How to handle flameout in 2nd semester college sophomore?

Parents Forum
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<p>I would haul him in for a complete physical. I would say “things have changed and we clearly need to make sure there’s nothing organic.” </p>

<p>Ask him: 1) Are you tired all the time? and 2) Do you snore? If the answer to either is “yes”, I 'd also ask “had any beer lately?”</p>

<p>One of our guys nearly flamed out sophomore year because of a sudden onset of sleep apnea (which can be triggered by weight gain or alcohol consumption). Hepititis and other organic illnesses can also cause exhaustion. </p>

<p>ADD testing and Executive Functioning testing should be in the mix. Include these:</p>

<p>Delis-Kaplan Executive Function System (D-KEFS)
Auditory Consonant Trigrams (Brown Peterson Task)
Rey Complex Rigure Test</p>

<p>Kudos, to you, parent, for trusting your instincts that something was amiss. Trust also that the kid is full of grief, shame and rage. Instead of heaping more To-Do’s on his plate, help him figure out where things went into the ditch. You will all feel a tremendous sense of relief if it turns out he picked up a treatable virus or other treatable medical condition. While you are checking out the medical aspects, there are opportunities to talk too – maybe he needs to sell hot dogs on the beach for a few years and then finish college. </p>

<p>Good luck.</p>

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<p>When I try to figure out what has happened, this point is the one I keep coming back to. I think that S hasn’t really had to face adversity before, academically or personally. When he found himself in a hole this time, he lacked the skillset to face it and climb out of it. I guess that is a downside of having had an advantaged life. Avoidance was the path he chose, and I think he is still in the avoidance mindset, and not facing what he needs to do now. </p>

<p>S has always been a procrastinator and a bit lazy, but very smart and very quick. In HS he would wait until the last minute to work on a big assignment, and was always able to produce something acceptable despite spending a very short amount of time on it. His grades were good but not up to his full potential, and I think he got into his reach school more on the basis of his very high standardized test scores than his grades. </p>

<p>Given the situation and his personality, I do feel like it makes sense to give him a deadline and clear consequences: If he manages to complete all of the makeup work this summer before tuition is due, he will be given the opportunity to go back to school in the fall (which he has indicated that is what he wants to do), but if he can’t complete it, he won’t go back to school in the fall. </p>

<p>I’m not stressing and second guessing myself over that, but with how much (if at all) I should try to monitor and nag him to complete the work in time. And, especially, how will we handle things if he fails to complete the work in time, and doesn’t go to school in the fall and comes home? e.g., What privileges and responsibilities will he have, what will be the expectations?</p>

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<p>Arghh, why are we so quick to jump into all these labels of add ADHD sleep apnea,and the like</p>

<p>He was able to excel at his ec, he put his energy and time there and even won a prize or award. </p>

<p>Can it ever just be, as the op says, they just blow it? </p>

<p>Lets spend money on all kinds of tests medical etc? the kid just didn’t prioritize work…and for the first time he is really feelongnthe consequences. He can salvage this, but he needs to grt past the embarrassment and pride and just buckle down.</p>

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<p>He needs some time off. I don’t know if he needs help, meaning a professional to talk with, or not. </p>

<p>Maybe the best thing is to say something like this to him, “This is your life. You have to live it. We want you to be happy. If you need to step away from school to get perspective, you should do that. If you want to talk to someone, we’ll help arrange that.”</p>

<p>You’ll want to talk about all the issues but you can’t. It’s never easy to talk about all the issues. Those conversations can’t be planned. </p>

<p>Remember, it’s his life.</p>

<p>I had a serious problem one semester when my father nearly died. I managed to get through 3 of my classes - finishing enough for the 3rd late to get a grade. I should have taken the term off. It was absolutely stupid to be sitting in a dorm room while my dad was having surgery which the year before had killed far more than it saved. (He was lucky this was the year the odds switched around.) My family cared way too much about appearances and about keeping things on track. They had a terrible time understanding that my life is my track. There is no one in my head but me. The same is true for your kid. There is no one in his head but him.</p>

