was a little shocked by some responses
Glad it's not just me that found the entitled and demanding attitude of some parents problematic.
I've never liked to be one of those "it was harder in my day" or "students are now wimps" academics. But I do think it's getting harder and harder to work with first years because they are generally less well-prepared for university. Not that they are not clever enough - my students are really bright, energetic, and ambitious.
But ...
They have been in a secondary education system where it's become the teacher's fault or problem if her/his class don't get a required set of results. They can do course work over & over until they get the required C or above. They are spoonfed answers to exams - teachers now teach to the exams from early years SATS onwards.
And it's because teachers have the league table/OFSTED pressure. Of course, if teachers are told that X outcome is needed, teachers do what is needed to get the best X result they can!
I think too that students aren't used to the synthesising thinking that certainly my first year module requires - I ask them to think over a big arc of time & ideas, and to make connections. A level syllabi tend to cut it all into bitesize examinable chunks.
And the digital resources available now sometimes offer a false sense of comprehensiveness. They can sometimes think that surfing the internet is 'research.' That randomly putting words into Google will produce an adequate bibliography, or even doing the same with JSTOR (better, in my field, but still not good research method).
So if they indicate dissatisfaction, it's probably less to do with what you're offering them, and more to do with their own unease and frustration with first year.
Learning well is difficult. Unfortunately, they've had 13 years where that has been smoothed over for them, and the benefits of what comes with difficulty have not been modelled for them. They lack resilience, partly because the K-13 education system cannot accommodate failure from risk-taking.