Life 360 in College

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We've been on Life360 for many years and I'm glad that this has never been an issue with privacy. We all see it as a security and convenience feature. My kids are now 17 and 20 and have never asked to deactivate. I travel overseas frequently and they actually are the ones who check on me. My DS has been so thoughtful about even calling or texting any of us if he sees we are driving.

Lol.. one of my kids texted me.. thought you are at work today. What are you doing at home?

Is that really necessary though, I mean I don’t want my kids worrying About what I’m doing nor do I want to worry about what they are doing. There’s something to be said about having too much information.

It's not like we are checking it all.the.time. It's just when we need to find someone for something- which isn't "too much information"
We share cars in our family so knowing where a car might be is important information.

Trust me you can live without it. If the car isn’t home, someone has it, you can always text and they will respond if not driving.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We've been on Life360 for many years and I'm glad that this has never been an issue with privacy. We all see it as a security and convenience feature. My kids are now 17 and 20 and have never asked to deactivate. I travel overseas frequently and they actually are the ones who check on me. My DS has been so thoughtful about even calling or texting any of us if he sees we are driving.

Lol.. one of my kids texted me.. thought you are at work today. What are you doing at home?

Is that really necessary though, I mean I don’t want my kids worrying About what I’m doing nor do I want to worry about what they are doing. There’s something to be said about having too much information.

It's not like we are checking it all.the.time. It's just when we need to find someone for something- which isn't "too much information"
We share cars in our family so knowing where a car might be is important information.

You can put a tracker on the car.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:WTH is Find My Friends? I hate iPhones and don't have one.

Why do you hate iPhones?

[Anonymous]

We didn’t do Life 360, but my kids know that as long as I’m buying the phone and it’s on my plan, Find My Friends is on. I have a college junior and it is on right now.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:WTH is Find My Friends? I hate iPhones and don't have one.

Why do you hate iPhones?

I have never had an iphone because I like all the adroid options when buying..more choices in terms of price and features. I feel like once you have an iphone you are an Apple person for electronics and just buy what Apple puts out. (not the I hate iphone person)

[Anonymous]

We didn't track our oldest ever. However, it is helpful the younger sibs can track the older. Used it mainly when oldest was out and about at college and I'd get notification of a shooting/robbery in the area (went to a Jesuit university so we got a lot of those notifications from right "on campus"). If they didn't respond to my text, I'd have younger sib check that they were safe.
Senior year there were two weekends with shootings in the main bar area/near the NBA games watch zone and I knew my kid was watching the game in that area. Many kids from their university were in the bars when shooting happened and had to "hit the ground" and wait it out. Thankfully my kid responded to my texts so I didn't need to "track".

Middle sib was not tracked---never gave us a reason to. But other sibs can track if we need a location or have reason to be concerned (incidences where they are at college)

Youngest sib was tracked in HS with "find my phone" simply because they kept forgetting to inform us when they arrived at their location (our rules for first year after license is to text when you arrive and let us know when driving elsewhere---we don't care where they were going, we trust them, we just wanted notification that they were driving and when they arrived safely). So we activated "find my phone" as a consequence for not remembering to provide us the information.

[Anonymous]

We talk everyday and yesterday I asked DD her plans for the night. “Homework and hanging with friends” was her answer. Great. Have fun!

This morning we noticed we didn’t get the alert she had come back to her house. A quick check of Life360 showed she was at her GF’s house.

Of course she doesn’t have to check in and we know plans change. The little skip our heart made this am was settled knowing she was somewhere safe.

And before you ask, we have been to her GF’s and knew the location just by the surrounding streets we saw on the app.

For those who ask what we would think of our parents had this capability, this is truly a non-starter. Our privacy erosion began long after our parents had us: there really is no going back.

Our daughter asked to keep it in for safety. We don’t track each other but from time to time we do look on at each other especially when we are traveling and on different hemispheres.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:In our family everyone that has a phone has the free version of Life 360. That includes parents, teens and college students. My kids can see where I am and I can see where they are...if I look. Don't give me a reason to look and I won't. I have enough other things to keep me busy. But we are honest with our kids and they have figured out that having our trust is worth it. Our oldest is a junior in college and goes to school out of state. She has said she likes that we have it. She considers it a safety back up. She checks on us more than we check on her. Typically she checks to see if we are at home or if we are out so she knows if she can call home. I check our 17 year old at night since he works late and closes the building he works at. I'm not going to go to sleep until he is home so I like to know if he has left work yet. My husband and I both have it and our kids have seen that in our marriage we don't have anything to hide from each other. Since we don't have anything to hide then the app is just for safety and continence.

Our reasoning is fairly similar. We have 4 kids in college this year and 3 kids middle and high school. None of our kids in college have removed it (they have the ability to if they want). I know they still use it to check on where their dad or I are, and we know because they told us when they've called from college, "Hey Mom, I know you and Dad are at xxx but I need to know yyy."

It works for our family. If it doesn't work for yours, then that's fine, too. Indeed, if you don't like my explanation and feel you need to make a snarky remark or ask a falsely insincere question, then that says more about you than us.

