<p>I don’t agree with this general attitude:</p>
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<p>An e-mail or complaint from the student is not likely to be taken as seriously as one from a parent.</p>
<p>Analogously, if I have a problem where my own intervention is unlikely to be successful, I get others to help me (such as a lawyer). As adults we take advantage of any help we can get, why should freshmen college students be expected to be so self-sufficient?</p>
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<p>That’s a really good question. I used to think that once they were 18 and off to college, my job was essentially done. Not true. My duties and obligations have changed, but I still have the job. Although mature and poised, my D still needs me as her Mom. I don’t think there is anything wrong with advocating for your child, your spouse, your friends, your own mother! Before I get any more lectures (and I really appreciate the advice but the scolding I can do without), I know the difference between meddling “helicoptering” and letting them make their own mistakes. I raised this question because it seemed wrong and possibly unethical for a college to make promises it doesn’t keep. That this happens elsewhere doesn’t necessarily make it OK, although it does give some perspective.</p>
<p>Prospective students should be aware that the flip side to small classes is that they might not be able to get into one. Somehow, neither D or I thought about that til now.</p>
<p>This thread has turned into a rationalization of both enabling and helicoptering. The fact that a parent might be more successful at gaining the attention of a university administrator than the student/child doesn’t mean that this is the best approach, either for the student/child or for addressing the problem at hand. It may sometimes work, it may not, but in either case I think it’s seldom the best approach and shouldn’t be an automatic one.</p>
<p>I appreciated it when my daughter’s college told parents and students in no uncertain terms that on any matter dealing with academics it was the student’s responsibility to bring problems or complaints to the administration, not the parents. Obviously, there are exceptional circumstances including health/medical emergencies, perhaps financial ones, among others, in which parental intervention is critical, but in most cases an overescalation of an academic issue is not going to accomplish anything except perhaps to increase the sense of psychological satisfaction (“that I am still needed”) of the helicoptering and enabling parent.</p>
<p>As is evident, I feel very strongly about this. I think that part of the reason that people see this as “helicoptering and enabling” is that we are talking about several distinct scenarios as if they were a single situation. QMP has been closed out of several small seminars in the first two years, figured “those are the breaks,” and moved on to create the best possible schedule of classes that were available. I saw no need to do anything. If just a few students are closed out of a course, then there may be a large enough number of students who drop to make it possible to accommodate a mature, determined student. If the close-outs do not impact the time to degree, and there are approximately equivalent alternatives available, then no harm, no foul.</p>
<p>But–there is a budget problem affecting our university this year that falls outside all of these categories. We will have to close approximately 150 students out of each of 5 introductory-level courses, if nothing changes. This will definitely affect time to graduation, in our major, because the courses are sequential. Our entire department consists of mature, determined Ph.D.-holders. However, we haven’t been able to secure the missing funds yet, and so we don’t have the course openings. If parents do not complain, the administration will conclude that there is no real problem.</p>
<p>Also, I am talking about a public university, which parents support through their taxes.</p>
<p>Back in the dark ages (late 60s early 70s) if was not unusual to see dozens, (possibly hundreds) of kids camping out in front of the registration office the day before you could register in order to insure getting into a class. We all managed and somehow found classes without having to resort to parent intervention. My senior year we had 1200 kids who HAD to take the two series biochem classes in order to graduate in their major (you didn’t even try to get into the class unless you were a senior). The largest lecture hall held 450. The instructor found an alternate time and offered to teach a second section to accommodate students. Some did drop out but most of us were able to graduate on time. Not getting into a class is nothing new. Given a chance, kids can usually work things out.</p>
<p>“If parents do not complain, the administration will conclude that there is no real problem.”</p>
<p>I don’t believe this is true. I teach at a very large state university, too. Like virtually every other such institution we have a huge squeeze on resources. At every level of the university there is awareness of the type of issue you refer to. We don’t need parental complaints. A large contingent of student complaints, or of chairs and directors referring to the enrollment implications of staff or graduate student funding cuts, will do the trick at the institutional level. Faculty are not a highly compliant or complacent lot. So we gripe too.</p>
<p>But the fact is that in the short run at least there is a huge shortfall of state funding (recisions/reductions of general funding), there are constraints on what we can do to raise tuition and fees, and so forth. </p>
<p>The real structural adjustments, however, are going to take two to three years to fully implement. At large schools and small (I attended a small LAC, so I watch those schools too) a big issue is the share of total budget that constitutes administrative overhead – as opposed to paying instructors’ salaries. Not only have colleges devoted increasing resources to providing for “comforts” and “choices” and “advice/protection” of the students – beyond what is essential to good learning – but federally and state mandated administrative services consume an inordinate share of the institutional budget: offices on intellectual integrity, human subjects research oversight, ADA compliance, occupational safety and hazardous materials, etc. They cost a whole lot of money! And so does the great increase in expectations for “technology” support – network and email, classroom technology, and so forth (not to mention internet security).</p>
<p>Structural adjustment requires getting back to basics in some respects. But it’s not easy. Faculty aren’t going to be happy with zero raises or reductions in fringe benefits. Nor are short-term fixes to shortages of sections (hiring more adjuncts, hiring more TA’s) in the best interests of the students. As chair I always resisted temporary appointments because they came too cheaply and led to more faculty/instructors who had only their own very short-term interests in mind – they would not be there when students really needed career advice, letters of recommendation, etc. They couldn’t do the needed work on curriculum and program development. Colleges need “real” faculty whose activities span the range of roles in teaching, research, advising and program/curriculum development.</p>
<p>Yes, sometimes opening up a couple more discussion or lab sections is possible. In the short term, space requirements sometimes militate against that. (And sometimes the “taste” of students and professors not to have classes on Fridays in effect leads to wasted or unused capacity, as well as apparent problems in schduling additional sections.)</p>
<p>But college and university funding – both private and public – requires a structural adjustment to fit (potential) revenues to costs and capacity, plus an adjustment of expectations. And this is going to take a while.</p>
<p>I’m on the side of not calling. It was a pleasure to see my son handle his freshman year challenges last year. If he needs advice from us, he asks for it. There’s where we as parents have an opportunity, because 19-year-olds sometimes really don’t know what their options are. I see that as our role: consultant. At this moment the air conditioning is not working in his room in a newly renovated dorm. It’s miserable. He and his roommate seem to be on top of it. Sure, we’re the ones paying X thousand dollars a year for the room, but our son is an excellent irate consumer when he needs to be. My H and I suggested a couple of options they could pursue if they don’t get satisfaction soon, but they’ll take action, not us. He’d be doing the same if he couldn’t get into a class (surprisingly not a huge problem for him so far at his huge school).</p>
<p>I was thrilled to move into the consultant role toward the end of high school. I felt that I’d done my go-to-bat-for-my-child role very well, and he could take it from there.</p>
<p>mackinaw, you are right about a great many things, including the structural issues. In the past fifteen years, our faculty count has remained level, while the count of administrative-professionals has doubled, so that it is now virtually equal to the full-time faculty count. However, I have known our university president since I was an assistant professor and the president was a first-rung administrator. The statements I made about what is needed do hold at my institution. You may be more fortunate.</p>
<p>I should add that the administrative-professional count within our department has dropped–it has just grown in the administrative units.</p>
<p>@QM: that’s true of us, too. We’re shedding non-faculty “staff” in the department. It’s all those central services that add mainly the the admin burden. Of course we’re all being killed by the soaring costs of health care in our fringe benefits – despite low or even negative inflation in the rest of the economy.</p>
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<p>Yup. S1 found that at his LAC. It made for some stressful times and sub-optimal course choices and less than stellar grades.</p>