Young adults.

[XingMing]

DH and I were old parents; our parents were WW2 babies and children, so we grew up with a make do and mend life: don't buy anything, fix what you've got. We also went to boarding schools fairly young, and have survived it. It seems to us, talking earlier today, that our DS and his GF are much much younger for their age (20), and less competent than we were at the same age. Is this a good or bad thing?

What I find is that young people are less competent than our younger selves in some ways and more competent in other ways. And that the same goes for a comparison between our younger selves and those of our parents or grandparents. It is about adapting to a changing world. My grandfather as a fatherless young boy needed to know how to help run a smallholding in the late 1800s; his daughter didn't; I didn't either. Then again he didn't need to know about computers or about keeping safe from having his drink spiked.

I often look at my dc and wish I had been as streetwise and competent as they were at 18. I knew how to cleanse fish and make jelly, but I made some very risky decisions around men at a young age without even realizing how risky they were, because I didn't have the sense that mine seem to have and my parents were total innocents. I could very easily have been scammed if any scammers had been around because I had very limited idea about how things worked and how they shouldn't be working. I was not good at finding out information and only moderately good at evaluating the information I found. I would have been clueless in the kind of emergency my dc have dealt with beautifully: spotting that a friend needed to go to hospital after a fall at a party and arranging for it to happen, intervening when a customer was being mugged and getting his property back for him, knowing what to do when you find yourself groped by an older man at a communal event (he never took part in that organisation again).

I may have been slightly more conscientious about not spending money on socializing (coffee, drink), but though I knew in theory about environmental damage I would have been flabbergasted by any suggestion that I personally should change my lifestyle to ease the damage on the planet.

It is also worth remembering that whatever your personal situation, not all young people are more financially privileged than their parents were at a similar age. I had things my dc did not have.

I wish I had been more cautious with decision making at 18. I was pushed to go to university but not given much direction other than "you have to go to get a good job afterwards". I studied Fine Art believing the university sales pitch of "you can teach, work in museums or galleries or go into heritage or creative design roles." Either they lied or job and university landscape changed quickly (probably a bit of both) now to do those jobs you need a different degree e.g. Museum Studies.

I now have a mountain of debt and no real career prospects. If you read the number of threads on here about people stuck in dead end jobs wanting to retrain but not sure how, I would think you would be commending the careful consideration that this person is putting into deciding their life's path.

It's not about technology or fashion. At 22, we had real responsibilities, for running local/small businesses, with the freedom to hire (and fire) people. We were trusted to make sensible business decisons and by and large, we did okay.

Most young people I knew in the 70s and early 80s were not running businesses, some young people are today. You are extrapolating.

A friend of DS is stressing, big time, about going to university. WIth a string of A A levels, and unconditional offers with scholarships at RG unis. Yet, the person is terrified of making any decision. I don't really understand why and I suppose that's why I'm asking these questions.*

She seems very wise. As a university lecturer there is nothing that worries me more than young people taking on a huge debt for an education their parents want for them, then finding they are not coping (A* at A-level is really no guarantee you will do well at uni) but feeling obliged to struggle on until their health breaks down. It's not only about the damage done to them; it's about the complete uselessness of the experience. They are not learning. Waiting, choosing carefully, not taking this usually one-in-a-lifetime experience until you are mature enough to make the most of it would be so much better and so much more productive.

Universitites are far more pressurised enviroments than they used to be: there is less room for failure, less room to just bum about, which is what a lot of my generation seemed to do.

As long as your friend's dd takes a job and contributes to housekeeping costs, she is not staying a child, is she?

My concern is that if this person doesn't take a place at university, the career prospects locally are bleak

No bleaker than if she has to leave uni because she can't cope. In fact, compared to that scenario probably less so because she could have spent the intervening time getting experience in the workplace and getting glowing references.

So may older people seem to think it's simply a case of getting to uni and all will be well. Students do fail, you know. We don't guarantee success.

"It's not about technology or fashion. At 22, we had real responsibilities, for running local/small businesses, with the freedom to hire (and fire) people. We were trusted to make sensible business decisons and by and large, we did okay"

Yes I'm sure everyone was doing this. 🙄

At that age, DH was responsible for closing one branch of the manufacturing company for which he was a trainee manager and moving it to new premises the other side of London. It was 40 years ago, and then it seemed quite "normal". His friends were doing similar things. A lot of our contemporaries moved overseas to work around the same age.

And I am quite sure that some do now, too.

Apologies to anyone who has taken offence: none was intended. I asked the question out of curiosity, wondering when the world changed so much. And yes, I do completely understand that our children and grandchildren navigate new hazards with confidence and competence, and show grace under the pressures they encounter.

Please don't pretend this is anything other than a young people bashing thread.

My DCs in the early twenties are quite mature, they have pensions and career/travel plans and so on. I think their generation are more sensible than my generation were at their age.

A lot of our contemporaries moved overseas to work around the same age.

Very, very popular amongst the people in their early 20s that I’ve known, including colleagues’ children who are doing this right now.

I think you’re applying the realities of this very small circle of your acquaintance to a much wider context with no reason for it.

A lot of the young people I knew 40 years ago were connected to the Hippy Brigade or similar lifestyles. Just saying.

Don’t agree. Do you think by waiting until the last minute to have kids you’re somehow better than those who have them young? You could argue that by being so old when having your kids you’ve put them at a disadvantage.

Think OP’s just feeling her age and trying to make herself feel better.

