bad news on difficult son

Parent Cafe
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<p>FERPA protects the rights of the student - who is a legal adult in the eyes of the school - unless the student is under 18 (and actually that could be challanged if the kid is in college) - just as HIPPA protects all of your medical information - there is actually very little difference - would you want anyone to have access to your medical information just cuz…??? So it is a legal issue in our country - and that right extends to our kids as well - just because we think they will always be kids - well - they will always be OUR kids LOL - still allows them their legal rights.</p>

<p>The idea of the ‘mommy scholarship’ with verification - just like many other scholarships - is a great idea - we utilize a similar type of thing. But the schools do not recognize that just because we supply the bucks that it also gives us the right to protected records - that belong to the students themselves. Which actually includes the right to be protected FROM parents - which precludes parents rights to that protected information. So - a school has the legal right not to provide information to parents if the student is not attending classes - some classes don’t take attendence - so it would make no matter - or even if the student had legitamately dropped out as well if the student has decided not to provide that signed piece of paper to the school.</p>

<p>It has become a fact of life that a persons rights are to be protected - and we do have to live with that - and at 18 - our kids have the right to declare themselves in charge of their rights. How is a school to know by a phone call or an email if one who is they say they are?? With what is going on in this world the protection of ones rights is paramount.</p>

<p>The medical issues/concerns of a student - or anyone for that matter - is included in these rights as well - yes - we want to know if something has happened - we want to be notified - we want to be there for our kids in the case of an emergency. That is something I would certainly sit down with the kids and discuss in depth and make every attempt to clarify all the issues - including allowing/giving permission for the parents to be involved. But then again - there are those times that at 18 - they may want that information to remain private - for their personal reasons - if you get my drift. We have utilized the ICE program in this respect also - and all have it on our cell phones - at least we have a greater probability of being contacted - In Case of Emergency. Families/students who have medical histories that require fairly frequent follow-up/care - it is a great idea to have the right to be involved - can make a huge difference I agree.</p>

<p>When a parent oversteps those boundries (and some parents try to step waaayyy over that line much toooo often) that have been established to protect the students - or even other adults - schools are going to be very very careful not to break that confidence - and for good reason - for that piece we do have to remember that in their eyes - our kids are legal adults with the same rights that we have - the right to privacy. Would you - a parent - want your rights violated?? Probably not - so that same expectation is there for our kids - right to privacy.</p>

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<p>Good point, calmom. Also, worthy of note is that how FERPA is interpreted can differ from public to private and from private to private school. The school my son attends is fairly cooperative even without FERPA being signed if there is some danger, but with it, I could, if I wished, call his profs and ask how he’s doing in class. He’d give me a severe tongue-lashing, and it would NOT be worth the destruction of trust, but I could do it.</p>

<p>I don’t know whether that would be possible everywhere.</p>

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<p>in answer to the one question, my son went off to college, (or so I thought), but in reality went to my sisters. I had not heard from him in those 2 weeks, which is not unusual because he is very independent, and I don’t like to interfere because I think he needs to grow and count on himself. so imagine my shock when I was told by his girlfriend’s mother “you know he never went back to school don’t you”. uh, no.<br>
I also agree that ferpa and some of hippa are absolutely ridiculous. If I have a patient in need, and nobody is showing up or stepping up to the plate, hippa be %$#@#%, and I have never once been called to task for calling a child of an elderly patient who needed help but couldn’t be convinced by me. I have to be able to sleep at night, and I want to know how those professors could sleep at night knowing a kid wasn’t showing up to class, and wondering where they were. but then again, my guess would be they didn’t give a hoot and probably didn’t even notice with the exception of official attendance record. After so much conversation with my son, I too believe the J and W way of structuring classes is terrible and setting people up to fail. absolutely if you miss one class, you are lost. It is like missing 2 or 3 under a regular structure, which is what happened to my son. and if as in nursing, you screw up med/surg 1, well then you don’t get to repeat it for a whole year,and you can’t continue with anything else because it all builds on med/surg 1, so mostly people just say forget it. and if other students or teachers aren’t willing to help when asked, then you are definitely going to be out. but what I consider to be the huge disadvantage of their scheduling is this: in a typical 16 week course, you truly get to know your teacher, and they get to know you if you participate. in a 12 day course where you are saturated daily, the teacher probably doesn’t even know your name by the end, let alone realize you are gone or missing. there is no onus, no bonding. how can that work? and I guess that when you look at the bad rep of J and W as portrayed on various internet sites by students and alumni, that sentiment prevails, “the teachers don’t care, the teachers aren’t involved”. well, 12 days. how could they be. In nursing school, we had a young lady who didn’t show up for a week. a very promising, sweet, shy young lady who just wasn’t there, and because I got to know her I knew she wasn’t there. so myself, the teacher and 2 other students went to her dorm, found her and discovered that she had a very bad experience and needed help. we helped her. we cared. I just don’t see that here. it’s sad that university studies has come down to FERPA. My husband tells me not to blame the school, and I don’t. My son has most of the onus here, but there should be rules of conduct, behavior, things you can count on when your child, (ok, grown up 18 year old) is at school. and one of them would be to be notified if they were missing. call me ridiculous, call me silly. and I know my son was fine, I know that now. but for 2 days I had no idea where my son was. and since he lives in such a great part of Providence because J and W does not let upperclassmen live in dorms, I truly was thinking the worse for those 2 days. I would hope that if I were a teacher I would make that call, because I don’t think FERPA would save them if the kid were dead. just my perspective.</p>

