Do you let you 17- or 18-year-old high school senior visit friends at college?

[Anonymous]

I started college at 17 before we started dumbing down the ages to go to kindergarten.

I have no issue with the my 18yr old senior going to see friends.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm going to go against the grain here. When I was a senior in college, I did three weekend visits on college campuses that were required as part of merit scholarship interviews. One, the school put us up in a hotel on campus. The other two, we crashed with kids who had the same scholarship. Sleeping bag on the dorm floor. I stayed on campus with a friend who was a year older at a 4th college I was considering.

Those visits made me realize that my "dream college" was actually not a great fit, and that the college I had applied to to just to make my parents happy was a wonderful choice for me.

I would not want my own kids to choose a college without spending the night, preferably in a dorm, eating in the dining hall, attending some classes and meeting some kids without a parent tagging along-- when they are second semester seniors, for places the have acceptances or are likely to be accepted, or when they are interviewing for scholarships.

I don't condone drinking in high school, or wild partying or anything of that sort. My kids don't get to do whatever they want. But, if I can't trust them for 24 hours on a college campus in early spring of their senior year, how am I supposed to trust them to live on that same campus for weeks or months on end less than 6 months later? If they really can't manage a late Senior year overnight at a college they might attend in a few months, then I haven't done my job in preparing them to leave the nest.

This would be an ideal type of visit that I would absolutely condone for my HS senior.

The whole business of a HS kid visiting college friends for the sole intent of partying and hanging out....no.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Do you let your kid sleepover at a trusted friend's house if no parents are home? Same thing. If I trust the friend and I'm OK either the proposed sleeping arrangement, I'd allow it. If you're so worried about your DD being irresponsible, then you probably shouldn't go cold turkey next year anyway...

No, I don't do this either. Nor do I leave my teens alone overnight. So trusted friend can come here to sleep.

Sorry, I am the PP and I didn't mean to suggest that the answer to this question was obvious. I just meant that, to me, it was the same calculus re: trust. I, personally, do let my DD (17) sleep over at 2 different friends homes when parents aren't there and would use the same standard I use to answer that question to decide on the college visit.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:No. I used to visit my college friends when I was in high school and every event involved drinking and unacceptable behavior. I'm surprised I survived!

Too many parents on this board want to coddle little billy/mary right up to the point that they leave the house. Then they are shocked when the sheltered child goes wild during first weeks of college.

I let my older during senior year visit friends at a couple of Universities in the fall. I suspect that there was drinking going on but I have always operated on a "don't ask / don't tell" when it comes to teen drinking. I drank a couple times a month in high school and I survived as did my friends.

These comments are not directed to the nervous nellies who always pat themselves on the back and are in an apparent arms race to show how protective they can be of their children. They believe that they love their too much to accept any risk and will go to herculean efforts to show how great of parents that they are. Unfortunately, these are lost causes and nothing that I or anyone could write will ever convince them that there are other reasonable alternatives.

Instead, this is for those parents who are willing to weigh the risk/rewards and are able to look beyond the following week. Such long thinkers are becoming increasingly rare in today's world!

[Anonymous]

6 years ago I was 16 almost 17, and I stayed at the university of Minnesota with my sister all the time. I had little parentlal supervision my last two years of high school as my parents moved across the country and I was arranged to live with a close friend. The times I stayed with my sister were 100% about partying. It was good practice for college drinking but now thinking back, I wouldn't want my daughter doing the same at that age. 18, that's a bit different.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No. I used to visit my college friends when I was in high school and every event involved drinking and unacceptable behavior. I'm surprised I survived!

Too many parents on this board want to coddle little billy/mary right up to the point that they leave the house. Then they are shocked when the sheltered child goes wild during first weeks of college.

I let my older during senior year visit friends at a couple of Universities in the fall. I suspect that there was drinking going on but I have always operated on a "don't ask / don't tell" when it comes to teen drinking. I drank a couple times a month in high school and I survived as did my friends.

These comments are not directed to the nervous nellies who always pat themselves on the back and are in an apparent arms race to show how protective they can be of their children. They believe that they love their too much to accept any risk and will go to herculean efforts to show how great of parents that they are. Unfortunately, these are lost causes and nothing that I or anyone could write will ever convince them that there are other reasonable alternatives.

Instead, this is for those parents who are willing to weigh the risk/rewards and are able to look beyond the following week. Such long thinkers are becoming increasingly rare in today's world!

Must be exhausting patting yourself on the back so relentlessly.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Juniors and seniors going to visit (and party with) college freshman friends is super common.

Maybe at your house it is.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:No. I used to visit my college friends when I was in high school and every event involved drinking and unacceptable behavior. I'm surprised I survived!

What is unacceptable? I also used to visit friends @ college when I was a senior. While I did partake, I was a cautious kid, so not one to overindulge.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No. I used to visit my college friends when I was in high school and every event involved drinking and unacceptable behavior. I'm surprised I survived!

Too many parents on this board want to coddle little billy/mary right up to the point that they leave the house. Then they are shocked when the sheltered child goes wild during first weeks of college.

I let my older during senior year visit friends at a couple of Universities in the fall. I suspect that there was drinking going on but I have always operated on a "don't ask / don't tell" when it comes to teen drinking. I drank a couple times a month in high school and I survived as did my friends.