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<p>The ops son didn’t have any crisis, he had an extra curricular activity he put his energy into, he excelled at the extra curricular. He let, he ignored, he just didn’t do his homework, he skipped classes and the more behind he got, the more behind he got, so he just avoided it all. He ignored his phone because he didn’t want to have to answer questions, he was embarrassed so he avoided the award ceremony.</p>

<p>These are normal for people. We have all done it to various degrees. V</p>

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<p>^ that’s your interpretation- and, from afar.<br>
I don’t like labels and gushy sympathy any more than you do, but there are patterns and syndromes and ways to resolve issues based on understanding the context.</p>

<p>OP, nagging and project managing this for him is enabling him to do only part of his share. Consider helping with logical organization, up front (targets, dates, how to tackle various work,) then just be available for him to come to. Don’t find yourself helping with research, editing the work or whatever. He may need to learn this life lesson. You can be there but not hover. Good luck.</p>

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<p>My background is as a scientist. When anything is different than what I expected, I immediately start asking “hmm, what would cause this to happen?” – and eliminating health aspects is a logical thing to do. </p>

<p>Please do not underestimate the guilt, shame and rage a student can feel when things are not going well. Working through some health evaluations can start the conversational flow going without a lot of finger pointing or avoidance behavior (this has been my personal experience). </p>

<p>People who were raised in the '50’s and '60’s often have the “just paddle his butt and get him a job” attitude – which can, occasionally, be the correct prescription – but doing the health evaluations first make sure that approach is not the WRONG prescription. </p>

<p>Keep in mind a hundred years ago a kid could be slapped and humiliated for mixing up b’s and p’s in elementary school. Now we know that a kid can have dyslexia and there are things that can help one cope with dyslexia (and slapping and humiliation aren’t helpful). </p>

<p>As for Procrastination, my guys found “The Now Habit” helpful. It delves into why procrastination “works” – insightful and helpful things to know before the next semester begins. </p>

<p>I’d be open to any student looking at a gap year at any point in their college career – or a stint in the Coast Guard or military. There are many ways to learn and grow – but being sure one is throughly healthy will help on any path. Good luck.</p>

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<p>I like your approach OP. you’ve given him an achievable goal and consequences if he doesn’t hit it. Be ready to stick to them, and you’ll be fine.</p>

<p>How much monitoring/nagging? Well, how much can you do? Seriously, I don’t “get” a lot of what my kids are working on, so monitoring from me is pretty useless. They could do just about anything, show me, and I’d have to say “okay”. They know it, too.</p>

<p>I work with college freshmen flagged as at-risk for any number of reasons. It is very common to see a decrease in GPA from first to second semester when all the first year “help” programs stop. It is also more common than you might think to see sophomores crash as they hit courses beyond gen eds and prereqs. Kids have been in school their whole lives. Some start to question if that’s what they want, but they don’t know what else might be out there. Around this time, they may start questioning career paths. Some panic if things aren’t as they envisioned. There is nothing wrong with the vast majority of these kids, and they are far more likely, given the cushion provided by their freshmen grades, to be able to dig themselves out of holes. Not easy, but most can if they want. Some who are really having a crisis of faith, so to speak, do need to step away for a while. Not the end of the world.</p>

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<p>All of this sounds very accurate. If this is indeed the situation, what should the parents do?</p>

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<p>Delphinium- I hope you and your husband feel good about your plan. You’re trying to find a way to support your son’s growth and help him feel responsible in a way that he can succeed.</p>

<p>For the summer plan you could ask him how you and your husband could help him stay on course. Or, if you have something in mind, tell him what that is. It sounds as if you’re trying to have him experience you as a mentor or adviser rather than as a parent. I make the distinction because from what you wrote I think that you don’t want to parent him in a way that leads him to feel nagged.</p>

<p>The hard part is the end of summer when everyone has to assess and decide if he’s grounded enough to return for the fall semester. Maybe the academic dean can provide all of you with some guidance as the summer progresses.</p>

<p>I’ll close by saying that how he came to feel overwhelmed, which led to and accompanied the change in behavior, might take time to understand. Understanding and learning from what happened can happen at any time. Whether and when this occurs (for some) is not necessarily a part of getting back on track.</p>

