Anyone's kid take a year off during college?

Parent Cafe
1

My daughter is a junior at Wellesley, currently studying in Aix-en-Provence for the entire school year. She loves it there and even though she is struggling with mental health issues that have plagued her since high school, she is thriving. She lives with a lovely French family, has connected well with the community there, and likes three of her four classes.

We went to visit her earlier this month (flew home hours before the attacks in Paris), and while we were there, she told us that she was sick of the intensity of Wellesley and and may want to take a year off before beginning her senior year.

I am okay, but not thrilled, with this idea. I think part of her concern is the immense pressure she puts on herself. (For example, she has a 3.9 GPA in a school with so-called “grade deflation.”) I suggested that rather than taking time off, she should give herself permission not to perform at such a high level and just to have more fun.

My concern is that if she takes time off, she may not go back and finish because she will build up such anxiety in her mind that it may not be possible. I feel that if she goes back and just confronts her anxiety by easing up on the pressure she puts on herself, she will stand a better chance of completing her degree. It seems to me that learning when to let up on oneself is an important life skill and one she needs to learn before going out into the workforce.

Has anyone else dealt with this type of thing? (kid with mental health issues, time off, etc.)

2

My S took a year off between sophomore and junior years. He was also battling some depression and anxiety issues at a school known for grade deflation. He set very high standards for himself and couldn’t balance having fun and getting good grades. He got good grades but the joy was gone.

He worked a few different jobs throughout the year, none of them high pressure. He saw a counselor, got on appropriate meds, and got the anxiety and depression under control. With help he figured out what would work best for him, and that was switching schools. He is back in school but living at home. He is working on the weekends and enjoying a social life. Grades are still good and he is much more relaxed for the most part. He does not regret taking that year to get things figured out.

3

My daughter is taking next semester off to do an internship at Disney. I’m not sure she’ll go bsck. She thinks she wii but you just never know. One concern for me was her scholarships. Her merit aid is small, but it’s for 8 consecutive semesters. She has permission to take one semester, but if she doesn’t go right back she’ll lose that funding.

4

Has she said what she would actually do during her year off? If she has a specific plan, that’s different from Someone just assuming she can live at home and do nothing?

5

Thanks, all, for your replies. She doesn’t yet have a plan, but we would certainly require her to have one if she really decided to do this. She doesn’t have any aid money, and this is one reason why I really want her to finish at Wellesley, which she loved for the first two years. Her mental health is vital, but we have also, in good faith, invested a great deal in her education, and it would be a shame for her not to get that degree. I think that if she can truly understand that she doesn’t need to graduate with Latin honors, she’ll let go and have a lot more fun her senior year.

6

I took a year and a half off back in the day. I was a dance major and wanted to try my hand at a professional career. I also went to a college very far from home and really wasn’t mature enough to handle it at the time. I see that now only in hindsight. I had a pretty devastating injury and spent some time in pt and realized the dream was just that. I went back to a different school, and after all I had done felt a bit like a fish out of water so I worked and went to school and graduated as fast as possible.

7

I have no experience to offer, but I think I would tell her there’s no need to decide now. She may find that spending the entire year abroad is kind of like a year off from Wellesley and be ready to go back next August or September.

I know someone–a long time ago–who felt that way about Amherst. He went back for his senior year after spending a year abroad. He was unhappy but decided it would be worse if he took time off and went back after his closest friends had graduated. So, he went back and finished up.

So, I’d tell her to just postpone the decision til at least March or so and see how she feels then. She may want to live off campus her senior year; that may help too.

8

My son is in a rotating co-op program so he worked this summer and this next year he will work spring & fall and only go to school during the summer. What I have learned from that is at least at his school you can only take 2 “semesters” off in a row. Otherwise you have to reapply. In other words if he were to take a year off he would have to reapply because summer session is considered a “semester”. You might want to look into that at her school to make sure she can take a year off without having to reapply.

