Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Academic parents can be intense and competitive, but I've seen no crazy ones. Sports parents, on the other hand, with the shouting and the insults...

Where would you see Academic parents in their setting? Standing behind their child at the SAT's screaming in their face to finish? You don't see them because they are at home abusing their children to take the top classes, to get only A's, to guilt them when they get any grade lower, to deny them socialization, etc...

we are academic parents. We encourage and help when needed. Sorry your kid is an academic failure and you need to take it out on us.

My DS is more academically successful than athletically. He does participate in HS sports but is typically on the bench. But his GPA is 4.0 in a rigourous private school.

The thing is, you don't see a lot of parents bragging about their kids' grades, but you do see a lot of bragging about athletic achievements. Recently I mentioned to a friend that DS was nominated to NHS. Her DS is very successful on the lacrosse field, but not so much in the classroom. I could tell it clearly annoyed her. But it's okay for her to tell me her DS scored 3 goals at the game. I guess it must be socially acceptable to brag about athletic achievements but not so much for academic.

Anonymous wrote:Academic parents can be intense and competitive, but I've seen no crazy ones. Sports parents, on the other hand, with the shouting and the insults...

Where would you see Academic parents in their setting? Standing behind their child at the SAT's screaming in their face to finish? You don't see them because they are at home abusing their children to take the top classes, to get only A's, to guilt them when they get any grade lower, to deny them socialization, etc...

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP here. One of the reasons I asked is, DS, senior, did his calculus midterm 100% right and then just put the answers on the sheet and the teacher very specifically asked for all the work to be shown, and he threw away the work, hence he got a D. This lowered his grade to a B, and I am really trying not to overreact, as I thought he is past this careless nonsense. He was mad at the teacher, and it was plain in site on top of it, "show all your work." He is also in sports, but in that I always say to him, it is just a sport in the end.

Was it an in-class exam? Couldn't he have got the page with the work out of the trash? Was the teacher's concern that lack of showing work could indicate cheating?

It is important to learn to follow directions. It's a hard lesson to learn, but better now than in college or in the work world.

I wish it was in class exam. No, it was online course, and his midterm was proctored, he handed the papers to the proctor and by the time he gave it to the teacher and she graded, one week has passed. I just had a hard time with him blaming the proctor and then the teacher, but I didn't lose my temper or anything. I always keep telling myself to remember how much I stressed over As, and had all As all my life, and in the end it didn't really impact my life nor my career. But, I will admit that it wasn't easy keeping my cool.

I've come across some crazy academic parents over the years in our MCPS schools. But I've also seen a few disturbing interactions at travel soccer games and one particularly bad one at a rec baseball game. Not really sure which is worse. It's just bad parenting either way. Let kids be kids.

Anonymous wrote:OP here. One of the reasons I asked is, DS, senior, did his calculus midterm 100% right and then just put the answers on the sheet and the teacher very specifically asked for all the work to be shown, and he threw away the work, hence he got a D. This lowered his grade to a B, and I am really trying not to overreact, as I thought he is past this careless nonsense. He was mad at the teacher, and it was plain in site on top of it, "show all your work." He is also in sports, but in that I always say to him, it is just a sport in the end.

Was it an in-class exam? Couldn't he have got the page with the work out of the trash? Was the teacher's concern that lack of showing work could indicate cheating?

It is important to learn to follow directions. It's a hard lesson to learn, but better now than in college or in the work world.

Sports by far. Our daughter did rec soccer and was on the chillest team ever but we played some teams with crazy ass parents, Now she's on travel and its the worst. (I am hoping she decides one year is enough). I can barely go to the games anymore because it is just so ugly. Come on people, these girls are 12 and I'm pretty sure none of them will become professional soccer players.

OP here. One of the reasons I asked is, DS, senior, did his calculus midterm 100% right and then just put the answers on the sheet and the teacher very specifically asked for all the work to be shown, and he threw away the work, hence he got a D. This lowered his grade to a B, and I am really trying not to overreact, as I thought he is past this careless nonsense. He was mad at the teacher, and it was plain in site on top of it, "show all your work." He is also in sports, but in that I always say to him, it is just a sport in the end.

Thread makes me recall a teammate's dad in high school. The dad was a loudmouth arrogant son of bitch. Used to harass high school bball refs from the stands.

Get this, the dad was an oral surgeon, in a small town this made him a fairly prominent community member.

Kid was an even bigger asshole. The only good thing was that his son was dumb as doornails and never as great as he thought. Went d2.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP here. I will give an example of a sport's parent. This dad, kid was about 10 at the time, yelled and coached his son and got kicked out by the ref. Another sport's parent yelled during the game at her son and his team, "You got them in your clutches now, crush them," while the parents of the other team were right in front of her, no less. I agree with sport's parent being the more visible ones to all.

I agree that the sports parents are more overtly crazy, but the academic parents do just as much damage, as a PP said. Take it easy on your kids, people!

+1000

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Neither. DCUM parents win it hands down.

I guess you would know, as you just called yourself crazy. Unless you are not a parent but a pervert trolling this site?

Why would perverts troll this site? They are much more likely to show the social media accounts of parents in order to see pictures of kids.

"show" should be "troll". Stupid autocorrect!

Well I have a kid who is a brilliant, hard working student and an immesely talented and hard working athlete. I think there are lots of other kids in this area who are both - great in school and gifted in a sport, or at least we know many. This kind of kid often comes with a specific personality type that results in working hard at both. These kids are usually the ones who end up playing a sport at the DI level at an Ivy. There are truly lots of the kids in this area, especially at the privates.

I care more about the academics but who ever sees how I encourage my child academically? On the other hand, everyone sees me cheering for her during her games. You cant really judge these things from the outside.

The return is much higher with academic preparation.

However parents spend insane amounts of money and time to encourage a particular sport. Once college comes around they're so locked into the suck cost that they're willing to send their kid to a lower ranked school that promises a spot on the team (no scholarship!)

There was a thread recently about "signing day" and how proud the parents were of their kids for making it on any team. It sounds like a scam quite honestly. You spend tons of money on a sport in hopes of a scholarship, but when college comes around you end up having to restrict your choices to lower ranked schools just so your kid can make it on a team. And you're still paying the full tuition!

Sigh. People love sports though.

I'm not sure you can really generalize. There are crazy and not crazy parents involved in every EC. That being said, the majority of the parents with an over-the-top focus on academics and academic competition I personally know do not have much experience with sports either personally or via their kids. A lot of them secretly or openly assume that anyone who is great at a sport is a "dumb jock". I also know a lot of people who lose their minds at kids sporting events, but they tend to be very focused on their kids' academic success. I think virtually everyone I've met in this area cares a lot about academics, which is not surprising given the highly educated populace.

I've actually thought about this issue a lot as the parent of one brilliant kid who is a good, but not exceptional athlete and one brilliant athlete who is a very good, but not exceptional student. It's kind of depressing how prevalent the "dumb jock" stereotype still is in this day and age. On the plus side, I am glad to live in an area where girls get respect and positive attention for being great students. That wasn't the case all those years ago in the small southern town I grew up in.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Neither. DCUM parents win it hands down.

I guess you would know, as you just called yourself crazy. Unless you are not a parent but a pervert trolling this site?

No not a pervert but I think you just proved my point by your expert level of personal attack and troll comment.

I read DCUM sometimes because I have 3 kids. But the level of competitiveness and status checking is truly insane.

You read and post on DCUM, you are a parent, hence per your own words DCUM parents win the crazy contest, hence you are DCUM parent, ergo you are crazy.

Yes okay I will accept that. Unlike all of you are getting defensive. Clearly I have touched a nerve!