Reducing the academic load to play elite soccer.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think that children will always have an optimistic view of their own talents. It is up to parents to decide how to focus the children on the right path. Parents have an obligation to really stop and consider how much talent their child really has and help guide their child to the right priorities.

Here are some numbers:
http://www.ncaa.org/about/resources/research/estimated-probability-competing-college-athletics
https://www.ncaa.org/sites/default/files/Recruiting%20Fact%20Sheet%20WEB.pdf

In general, with only a few exceptions, well under 10% of high school athletes will compete at the NCAA level. And of those, only about 1/3 of those will compete at the Div-I, Div-II and Div-III levels. And of those, only about 1-2% will go to compete at the professional level. In soccer, the numbers are about 6% of high school participants will play NCAA and about 1.4% of those will play professional. So that means out of 440K high school soccer players, less than 400 will play professionally.

So, do you want to prioritize the sport or academics? Yes, it is important to have balance, but moving from a higher rated school to a lower rated school just to play athletics to get into a collegiate athletic program is not wise. Instead, why not stay in the higher rated school and play a lower level/tier of athletics. Your child will still get their balance from sport/academics and will have a better foundation for college.

And if you want to know why this is significant, go look at the thread about the shortage of "economically attractive" men. Ex-college sports stars who are making less money because they focused on athletics instead of academics are a dime a dozen and are less attractive for marriage, so if having that job, family and stability is important, then they may want to reassess their priorities.

My nephew did make the one decision that made sense. He was a cross-country runner. He went to a good high school and still competed. He did go to a school on a track scholarship, but he deliberately chose a school with a good engineering program and a lesser NCAA division track team so that he could focus on academics at the collegiate level. He found the pressure to compete less intense so that he could still compete, but the sports program did place an emphasis on maintaining the academics and made allowances for athletes around their academic requirements, which was exactly what he wanted.

This is exactly the opposite of true.

The large majority of CEOs of Fortune 500 companies were college athletes.

College athletes get access to internships that are not available to other students.

NCAA athletes GPAs are higher than the rest of the population.

I think too many are focusing on the cream of the crop. Yes, it does happen that there are many executives and high end earners in many fields who did pursue college athletics. But here are 500 Fortune 500 CEOs. And there are maybe a few thousand athletes who benefited from legacy-type internships, mostly at the more prestigious schools.

In reality, there are 7.3 million high school athletes of which about 500K pursue college athletics and about 8-10K who make it into professional sports. That means in every generation of about 4 years, there are 6.5M high school athletes who will not play college athletics; there are about 7.2M who will not make it into professional sports. If you are one of those who played college level athletics but don't go into professional sports you are one of about 490K in each generation. How many of those do you really think are getting CEO, high level finance, MBA or wall street jobs? Probably less than 10%. There are another 5-10% who end up coaching, training, or otherwise working in their sport, often for very moderate (at most) salaries. Over 80% of those who played college athletics are stuck relying on their academic credentials the same as their peers who concentrated on academics instead of athletics and they are often behind those peers in credentials because the prioritized athletics and athletic accomplishments to academic ones.

You want to hear what happens to the other 80%? They are stuck trying to find their way. Here is one such example and this guy was a top competitor in his sport. He was working for $8 an hour as an intern to get into a sportscaster job which starts at $28K and up. The average sportscaster in the US earns $39K. The ones that make it on national chains including ESPN, SI, etc are the exception, not the rule.
http://www.espn.com/espnw/voices/article/15182997/moving-sports-college-athlete-greatest-challenge

Dude! We are only talking about the cream of the crop. If you are a top athlete is it okay to cut back on academics?

That is the only question on this thread. Nobody is suggesting average soccer p!ayers cut back on academics.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If you want to cut back on academics go ahead. No one should be surprised that that idea is unpopular on this board. I think that the demographic that has the resources to be playing high end youth sports is the same demographic that values education for the most part. These folks are trying to get their kids on track for college and grad school and professional careers with solid incomes that would enable some financial security. Pulling backs on academics is not going to sell in this demographic.

