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A Series of Questions on Parenting

93 Comments

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Here's the situation. I will soon have a 16 and 14 year old. It feels like we've hit a point where parenting strategy has to shift. Less telling them what to do and more picking them up after they fall. This doesn't seem as obvious as parenting younger kids. I didn't have to think much when a toddler was grabbing an electrical cord. It was pretty obvious what I should do.

Should I monitor digital communications with her friends?

Should I let her use social media?

Should I tell her I know she has a second "secret" Instagram account?

How much input should I give her on classes she chooses?

How much input should I have on college?

Do I encourage her to start looking at colleges or just sit back and wait?

Do I suggest any schools she should visit? What if I think she's going down the wrong road? Do I really know the wrong road for her?

Should I give any advice on her major? What if she thinks she wants to go on to get a PhD?

If she's watching Netflix on her Kindle after she's gone to bed, do I punish her or just explain why it's a bad idea?

Should she have a bed time?

Should I push her to get her driver's license?

We haven't gotten to the dating thing. What do I do then? I picture myself like the coach on Friday Night Lights where I say and do the wrong thing most of the time.

How much do I "warn" her about boys?

How much do I talk about safety and avoiding bad situations? (I have a pretty cautious daughter. The hesitance to get her driver's license comes from a Driver's Ed course that focused on car crashes as a "Scared Straight" strategy. It scared her straight out of the vehicle.)

Thanks for reading and any suggestions!

93 thoughts on “A Series of Questions on Parenting”

  1. Should I give any advice on her major? What if she thinks she wants to go on to get a PhD?

    If/when she gets to college., encourage her (strongly) to make use of a professor (or more than one) that she feels comfortable talking with. The students that come around to my office and discuss majors/careers/post-grad things have so little idea of what those things entail that I worry about the ones I never see. Academics obviously have a slightly skewed view of the PhD/career system, but they've been through it, they have friends and colleagues in lots of other careers. They should give their advisees at least a starting point to determine if grad. school or a particular major is for them or not.

    1. Thanks.

      I know it is early but it does worry me a little when she's convinced she wants to get a degree (psychology) that may require a PhD to get a job.

      On the other hand, I was talked out of majoring in statistics and looking at MLB front office jobs. I was told that was impossible. Looking back, my timing would have been perfect.

      1. If she's interested in doing therapy, a Master's degree is all she would need in psychology. (we just discussed this at our University Academic Affairs Committee)

        If she wants to do research and/or teach, then she would need a Psy.D.

          1. PHD is not a requirement for a Psychology job; there are masters programs for Industrial/Organizational Psychology or Behavioral Neuroscience, for example.

            Runner daughter got her bachelor degree in Psychology...then got a nice job in finance. Hey, we'll take it!

            1. Reminds me of a gal I knew that graduated with me with a Chem and/or Bio major (one or both?).
              I ran into her at a concert a year or two later and found out she was in grad school for performing arts/dance. I haven't heard anything about her since (nor can I remember her name).
              I'd probably know if there were facebook back in my undergrad days, but alas, Zuckerberg was still in High School when I graduated.

          1. In my field (physics and astronomy) it matters some, but it isn't everything.

            The biggest difference between students that went to the more prestigious undergrad schools and those at smaller, less-renowned places isn't just the name of where you went, it's that access to opportunities that come along with that name. A bigger, better department would be more likely to have research opportunities available to undergrads, which is a big plus in getting into a top grad program. (Again, this may be field dependent, so YMMV.)

            1. Also in the physical sciences, but I'd say my field is more or less the same.

              Most grad schools are equally interested in assessing the maturity/temperament of an incoming student as they are in assessing previous coursework/research opportunities.

          2. In my field (political science), grad school programs vary somewhat in their recruitment strategies. But. But a lot of the top-ranked programs have moved toward more emphasis on recruiting students from smaller schools (e.g., liberal arts colleges), in significant part because those students are more likely to have had meaningful intellectual relationships with the professors writing their recommendation letters.

            I did not send very many kids on to grad school from my time as a professor, but the ones I did send on tended to be one for whom I could write a real letter of recommendation because the student had taken multiple classes with me, attended office hours, and found other ways to make a connection (e.g., an independent study project). Those connections are much easier to make at small schools.

