Colleges seeing helicopter parents

By Carol Rolf

LITTLE ROCK — From early on in their children’s education, parents are encouraged to be involved. However, some experts say too much involvement, especially during the college years, is sometimes considered not so appropriate and can lead to a less-than-flattering description of those parents - “helicopter parents.”

Fred Baker, associate director of admissions at Hendrix College in Conway, said he’s not sure where or when the term “helicopter parents” was coined, but that it has been a “vogue term” for several years now, especially in administrative offices in colleges across the United States. Helicopter parents as those who “hover over their children, swooping down to fight their battles and make decisions for them.”

Baker said the term has been especially used when talking about parents of students of the “millennial generation” - those born between 1980 and 2000 and the first generation to grow up surrounded by digital media - when they start looking for and going to college. Baker said the involvement seems just a “natural progression” forboth the parents and the students, as the parents have always been involved in the students’ lives and the students have always looked to their parents for help and advice.

“We see it when Johnny or Susie visits our campus with his or her parents, and it’s the parents who are saying ‘We want to look at biochemistry’ instead of letting the students speak for themselves,” Baker said. “But truthfully, it’s not just the parents. I believe the students are so used to a high level of parental involvement that they often don’t notice that sort of comment. If the students really become fed up with it, they will attempt to put some space between them and their parents.”

Baker said “helicopter parents” is “not always a negative term.” However, he added “There just needs to be a happy medium regarding parental involvement.”

“Most colleges offer a variety of extended services to help students make the transition from home to college,” Baker said. “It’s our job to make sure students make good choices, to keep them on the right track to success.”

“Parents need to do a bit of reflective thinking about their involvement in their students’ lives,” Baker said. “They need to work to strike the right balance between a hands-off approach and hovering.”

To help parents find the happy medium between too much and not enough involvement in their students’ college admission process, Baker refers them to a quiz posted on the Web site hosted by the College Board www.col legeboard.com. Click on parents, plan, getting ready.

Questions include:◊Do you play the lead role in

planning and scheduling your

child’s activities?

◊Are you planning to pre

pare your child for campus

interviews?

◊Do you plan on directly con

tacting faculty, coaches or other

individuals at the colleges your

child is interested in?

Baker, who has served in the

Hendrix admission office since

2002, can be reached at (501) 450-

1267 or Baker@hendrix.edu.

River Valley Ozark, Pages 129, 131 on 08/10/2008