<p>I hope things work out and your son grows from this experience.</p>

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<p>^^if this is indeed the situation, sometimes there’s not much parents can do. And that’s hard for us to accept. Give him the “I love and support you no matter what” talk. Tell himhe can do this if he chooses, and then stick to your plan and it’s consequences.</p>

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<p>I’m the original poster, with an update.</p>

<p>My S did manage to accomplish the objectives we set in order to be able to return to his University in the fall, so he will be going. </p>

<p>He procrastinated until the very end, but during the summer he did manage to complete the work for the two incompletes, and re-took the failed class (getting an A-). I’m nervous about how he will manage when he goes back, but have had more time to get used to the idea that his college path will not necessarily be a smooth one, so I am less stressed than when I had first posted early this summer.</p>

<p>He plans to continue to participate in his EC. He seems to do better with structure and deadlines, and less well with too flexible of a schedule. This EC also was his main motivation to complete the work needed to able to return to school in the fall.</p>

<p>Based on more discussion with S, I think his problems in the spring were depression related. He had another bad patch this summer, right after his summer class was finished but with one incomplete still to finish, and with no structure to his schedule he went dark and his cell phone was switched off for almost three weeks. We were starting to get really worried and wondering what to do, when he turned the phone back on and re-started communication. This happened at the same time as some EC-related activity was just starting, which I think is no coincidence. </p>

<p>I asked him how he spent his time when he wasn’t going to class, and he said he watched TV and movies on the computer, played a lot of solitaire (since it was “mindless”), and slept a lot. I’ve encouraged him to take advantage of the University’s student mental health services, but he was not good about it during the summer. He went a couple of times to mental health appointments at the beginning of the summer, took forever to schedule the next appointment, then was a no-show at that appointment, and never scheduled another one. He said that when he was feeling well this summer, he didn’t see the point of it, and when he wasn’t feeling well, he was completely unmotivated to make or go to an appointment. He said that the psychiatrist had suggested that medication might be an option for him, but since he stopped going to appointments, none was ever prescribed for him. </p>

<p>We’ve discussed the importance of consistent mental health treatment going forward, but I’m rather doubtful that he will follow through. He is on academic probation, and the University will require him to meet weekly with a probation counselor, so at least he will have that structure. </p>

<p>I suppose it differs based on the University, but does anyone know what happens during academic probation? Does the probation counselor check with his professors about if he is attending class and turning in assignments, or do they just rely on what the student says? Will a probation counselor ask if he is going to mental health appointments? I know that the probation counselor won’t be communicating any of this information back to me as a parent, but I would feel better knowing that someone other than me is checking up on him.</p>

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<p>Was there an internship too?</p>

<p>The sort and level of support depends on the school and the adult. I worked with a team, this summer, at a well-known college, where the Dean of Students would absolutely get involved to the extent you’d like. The predecessor might not have. At this school, there is a formal method of profs sending weekly feedback to the Dean. </p>

<p>I think it’s fair to ask. Ferpa is a funny thing, more broadly interpreted at some colleges than others. (Maybe you can find how that college interprets it, when it reaches a probation stage.) Probably keep it simple, cautiously not setting off any bells. Agree an email sounds good, but you’d probably need to call, anyway, to learn whom to send it to.</p>

<p>Glad this is better than before. Best wishes.</p>

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<p>Happy to hear the good news. I imagine it must have been very worrisome, however, when your son dropped all communication for so long. I would think you have a right to know exactly what the probation entails and what meeting with the probation counselor does. I worry that your son is suffering and because of his own resistance is not getting the treatment he needs. If he had a “physical” illness, would it be ok for him to skip appointments and not be on board with medication?</p>

<p>I know there is a fine line throughout this thread about some involvement and too much, but when health is at risk, it would seem that more intervention might be needed. </p>

<p>Best to you and your son.</p>

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<p>When my S2 was on academic probation, there was no oversight from his advisor/professors. It was his responsibility to make the grades to get his overall gpa up. There was oversight by me. I had the password to his Blackboard
account and checked it on a regular basis that semester. Once that semester was over and his grades were satifactory, he was on his own.<br>
He went to a big state u. The process might be different at a small school.</p>