          3. In most physical health fields any undergraduate degree is a sufficient credential for eligibility, regardless of the field in which it was earned. What matters is that the student has completed the required academic preparation (Biology, Chem & O-Chem, Stats, some Psych, etc.) necessary to prepare them for their professional field. I have this conversation with multiple students every day who think one of my school's programs is the only/optimal route to med/PA/PT school.

            What I reflect back to the student is that the best field is one that they enjoy studying and fosters strong academic performance regardless of whether the prep courses are packaged into the curriculum of the major(s). There are brilliant doctors out there with abysmal people skills, and I don't think it's a stretch to say that makes them weaker doctors. There are very compelling arguments for having more doctors with undergraduate degrees in the fine arts, humanities, social work, rehabilitation psychology, and even economics. It's up to the student to make the connection between their primary undergraduate field and their professional school, but solid students who do that well will be very memorable and competitive when it comes to selection committees.

            As for a field like psychology, be sure to encourage your daughter to explore related fields. Rehabilitation Psychology is a really cool nexus of cognitive and behavioral/medical/physical issues. Social work includes clinical coursework and strong emphasis on helping people improve their lives. It's frequently gritty, in the trenches work, but lord, we need more good social workers. There are other areas in the social sciences that she might also enjoy.

    2. If/when she gets to college., encourage her (strongly) to make use of a professor (or more than one) that she feels comfortable talking with.

      DG can probably attest to this, but I encouraged Runner daughter (and every other kid I know going to college) to get to know and be on good terms with the secretaries in their major's department -- they're the real ones that make things happen.

    3. Depending on the institution she attends, a dedicated academic advisor may also be an option for your student. In addition to knowing about usual tracks into academic careers, advisors usually have a handle on other career paths that may involve some post-baccalaureate schooling, whether in a graduate school setting or in some type of professional program. Students have very interesting ideas about the kind of academic background they think they must have to get into certain fields. Advisors are frequently the clearinghouse for info on other things students need to know about, including unadvisable course combinations, impending curriculum changes, limited enrollment programs, scholarships, extracurricular involvement opportunities, and so on.

      1. What is the financing of advanced degrees? Are there usually opportunities to do research or student teach that could offset the cost?

        1. It depends on the particular field of study. Most every field has some sort of TA positions available for grad students that cover the tuition and fees plus pay a salary on top of that. In some fields (like humanities) there are more grad students than positions, so most people don't get funding support for the whole time. In most physical sciences, grad school often gets fully paid for through TA positions and research grants, again plus a salary. I'm not really sure where psychology falls on that scale, though. That's another question that could/should be brought to the faculty in that department.

          1. In addition to what Mike outlines, some grad programs only accept students on a fully-funded basis, meaning that program makes an obligation to a student to fund their education in exchange for services of some kind (teaching, research, or program assistantships are common). This means that they only have a very limited number of seats, but that every student is taken care of within the program. I entered my program without funding and had to rely on tuition remission based on my teaching assignments, which I always managed to get. I took over half of mine outside my home department because there was a cap on the number of times one could teach within the department and I wanted to use those judiciously. It also helped that I loved teaching courses with a more interdisciplinary approach anyway.

            I'm sure there are a few areas where it makes sense, but my general advice is to not go into debt for grad school.

            1. my general advice is to not go into debt for grad school

              Yup. I made on the order of $15k per year as a grad student back in the late 1980s/early 1990s.

              grad school IS professional school, but without the kind of reimbursement gradient possibilities of med school or top-end law schools. I can't recommend paying one's way through any program intended to prepare you for a career in academia.

              1. Yup. I made on the order of $15k per year as a grad student back in the late 1980s/early 1990s.

                Heh. I made 8k a year as a MFA in the 2000s. No debt because Buffalo, NY, but there is a distinct difference between the humanities and the (even soft) sciences.

                1. Indeed. I made $11k/year in a humanities discipline. Wolfram Alpha, using the CPI as its yardstick, seems to think Doc's $15k in 1989 money would be $29,770 in 2016.

                    1. I went to grad school in San Diego. What I was making was pretty close to the going rate for fully-funded grad students in the social sciences nationally (I had similar offers from other schools around the country as well).