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<p>often times professors don’t even take attendance until they have an official 10 day roster, or some similar official notice. even after the official roster is sent out, some professors take attendance, and some don’t. that early in the semester and assuming you don’t even show up for class, how can you have a relationship where you expect the professor to be concerned for you? i would imagine the professor assumed correctly that the student was not attending and had dropped out. </p>

<p>perhaps there should be some sort of safety net, but i think that colleges prefer to treat their students like adults, whether they should is probably open for discussion.</p>

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<p>Amith1,
I’m so sorry for all you have been through, though it sounds like everything is on the upswing now. I too would be upset with J&W and also any roommates he might have had. FERPA drives me crazy. My son signed the papers which we thought covered everything. However, he had several medical problems last semester, including emergency surgery and everytime he had to sign another piece of paper to allow clinic or Dr. to talk to us. We he complained about the hassle of continually having to resign permission, the school explained that a student may want one medical issuue discussed with a parent but perhaps not another one.</p>

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<p>And so if the emergency surgery was for a condition that rendered him unconscious, you would never know?! That’s absurd and makes me very happy that my son goes to Tulane, where my understanding is that the interpretation is in favor of reason. For example, when I didn’t hear from him during the evacuation for two days last August, I e-mailed a reporter who had writen a story about the Jackson shelter, and within 24 hours, I had an e-mail from a VP at Tulane asking how she could help me find my son. Emergency surgery is no more extraordinary than a hurricane. It just affects fewer people. That’s how these situations ought to be handled–with reason and compassion.</p>

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<p>thank you ctymomteacher. reason and compassion. 2 things completely missing from my son’s college. reason and compassion should guide us through everything. It guides me in my job, I guess I call it morals and ethics too. we are in the process of trying to set up appointments to have my son speak with the financial aid officer, academic affairs and career counselor. nobody returns phone calls or will set up an appointment, “just have him come in”. sorry, no, that hasn’t worked before, he shows up to speak with somebody and they are at a staff meeting or out that day or off or whatever. bottom line is they aren’t there. so I left voice messages for all of them that I expect a call back with appointments dates and times, end of story. unbelievable. how does this school stay in business.</p>

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<p>An aside for everyone…members of our family carry a small note folded in their wallets near their driver’s license or school ID that states “in case of an emergency or medical necessity, please immendiately notify XXXX.” While it would not have helped in the case of a student who was missing from classes, it may help your loved ones be informed in the case of a severe medical emergency.</p>

<p>I have followed this saga, and I can only imagine how sressful and demoralizing this has been for you. At first, I didn’t realize the school was J&W. Ironically, good friends of ours had a son who also attended a J&W campus and had a very similar story. Their S just stopped going to classes (albeit, also got a DWI and a few other issues he didn’t tell his parents about). I am guessing that there is either (or both): 1) a very indepedent sense of time on campus, and/or 2) a very compressed and stressful curriculum, especially with the practical courses taught there. Both of these elements could lead to a sense a compression and frustration for the student. By the way, everything eventually worked out for our friends’ son, alhough I don’t think he ever finshed at J&W.</p>

<p>Again, sorry you are having to sort through all this.</p>

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<p>Since your son has only a short while left at this school and since you have a rather large financial interest (don’t we all) and since the school seems to be ignoring your attempts to have that meeting, perhaps an attorney working on your behalf could make that call. Fear of a lawsuit or bad press often works.</p>

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<p>Go up the ladder. Email the Dean of Students, the Dean of your son’s college, the Assistant Dean etc. </p>