These comments are not directed to the nervous nellies who always pat themselves on the back and are in an apparent arms race to show how protective they can be of their children. They believe that they love their too much to accept any risk and will go to herculean efforts to show how great of parents that they are. Unfortunately, these are lost causes and nothing that I or anyone could write will ever convince them that there are other reasonable alternatives.

Instead, this is for those parents who are willing to weigh the risk/rewards and are able to look beyond the following week. Such long thinkers are becoming increasingly rare in today's world!

And this is exactly what experts advise NOT doing.

Here's what my DS1 did not do any time in high school:

Stay alone in a house overnight without an adult
Go to visit any friends in college
Go to beach week
Do any drinking (or drug use) that I knew about (or even suspected. I actually don't think my DS1 did any drinking at all in high school. Which doesn't strike me as odd or unusual, because I didn't either.)

Here are some of the things my DS1 did his senior year:

Took public transit wherever he wanted, in groups and alone
Traveled via bus to and from his volunteer gig 2 days/week
Rode his bike to and from his part-time job
Did the family grocery shopping several times/month
Got to and from regular doctor appointment on his own (management of chronic condition)
Flew without adult supervision to and from grandparents' home
Took metro alone to Union Station and boarded Amtrak train for solo trip to Philly, where he met family friends for a weekend stay

IOW, he was given a great deal of freedom. Just not the freedom to get wasted while I looked the other way.

He's a sophomore in college now and doing very well, no indication of "going wild."

[Anonymous]

I did this when I was a senior in high school. To try to convince my parents, I made a word document that I entitled "I AM SO RESPONSIBLE.doc" that outlined all of my transportation plans (trip was not easy and involved multiple buses). I somehow still have it nearly 20 years later!

I was a good kid who didn't drink in high school, which might have helped. This was also pretty late in my senior year (maybe April?), and I think my parents realized that it wasn't too long until I was in college myself and could do whatever I wanted.

[Anonymous]

I can go on my daughter's instagram right now and find at least a dozen junior/senior girls who were partying at colleges this past weekend.

[Anonymous]

... and that's not good

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No. I used to visit my college friends when I was in high school and every event involved drinking and unacceptable behavior. I'm surprised I survived!

Too many parents on this board want to coddle little billy/mary right up to the point that they leave the house. Then they are shocked when the sheltered child goes wild during first weeks of college.

I let my older during senior year visit friends at a couple of Universities in the fall. I suspect that there was drinking going on but I have always operated on a "don't ask / don't tell" when it comes to teen drinking. I drank a couple times a month in high school and I survived as did my friends.

These comments are not directed to the nervous nellies who always pat themselves on the back and are in an apparent arms race to show how protective they can be of their children. They believe that they love their too much to accept any risk and will go to herculean efforts to show how great of parents that they are. Unfortunately, these are lost causes and nothing that I or anyone could write will ever convince them that there are other reasonable alternatives.

Instead, this is for those parents who are willing to weigh the risk/rewards and are able to look beyond the following week. Such long thinkers are becoming increasingly rare in today's world!

Do you think that 16 year old HS kids are too young to visit their college friends overnight? What about 15? How about 14, 13, 12? Would you let your 14 year old go to a fraternity party with college students?

To my way of thinking they are going to be kids for such a short time. HS is a milestone in their lives and they should be enjoying being in HS and having the extra supervision (and security) of mom and dad for a little while longer. They will be graduated from HS soon enough, those days will be over and they will never be able to go back to them ever again. Let them enjoy being teenagers in HS while they still can. College, dorms, roommates, and college social events can wait.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I can go on my daughter's instagram right now and find at least a dozen junior/senior girls who were partying at colleges this past weekend.

2 Kool for Highskool I guess.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No. I used to visit my college friends when I was in high school and every event involved drinking and unacceptable behavior. I'm surprised I survived!

Too many parents on this board want to coddle little billy/mary right up to the point that they leave the house. Then they are shocked when the sheltered child goes wild during first weeks of college.

I let my older during senior year visit friends at a couple of Universities in the fall. I suspect that there was drinking going on but I have always operated on a "don't ask / don't tell" when it comes to teen drinking. I drank a couple times a month in high school and I survived as did my friends.

These comments are not directed to the nervous nellies who always pat themselves on the back and are in an apparent arms race to show how protective they can be of their children. They believe that they love their too much to accept any risk and will go to herculean efforts to show how great of parents that they are. Unfortunately, these are lost causes and nothing that I or anyone could write will ever convince them that there are other reasonable alternatives.

Instead, this is for those parents who are willing to weigh the risk/rewards and are able to look beyond the following week. Such long thinkers are becoming increasingly rare in today's world!

Do you think that 16 year old HS kids are too young to visit their college friends overnight? What about 15? How about 14, 13, 12? Would you let your 14 year old go to a fraternity party with college students?

To my way of thinking they are going to be kids for such a short time. HS is a milestone in their lives and they should be enjoying being in HS and having the extra supervision (and security) of mom and dad for a little while longer. They will be graduated from HS soon enough, those days will be over and they will never be able to go back to them ever again. Let them enjoy being teenagers in HS while they still can. College, dorms, roommates, and college social events can wait.

Straw man argument