,

It's not selling in this demographic because nobody posting has a kid in the top 1% of the nation in their sport.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Met with some DA parents (U17) and several of them noted that they have had to make some "academic sacrifices" for their kids given the elite soccer schedules. "We moved to a different school that was easier" and "we are skipping some AP classes this year" were some comments I heard. I even heard the story of one kid, who is on the national team callup / shortlist has even gone so far as to switch to homeschooling.

Do you think this is common? Are there a lot of DA kids at the tougher academic schools or are there just a few outliers? I've seen DA players get into Harvard / Stanford etc so some are able to balance, but wondering if there are people who have made the choice to dial it back a bit academically so they can purse sporting dreams.

They are getting to these colleges because they are athletes.
Their schedule in college is also modified.
Champion athletes who are in Ivies or any college as a matter of have to train numerous hours a day. Do you actually believe they attend classes and study for exams/do homework just like the rest?

Yes, D1 athletes are going to class, studying for exams, have required study hall time and free tutors.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You do realize that if you want to learn something you can just buy a text book and read it through without being in a class

That is the opposite of what is being said here. Don't read the text. Drop the AP classes. Take lower level, less challenging classes.

Suit yourselves. Sounds like a big mistake to me. For every story put out there about some kid that dropped down to lower level academics to spend more time playing soccer for spectacular results, I can show you a thousand that are now driving for Amazon or selling used cars or monitoring the playground at lunch.

No. You can’t. You wish you could since you have a chip in your shoulder about sports. Show me 1 person who is an academy level player who had their college commitment taken away because they dropped AP classes.

Why are you skipping over the content of the education. If you are taking high level courses for the sake of taking high level courses then who cares? Drop them. If you are taking them because you need that information to then take the next level course in that subject and advance your knowledge and education, do not drop them.

Many here are focusing on the AP courses, but that was only one scenario that OP posited. She also said that some parents deliberately moved/chose an easier school with less academic demands to allow more time to devote to athletics. I think there are two parallel conversations going on here and many of those debating aren't connecting on the actual topic.

So, yes, you can take a less rigorous academic schedule by not taking AP classes. However, if you are downgrading your child's school for a less challenging academic curriculum, then you are doing your child a disservice. Even in collegiate programs, scholarship athletes are expected to uphold a certain grade point level. If your child is behind academically due to a lesser high school curriculum, (s)he will be struggling more in college to keep up that college GPA to maintain the scholarship and stay in the athletic program.

moving to a worse high school can actually be useful for college admissions. It’s easier to get noticed by admissions offices even without the assistance of your sport if you are an A student at West Potomac than if you are an A student at TJ or at St. Albans.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you want to cut back on academics go ahead. No one should be surprised that that idea is unpopular on this board. I think that the demographic that has the resources to be playing high end youth sports is the same demographic that values education for the most part. These folks are trying to get their kids on track for college and grad school and professional careers with solid incomes that would enable some financial security. Pulling backs on academics is not going to sell in this demographic.

,

It's not selling in this demographic because nobody posting has a kid in the top 1% of the nation in their sport.

One in one hundred posters may have that or maybe more as this is self selecting audience on here of folks interested in high level youth soccer. Of the cream of the crop, some will ditch challenging academics and some will not. Really depends on the player and their interests and capabilities.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you want to cut back on academics go ahead. No one should be surprised that that idea is unpopular on this board. I think that the demographic that has the resources to be playing high end youth sports is the same demographic that values education for the most part. These folks are trying to get their kids on track for college and grad school and professional careers with solid incomes that would enable some financial security. Pulling backs on academics is not going to sell in this demographic.

,

It's not selling in this demographic because nobody posting has a kid in the top 1% of the nation in their sport.

One in one hundred posters may have that or maybe more as this is self selecting audience on here of folks interested in high level youth soccer. Of the cream of the crop, some will ditch challenging academics and some will not. Really depends on the player and their interests and capabilities.

Substitute “high level but nonprofessional frisbee golfing” for “high level (but nonprofessional) youth soccer” and perhaps you will find the skepticism about tipping the balance in favor of soccer vs academics a little more understandable even if you disagree with it. Fun but ultimately not enough to displace academics. Unless you will be a pro. End of day, people should do as they like without judgment from others. But this is my opinion, for whatever it is worth. And for those able to do both, kudos to you. Definitely not the case for most elite athletes or students. But great if you can do it.

