What to do when your kid struggles academically at college?
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Anonymous
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Kid is struggling. Can’t do advanced math, so they’ll need to change their major. Struggling with some other courses as well.
Both the kid and parents want them to earn a degree. Any degree. Anyone btdt? How do we properly support? Is catching up with CC classes during breaks a practical solution? Socially and emotionally the kid is fine. |
Anonymous
| Office hours, tutor, change major. |
Anonymous
| Cut back on course load, tutors, office hours every week, improve study skills, if that fails try a trade school. |
Anonymous
| In addition to the points mentioned above, ask around about easy classes. Your kid probably just needs a semester to get on his feet and regain confidence so he should take 4 easy classes next semester and not feel bad about it. Figure out his major after that. |
Anonymous
| VT is notoriously awful at teaching math. If your kid want to stay, drop the engineering major and knock out the math over the summer at CC. |
Anonymous
| Tons of college students struggle with study skills and time management, and these things are really what their academic success comes down to. So focus on helping your kids improve in those areas. |
Anonymous
| They may need to take fewer courses per semester and either plan for five years or take courses each summer. |
Anonymous
| 12 credits is full time |
Anonymous
Find a major which excites them enough to work hard and succeed. If you ask a fish to climb a tree, it would fall short no matter how much it tries. Put it in water and see it swim. |
Anonymous
| My student has an executive function coach that meets with her (virtually) Monday morning and Friday morning and reviews upcoming tests, papers, deadlines, etc. They develop a study plan to the week and then for the weekend. It has been immensely helpful. I doubt we will do it all four years, but it has been a good start. |
Anonymous
NP here. How did you find this? DC is getting their butt kicked in two classes this first semester - political science and history classes. They’ve met with the professors and the repeated comment is they aren’t analytical enough in their essays, seem to be able to regurgitate the readings but have trouble applying the concepts, etc. (This was a 4.0 kid in HS with all 5s on their 15 APs incl every social science offerring. They are feeling very demoralized.) I am not sure what kind of tutoring to even suggest that DC seek, but I suspect they need some “back to basics” type tutoring teaching them how to note take and study. |
Anonymous
honeslty the feedback that your DC is getting should help them learn how to respond in the essays. Its a learning experience. if all else fails, see if they have a writing tutor kind of situation who can help. My DD is doing a philosophy minor and in the process had to learn an entirely different way to write essays, also was a straight A student in HS. Now that she's a junior, she's got it all figured out, but it was a little bit of trial and error and talking to professors to get feedback. |
Anonymous
+1 Pull him and put him in a CC if you have to, then they can transfer. |
Anonymous
| Direct result of inflated HS GPAs, no substance, no teaching proper term paper/writing, etc. Kids end up at college unprepared. |
Anonymous
Most colleges have a writing center with tutors. Would be a great time to take advantage of this |