Reply to Purdue President’s Op-Ed

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I think it’s an important read for many on DCUM — don’t be like the moms he references.  Let your college kids figure stuff out on their own!

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/05/06/mothers-day-helicopter-parenting/[/quote]

OP, are you a woman? You shoud be ashamed of yourself if you are. We have got to take the country and our lives back from these sexist, mysoginist pigs. What a hateful, horrible

man. If my kid were at Purdue (he's not, he's at a top 10 university, t thankfully), I would not pay another dime of tuition until this man releases a apology. Shameful.[/quote]

OP here.  Yes, I am a woman.  Do you think the actual requests and commands that he mentions are appropriate?  I hear this type of thing over and over from people who work in colleges and even at workplaces.  The infantalizing of our adult children has to stop.[/quote]

[b]But not a single mention of men.[/b] It's mean-spirited at best but more accurately a reflection of the diretion this country is headed. We are no longer moving forward as women. I feel it in my life everyday. Being belittled and looked down on by men. So some moms can't let go. Of course I believe that. But so the hell what? Why do I care? I don't do that. What I do see everyday is my husband leaving every single aspect of parenting to me. Treating me as if I'm the hire help, even as I hold down a full-time, WOH job, and he doesn't. This guy is a sexist and is joining the whilte men chorus in taking women back down. Wake up.[/quote]

You obviously didn't read the op-ed. While I am no fan of the former Indiana governor, I have been a professor for 20 years, and I empathize with the sentiment expressed in the op-ed. 90% of the parental involvement, nay, intrusion, with regard to college student experience comes from mothers. I'm sure this is due to a number of sociological and cultural factors, but yes, moms need to back off. [/quote]

I'm a professor too--have taught at 3 very different kinds of institutions over 2 decades.  Be honest what percentage of parental involvement have you experienced directly?  Total up your students.  Give a percentage of how many you have taught that you have had ANY contact with their parents outside of graduation, let alone egregious involvement.  Your 90% figure is meaningless a commentary on moms, if it's anywhere like mine,  less than 1% of my students.[/quote]

Right on professor! That first "professor" clearly isn't one at my child's prestigious university, because they lack any ability for critical thinking. Obviously another woman-hating man. [/quote]

Critical thinking goes both ways. I'd be wary of arguing with "only a few." If a college had only a handful of transgender students, and the president wrote an op-ed about policies enacted to protect those students, would you also say that only 1% is meaningless? [/quote]

Your point makes no sense. The issue is the making a commentary about "moms" and then describing the behavior of a few "moms" he finds problematic when the reality is that anyone who works in higher ed knows this represents a tiny percentage of students' mothers.  This isn't like protecting the interests of a small minority like transgender students.

I have a similar less than 1% of students who complain about their grades, give excuses I find laughable, make unreasonable demands like me recounting all we covered in a class that they missed. Does that mean I should write commentaries on how my students as a whole need to be less annoying and entitled?  Should I comment that it tends to be the white men who do this more and therefore extend that to my critique of white male students writ large?  No, it means like all social situations there are going to be a few people whose behavior I find problematic and I complain about their individual behaviors and not extend it to the group to which I think they belong.[/quote]

Um, professors, I don’t think any of you understood the first professor’s post. They said 90% of parental involvement comes from mothers. Not that 90% of their students’ mothers get involved. It could be 90% of your 1% for that professor. [/quote]

That was exactly my point.  The prior professor agreed with the op-ed  that "moms need to back off"  because 90% of their experience of  parental involvement was moms.  But never clarified what the overall percentage of parental involvement was.  If it's less than 1% of parents involved at all, it is bad reasoning to think that they have anything meaningful to comment on "moms" as a broad category.[/quote]

I'm the first professor. There are a lot of things that involve just a tiny, tiny percentage of students, but take up a disproportionate amount of mental energy--like moms emailing professors about their child's low grade. The vast majority of my students' parents are hands off, but I have had a handful of nightmare scenarios with parents, in my case 100% moms, who were massive drains on my time and energy. On a couple of occasions, their complaints would escalate up to chairs, then deans, and on up. If you're an assistant professor or an adjunct, these sorts of complaints cause a tremendous amount stress because you are afraid of losing your job over it.
As I said, I'm not a fan of the Purdue president, but I don't know of a single long-time professor who hasn't had an experience with a disgruntled parent. 
Yes, the president does sound old and out-of-touch with his mother's day rhetoric, but the point of helicopter moms is not completely off base.[/quote]

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