This just in: parents take helicoptering over the top. To wit, this post on the NYTimes Motherlode blog that links to a CNN story on moms who quit their jobs to help their kids get into college.
No joke. According to the piece, these are highly educated, professional women who take a “college prep leave” or quit entirely in order to micromanage their kids through the grueling college application process — along with all the resume-building that accompanies it:
There are no statistics counting how many mothers compromise their careers to help their teens with college admissions, but college counselors say they’ve witnessed more cases of mothers pausing their jobs or completely quitting their jobs. Over the past five years, Jeannie Borin, president of College Connections, says she saw a 10 percent uptick in mothers who quit or postponed their career to get their teens into college. Her counseling company offers services in 32 states.
These mothers, who can afford to quit their jobs, may stop working for months, a year or several years leading up to the admission process, say researchers and college admissions counselors. They reduce their full-time hours to part time or request a temporary leave. Because many of them have jobs that require advanced degrees and specific skills, it’s usually easier for them to transition back into the work force.
“They know it’s going to be an intense year and they take a leave to that effect,” Borin said. “The college frenzy has affected the entire family.”
I vote yuck for a number of reasons, not the least of which is the divide this creates between upper middle class kids and, well, all the rest. But that’s another story. The piece goes on:
Managing a child’s college application process can be similar to a corporate job, says Hilary Levey, a fellow at Harvard University who specializes in family studies. Levey conducted dozens of interviews with mothers who stopped working and stayed at home for their children. She says she talked to mothers who used their Blackberry devices to organize schedules and help their teens craft resumes.
“Raising the child sometimes becomes a career in itself,” Levey said. “Instead of getting a promotion and measuring progress in professional sense, a way to measure how well you are doing is how well your child is doing.”
This kind of takes the idea of parenting-as-competitive sport to all new levels of ugly. In a post a while back, we mentioned a time-use study that found that highly educated parents were spending much more time with their kids these days — which was the good news — but that the reason for the additional time spent went a little toward the dark side: prepping their kids early for limited slots at prestigious universities. In other words, rivalry. We’ve also written about the treadmill that starts early for so many kids, when their lives are pretty much dictated by the need to build a college resume. Put the two together and you wonder if these kids will ever get out from under the weight of great expectations — or be able to make a decision for themselves.
A while back I interviewed a teacher and counselor who had worked at the same private girls high school for the past two decades. She told me that the rate of parental involvement had lately escalated to the point where the school had to issue a written “communication protocol” spelling out the steps the students should take in handling their own problems before parents were allowed to intervene. “For the longest time, parents would call the school – my daughter didn’t make the team, didn’t make it into the play – and she’s always been the best at this,” she said. “And we’d say, well, you know what, your daughter needs to go talk to the director of the play, the coach, the teacher. And the parents were appalled. What do you mean? You’re not going to talk to me about it?”
One of the comments to the Motherlode post offered a similar take on the rising role of helicopter parents:
I work at a university, and the number of parents that have called my office asking about registering their kids for classes, picking up forms or papers for their kids, or any other item or request that should be fielded by the actual student makes me a little nervous for the next generation. Parents should know that there are consequences to this kind of micromanagement, namely, a kid who can’t handle the real world by themselves.
And a kid who is never allowed to fail. And yet, because she’s never been able to climb down from the treadmill, may never feel that she’s succeeded, either. And it’s worse for girls, experts say, because they’re hard-wired to please. They’ll stick with the program, no matter how crazy, so they won’t let anyone down.
And then, of course, comes the real world. No benchmarks of worth, such as grades or fat college admission packets. But the chase all the same. Grass is greener, anyone?
Barbara Kelley
Shannon Kelley
As a parent of a recently admitted college student I have to say that our national college admission process is a high stakes pressurized process that has gotten way out of hand.
We were lucky. My kid was motivated to pursue a college prep path completely on her own, and she is going to a great school this fall, but honestly, it was by no means easy for any of us. She did her own work, she filled out her own applications, wrote her own essays, but we were witness to her countless all nighters, emotional turmoil, stress and regular bouts of illness.
We have a results oriented system where outstanding GPAs, SATs, ACTs, Extra Curricular Activities, Volunteerism, have become the basic prerequisites for acceptance to a good college.
Tell me if it seems fair to you that kids are expected to achieve all of this and maintain their health and sanity on 4 to 6 hours of sleep per night just to get their school work done?
Who is crazy here? The parents who want to be there for their kids, and I don’t mean do the work for their kids, OR the colleges that set the bar so high that if you want to go to a good school be prepared for four years of crazy break neck schedules and so much pressure your kid will be one of the lucky ones if they don’t need therapy, medication or both just to get them through.
Please don’t blame the parents who want to be there for their kids. Let’s start at leveling some responsibility at the system that says if you want in at a great school here are the hoops, NOW JUMP and JUMP OFTEN!
This is an ongoing problem in all fields. As an attorney I see way too many parents trying to get too involved in the criminal process for their charged “children”. Never mind that the children are well into adulthood. It is important for parents to be involved in their children’s lives, but the ONLY good involvement involves the children taking charge of their own actions.
This is particularly distrtessing since the helicopter dance is only prevalent in the lives of affluent parents, leaving poorer kids without this asset.
My desire for my children was that they become responsible and well functioning adults. THEY become responsible. This does not and should not mean that they don’t become responsible because they have a parent who will run interference for them. What does this teach the child about the rest of their life? Will their helicopter parent give up his/her senior life or nursing home in order to keep their child from suffering the consequences of their own actions?
If success truly requires this kind of action? How do we then account for the situation of the child who is thus given these advantages, and still fails? Instead of being given the strength to face his or her own problems, they are being deprived of the rewards of governing their own lives, and of choosing their own education, career, etc.
Yippee, your children got into an Ivy League school although what they really wanted was training in the arts. Our kids have their own lives to live. Help where needed, but for God’s sake, let it be their lives!!
Super great article. Truely!