to be shocked by parents of some university students

[giraffesCantZumba]

My friend works in the graduation office, this time of year is really busy for her so been working weekends/long hours etc. She was venting to me about this and says she gets 3/4 parents a day phoning trying to sort out their childs graduation for them! ANd become totally outraged when told that it is confidential and they can only deal with the student. When do the apron strings get cut?!

Often its because student has totally missed the deadline for paying graduation fees and they are outraged as their poor dc had no idea.

I went into halls in 1st year - meals cooked and room cleaned. I actually found I had less responsibility in some ways than I had had living at home. I know it was easier for me living in halls, but I think I was pretty capable of looking after myself at 18. But some of the students did find the transition more difficult.

TBH I think most 18 year olds are capable of looking after themselves at 18. But they won't be capable if they haven't been gradually given independence at home. I didn't go from being a child at home - I went from being a young adult at home.

My parents did their best to prepare me - I'd had Saturday jobs and I knew how to cook etc. Couldn't live in halls first year because there were not enough places, so lived in B&B. Money was very tight, even with my job.

My mum had not long had twins when I left, so I really didn't want to go. I missed the kids and wanted to stay home. That might have been the problem with my emotional state really.

I wish i had gone as an older student-I would have truly appreciated it then.

the op says sorting out their graduation, so presumably they have already been there three years! what exactly is there to sort out for graduation?

it's quite laughable that graduates expect their parents to call up at this stage of their degree, quite bananaas

Slightly changing the subject, but someone way upthread (who presumably works in a university) said that universities needed the £9,000 a year as that's how much a degree costs.

I'm genuinely willing to learn here, but how does, say, an English degree, with maybe 4-8 contact hours a week, cost £9,000 a year?

I can understand how the money might be used to pay for research and so on, but surely the teaching/resources themselves cannot possibly cost that much?

But would you have worked harder? I think I'd be motivated to spend some more time in the library if my parents were forking out for my fees and knew what my grades were.

SlackSally Re costs. The University is a large place to run and extends past the department office ie Library, IT, SU, Upkeep of grounds/buildings etc.

I work in a Uni Library and am also experiencing what the OP's friend is right now. Having finished clearance for our students, many of them are now receiving Invoices for unreturned books. We send copies to the home address as it's the agreed postal address for correspondence with the students as it's less likely to change than a local one. The amount of parents who take it upon themselves to open the mail addressed to their child is quite high. Often the child has finished uni and promptly gone "away" leaving mum & dad to sort out any problems. Parents will often pay the invoice rather than speaking to their child as to why they have accrued this debt.Throw money at it and it'll go away mentality maybe?

I do my sons Student Finance application, I rang the Uni when he started, what's the problem? Irrespective of their age they are still your kids.

Oh my god what a lot of replies.

Yes graduations only so already done at least 3 years of Uni. Most of the time its "Poor DS didn't realise he had to fill in a form/pay for graduation, he has worked so hard you know, can you not just let him in?" When actually they all have the info/posters up etc and they just haven't taken responsibility. And friend has no power at all, if its not in by that date they can't graduate until the 1/2 year graduation ones.

This is Scotland so different fee system too.

nine grand is, I think, slightly more than it costs to deliver many arts subjects (less lecture time/more individual study time) but a lot less than it costs to deliver a lot of science and medical subjects (lab time, all day attendance at classes etc)
maybe in future there will be a range of fees for different degrees

op, yanbu and I can't believe the number of posters who seem to think it is ok to step in to organise a 21 or 22 year old's life. quite likely they didn't want to go to the graduation ceremony at all and were keeping quiet about it.

I was mortified that my mother insisted on accompanying me to the town of one interview (this was back in '86) saying that it was too far to go on my own. A few years later I realised that that was just an excuse and it was a very rare opportunity for her to have a day out at the shops in a town she liked to visit but hadn't been able to go to for about twenty years. :)

My other interview my dad gave me a lift, waved me off and we met back at the car at a pre-arranged time.

Fabbychic yes they are 'still our kids' . We don't love them any less by not cosseting them - what we do by NOT sorting out their student loan etc is enable them to do it by themselves

i call that good parenting

I also find the open day thing odd
The teens are venturing out into the world
It's their life - their independence, their choice.
I am sure a lot of parents go - I am not sure 'why?'

i am worried about the way our higher education is going not only for reasons of access but because they are encouraging a customer/provider relationship but the way that things are set up now it's not entirely clear that the student (rather than parent) is the customer.

the way our system is going is infantilising 18-21 yr olds and encouraging a much lower level of independence in young adults.

fluffles - I had an interesting conversation on another thread the other day where I suggested that teachers should see themselves as providing a service to parents and I was roundly knocked down. Teachers telling me en masse that I was not their customer or their boss. It was suggested I had that only had that view as I paid for private education for my currently Primary age children and that I was still wrong to see it that way even though I already pay roughly the same as current univesity fees to school my children.

I suspect the view that parents are not customers of universities also comes from the same thinking among educationalists, lecturers, and Vice Chancellors. I suggest that universities need to GET REAL the piper calls the tune. Parents are paying, they require results. Get used to it.

"i am worried about the way our higher education is going not only for reasons of access but because they are encouraging a customer/provider relationship but the way that things are set up now it's not entirely clear that the student (rather than parent) is the customer. "

The person who pays is ultimately the customer. Things are going to start changing big time I suspect, now the price has rocketed.

