DON’T call me for any reason unless you are notifying me that your child is unconscious and cannot call me themselves. I do NOT have conversations with parents regarding playing time, position, or any other matter relating to the team. They are adults and I expect them to act as such.”</p>
<p>Haven’t had to intervene for S but we do discuss things a lot. He has delt with problems ranging from roomate problem to grade issues to lease issue.
We discuss everything from what classes he should take to how to handle problems. Basically, he tells me what’s going on, I give him my advice and he does what he thinks is right.<br>
He has been involved in rental negotionation on a couple occasions with good results. I’m not sure I would have even done as well as he did. Latest one involved a kinda crazy lady renting a 7 bedroom house 1 block from campus. He convinced her to go to a meeting with campus rental people and they explained to her why she had unreasonable & illegal clauses in the lease she wanted them to sign. Got her to agree to even better terms than they had really wanted in the first place.<br>
Back to the original post, I guess I would intervene if I felt it was something where he was being taken advantage of and for some reason couldn’t handle the issue him self. I don’t really see that happening.</p>
<p>Absolutely - there is a big difference between helping a kid who asks and going behind their back. I felt very weird about what I did, waited quite a few weeks before deciding to do it, something H and I discussed at length. “Mom” had clearly said to us, “I am here for you, for your concerns, please let me know if anything comes up.” And when I e-mailed her she understood I was just looking for a little reassurance. I never asked for anything, just to get her impression of my kid, and of the situation. My D will admit she didn’t handle the first couple of months of school with as much maturity as she’d liked. She might have been hurt to know that I was snooping a bit, but I also think she knew we were upset from what we were hearing from her. Sometimes with real reason parents do these things. It’s not my style at all, but this particular D requires it at times. Really what that contact did was help all of us move on, and it surreptitiously gave D the jolt she needed to move forward. In hindsight I can say I never “had” to check in with “Mom,” but if things had been at all different it could have made the difference between a real crash and things getting better. I’m OK if it made me look a little foolish - we’ll get over it.</p>
<p>When it affects my wallet, I stepped in. We got hit with some outrageous cleaning fee fo a stain in a very old, nasty disgusting indoor/outdoor dorm carpet his freshman year. He did some of the preliminary conversing with the appropriate department, but I negotiated the charge down to 40 cents on teh dollar. I was a ripoff and the principal of the thing.</p>