                    4. Oh, my, Chalmers....

                      One of my best friends (and former office mates) from grad school is an expert in Japanese politics. he was on the market in the early 1990s and interviewed at IRPS (Chalmers was not in the department, but rather, in IRPS). And became a target of that asshole, who, amongst other things, compared my friend (who is jewish, btw) in print to a Holocaust denier (analogized, I mean).

                    5. I'm sure I've mentioned before that I read The Sorrows of Empire at a pivotal time (and was openly castigated by my battalion XO for reading the same). It was influential in shaping my perspective on my deployment & what I was doing at the time. That book – and Blowback – have stuck with me. For all that, I'm grateful. I have all of his last four books on the same shelf as stuff like Andrew Bacevich's The New American Militarism, Al McCoy's The Politics of Heroin & Neil Sheehan's A Bright Shining Lie. I respect the work.

                      Since I was living near San Diego at the time, I more than once considered driving down to visit him and thank him for the book that got me in trouble with my superiors. I might've asked for suggestions for additional reading or even his thoughts on where to go to school after I got out. Perhaps it's best I didn't. It sounds like I would've been disappointed by the guy in person.

                    6. Yea, nothing like being on the job market for the first time and having one of the big names in your subfield (he was emeritus by then, IIRC) try to blackball you because he didn't like your research approach. My friend happens to read and speak Japanese pretty fluently and had done field work in Japan, in addition to actually knowing something about statistics, formal modeling, and economics.

                      Let's just say that "Chalmers" is a swear word in my circle.

        2. in political science, a lot of the top programs fully fund most of their students on a non-competitive basis for at least 4 years. Some of the top programs (e.g., Harvard) have a history of admitting far more students than they fund (leaving some to fight for TAships at MIT, for example) and letting the students sort themselves out through attrition. My program, and the programs in which I taught, followed the fully-fund-them model. We were interested in sorting carefully on the front end and then investing in the kids to promote success, rather than a survival-of-the-fittest competition.

  2. If she's watching Netflix on her Kindle after she's gone to bed, do I punish her or just explain why it's a bad idea?

    This was a big issue in a lot of truancy cases I handled. Not saying it will be for you, but frequently enough there seems to be a correlation between after-bed tablet/TV use and attendance/grades. You know your kids better than anyone, but if I were in your shoes I imagine I'd start with "why it's a bad idea", follow up with supporting materials (studies on why it's bad), and then, if need be, cut the wireless connection/change the password around bed time.

    Let me know what you come up with on the social media stuff. I feel like education on appropriateness and permanency of social media for kids is a really good idea. I probably would have been an idiot without even knowing it had it been around back then.

      2. Obligatory shiv response (we used to have a gif in the library).

        No. 8 is kinda pretty, but I bet you could cause a lot of carnage with No. 6. Props to No. 1 for design/styling.

        1. I'm with Phil on this.
          CER (now 13.4) has a tablet she bought with her babysitting money. After the second time we caught her using it in her room after dark, we told her it had to be left in the living room when she goes to bed.
          She's not using that much internet connection, so changing passwords after a time would do little. (Is there a way to do that easily where other devices could remember both passwords?)

          At the same time, I've gifted her reading lamps in case she wants to read.
          But then sometimes the books are graphic novels or Minecraft guides or shallow books about Pokemon, MLP: FIM, or Equestria Girls. (I mostly read field guides so I'm probably to blame.)
          But she's also read Pride & Prejudice and some other actual literature/novels and intermediate books (like a fiction series about the Greek gods as teenagers that mostly taught mythology by making it relatable).

          1. Is there a way to do that easily where other devices could remember both passwords?

            Switch the SSID too. Any device with unfettered access will be able to switch between them, albeit I expect a hiccup if streaming. Unfortunately doing this nightly would be a pain because you need to change the SSID and passphrase each night and morning. Better would be to look for a router that allows you to block devices over certain periods. If this is an uncommon thing then it may be useful.

              2. Neat idea but not something I would pick. It would not be very hard to get around it. Any cellular device could disable wifi and get around it. It uses ARP cache poisoning to do what it needs to do. This is normally done as an attack so there are countermeasures to it that can be done to get around the device.