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<p>Thanks for being willing to share your story. I have a son heading to college this week, and I worry about things like computer addiction (technically I think it’s considered a compulsion, not an addiction) with him. He is not a social person at all, and has spent the entire summer doing pretty much nothing but computer. (Long story, and I was not supportive of this. We consulted multiple professionals and he has never spent a summer like this before. As someone said previously, it used to be we could beat them into submission or whatever, but that doesn’t work so well these days). In any case, it is helpful to read about others with less than ideal circumstances and how they have handled them. I’m sure it was a stressful summer, but hopefully things will improve. With my son I have to hope he continues to thrive overall, matures socially during college, and finds something that he’s passionate about so maybe he will spend time away from the computer. We want a perfect path for them, but we can’t control everything or try to solve their problems for them forever. Good luck, and come December I hope to hear the semester went great for him.</p>

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<p>My experience too.
Additionally, what is his EC? Can he major in something more related to it?</p>

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<p>Smaller courseloads, more interesting classes, and study aids helped me through my sophomore slump. One of my favorite study aids was software. The best one in my experience is Study Genius Software. Another one is CRAM study aid.</p>

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<p>I’ll use myself as a case study here.</p>

<p>My GPA went from a straight line down from a 3.75 to a 1.75 per semester through my college days as I consistently did less and less work and attended less and less class and became more and more burnt out. I graduated with a 3.2.</p>

<p>I also went the watching TV, eating pizza, computer game, sleeping route. Yeah, that’s not a good way to experience college.</p>

<p>I never went on academic probation, since I didn’t really start with the C’s D’s and F’s until the last two years.</p>

<p>I proceeded to go to Duke Law with high LSAT scores. I got them to give me about a semester’s worth of tuition money.</p>

<p>The difference between my situation and the OP’s is that I chose the full ride at a state school rather than take out the six figure debt for an Ivy League school.</p>

<p>Based on my experience, you had better check up on him to make sure that he’s taking care of himself and keep tracking his e-mails if you suspect that he’s repeating the last semester’s progress. I kept trying to do better subsequent semesters and ended up doing worse.</p>

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<p>To the OP:
So sorry that you, H, S are going through this difficult time. I haven’t read through all of the posts, so forgive me if these points have been previously discussed or refuted. </p>

<p>The complete withdrawal from academics and finals could be due to many things. I’m just taking random stabs in the dark. </p>

<ol>
<li><p>Could it be that this reach, prestigious uni is just too hard for him? When kids are a big fish in the small pond of HS, they get a certain view of themselves. Then they go to presigious U and all the other kids are amazing while son becomes <em>yikes</em> below average?! Son’s world view and view of himself are turned upside down. Has to work very hard just to keep head above water. I’ve read about students that get depressed at Princeton for this reason. Solution: consider an easier school. It might be hard on his pride, and yours, but he may become a happier kid.</p></li>
<li><p>It could be depression/anxiety, especially if it was brought on by video games. Video games, and TV, can be addicting, leaving the addict with shame and depression. </p></li>
<li><p>Could this be his passive/aggressive push back to your demands (esp in not doing his make-up work for his incompletes)? My kid usually takes care of business independently; however, when I get anxious and want it done, I start getting involved. My kid’s action is then to steadfastly NOT do what needs to be done, possibly because kid doesn’t not want to seem like they are caving in, or to spite me, or feeling like I don’t trust kid, or some combo of the 3.</p></li>
<li><p>He probably loves his EC, because it is something that he is good at (and might come easily to him), and he misses having that feeling from his HS academics and he is not getting it from his college academics.</p></li>
</ol>

<p>After the complete tune-out spiral, he is probably very ashamed. If he goes back to the same school, he will have to add shame to the previous difficulties that he was having (whatever they were). The more pressure that you put on him, the more shame will build up. Consider changing schools to some place easier, say a target school.</p>

<p>Lastly, maybe a life coach, rather than a psychologist would be a better fit for him to talk about his problems. He might be concerned that a psychologist is analyzing him, so he might not open up. A life coach could focus on his actions, rather than what is running around in his head, and this might give him enough distraction to start to open up to somebody.</p>