<p>Only the folks at the top have the power to wave the wand.</p>

<p>However, in explaining your problem to the higher ups, it would help to accept the part that is your son’s responsibility, along with an acceptance that he did not react with the proper maturity. Also, make sure the letter is not a rant agaisnt personalities. Make it a statement of fact–and add a few possible solutions.</p>

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<p>I concur w/cheers. Having spent the weekend at J&W’s denver campus, I would go directly to the University President. The buck stops there and I can tell you I got an email returned within a few hours. My trip to J&W clearly indicated that my DS could easily finish their program in 3 yrs since he already has ALL of the math credits they offer and many of the English and business classes. My fear is he would be so bored there…given the level of their more “typical” students.</p>

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<p>so glkecon2, what did you think? I’d truly be interested to know if you got the same promises and rhetoric we got. trust me, if your child is more than a c average, he will be bored. I did send a letter to the charlotte campus president since we initially had so many problems there, I was calm, sent a good letter that gave specific events, people who were involved, specific quotes that were rude and nonresponsive. My return letter was “nobody agrees with what you are saying, they see things differently, good luck on your son’s education”. Hey, thanks for taking me seriously and looking into my concerns…you jack@$$. The buck may stop, but it doesn’t do anything. My son is up at providence as we speak, and I have made the 3 people he will be speaking with glaringly aware that it is up to them, I expect them to be on the ball and completely prepared, and that I need intelligent, assertive people to speak with my intelligent, shy son. cross all your fingers…</p>

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<p>I think you are partial right …due to the propriatary nature of their program, it would be harder to transfer out…especially if you are in culinanry program. Looked like the hotel mgt program gives you a little more flexability. I will say that the dept dean I spoke to was very frank about HIs program (and the other schools my ds is looking at). He wasnt trying to “sell us” on J&W…he laid out what he thought was his advantages and those of each of the other programs. SInce my ds is a 3.99 student who excels in math, I think he would be way beyond the vast majority of the students there. I know J&W would LOVE to have my son (and not just for $ reasons) but I think he would enrich their program. </p>

<p>I will pray your son’s meetings at Providence go well…</p>

<p>and FYI…I dont think your posting here have gone unnoticed with the J&W administration.</p>

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<p>wbow is right, a lot of prof’s do not take attendance/learn people’s names, especially if it is a large class.</p>

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<p>hold on to your seats!</p>

<p>i sense there is still some misdirected resentment and/or anger. i don’t think you can blame the school for not notifying you of your son’s whereabouts. </p>

<p>i do understand why you would be upset that no one seemed to know where he was for that time, but how is it that you didn’t know where he was either? don’t you think it would be just as easy for the school to turn the tables right back on you? </p>

<p>it’s a great big world out there. there is no one entity that can take total responsibility for the well-being of our children.</p>

<p>did your son have access to a phone? the internet? did he contact the school? did he contact you? did your sister have access to a phone or the internet? did she contact you? </p>

<p>there is enough blame to go around for everyone. i think your time would best be served by looking for solutions for the future instead of dwelling on the past.</p>

<p>please don’t assume that i am unsympathetic or uncaring. i have enough problems dealing with difficult kids, my own included! i just think that in our anger to find fault with others, we often fail to look at ourselves and our own actions clearly.</p>

<p>this quote is on my desk</p>

<p>“when an archer misses the mark, he turns and looks for the fault within himself. failure to hit the bull’s eye is never the fault of the targert. to improve your aim–improve yourself.” gilbert arland</p>

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<p>oh I absolutely agree that my sister should have called me, I did call daily but his cell phone doesn’t work in providence, so I thought nothing of it. He should have been forthright and told me what was going on. My concern is, what about that next student who disappears, who was murdered by one of the thousands of homeless people or whoever roams that town who daily harrass and follow the J and W students. How long will it take before the student is noticed as missing, and somebody looks for them? we’re yelled at if we call the student too much, yelled at if we don’t call. I will not take blame away from J and W, they deserve blame not just for this, but for the lies, the terrible way my son, and I have been treated for the last year and a half, how my son has been ignored, tossed aside, not incorporated. I won’t release them of that blame, never. I hope they have seen these posts, because they need to get their act together. I was recently told that they changed their co-op program. I sure hope so because it was a disaster. My son’s teacher not once contacted the co-op chef, not once to see how it was going, if he needed anything, not once. the chef was flabbergasted, has done many co-ops and said this was by far the worst with no organization or involvement by the school. yet he got paid for that. yes, when this is over we will not look back. but I will make sure people know that J and W is awful. “when all else fails, johnson and wales”. are ya getting that j and w???</p>