[Anonymous]

You don't have to play for a NCAA athletics program to be an athlete

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Educate your brains people. Why would you skimp on academics for soccer unless you were a professional being paid? That seems really really misguided. Don't do that.

Soccer is good for your brain (unless you get lots of concussions). You have a few years to do something wonderful, rewarding, and character building. You have your entire life to learn. I see nothing wrong with striking a balance.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You do realize that if you want to learn something you can just buy a text book and read it through without being in a class

That is the opposite of what is being said here. Don't read the text. Drop the AP classes. Take lower level, less challenging classes.

Suit yourselves. Sounds like a big mistake to me. For every story put out there about some kid that dropped down to lower level academics to spend more time playing soccer for spectacular results, I can show you a thousand that are now driving for Amazon or selling used cars or monitoring the playground at lunch.

No. You can’t. You wish you could since you have a chip in your shoulder about sports. Show me 1 person who is an academy level player who had their college commitment taken away because they dropped AP classes.

Why are you skipping over the content of the education. If you are taking high level courses for the sake of taking high level courses then who cares? Drop them. If you are taking them because you need that information to then take the next level course in that subject and advance your knowledge and education, do not drop them.

Many here are focusing on the AP courses, but that was only one scenario that OP posited. She also said that some parents deliberately moved/chose an easier school with less academic demands to allow more time to devote to athletics. I think there are two parallel conversations going on here and many of those debating aren't connecting on the actual topic.

So, yes, you can take a less rigorous academic schedule by not taking AP classes. However, if you are downgrading your child's school for a less challenging academic curriculum, then you are doing your child a disservice. Even in collegiate programs, scholarship athletes are expected to uphold a certain grade point level. If your child is behind academically due to a lesser high school curriculum, (s)he will be struggling more in college to keep up that college GPA to maintain the scholarship and stay in the athletic program.

moving to a worse high school can actually be useful for college admissions. It’s easier to get noticed by admissions offices even without the assistance of your sport if you are an A student at West Potomac than if you are an A student at TJ or at St. Albans.

Please folks. Gaming admissions like this does not happen at top schools (perhaps you should move to South Dakota if you think crap like this matters - it really doesnt move the needle). And if you think you are doing your kid any favors by pulling this nonsense, then you clearly don’t understand that (1) college is essentially high school now, (2) where you go to undergrad doesn’t matter that much compared to performance, tests and recs for grad school, and (3) a lot of the latter is driven by your training and self discipline every step of the way. There are no shortcuts or room for taking time or semesters or years off tough work. Those days were over long ago. So your kids need to bear down and carry their load or find satisfaction in a less fulfilling line of work.

[Anonymous]

The pyramid narrows as the level gets more competitive, so those who want to be in it have to make sacrifices. Let them, it's their goal.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think that children will always have an optimistic view of their own talents. It is up to parents to decide how to focus the children on the right path. Parents have an obligation to really stop and consider how much talent their child really has and help guide their child to the right priorities.

Here are some numbers:
http://www.ncaa.org/about/resources/research/estimated-probability-competing-college-athletics
https://www.ncaa.org/sites/default/files/Recruiting%20Fact%20Sheet%20WEB.pdf

In general, with only a few exceptions, well under 10% of high school athletes will compete at the NCAA level. And of those, only about 1/3 of those will compete at the Div-I, Div-II and Div-III levels. And of those, only about 1-2% will go to compete at the professional level. In soccer, the numbers are about 6% of high school participants will play NCAA and about 1.4% of those will play professional. So that means out of 440K high school soccer players, less than 400 will play professionally.

So, do you want to prioritize the sport or academics? Yes, it is important to have balance, but moving from a higher rated school to a lower rated school just to play athletics to get into a collegiate athletic program is not wise. Instead, why not stay in the higher rated school and play a lower level/tier of athletics. Your child will still get their balance from sport/academics and will have a better foundation for college.

