College and Meeting Your Future Spouse

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:So he's in the market for some frat boy for your DD? Is he cool with them meeting the morning after their first sexual experience?

I'd never recommend that my DD date a frat guy or step into a frat house - bunch of aggressive drooling losers waiting to spike your drink. Why bring one home?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:there was already a thread a few months ago on this - the op said "lets be serious, many of us are wanting our kids to go to elite schools so they can get into elite dating pools".

it absolutely shapes your dating pool even after graduation.

op's dh is smart.

Does this hold true even for the SLACs? Seem like such a small pool to begin with.

It's VERY true at swat.

Lots of swatties end up marrying each other

[Anonymous]

If you buy into OP's premise, is a SLAC or a large prestigious State U (like Michigan) the way to go to maximize chances of finding a suitable spouse.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If you buy into OP's premise, is a SLAC or a large prestigious State U (like Michigan) the way to go to maximize chances of finding a suitable spouse.

Slac

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:there was already a thread a few months ago on this - the op said "lets be serious, many of us are wanting our kids to go to elite schools so they can get into elite dating pools".

it absolutely shapes your dating pool even after graduation.

op's dh is smart.

Does this hold true even for the SLACs? Seem like such a small pool to begin with.

It's VERY true at swat.

Lots of swatties end up marrying each other

What do you consider "lots"?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If you buy into OP's premise, is a SLAC or a large prestigious State U (like Michigan) the way to go to maximize chances of finding a suitable spouse.

Nope. At big state schools the wealthy kids join Greek life, which means they're constantly hanging around the same 400-600 peers.

[Anonymous]

Met my spouse at a prestigious SLAC. Got engaged the week after graduation and married a year later. We were unusual.

The dad in the original post sounds like he needs some boundaries put in place by his daughter.

[Anonymous]

My husband and I met though mutual college friends but never met each other in college during the couple of years we overlapped. The majority of his friends met in college and married soon after, and over 50% of them are divorced now, many on second long-term relationships.

Has your husband recently suffered a head injury or has he always been that ridiculous? Presumably, you're shellout out for college so your DC can get an education that leads to independence. This isn't the 1950/1960s (and, even in the 60s, my grandfather sent both his daughters to college with the explicit instruction that they were there to get an education, and he would not support any wedding that occurred before graduation day). I also found the downside to Greek life outweigh the positives and many men I encountered who were in fraternities were nice on their own but not people I wanted to be around in a group setting, particularly if alcohol was involved.

What does your DC say about this?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Wow. I know very few people who met their spouse in college.

I had a serious boyfriend for most of college; we broke up right before graduation. I like to joke that in my parents' era, he would have been my "starter husband" and I would have been divorced by age 25.

This is exactly what happened with my husband and his first wife. They dated all through college and married a year after graduation. Divorced by 24. We are counseling our kids to at least wait several years after college before thinking about marriage. Live a little!

[Anonymous]

Younger age groups want to sahm more and earlier so they will think about this more than gen x

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Your DH is nuts. Really.
We didn't meet in college.

He's not nuts at all. Lots of people meet their spouses in college or later on through friends that they made in college.

Totally agree. I'm not saying it should be the main factor, and certainly not determinative. But is there something unhealthy with thinking it to be a real possibility?

What is so bad about this thinking?

[Anonymous]

Measured and balanced folks realize how common it is to meet your spouse in college (or via college social circle) - which is why folks are so obsessed with their kids attending the “right” college. We all know what “right” means.

Then you’ll get the bitter souls on forums who either didn’t meet anyone in college or attended a non-peer college, so they bash their keyboards to convince us dating pools in college don’t matter. So sad.

[Anonymous]

It's certainly less effort to meet someone in college. It actually benefited my career to have met my spouse in college (although we married years later). I focused on my professional goals and didn't have to stress about finding a mate. Not that anyone has to stress about that. I just personally did know that I wanted to have kids and wanted a partner I loved to share that with.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Measured and balanced folks realize how common it is to meet your spouse in college (or via college social circle) - which is why folks are so obsessed with their kids attending the “right” college. We all know what “right” means.

Then you’ll get the bitter souls on forums who either didn’t meet anyone in college or attended a non-peer college, so they bash their keyboards to convince us dating pools in college don’t matter. So sad.

What's sad is a parent focusing on the potential dating pool at a college as a selection criteria. Of course many people marry somebody they met in college.....I did.....but the regressive idea that a parent contemplates their child's future spouse when they're 17 is idiotic.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you buy into OP's premise, is a SLAC or a large prestigious State U (like Michigan) the way to go to maximize chances of finding a suitable spouse.

Slac

What's your logic? SLACs are by definition small, maybe 2000 kids at the larger ones. Seems like statistically a big state school offers up more fish in the pond.