Category — Helpful Information

If the college acceptance letters have just begun to come in, congratulations!  You are now officially a college parent.  You are excited for your student, and possibly a bit overwhelmed for yourself.  You’re not sure what you should be thinking about, or doing, or how to help your student prepare for the next phase.

Here at College Parent Central we believe that the more information you have, the better you will be able to support your college student as he navigates his new experiences.  But the problem with lots of information is that it can feel overwhelming.  Here are a few posts that we think might be a good starting point.  You’ll want to read more specific information later, but if you’re a new college parent, these posts should help you think about your new role and help you get started on your journey.   Congratulations!

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College spring break activities are legendary.  Many students travel – often to warmer climates – and party, drink, and generally carry on.  Many parents take these activities in stride, and many parents worry about their students during this time.  However, in recent years, many students are talking about, and engaging in, an “alternative spring break”.  This is the phenomenon of spending the week of spring break participating in some type of organized volunteer effort.

The idea of spending spring break in a volunteer effort has been around for a while, but it gained popularity and publicity following hurricanes Katrina and Rita.  Many college students spent their spring break traveling to hurricane torn areas of the country to help clean up and rebuild.  One estimate is that by 2006, more than 30,000 students participated in some sort of alternative spring break experience.

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Many students have grown up studying the arts.  Children take dance lessons, music lessons, and participate in drama or choral performances.  Hopefully, these children and young adults participate in these activities because they love them. Unfortunately, the arts are often seen as add-ons to a student’s education.   However, students reap many benefits from these activities which will serve them well when they get to college, and as they continue throughout their lives.

I am pleased to have a guest post this week on DanceAdvantage.net about some of the benefits of a dance education for college students.  Although the post was specifically written about dance, the principles apply to any study of performing arts.  If your student participates in the arts in any way, or has participated in the past, please visit DanceAdvantage and read Ten Credits Dancers Take With Them to College. In the article we discuss some of the qualities which dancers (or any student of the arts) have which will give them an advantage when they get to college.

If you have a student who dances, you’ll want to spend some time looking around DanceAdvantage.net.  Writer and dancer Nichelle Strzepek has put together a wonderful site that is chock full of information for dancers, parents and teachers.

Ten Credits Dancers Take With Them to College on DanceAdvantage.net

College is expensive.  Both parents and students know that they are investing a lot of money in a college education.  Some families have pieced together significant scholarships, grants and loans in order to pay for a college education.  This post is not about those bigger financial issues that make a college education possible.  It is about helping your student create and live by a daily budget for his living expenses.  Whether your student must pay for his own expenses, or whether you partially or fully fund his expenses, college is the ideal time for your student to learn to manage his money carefully.

Working together with your student to help her establish a budget may provide an opportunity for you to talk with her about her priorities, her needs and wants, her interests, and her goals.  You will get to know your student even better.  You will be helping her to establish an important skill for after graduation, as well as helping her to understand where her money goes now.  She may already understand, or she may be surprised to discover, how quickly little expenses add up.  Your student’s budget will be more and more realistic each semester that she spends at college as she learns what true costs are and what opportunities she may have to save.  If she is just starting college, her budget may be only an estimate and she will need to be flexible.

Thinking About Budgeting

Hopefully, your college student will be interested and willing to work at setting up a budget.  If he resists, try to insist.  Help him understand the importance of understanding where his money goes.  Convince him that if he wants or needs more money, or more independence, later, then he will have a more solid argument if he can demonstrate his spending responsibility.  Creating a daily budget is another step toward the responsible independence that both you and your student seek.

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When your college student began college you both had high hopes and expectations.  You knew that there would be challenges ahead, but you both did everything that you could to prepare.  Now your student seems to be struggling and having difficulty at college.  You may be feeling helpless and concerned for her.  Perhaps she hasn’t applied herself to studying, or perhaps she doesn’t understand what is required to succeed in college, or perhaps she has worked hard but is still unable to accomplish what she needs to do.

Whatever the reasons may be, your college student is now struggling and you want to know what you can do to help.  Obviously, every situation is different and every family dynamic is different, but here are some posts that may help you as you try to decide how you can help support your student as he works to improve his situation.

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New Year’s is often a time of new beginnings.  For parents of high school students who may be headed off to college in the fall, this year will bring significant changes.  You may, or may not, be prepared for those changes, but you know that they are still several months away.  We’d like to offer some New Year’s resolutions to help you, and your college bound high school student, begin to prepare now.  We hope that you find them helpful – and that you pass some of these on to your student.

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New Year is often the time for new beginnings.  Fortunately, for college students, the new year also often brings a new semester with its fresh start as well.  We offer here 10 New Year’s resolutions for college parents and 10 resolutions for you to pass on to your college student.  Enjoy your fresh start – and make this a great year for you and your college student!

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As college parents we want the best for our college students.  Many college parents have spent years planning for and working toward their student’s college experience.  They would never intentionally do anything to harm their student’s chances of making the most of his years in college.  However, there are some things that parents do, often unintentionally, that may have negative effects for their student.

Check this list below and consider whether or not you may be guilty of any of these habits.  Certainly, no parents are guilty of all of these habits.  Many parents may not be guilty of any of these habits.  Unfortunately, all are actions that some parents take at one time or another.  The list may seem harsh, but it gives us all pause, and food for thought.

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If you feel as though you don’t know much about what life is like at your child’s college, there may be a reason.  A recent study conducted by the Brookings Institute discovered that only 1.4 percent of news coverage in this country deals with education.  Of that 1.4 percent, only about 27 percent deals with colleges and universities.  Twenty-seven percent of 1.4 percent isn’t much coverage!

The Brookings study covered the first nine months of 2009, and by comparison found that the 1.4 percent of coverage during this time was twice the amount of coverage in 2008, when it was 0.7 percent.  In addition to the fact that education was covered minimally, this study found that little of the coverage that there was dealt with school reform, teacher quality, curriculum or other educational policies.  In other words, the actual work of the schools was hardly covered.  Topics covered most during the period of this study were the H1N1 flu outbreak, budget problems, and school crime. Coverage of higher education topics centered largely on admission to college and paying for college.  Little coverage had to do with college life, college curriculum or college policies. This study concluded that “education news coverage suffers from problems related both to quantity and to quality.”

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Are you familiar with NSSE (pronounced “Nessie”)?  As a college parent, you may have looked at some NSSE results when your student was choosing a college.  Or you may have heard from your college student that he has filled out a NSSE survey at his current school.  More than likely, however, you may not be aware of NSSE.  NSSE stands for the National Survey of Student Engagement, and as a college parent, it might be helpful to know something about it.

NSSE is an approximately ten year old, eighty-two question survey, conducted each year by researchers from Indiana University, which measures how students spend their time at college and what they gain from their college experiences.  Over the life of the survey, more than 1400 colleges have participated at least once, and over 2.4 million students have been surveyed.  Each year the survey is distributed to first year students and seniors at schools who choose to participate in the program.  The results for 2009, released recently, come from students at more than 600 schools. The results of the NSSE survey are intended to help schools identify areas that may be improved in order to help students become more engaged in their learning.

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