            1. Yea, The Girl was pretty much wedded to her laptop as a reading device. She also read a lot from dead-tree books and did some journaling, but most of her writing was also at the keyboard. We would have been prying it from her cold, dead hands.

              I had some fights with her when she was a bit younger in which I had to take her access away. But by the time she was in high school, that was a losing proposition. And I think she's turning out ok.

  3. Should I let her use social media?

    I have a feeling she'll use it somehow regardless of what you do. While I was growing up before social media, I did grow up during the early internet. And I wish someone had told me at the time that anything you post on the internet will be there until the end of time and somebody will find it. While I luckily don't have anything embarrassing, there's still little minutiae about me on the internet that my clients can now Google. When I was a teenager, I was very much like, "I'm going to express me and be proud of it and anybody who doesn't like this about me...well that's their loss." While that is admirable in some ways, in some ways that can hurt you down the road.

    1. Our conclusion was to be happy that she asked us.

      I'm a little leery of Snapchat as I think of it as a sexting and bullying app, but that probably just shows I don't get it.

      1. CER is on Pinterest and some page ("Quizlet"?) she needed to be on for a distance-learning class but on which she's stuck around since it's been over.
        She had the other kids laughing at some meme-type things on Pinterest the other day.

      2. I have Snapchat and have never done either, if that helps. Except for sexting, but she loves me, so whatever.

        I don't know that any app can be the bad guy. Intent of the user is paramount.

        1. I picked that one day in high school as my email handle because it seemed random and ironic. I bounced around and tried out a few other weird things, though all that comes to mind is "Lite Thrash". (Not that I did a lot of emailing in High School: a listserv or two was about it.)

          I brought it back as my college email handle as soon as I figured out to change that from default, and like my current Craig James gravatar, just left good enough alone.

  4. Do I suggest any schools she should visit? What if I think she's going down the wrong road? Do I really know the wrong road for her?

    Should I give any advice on her major? What if she thinks she wants to go on to get a PhD?

    Are you paying for (any of) it? Then you absolutely should have a say, and it should be obvious that you have a reason to. Not to necessarily redirect choices, but at least recommend a non-private college for a social work major, for example.

    1. While the Poissonnier is years away from college, I have some insight on these questions since I get to see both sides of the parental involvment spectrum in my day job. Parental involvement around college choice is an important part of a student's support system as they make one of the major decisions of their lives. I work with students who've received all kinds of varying levels of support, from students who are children of faculty/academics to first-generation college students who are figuring higher ed out on their own.

      When prospective students visit my schools, I find that parents ask most of the questions. I always address the answers to the student first, but because of where most teens are at developmentally in their junior year of high school, they tend not to engage much. In those situations I'm trying to make sure they feel that I already see them as a person with their own agency, but I'm relying on their parent(s) to ask good questions and take good notes at the same time. Prospective students should have a inkling of their aspirations – or at least their preferences in school atmosphere/location/culture – but parents are vital resources when it comes to figuring out things with lifelong implications like financial aid, student debt, and the like.

      Where parental involvement can become toxic is when it's tied to unnecessary pressure on the student. Given what we know about the typical cognitive development and brain chemistry of people in late adolescence/early adulthood, we should expect a certain amount of change in a student's academic plan, particularly (but by no means exclusively) during their first year of college. The college transition is an umbrella for so many smaller components of self-discovery in social, academic, and personal realms. Asking someone who is 18 or 19 what they're "going to do with X degree" is as ridiculous as asking a first-round draft pick to write his HoF induction speech. It's much better to ask them what they'd like to explore academically in their first or second year. They probably have things they've enjoyed studying in high school (although you'd be surprised at how many students seem to be attending college out of some kind of sense of obligation to stay in school), and it's perfectly fine to try out a few areas each semester.