And if you want to know why this is significant, go look at the thread about the shortage of "economically attractive" men. Ex-college sports stars who are making less money because they focused on athletics instead of academics are a dime a dozen and are less attractive for marriage, so if having that job, family and stability is important, then they may want to reassess their priorities.

My nephew did make the one decision that made sense. He was a cross-country runner. He went to a good high school and still competed. He did go to a school on a track scholarship, but he deliberately chose a school with a good engineering program and a lesser NCAA division track team so that he could focus on academics at the collegiate level. He found the pressure to compete less intense so that he could still compete, but the sports program did place an emphasis on maintaining the academics and made allowances for athletes around their academic requirements, which was exactly what he wanted.

This is exactly the opposite of true.

The large majority of CEOs of Fortune 500 companies were college athletes.

College athletes get access to internships that are not available to other students.

NCAA athletes GPAs are higher than the rest of the population.

I think too many are focusing on the cream of the crop. Yes, it does happen that there are many executives and high end earners in many fields who did pursue college athletics. But here are 500 Fortune 500 CEOs. And there are maybe a few thousand athletes who benefited from legacy-type internships, mostly at the more prestigious schools.

In reality, there are 7.3 million high school athletes of which about 500K pursue college athletics and about 8-10K who make it into professional sports. That means in every generation of about 4 years, there are 6.5M high school athletes who will not play college athletics; there are about 7.2M who will not make it into professional sports. If you are one of those who played college level athletics but don't go into professional sports you are one of about 490K in each generation. How many of those do you really think are getting CEO, high level finance, MBA or wall street jobs? Probably less than 10%. There are another 5-10% who end up coaching, training, or otherwise working in their sport, often for very moderate (at most) salaries. Over 80% of those who played college athletics are stuck relying on their academic credentials the same as their peers who concentrated on academics instead of athletics and they are often behind those peers in credentials because the prioritized athletics and athletic accomplishments to academic ones.

You want to hear what happens to the other 80%? They are stuck trying to find their way. Here is one such example and this guy was a top competitor in his sport. He was working for $8 an hour as an intern to get into a sportscaster job which starts at $28K and up. The average sportscaster in the US earns $39K. The ones that make it on national chains including ESPN, SI, etc are the exception, not the rule.
http://www.espn.com/espnw/voices/article/15182997/moving-sports-college-athlete-greatest-challenge

Dude! We are only talking about the cream of the crop. If you are a top athlete is it okay to cut back on academics?

That is the only question on this thread. Nobody is suggesting average soccer p!ayers cut back on academics.

No you are not. You are talking about the big fish in the little pond. That's a far cry from the cream of the crop. As has been pointed out there are 7.5 million high school students in athletics. There are just under 500K that play college sports. Even those are not the cream of the crop. The cream of the crop are the the 10K or so that will work professionally in the sport, that includes those who become professional athletes, coaches, trainers. Even those who are recruited to pay college athletics number well over 100K and less than 10% of those will be the cream of the crop.

If you think that talented high school athletes who might be scouted for a collegiate scholarship are the cream of the crop, then you are sadly mistaken and possibly misleading your teenager. Go back and read the story of that top NCAA collegiate tennis athlete above. He had a top-10 national ranking in NCAA collegiate stars and was on the traveling US national collegiate team. And he never made it to the pros. He placed a higher priority on his athletics than his academics and he will be behind on life for his lifetime for not placing a priority on his academics. Since OP started about soccer stars, just under 500K kids play high school soccer. Under 25K play collegiate soccer (so about 5.6%). 1.4% of those playing collegiate soccer will play professional soccer, so about 350. Maybe another 500 or so will find jobs working in professional soccer like trainers or coaches. Nearly 24K of those playing collegiate soccer will have to find work unrelated to soccer. Let's say another 500-1000 will get the bonus of going to a school with legacy internships as posted above. They'll do fine. Those are the types that will end up doing something lucrative because of the "networking" provided by their school. Another 20-22K collegiate soccer players will have no benefit of working in the sport or legacy networking. And will have to do something based on their collegiate background.