9

Does Wellesley offer a summer session? Perhaps she could take enough classes during the summer and finish up in December. It is not clear to me what her reason is for not wanting to return for her senior year. She is just so close to graduating that it would be a shame to agree to the year off if you think it is unlikely she will return and finish.

What is Wellesley’s policy about the number of credits that need to completed at Wellesley to qualify for the Wellesley diploma? I believe they also have cross registration with schools in the Boston area- would she consider taking some classes at another school?

10

Could she take a reduced load of just 2 courses (for reduced tuition)? Some schools have this opton. It would allow her to cut back/enjoy school more and wouldn’t have the issue of a complete break so she may not return. Maybe with extra time could do some research or just work at a job.

My ds has a hard time with letting go and not worrying about grades/honors. He puts a lot of pressure on himself. Even when I say, find some easy, enjoyable electives - or use pass/fail, he doesnt seem to get that.

11

I don’t know if Wellesley allows a reduced load without some compelling medical reason, but I will suggest that she look into this. The school knows about her history of anxiety and depression, so maybe they would be open to this if she asked. I am hoping that she just relaxes more while she is in France and really gets some perspective.

Thanks so much for all of your suggestions!

12

My D took a semester off after freshman year. Her situation was different from your D’s in some respects, in that she was miserable the whole first year and wanted to transfer someplace else. But it was similar in others – perfectionism, and too many consecutive years of high-pressure academics (she’d been in IB since 6th grade). And she had struggled with depression, which I think is entwined with the perfectionism. At the end of freshman year, she applied for a personal leave of one year, and intended never to go back there. Spoiler alert: :slight_smile: She found she missed it more than she’d ever imagined she would, and went back after only a semester off, ended up loving it, and graduated with honors.

Like you, we worried that she’d never finish school, but we knew that in her state of mind, nothing good was going to come of forcing her to stay, and we could see that she really did need a break from school. So we reluctantly allowed her to apply for the leave. One thing we did which eased our minds just a little: Before she left, we required her to come up with a concrete plan as to how she was going to finish college, including what schools she could transfer to, and how it would be paid for since she’d be giving up a hefty scholarship if she left her school. She also had to give us a detailed plan about what she’d be doing during the time off. Your D’s situation isn’t nearly that dire, but you may want to have that conversation with her about her year off, and about what it will be like going back for senior year which will start making it concrete in her head that she really will go back.

But what helped the most was, as much as we could, letting go. Somewhere in that miserable spring of 2010, we made the decision in our own minds that this was her life, her education, her choice. Ultimately, we really had no control over what she’d do. We could only control us, and that included not alienating her from us by trying to force our wishes on her. So we tried to be supportive of D the person, as opposed to D the student. We constantly reminded ourselves (and occasionally told her) that she was an adult, that she knew the situation and the stakes and the difficulties, that she was capable of making this decision. We were always available for advice or as sounding boards, and we did encourage her to think things through. But we tried as best we could to back off, wayyyy off. Don’t get me wrong, we 100% wanted her to go back, but we decided that if it wasn’t meant to be, we had to be OK with whatever alternate path she chose. And we decided that if she did go back she – not we – should “own” it. We communicated that to her too, which (she told us much later) was tremendously helpful to her in trying to separate what SHE wanted from parental expectations. It helped us sleep better at night, understanding that it wasn’t up to us to control the outcome.

So my thoughts FWIW: Your D is a smart and accomplished young lady, and she understands the importance of a diploma. I completely get the academic exhaustion, which is not the same thing as rejecting education. Help her talk through the decision and try to tease out concrete plans. Support and encourage her. Be available as a sounding board. And then leave her to her own decision process. I think it’s highly likely that she’ll go back, but even if she doesn’t, she’s not going to end up waiting tables for life, She will take another path to wonderful things. I’d put money on it. :slight_smile:

I like @Python20 's suggestion of taking a fun easy elective. You may want to suggest that to her, or even a 101 class in a totally different field which has always intrigued her. If you can get her to browse the course catalog, even better, because it makes it more specific and more real.