Really interesting, this thread.
I started uni in 1997, and family came along to each of the open days I went to. At 2 of them, specific events were arranged for parents so it was clearly common enough to have parents along by then that it was worth the universitys' while to do this. I've seen a couple of posts where people who went around the same time went by themselves and see that as the norm 'back then' (them good old days!) - maybe you weren't aware of the parent's activities as you didn't need them? But I would think that having specific talks and activities set up for parents shows different?

My family didn't help me choose. They let me bounce ideas off them. They knew what I was talking about because they'd seen it too, but they didn't push any choices on to me, or even really nudge me in any specific direction. I didn't go with friends because none of my friends went to any of the same open days. It was a big decision and I wanted someone to talk it through with, is all. I wouldn't do a house viewing without taking someone along to bounce ideas off either and to my way of thinking, choosing your university education is not much different in terms of scale of importance. It's not about being babied, but about the way that I take in, process and consider information, I'm better off if someone is around for me to say it all out loud to. Nowadays it's my DH but I as I hadn't met him at 18, never mind married him, that wasn't an option back then!

The other thing that seems to be being assumed is that if a parent trundles along to an Open day, they will automatically interefere in every other aspect of the child's uni life. Not true, in my experience. Most of my housemates at college had folks who took them to open days, and not one of those parents ever cosseted us once we were there - even when we found out our gas cooker was spewing out carbon monoxide, the parental reaction was 'so what have you done about it?' in a way that clearly suggested that the action was for us to take.

So taking your DC to an open day, to my mind, does not indicate whether your DC will be an able confident adult or not. However, I do agree that there are certain parents who do over-protect kids - I'm thinking of a colleague whose Dad phoned up to say she'd been unfairly treated at work and another parent whose son was dismissed for being stoned at work and who is now taking the employer to court....

We didn't have Open Days in my day. My dad gave me a lift to one interview because he wanted to see my aunt who lived in the same town. I went to the other two myself. He refused to contribute to my final university year - in fact I had to get the Principal to ask him to sign the income forms otherwise I'd have had to pull out.

My studies and handling of my life, finances etc were for me to do once I got to university - I was considered an adult then.

I can't believe how much students are mollycoddled and babied now. I have a friend who still snoops on his daughter's finances online and still nags her about organising them: she's 24.

I am not paying though MOREBETA my children are/will be. I pay accommodation the same as was supposed to happen when i went many years ago.

Were I paying i still would not go . 18/19/20 year olds are adults - this needs to start being recognised

It doesn't surprise me at all. I have had calls from mothers telling me their wee boy/girl isn't well the you realise that the wee one is in fact 21 but is apparently too shy to come to the phone. I am not including SN here.

I think that it is just the norm these days to go on the open days. We happened to take DS to the first because it fitted in with visiting aged relatives. We were unsure of whether to go or stay and he didn't mind. Our feeling was that we would slip away, but everyone was queueing up with at least one parent so we stayed. We then went to a couple of others, one he got the train himself and one he got the train to his brothers and he went with him. I found it interesting, but we did just stay in the background, he asked the questions and it was his decision. Our eldest had to do it all himself, we had 2 much younger DCs and simply couldn't manage it but most students were on their own at that time. It has changed in a very few years. We took him on the first day and then it was up to him.
We didn't get to graduation with DS1, he disappeared abroad on a summer job. It was disappointing but you have to accept their decisions and not have the 'proud mummy photo'.

It isn't good parenting to do it all for them. It just shows that people do too little, too late. Start any thread about leaving a DC on their own for 10 mins aged 8yrs and you get all those who would never do it-the house will burn down, SS will be called etc. They still won't go out and leave them at 16yrs or let them get a bus and they think it is 'being a good parent'! It is lazy. They need to be given responsibility and assess risks. I would imagine that those smothered at home are the ones who run the most risk when they finally get away.

My children would have been aghast at the idea that I should accompany them to open days/interviews etc. We discussed their choices, but I didn't feel I had any right to dictate to them. They certainly wouldn't expect me to have any right to know about how they were getting on with their finances or their course unless, that is, they chose to tell me about them - which I'm glad to say they quite often did. They also sometimes asked for my advice and they knew they could come to me if they had problems.

I tried to encourage my ds to be independent - he needed a bit of encouragement, but he got there by the age of 17 or so. My dd wanted to be independent from the age of about 2. Her first phrase was an indignant and determined "my do it!" - she hasn't changed

When we took DC1 to her first Open Day I worried we'd be the only parents there. As it turned out I don't think any of the prospective students had come alone.

All of our DCs picked universities a long way away from home . Most involved overnight stays. We took each of them on the open day and went to the parents events. While they were interviewed or on the students events we popped off to look at the town or get something to eat.

Each of our children chose their own subjects and the universities they wanted to apply to with no pressure from us. The applications were done at school. We gave our opinions during/ after the visits but the ultimate decision was theirs. We drove each one up on their first day with a van full of stuff, unpacked, bought them some shopping, then left them to it and cried once safely back in the car

OP I though you were going to say something about parents who help their university student DC out with money when they start uni. But YANBA parents should not be sorting out their DC's graduation. DD1 sorted out her own Graduation and the only contribution we had was to replied how many tickets we wanted when she asked us. I will also expect DD 2 to do the same when she Graduates next year.