Yet, the person is terrified of making any decision. I don't really understand why and I suppose that's why I'm asking these questions.

Afaik, you only get 4 years of undergraduate student funding - so doing the wrong degree the first time round , and then changing your mind/discovering you need a different degree (vocational maybe), means you have to finance a large chunk or all of the second one yourself. At £9k a year plus maintenance that is an expensive decision.

People dropped out of university and failed their degrees even in the 1970s, Corythatwas, but I do agree with you that the decision to take on a massive burden of debt inhibits freedom of choice.

However, now that about 50% of school leavers do go to university, my child worries that not following the herd will mean the world labels them as failures. It seems especially hard for a young man, who has deferred the university decision for three years, but has worked hard on NMW.

Do you think that location is still a significant factor in the decision? It was for me, because it was the way out of an extremely rural area without much employment beyond manual labour.

Sorry but if you went to boarding school you’ve come from a privileged background. I’m sure being from the middle of no where wasn’t the only reason you went to Uni.

@Gliese163, I am troubled that you have read this as a young person bashing thread. It wasn't, and isn't.

No regret for not having had my first child earlier. Never have, and can't see any reason for that to change. My first marriage was childless, by choice, and the second came quite late in life. Being an older parent has helped to keep us younger in outlook, though that is not for me to say.

Went to boarding school because of a services background.

When I was deciding which university to go to in 1992 or 1993, I travelled around the country alone for the various open days.

Talking to a friend whose daughter is going through the process, she drives her to ever open day which is the norm now apparently.

This can't really be good for the young people.

Still a privilege IMO.

In the 60s or 70s or whenever you went to Uni it was just not an option for anyone from a poor background unless there was a real driving force I.e a teacher at Grammar school with a real interest , or a
I don’t think it’s a bad thing that young people now have higher expectations of themselves.
Having said that, I know people with these ‘manual’ jobs you seem to despair of who are earning 3x those who’ve earned a university degree, so even though your pals son has great grades, he might do well just getting a job and using his noggin in a different way.

@tttigress I was born in the 90s and I took myself to all my open days. My parents were working. All my friends were the same. I think there are overbearing parents, but I think it has always been thus. I’m pretty sure OP has had a vested interest in her own sons’ university prospects and hasn’t let him get on with it entirely alone.

Talking to a friend whose daughter is going through the process, she drives her to ever open day which is the norm now apparently.

It does seem to be the norm, I went to all the open days bar one because they had sessions for the parents so I assumed it was the expectation. The DCs travelled to the offer holders days alone though.

Why does anyone need to change a plug in 2020, I can't shod a horse, no need!

At 18 I was a soldier in charge of an armoured vehicle and carrying an assault rifle. Still got my mom to arrange for application forms for university

When I was a child I can recall my own father asking his father (grandada) for help with a bicycle puncture.

Till his death when I was 35 I always looked to my dad for advice on a range of subjects and last time I saw a dentist it was mom who made the call.

Sometimes we all need support, it's called family

At your sons age I was expecting my second child (having already married, moved to a different county, and changed career paths). I do think it’s cultural, this fear, I don’t have it to a great extent but most British people seem to have it to a fairly big degree. I do think it’s normal for people to fear failure but how you are raised will determine if you continue to fail or realise that the real failure was to fail to try. I think the British education system has a lot to answer for here. The obsession with getting marks for correct answers teaches a fear of wrong answers which is counterproductive to real learning and indeed life. My upbringing was quite different. My parents were also migrants after loosing everything following political collapse. If you failed in one way another you just took what you learned through your failure and tried again bevause there was no other option. likewise my education was quite different too, classes at my school involved a lot of discussion and learning reasoning skills and techniques rather than parroting back correct answers. some people’s parents don’t help either, they should those children from failure too much with pushiness, drilling for exams etc. You need to fail to learn how to take control of your life.

There are obvious responsibilities which are going to be harder for the young generation to have. Dh and I found we could get a mortgage in the SouthEast (admittedly not a posh area) on a single manual labourer's salary in the early 90s. That's not going to happen for our son who is earning similar money now: it is going to be a very, very long time before he can even afford a rented room in a houseshare. It's not that he wants to hang around and be looked after (and indeed we treat him as any other adult who might be sharing a house with us); it's that times have changed.

Everybody I knew in the early 80s- and we are talking low-paid jobs then- could afford to move from home into a house share and still have a social life (beer was cheap!). I don't remember them as particularly clued-up or responsible people though most of them are now respectable citizens. We travelled round Europe on the interrail because interrail was cheap and you could sleep on the floor of the train. Can't do that these days.

I do agree that young people worry more these days, but I'm not sure the lack of worrying among my contemporaries was exactly a sign of maturity.

Naturally we've taken an interest in DS's work and education, FootieFan, but mainly the approach has been to support his choice not to apply until he was certain he was making the right choice.

My family respected education but were not wealthy or 'privileged'. Three of my four grandparents left school at 14; my parents left school after school certificate, before O/A levels were introduced.

However, now that about 50% of school leavers do go to university, my child worries that not following the herd will mean the world labels them as failures

50 years ago, my later-to-be-father-in-law worried desperately because his youngest son had decided to be an archaeologist rather than follow the herd and get a proper job with an established insurance company or something.

On the other hand, my father, who was university educated and had a comfortable life as a college teacher, was perfectly relaxed when his son started working first as a farmhand, then as a trawlerman. And this despite the fact that other children of his went to universities and did PhDs.

As parents, we can choose what signals we send to our children. And they are still going to react to those as individuals.