Shouldn't parents be teaching freshers life skills before university?

[RampantIvy]

I am still on the WIWIKAU Facebook page as DD is a post grad student.

I keep reading posts from parents of freshers students worrying about how their student DC are going to manage cooking, laundry and other life skills.

Isn't it our job to teach them those skills? Why on earth haven't these parents done so?

I admit to challenging one parent in the past about this and got my post deleted 😁

Many adults are cheeky, so no, they don't teach their kids not to steal. Plus kids can go a bit rogue once unsupervised before correcting themselves.

Surely you understand that some people do the wrong thing if they think they can get away with it? Fiddle expenses, break the speed limit, pinch something. Those parents have children, those children go to uni.

When I was at uni we just had a small shared gyp room for our corridor that wasn’t locked so food would go missing. By Christmas we all had cool boxes in our rooms and the small freezer was full of our freezer blocks. My nephew did the same in his halls.

as you say each to their own, but ime I would expect an 18/19 year old to be able to juggle a few more balls and be able to study university change their own bed weekly.

I know one woman through work who goes with her son to his uni city and stays with him during the week. He could not possibly go himself. Her husband stays at home with their younger child. I just did not know what to say to this.

Is he ND?

No! Just needs his mother to cook and look after him as he is doing a very very very hard uni course, that only super smart people do (In his mothers opinion). He would not have time for looking after himself.
I just nodded along in disbelief.

But it genuinely fascinates me how people have big lumps of teenagers who can’t get jobs and then their parents are paying cleaners, gardeners, paying to get cars washed etc. All these things could be completed by the teens, if they get stuck on how to do any of these tasks all they have to do is ask ChatGPT how to do it, then they will be fantastically trained for uni.

Perhaps they think you are a negligent uncaring parent who refuses to adequately support their university child… or maybe they are not as judgemental as you and accept other people have different approaches to
life.

On the brain thing- the point is that the original research has been taken out of context and used to support policies which it doesn’t actually support. The brain continues to develop and change throughout our lives- there isn’t a magic point at 25 where the brain suddenly becomes a fully formed adult brain and then remains like that, so the idea that 25 can be some sort of cut off point or developmental end point is wrong. It is true that as people get older they become more conservative/ less impulsive/ more risk averse ( and that is borne out by what we see around us). However, it doesn’t mean that people under the age of 25 are incapable of doing adult things/ shouldn’t be treated as adults or are basically still teenagers. Therefore when you see “ well the brain isn’t full formed until 25 so[ insert reason why a young adult can’t be expected to do anything for themselves]”
that’s just wrong. Arguably the dynamism that young adulthood provides should be totally maxed out- that’s when they should actually be pedal to the metal because risky decisions aren’t always bad decisions- society needs risk takers as much as it needs safe pairs of hands. Helicopter parents effectively crushes that dynamism- ships are safe in harbour but ships are not built to stay in harbour.

Not having to spend time doing mundane tasks like laundry, cleaning, shopping or cooking does not mean that they are incapable of being dynamic. Indeed they may well have more time for dynamic activities. Certainly the ex-private school students in catered halls probably have more financial resources to enable them to do so too.

@Girliefriendlikespuppies - here is the page: https://www.facebook.com/groups/wiwikau/?locale=en_GB It's very helpful.

Ha ha he’d just move on to the next question- like my son asking how to cook squid because he’d bought some reduced at 1am in the all night Tesco on his way back from the pub!
(He rang me the next morning 😁)

My son took over doing his own laundry at 14 because he didn’t like using the dryer and was very particular about his clothes (he ironed too). Ditto cooking - he is into fitness and had his own regime so cooked for himself for years (quite bland food so usually did not cook for us, though now he cooks lovely meals). I do my DD’s laundry when she’s at home but she coped perfectly well at uni once she figured out how the machine worked! She enjoys cooking and she would cook occasional meal at home before she left. No one likes to clean but they know how to do it.
Budgeting seem a real sticking point with many students. My own son (23, lives in his own) gets steak at the beginning of the month and ends it on tinned tuna! He still struggles with budgeting as money burns a hole in his pocket. My DD is the opposite and has quite the little nest egg.
So absolutely it’s a parents responsibility to teach them some life skills, they don’t magically assimilate these things. Sure the can blunder around and eventually figure it out by why not show them?
@Judysdreamofhorsesthat’s bizarre. Don’t most kids get the bus/train/tube to school from at least sixth form if not secondary? I see loads of young kids taking the bus and tube near me. Uni is not just the classes you attend but clubs, societies, sports, guest lectures, socials, using the facilities (libraries, labs etc) and if a student has to leave because their ride is waiting they’ll miss out.

Don’t most kids get the bus/train/tube to school from at least sixth form if not secondary? I see loads of young kids taking the bus and tube near me.

Not everyone has the plethora of public transport options you do in London. My kids walked to school, there are some kids that take the school bus but only a minority take public transport and lots of them learn to drive very quickly after turning 17.

Agree with this. DD took the school bus to and from school, but if she stayed after school for anything I had to pick her up.

You must live in a privileged area. Learning to drive and then run a car costs thousands and thousands of pounds (a young person is unlikely to to even get insured for under £2k). Well beyond the means of the majority of 17 year olds.