But the problem is that the majority of those players will be bound by their collegiate program to prioritize their athletics over the academics in the hope that they'll be one of the lucky ones. And so many of them will end up with a college career of mediocre academic results and less than average understanding of their collegiate fields due to lack of attention to their academic program and will struggle to find direction in their career and life.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You do realize that if you want to learn something you can just buy a text book and read it through without being in a class

That is the opposite of what is being said here. Don't read the text. Drop the AP classes. Take lower level, less challenging classes.

Suit yourselves. Sounds like a big mistake to me. For every story put out there about some kid that dropped down to lower level academics to spend more time playing soccer for spectacular results, I can show you a thousand that are now driving for Amazon or selling used cars or monitoring the playground at lunch.

No. You can’t. You wish you could since you have a chip in your shoulder about sports. Show me 1 person who is an academy level player who had their college commitment taken away because they dropped AP classes.

Why are you skipping over the content of the education. If you are taking high level courses for the sake of taking high level courses then who cares? Drop them. If you are taking them because you need that information to then take the next level course in that subject and advance your knowledge and education, do not drop them.

Many here are focusing on the AP courses, but that was only one scenario that OP posited. She also said that some parents deliberately moved/chose an easier school with less academic demands to allow more time to devote to athletics. I think there are two parallel conversations going on here and many of those debating aren't connecting on the actual topic.

So, yes, you can take a less rigorous academic schedule by not taking AP classes. However, if you are downgrading your child's school for a less challenging academic curriculum, then you are doing your child a disservice. Even in collegiate programs, scholarship athletes are expected to uphold a certain grade point level. If your child is behind academically due to a lesser high school curriculum, (s)he will be struggling more in college to keep up that college GPA to maintain the scholarship and stay in the athletic program.

moving to a worse high school can actually be useful for college admissions. It’s easier to get noticed by admissions offices even without the assistance of your sport if you are an A student at West Potomac than if you are an A student at TJ or at St. Albans.

This is especially true for kids in Virginia. Know several at private schools and TJ that could not get into places like Virginia, Virginia Tech or W&M even though they had mind-blowing profiles. This is because they're essentially competing with the kids at their own high schools, rather than general population. It was easier to get in to out-of-state schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think that children will always have an optimistic view of their own talents. It is up to parents to decide how to focus the children on the right path. Parents have an obligation to really stop and consider how much talent their child really has and help guide their child to the right priorities.

Here are some numbers:
http://www.ncaa.org/about/resources/research/estimated-probability-competing-college-athletics
https://www.ncaa.org/sites/default/files/Recruiting%20Fact%20Sheet%20WEB.pdf

In general, with only a few exceptions, well under 10% of high school athletes will compete at the NCAA level. And of those, only about 1/3 of those will compete at the Div-I, Div-II and Div-III levels. And of those, only about 1-2% will go to compete at the professional level. In soccer, the numbers are about 6% of high school participants will play NCAA and about 1.4% of those will play professional. So that means out of 440K high school soccer players, less than 400 will play professionally.

So, do you want to prioritize the sport or academics? Yes, it is important to have balance, but moving from a higher rated school to a lower rated school just to play athletics to get into a collegiate athletic program is not wise. Instead, why not stay in the higher rated school and play a lower level/tier of athletics. Your child will still get their balance from sport/academics and will have a better foundation for college.

And if you want to know why this is significant, go look at the thread about the shortage of "economically attractive" men. Ex-college sports stars who are making less money because they focused on athletics instead of academics are a dime a dozen and are less attractive for marriage, so if having that job, family and stability is important, then they may want to reassess their priorities.

My nephew did make the one decision that made sense. He was a cross-country runner. He went to a good high school and still competed. He did go to a school on a track scholarship, but he deliberately chose a school with a good engineering program and a lesser NCAA division track team so that he could focus on academics at the collegiate level. He found the pressure to compete less intense so that he could still compete, but the sports program did place an emphasis on maintaining the academics and made allowances for athletes around their academic requirements, which was exactly what he wanted.

This is exactly the opposite of true.

The large majority of CEOs of Fortune 500 companies were college athletes.

College athletes get access to internships that are not available to other students.

NCAA athletes GPAs are higher than the rest of the population.

