Do you use trackers with your college kids?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Kids do not care. My college sophomore son just realized he had been sharing his location with his entire contact list for YEARS after one of his buddies told him. He just shrugged. He didn't care.

This!
The naysayers are coming at the topic from their frame of reference, an era that coined 'big brother is watching'.
Meanwhile GenZ and Alphas have been sharing their locations since snapchat came online, and they just don't care.

That's not the issue though. Let's agree that 20 yr. old Charlotte "doesn't care" that she's viewable by everybody with a phone.

No, the problem is that Mommy can't cut the apron strings. Mommy can't let go. Mommy has an anxiety problem and panics about school shooters, falling off cliffs, hydroplaning into the guardrail on I-95, etc.

And if Mommy is tracking her baby and stays vigilant, naturally none of these very common things will happen to baby. So she tracks.

From what I’ve seen it’s very much the younger crowd that’s driving normalizing sharing location. I get why people would feel like parents are forcing or encouraging it but, oddly, this doesn’t appear to be the case.

Its not that younger people “don’t care”, a lot of them are used to using this technology, feel more comfortable sharing, and would prefer that friends and family have access to this info

[Anonymous]

god damn my kids are the ones tracking me. I got a message when my kids was in finals week one evening and all it said was “Must be nice eating at The Palm while i’m here eating slop at D2”

[Anonymous]

Here's a story of how this goes wrong. I'm 36, and have two younger siblings in their early 30s. When tracking came out about 10 years ago, we all had it on, under the guise of "hey, this is cool/fun and we don't have anything to hide." Over time, I got a little annoyed at how my parents would comment on my habits (going to Macys again? Why are you at the doctors office?)

However, my brother got in a bit of hot water. recently He lives in a small town, about 1.5 hours from a large city. He and SIL were having trouble conceiving, but they wanted to keep it private. They were visiting a fertility clinic in the large city, as there were none in their town. On iOS, the name of the city you are in appears underneath your name in a text message, so when my parents went to text my brother, they noticed his location was "large city" instead of "small town" They thought it was odd that he was in the large city during the weekday, so they opened up the find my friends app, and it clearly said "large city fertility clinic"

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My kids don’t tack me and I don’t track my kids. You all are too much. And I believe your kids don’t mind, but that’s part of the problem.

But what is “the problem” exactly?

It prevents them from learning how to actually communicate. If they'll be late, communicate that. Don't depend on someone looking up where you are. It denotes distrust. They should feel confident in making their own decisions, even if they make a mistake. Kids are less mature/grow up much later than in years past. They are over scheduled, over parented, always watched. It's sad that they think this is normal.
Gives a false sense of security. If they feel forced to share their location, they can do sneaky things like leave their phone, which is less safe.

Let's also differentiate between sharing select locations with friends and being tracked by your family.

And bottom line - it is none of your business if they are having a one night stand or staying out until 3am or ditching class and tanning on a sunny day. It's what young adults do to become full, responsible adults. Let them do that.

PP. I agree with you on all the above actually. And yet my kid shares location, so I’m officially a “tracker.” I think there’s a bit of a false binary thing happening in this thread.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Kids do not care. My college sophomore son just realized he had been sharing his location with his entire contact list for YEARS after one of his buddies told him. He just shrugged. He didn't care.

This!
The naysayers are coming at the topic from their frame of reference, an era that coined 'big brother is watching'.
Meanwhile GenZ and Alphas have been sharing their locations since snapchat came online, and they just don't care.

Well, our house was egged two separate times while we were away and couldn't figure out how those kids knew we weren't home.

With that said, my kids are not allowed to share their location with "friends" anymore.