      If they have an advisor, that advisor should help them think through how their exploration supports navigating curricular requirements or facilitates exploration of specific majors. Most students have more room to explore than they give themselves credit for, and I think a fair bit of that comes from parental pressure to graduate "on time." I understand that the cost of higher ed has ballooned disproportionately to other goods/services, but most graduate or professional programs are not going to assess whether a student completed a degree in 4, 4.5, or 5 years. Instead, they're going to be focused on things like cumulative or field-specific GPA, quality of work in a writing sample, letters of recommendation, non-classroom experience, and stupid hustles like the GRE or LSAT. All of those other things are controllable by the student and very frequently informed by that student's pacing through coursework. Helping a student set healthy expections that balance progress toward degree with appropriate credit loads and time to grow in non-academic ways is one of the best ways a parent can support their student.

      1. Ab-so-freakin'-lutely. Runner daughter has at least one friend who has a very hefty student loan which, compared to her expected/actual salary, is ridiculous. More power to her for choosing a worthy field like social work, and I'm sure even a public school like Missou has a fine program, but so do some of the smaller local colleges at a much more reasonable expense.

        1. I will half-agree.

          If you can complete the degree in 4 years, or even 5, at a non-private, then the lower sticker price might actually make the difference. But at 5 years, the total cost of education (plus the opportunity costs) could well be HIGHER at a non-public than at a fancy-pants private that pretty much guarantees a 4-year completion.

          So, think comprehensively. Many, many public schools have poor track records of accessibility to required or needed classes, which can delay or derail a student's education. I have a twisted view, perhaps, because of my experience in the UC system and knowledge of the even-worse CSU system. But this is a real concern in an era of constrained resources for public higher education.

          As Beau notes, community colleges should not be ignored. There are benefits. There are costs too (mostly social, which is a non-trivial arena when what we are really asking of a kid is to become a fully-functional adult) for many kids.

          1. I was told over and over again by my teachers in high school that I had to go to a snug private school for the socialization and experiences and life learning, et cetera. None of that appealed to me. I got my own apartment at 19, kept to myself, had a job, paid all my bills on time, then once I graduated I became more social. I know, weird kid. I didn't even have my first drink until I was 24.

            1. Different strokes, to be sure. I've always said that a kid can get a very good education at almost any college. It really rests on the kid -- temperament, maturity, interests, yadda yadda.

      2. Ab-so-freakin'-lutely. I did two years of generals at a community college, then finished my social work degree at a state college. My loans were paid off fast, which was good given my low salary. While my salary is pretty good now, that was after grad school. Hard to make a lot with a bachelor's in social work. Or psychology.

        1. Did the credit transfer work well for you?

          I know I went to school 20+ years ago, but I still remember friends that had credits that didn't transfer from CC. In the long run, I don't think it saved them much money as they had to repeat classes.

          1. I got my Associate of Arts degree, and I knew Winona State would just accept the degree as "x number of credits."

            Also, the social work instruction I got at Winona was pretty fantastic. It might have been better somewhere else, but more of my learning has come from good supervisors and good agencies.

          2. Most colleges work well with CC's, but you have to sit down with their administration offices with a plan of attack so you know which will transfer and which won't long before you are two years into it.

            1. This. Planning things out ahead of time and knowing what classes will transfer makes this a very reasonable way to do things. The students I know that have tons of community college credits that aren't going to be applied to a degree for transfer are students who didn't really know what they were doing, and ended up taking the wrong classes for what they end up wanting to do. Some of those cases are students who changed majors after taking a number of classes, but that's something that will cause students to take many extra classes whether it occurs at a community college or a 4-year school. At least at the community college those credits will be much, much cheaper!

              1. Of course, many people have no idea what they want to do as they enter their first year of college. Or they change their minds after taking some intro courses. That makes it a bit tougher. I was lucky enough to know exactly what I wanted to be at age 18 and then wind up enjoying it immensely.

                1. Most of those "intro" classes can count as general electives, so you can switch majors (or pick a major) even 1-2 years in and not be throwing away much of anything.

                  1. I would recommend not changing majors at the end of one's junior year. It makes for a very hectic senior year and recruiters aren't very undersanding of yourGPA dropping because you crammed too many hard classes into one year.

    1. Yeah, I have no idea. But I think warnings have to be nuanced and also filled with positive stuff. Most women I know (including my grandma) who were given the message, "Boys can't be trusted ever" struggled a lot with relationships.