I think too many are focusing on the cream of the crop. Yes, it does happen that there are many executives and high end earners in many fields who did pursue college athletics. But here are 500 Fortune 500 CEOs. And there are maybe a few thousand athletes who benefited from legacy-type internships, mostly at the more prestigious schools.

In reality, there are 7.3 million high school athletes of which about 500K pursue college athletics and about 8-10K who make it into professional sports. That means in every generation of about 4 years, there are 6.5M high school athletes who will not play college athletics; there are about 7.2M who will not make it into professional sports. If you are one of those who played college level athletics but don't go into professional sports you are one of about 490K in each generation. How many of those do you really think are getting CEO, high level finance, MBA or wall street jobs? Probably less than 10%. There are another 5-10% who end up coaching, training, or otherwise working in their sport, often for very moderate (at most) salaries. Over 80% of those who played college athletics are stuck relying on their academic credentials the same as their peers who concentrated on academics instead of athletics and they are often behind those peers in credentials because the prioritized athletics and athletic accomplishments to academic ones.

You want to hear what happens to the other 80%? They are stuck trying to find their way. Here is one such example and this guy was a top competitor in his sport. He was working for $8 an hour as an intern to get into a sportscaster job which starts at $28K and up. The average sportscaster in the US earns $39K. The ones that make it on national chains including ESPN, SI, etc are the exception, not the rule.
http://www.espn.com/espnw/voices/article/15182997/moving-sports-college-athlete-greatest-challenge

Dude! We are only talking about the cream of the crop. If you are a top athlete is it okay to cut back on academics?

That is the only question on this thread. Nobody is suggesting average soccer p!ayers cut back on academics.

No you are not. You are talking about the big fish in the little pond. That's a far cry from the cream of the crop. As has been pointed out there are 7.5 million high school students in athletics. There are just under 500K that play college sports. Even those are not the cream of the crop. The cream of the crop are the the 10K or so that will work professionally in the sport, that includes those who become professional athletes, coaches, trainers. Even those who are recruited to pay college athletics number well over 100K and less than 10% of those will be the cream of the crop.

If you think that talented high school athletes who might be scouted for a collegiate scholarship are the cream of the crop, then you are sadly mistaken and possibly misleading your teenager. Go back and read the story of that top NCAA collegiate tennis athlete above. He had a top-10 national ranking in NCAA collegiate stars and was on the traveling US national collegiate team. And he never made it to the pros. He placed a higher priority on his athletics than his academics and he will be behind on life for his lifetime for not placing a priority on his academics. Since OP started about soccer stars, just under 500K kids play high school soccer. Under 25K play collegiate soccer (so about 5.6%). 1.4% of those playing collegiate soccer will play professional soccer, so about 350. Maybe another 500 or so will find jobs working in professional soccer like trainers or coaches. Nearly 24K of those playing collegiate soccer will have to find work unrelated to soccer. Let's say another 500-1000 will get the bonus of going to a school with legacy internships as posted above. They'll do fine. Those are the types that will end up doing something lucrative because of the "networking" provided by their school. Another 20-22K collegiate soccer players will have no benefit of working in the sport or legacy networking. And will have to do something based on their collegiate background.

But the problem is that the majority of those players will be bound by their collegiate program to prioritize their athletics over the academics in the hope that they'll be one of the lucky ones. And so many of them will end up with a college career of mediocre academic results and less than average understanding of their collegiate fields due to lack of attention to their academic program and will struggle to find direction in their career and life.

You are obviously correct, but I think the PP thinks that playing DA in high school automatically means his kid is going to be an MLS star.

[Anonymous]

Competitive Sports is a great way for younger people to understand how to set goals and achieve them. Working hard for 10 years at a sport has a direct transfer to anything else you want to do in life that requires motivation, commitment, and hard work over a long period of time. Getting out of your comfort zone is something that athletes experience all the time. Sitting in a classroom all its own does not give you that type of life experience.

[Anonymous]

How about this, let people do what they want to do with themselves. There is no single defined pathway in life that leads to success or happiness.

Parents want to control everything for their kids but at some point, they have to let go of the steering wheel and let them make their own choices and live their own lives.

Let them do that.