13

@Lasma, this is great advice, thank you!. I do think it’s a combination of being exhausted by all her hard work, and discovering that it doesn’t really have to be that way. I am hoping that she can bring home some of the fun-loving, kir-drinking French lifestyle to offset the intense pressure she will feel when she sets foot on the Wellesley campus again. Hard work without any joy isn’t healthy.

14

None of mine have , but a young man who we embrace as a son that isn’t related to us did this. He worked for us during summers in high school and college and was close friends with my oldest daughter.
Thanks for the thread because it reminded me to shoot him a text to invite him to drop by for Thanksgiving :slight_smile:
He comes to visit us a few times a year despite no longer living in the area

15

Mental Health can be a compelling medical reason…Just saying

One thing to beware - schools have different reasons for taking a leave. Some schools have a “medical” leave (that included mental health) but there may be required time for separation (year or more) and you may then have to apply for readmittance and jump thru many hoops. You don’t want that!!! Make sure any leave is just set as a personal leave and you can rejoin the next semester.

16

I was thinking about this and realized that your daughter has only been in Aix for 3 months or so. My niece did a semester in Aix 3 years ago and loved it. She spent almost every weekend traveling to Germany and Paris and Dublin to meet up with other friends on other programs. She went to Africa and Portugal and Spain for her break. She was surrounded by great art and music, lived in a little apartment with another girl and ‘Madam’. Her parents and brother came for a week and they ran around Paris with her parents paying. She really wanted to stay for the full year, but my sister said no as they just didn’t have the money. Of course it was more fun and exciting than her regular college life (which was in San Diego, so not at all a dreary place). However, after a full year she may really want to come home, to go back to her real life.

I think you should just have your daughter enjoy the year, and plan on going back but if it really doesn’t seem right to return, then make plans for something else next spring. Could she stay in France and graduate from a school there with a second year? Is there another school she’d rather go to? Could she graduate early from Wellesley?

17

“My concern is that if she takes time off, she may not go back and finish”

I expect that Wellesley will let her return to finish her senior year whenever it is that she decides to - even 20 or 30 years from now. Don’t worry about that. If she wants a Wellesley degree, she’ll go back eventually.

18

I can relate to this. DD was at a top LAC as well and got “fed up” with classes in general despite (maybe because?) a high GPA. She studied abroad for a semester, and like your D, she couldn’t stomach going back to the grind of meaningless classes. She chose to do a semester (at the last minute) at Williams Mystic at Mystic Seaport, which is a living learning program with the same academic credit as any other semester and the same cost. She learned to be a Blacksmith and had great instructors in English (all about the sea), marine biology, history of the sea, and public policy related to how we manage our oceans. I appreciate this program for helping her get through with life-based learning. This is available for anyone, but easiest from other LACs such as Wellesley.

But, she was close to dropping out for the semester which I would have supported. It seems she is on her second year post college and still has trouble with the idea of returning to the drudgery of class.

19

Wow, this is interesting, @GTalum. I can totally see my daughter doing something off the beaten path. In her case, her interests are spiritual–she is exploring the idea of becoming a nun and has connected with a group of French Benedictines. I just want her to finish her degree first, though!

20

My daughter just graduated from Wellesley. At graduation, we sat next to a family whose daughter also wanted to take a year off after her junior year, as she too was working very hard.

Her parents convinced her to power through and not take a break, and the mother felt that the daughter was glad that she was finished after four years.

Someone in this thread made a good point, which is that taking a break would mean that she would not graduate with her class - and also perhaps not have the support of some friends from her entering class during her senior year.

I also like the suggestion of seeing if there is a course your daughter could take during the summer to lighten the load during her final year.

My daughter was a science major and she only needed to take two courses second semester senior year in order to graduate. However, students need to be enrolled in three classes in order to live on campus, so that is what she did.