I think most parents have struggled with when to step in with/for their children and when to step back.
If you’ve never questioned that, if you always step in, if there is only one way…you might be a helicopter or tiger parent.
DH jokes, “You’re not a tiger parent, you’re a ‘tail winds’ parent”. If one of our children expresses an interest in an activity or experience - I’m there to research options, investigate logistics and provide encouragement and support.
I live in the camp of “if you can’t imagine it, you can’t do it” and, as a parent, want to expand my children’s imagination and love of exploration. At the same time - when my children have decided they aren’t interested in an activity or experience anymore - we’ve been supportive of them saying, “Enough”.
It’s a balancing act and we’ve tried to always keep in mind that we believe our job as parents is/was to raise adults who can make their own choices, acknowledge/accept trade offs and live with integrity. We’ve never been interested in them achieving specific degrees, jobs, incomes, etc.
In California, the equivalent colleges would be UCR, UCM, CSUs, and starting at a community college on the transfer path to a UC or CSU. All of these paths are likely held in disdain by those who only want UCB, UCLA, or private top 10/20 or bust.
Unfortunately, it’s not that simple. An acquaintance of mine often shares that for him, tiger parenting wasn’t just about doing homework and earning good grades. It involved the recent immigrant belief system that the only career that could guarantee success in America was medicine. It didn’t matter whether the child had other interests, skills, or talents, they were quickly and rather ruthlessly discouraged. IMO, both Chua and Kang (the writer of the article) are putting a gloss on tiger parenting that renders it sort of humorous and easy to satirize (and attract readers) whereas, the reality is much closer to child abuse. In my friend’s case, it included a willingness to sacrifice everything, including outward demonstrations of parental affection, if that’s what it took to force his acceptance of that vision. As my friend described it, it was the sheer arbitrariness of the process that instead drove him to eventually start to visualize committing suicide. Like having to drop baseball and substitute it with tennis because baseball wasn’t a glamourous enough sport. Like Brown being deemed the closest thing to an LAC prestigious enough to apply to even though in retrospect a smaller college could have made it easier to spot some early danger signs. Just about the only thing I found remotely humorous about his entire story was the fact that his mother never forgave him - after several career starts and stops - for eventually pursuing a business degree.
And it can backfire, despite elite admissions being the goal at all costs. The signs are pretty easy for an AO to spot as they read an applicant’s file.
I have seen reactions from parents who seemingly think that the kid going to the same college that the parents graduated from* would not be a sign of success, despite the fact that the same college is now much more selective than when the parents attended.
*that college being a UC, not a bottom end for-profit college or some such; it was a college for B/B+ students then, but now admits mainly A-/A students.
I think something new that I’ve observed (i.e. new in the last 5 years or so) is the intense parenting (whatever you want to call it) of kids who “back in the day” would have been left alone to figure it out.
So an artistic kid who isn’t good at math-- there was a time when parents didn’t lose sleep over the kid potentially not making it into BC Calc by senior year. Kid had other strengths. Drawing, ceramics, painting. Or a musically talented kid who disliked learning history. Or a fun loving “goofball” life of the party type-- nobody was losing sleep over the kids EC’s and whether or not he was doing “independent research” to cure cancer.
High schools used to have a small number of go-getters/competitive/“tiger kids” and much of the time they had “tiger parents” to go along with that. And the rest of the class? They did their homework most of the time, they got B’s and sometimes C’s and the occasional A, and they worked on the yearbook and got normal summer jobs as lifeguards or working at an ice cream store. And folks seemingly were ok with that.
But what I’m observing now? Even THOSE kids are getting college coaching and being packaged to a fare thee well. It’s not enough that the kid loves to draw- the parent (or a paid coach) is figuring out how to “connect the dots”-- maybe medical illustration? Wow, yes, she needs a summer course in anatomy to “prove” her interest. Not enough that a kid is a strong enough swimmer to be working at the town pool as a lifeguard- now the kid has to start a 501 C3 to teach stroke victims the breast stroke, or arrange for new immigrants to learn to swim.