        1. All men are pigs. Except for the ones who aren't.

          My advice, fwiw, is to focus on her. You want your daughter to be strong and independent-minded, not dependent on boys (or girls, or whatever floats her boat) to define her self-worth.

      2. That's the tough part. The overly cautious probably don't need any warning. The overly confident won't listen, anyway.

        1. Maybe something about setting firm boundaries ahead of time that she is comfortable with and a self defense class?

  6. Boys? Hmmmm . . . settle in, gents.

    As Beau alluded to, the idea that boys should be warned against does a disservice to both boys and girls. The idea that boys think about nothing but sex only legitimizes behavior that reinforces this idea and overlooks the fact that boys think about (and do) lots of other things too. And the idea that girls are gatekeepers who don’t want sex (or other forms of physical intimacy) and don’t think about it is equally preposterous. From my point of view, one of the best things we as parents can do is talk with both boys and girls about consent, what it means, how it works, etc.

    But taking a step back . . . I’d say you should focus on cultivating a strong relationship with your daughter now and in the years to come. She’s not ready to drive on her own yet? Great!* This means you have the opportunity to continue driving her around and therefore talking—about both big things and small things. The car is such a great place to have awkward conversations because you don't even have to make eye contact.

    What’s her favorite book right now? Read it, and then talk about it with her. Not “talk” as in give her a lecture about what you thought about it, but rather have an actual conversation. If it’s not your cup of tea, find out what she found so compelling about it. If you like the book too—great, you can both read another book from that author.

    Watch tv together, go to a movie together, go to a sporting event that she enjoys, take a walk . . . whatever. Have fun. And when something comes up (as it inevitably will) that touches on one of the questions you included in your original post, talk about that thing.

    If (heaven forbid) a candidate for major political office makes an inappropriate comment about how he thinks women should be treated, bring it up with your daughter and tell her why you have a problem with it. (I don’t care who you voted for, mind you—you can disagree with something a candidate says even if you cast your vote for him or her.)

    Does this mean you treat your daughter as a friend rather than as your child? No. Continue setting limits, but also talk about the reasons for those limits. As a teen (one who was highly obedient, granted), I took a lot of comfort in the fact that my parents had set clear limits because that meant I didn’t have to figure them on my own. I definitely had a bedtime on school nights throughout high school. That said, my parents were also reasonable—they’d hear me out if I wanted to do something that they didn’t usually allow.

    If you’re in touch with what’s happening in your daughter’s life on a daily basis, I feel like you’ll both be better equipped to handle the bigger questions as they come.

    *I had a very similar reaction to driver’s ed, and if I recall correctly, I ended up getting my license a month after I turned 17.

    3. Thank you for this, it matches very well my own line of thinking.

      One of the things we've started doing with our boys along the lines of consent is beginning to talk about it in an age-appropriate way, even as young as they are (5 and 2). We remind them that they need to ask before touching someone, and make it very clear that if they don't want to be hugged or kissed, then they always get to say no.

      Our 5-year-old has taken to this quite well, and now almost always asks before doing anything to the other family members. I think it helps that he's the one that is by far most likely to not be in the mood for hugs or other similar things, so I think he realizes that if there are times he doesn't enjoy physical affection, then other people may not enjoy it, either.

      1. Fortunately at my house whenever one boy wants to give a hug, the other one never wants to be hugged, so we get lots of opportunities to have similar conversations about consent!

  7. e: college/grad school

    I completely fucked my educational career up (please pardon my language, but I always get upset with myself). I went into college not really knowing what I wanted to do, picked a major for terrible reasons, and then went to grad school THAT I PAID FOR! that hasn't paid off.

    And now I'm back at community college getting an AS in Geography/GIS, which is probably where I should have been from the git-go.

    So here's where I sit with my thoughts for 18 years down the line with The Babby (I still need a nom de WGOM for it).

    A - Honestly give thought to the idea of a gap year. From my experience, I was not ready to be making life decisions at 16 (a slight outlier age wise, I know, but not much).
    B - The idea that a trade is legitimate no matter what. I felt I had to "do something 'smart'". Turns out, a 16 year old deciding to be a physicist didn't turn out and I'd probably be happier right now tinkering on cars for a living.
    C - A year or two at CC for gen eds, with the proper planning mentioned ^^^.

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