This^^. I don't actively track my oldest. But they attended college in an area where I routinely get "safety alerts" 1-2/week, ranging from robbery/mugging/shootings/etc. One year, a shooting 5 blocks from campus had a bullet ricochet and hit their dorm on the 9th floor, in a study lounge my kid often studied in; when we moved them out after graduation, there was a safety alert for an attempted car jacking, that car was parked 15 ft from my kid's rental home 2 hours after graduation, and we heard gunshots during our final walk thru campus. So while I didn't track them, the younger siblings do "find my phone" as a group and if oldest did not respond to "are you safe" text, then I'd ask them to just track where older sib was. But I never did it in a creepy way---just when there was a true concern. Thankfully, 99% of time, my kid responded to my texts. Or would tell me after an incident on campus, as they knew I'd be concerned

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We've been on Life360 for many years and I'm glad that this has never been an issue with privacy. We all see it as a security and convenience feature. My kids are now 17 and 20 and have never asked to deactivate. I travel overseas frequently and they actually are the ones who check on me. My DS has been so thoughtful about even calling or texting any of us if he sees we are driving.

Lol.. one of my kids texted me.. thought you are at work today. What are you doing at home?

Is that really necessary though, I mean I don’t want my kids worrying About what I’m doing nor do I want to worry about what they are doing. There’s something to be said about having too much information.

It's not like we are checking it all.the.time. It's just when we need to find someone for something- which isn't "too much information"
We share cars in our family so knowing where a car might be is important information.

Trust me you can live without it. If the car isn’t home, someone has it, you can always text and they will respond if not driving.

sure it's not a need. But it's a nice feature if you aren't creepy about tracking. I also prefer NOT to text my teens/college students when they are likely driving. Don't want to give them any reason to check their phone when driving. So why not use the app? You can have the ability to track your family and not be a helicopter parent

[Anonymous]

Not really.

[Anonymous]

I think having life 360 is a red flag for abusive parenting

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I think having life 360 is a red flag for abusive parenting

Well I don’t think you can make that blanket statement but once your kid turns 18, you need to let that go.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:In our family everyone that has a phone has the free version of Life 360. That includes parents, teens and college students. My kids can see where I am and I can see where they are...if I look. Don't give me a reason to look and I won't. I have enough other things to keep me busy. But we are honest with our kids and they have figured out that having our trust is worth it. Our oldest is a junior in college and goes to school out of state. She has said she likes that we have it. She considers it a safety back up. She checks on us more than we check on her. Typically she checks to see if we are at home or if we are out so she knows if she can call home. I check our 17 year old at night since he works late and closes the building he works at. I'm not going to go to sleep until he is home so I like to know if he has left work yet. My husband and I both have it and our kids have seen that in our marriage we don't have anything to hide from each other. Since we don't have anything to hide then the app is just for safety and continence.

Our reasoning is fairly similar. We have 4 kids in college this year and 3 kids middle and high school. None of our kids in college have removed it (they have the ability to if they want). I know they still use it to check on where their dad or I are, and we know because they told us when they've called from college, "Hey Mom, I know you and Dad are at xxx but I need to know yyy."

It works for our family. If it doesn't work for yours, then that's fine, too. Indeed, if you don't like my explanation and feel you need to make a snarky remark or ask a falsely insincere question, then that says more about you than us.

This^^. I don't actively track my oldest. But they attended college in an area where I routinely get "safety alerts" 1-2/week, ranging from robbery/mugging/shootings/etc. One year, a shooting 5 blocks from campus had a bullet ricochet and hit their dorm on the 9th floor, in a study lounge my kid often studied in; when we moved them out after graduation, there was a safety alert for an attempted car jacking, that car was parked 15 ft from my kid's rental home 2 hours after graduation, and we heard gunshots during our final walk thru campus. So while I didn't track them, the younger siblings do "find my phone" as a group and if oldest did not respond to "are you safe" text, then I'd ask them to just track where older sib was. But I never did it in a creepy way---just when there was a true concern. Thankfully, 99% of time, my kid responded to my texts. Or would tell me after an incident on campus, as they knew I'd be concerned

University of Chicago?

[Anonymous]

"To the parents using life 360, or tracking their kids in college, how would you have felt when you were in college and your parents were tracking you?

Would you have been ok with that?"

Funny you should ask. When I was young and single living in DC and didn't know anywhere here yet, I would have loved to have had a free and easy way to let my family know where I was.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We talk everyday and yesterday I asked DD her plans for the night. “Homework and hanging with friends” was her answer. Great. Have fun!

This morning we noticed we didn’t get the alert she had come back to her house. A quick check of Life360 showed she was at her GF’s house.

Of course she doesn’t have to check in and we know plans change. The little skip our heart made this am was settled knowing she was somewhere safe.

And before you ask, we have been to her GF’s and knew the location just by the surrounding streets we saw on the app.

For those who ask what we would think of our parents had this capability, this is truly a non-starter. Our privacy erosion began long after our parents had us: there really is no going back.

Our daughter asked to keep it in for safety. We don’t track each other but from time to time we do look on at each other especially when we are traveling and on different hemispheres.

You get an alert that she has gotten home?! Omg my kids would absolutely rebel. This is too much people.