Colleges Shoo Away Helicopter Parents

As they welcome the incoming freshman class, colleges across the United States are finding that nowadays they have to do something they never had to do before: kick the helicopter parents out.

In order to separate doting parents from their freshman sons, Morehouse College in Atlanta has instituted a formal “Parting Ceremony.”

It began on a recent evening, with speeches in the Martin Luther King Jr. International Chapel. Then the incoming freshmen marched through the gates of the campus — which swung shut, literally leaving the parents outside. [...]

Moving their students in usually takes a few hours. Moving on? Most deans can tell stories of parents who lingered around campus for days. At Colgate University in Hamilton, N.Y., a mother and father once went to their daughter’s classes on the first day of the semester and trouped to the registrar’s office to change her schedule, recalled Beverly Low, the dean of first-year students.

Link (Photo: Brian C. Frank / The New York Times) - via Fark


I was watching the freshman orientation group troop around my campus a few weeks ago.
In general, both parents were there for each student, and often younger siblings.
Overheard one new student actually ask her father for permission to go to the bathroom.
School's going to eat them alive.
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I don't have this problem because I'm a senior, and my mom's never been crazy. But last weekend at a school-sponsored stand-up comedy show, someone's mom came and sat next to me and laughed obnoxiously loud at every joke and occasionally said things like, "It's true." I hope she isn't a helicopter parent.
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I was an RA in a freshmen male dorm over 20 years ago, and it wasn't all that different then. Though we weren't allowed to "shoo" parents out the door, we could get creative. For instance, if a guy was obviously dying for his parents to leave, I'd ask the guy to help another resident move some of his stuff in. Usually the parents would realize that was their cue to leave.
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It's scary. When I moved in last year, I was one of the few whose parents dropped dropped them off with their stuff in their dorm, still in boxes. The rest of the parents were there for what seemed like a week and a half, which I think made making friends with people outside of your residence hall hard, since when people weren't at the dorm, they were with their families.
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Twist there you have it- Parents who are afraid that their sons might make ... whaaaaa Friends or -ney Worse- make Boyfriends and therefore turn out to be Gay!!!! Or- God Forbid --- go straight away into the one night stand stuff with nice female students!
Or- the other way round Daddy and Mom want to be around to Not see with what ...Monster daughterDear will end up.........!

:lol:
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My daughter's school did something similar: Took all the freshwomen (women's college) off for a whole afternoon/evening of activities. They were pretty blunt: Parents, it's time for you to go.

It worked perfectly: The parents had nowhere to go except home, and the students were kept so busy they didn't have time to feel lonely, sit alone in their room, miss the parents, etc.
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