All of these activities are great. And I’d be the last person to diss volunteerism. But the days when a solid B student could just enjoy HS and join a few clubs or have a hobby and take the classes that would prepare him/her for college seem to be over. It’s one thing to take the “off the charts” academic kid and do the tiger thing. But why mess with the kids who “back in the day” would have just been happy playing in orchestra for the school musical and who now has to come up with a “narrative” to explain his interest in the history of American musical theater starting with Vaudeville and ending with Hamilton?
I think a big reason for the intense parenting is that, for many, college lists haven’t really changed/expanded, even as the colleges themselves became harder to get into.
A lot of this would be solved if more families would expand their idea of what schools are acceptable for their children to attend.
There are still lots of upper income kids who aren’t sweating every grade during high school. Most of them are applying to/attending large state flagships or directionals as undecideds/non-impacted majors.
I like the idea of a “tail winds parent” and I suspect I am one. One of the other big debates on CC is always how much help a parent should provide during the college search. Some posters have the view that the child should be responsible for almost everything, but I have always felt that it depends to a great deal upon the child. My own parents didn’t know anything about college and I didn’t have a very good GC in high school, so I did everything on my own, and it was really hit and miss for a couple of years as I tried to find the path. So I’ve been happy to help my kids, at least to make sure they have access to information and are thinking broadly about types of schools, locations, majors, careers, etc. Choices and outcomes are basically their areas of responsibility.
While this scenario may be the case at some highly competitive suburban high schools and with some prestige seeking students and their parents, it is by no means the norm among high school students and their parents in much of the country. In many areas and school districts, there is still very low pressure on “average” kids to package themselves for college admission.
Maybe it’s a matter of degree, but we (wife and I) both worked closely with S and D as they prepared resumes and LinkedIn pages. Just yesterday, S called and asked advice on how best to capture a recent promo on LinkedIn.
Since W and I have lots of experience in reading resumes it only makes sense.
I do think there are non-tiger parents who are parenting high schoolers who post here on the board. I just think that they’re the minority, or at least in the minority of the postings.
My running comment to my kids is “aim low, try medium, C’s get degrees.” I am around here for general college info (and got great intel from DMs when I had specific questions about student support for neurodiverse kids at certain schools) and because my career is in higher ed at a non-selective private university.
We are a little weird in that she ended up at an independent/ private high school for reasons totally unrelated to academics, but I do wonder how the influence of not being tracked to general ed classes as she would have at our very large public impacted her thoughts on higher ed in general. She didn’t do AP/ DE but several friends did, and our overarching priority in adolescence is mental health - and she was glad to not have the stressors of the intense classes. While many of her friends are headed to elite, super selective schools, she is thrilled with her destination (which was a reach for her and would have been a safety for them) but I am not sure her list would have looked the same had she gone to the public. Even for college the goal is “get the grades needed to keep financial aid and progress in your major” because at the end of the day, no one cares about your transcript, they barely care about the name at the top and the almost certainly don’t care about the letter grades. Did you graduate from an accredited institution? Great!
D28 is a different creature, and is headed to the same high school her sister just graduated from, but she would probably have been tracked much higher at the public - she just likes the other offerings at the smaller private, and our mantra is that they will get the same opportunities. (although I remember celebrating the end of 2-in-daycare by buying a newer used car and now I am celebrating 2-in-private school by enjoying my paid off car!)
For the record, I think that should be every parent’s overarching priority.
Of course if a given kid can do well in rigorous college prep classes without sacrificing mental health, OK, fine. But if not? Then choose health!
So I guess this is like litmus test number four or five at this point?
If you actually think your child getting top grades in the hardest courses is more important than their mental health, then you just might be a tiger parent . . . .
I kinda give non-Californian parents a break on that one since a state having even two public universities that selective is already unusual, let alone whatever California is up to at this point. And not to throw shade, but I am often puzzled when I see kids outside of California trying to target those colleges, given the OOS cost and selectivity.
But yes, if you are actually in California but not willing to accept the idea of your kid attending any in-state college besides Cal or UCLA, then you just might be a tiger parent . . . .
