little man shockey's first semester grades

Heh. There wasn't any set curfew once I got out of high school, but we had another little issue.

My dad, I'm sure, had sleep apnea, just like I've found that I do.

So anyway, he'd spend a lot of nights sleeping upright in his living room recliner. There was no tiptoeing past him when I came through the door. If I was staggering in at 2:15 a.m., you can be sure we were having a conversation so he could see just how out of it I was.

I paid for a couple of those conversations.

 

I had parents like yours, BYH. They knew everything I was doing up until I left for high school. It's one of the reasons I didn't look at a school closer than three hours from our house. I felt I was a pretty responsible kid and wanted to go out on my own and see what would happen.

Like you, I felt an immense freedom when I got up to school finally. My parents don't know nearly as much about me now as they did then. That's a good thing, though. I felt I handled the freedom well and figured out what classes were most important and when I really had to buckle down. However, it really depends on the individual kid. Despite the fact that I am still in school (and not far from where your son goes), I don't feel like I could give any helpful advice because my grades have always been fine. My first semester I got a 4.0 and I've rolled along fine from there.

 

Absolutely. But hopefully, they've been allowed to have a little more gradual freedom as they get older, into their teenage years and on through high school. That way, the freedom doesn't come as such a shock when they're on their own.

I've seen too many kids with helicopter parents who were completely unprepared for life on their own. I don't think that's healthy.

 

My first semester was, well, not good. My mother told me I could get my grades up and she'd still pay for me to go to school eight hours away or I could keep goofing around but I'd have to come home and go to the local school if I wanted her to continue to pay.

My grades went up, mostly.

I was really not mature enough for college. I graduated from HS early and had always skated by in school. I probably would have benefited from a year or two in the Peace Corps first.

 

Same. I paid a price farther down the road for that bacchanal. That semester, I got the most ass of my life, drank like a fiend and discovered weed, and hundreds of miles from home. I look back at some of the photos and read some of the garbage I turned in and I want to cringe, but I can't quite do it.

 

First semester was rough for me and second wasn't much better. My parents encouraged after the first, warned me I was coming home if they didn't go up after the second. Grades went up some in the second year and then progressively got better as I got in to classes that I was more interested in. Horrible example, yes, but I put more effort into the ones I liked better.

 

My first two semesters, I attended classes on the days I knew there were exams.

 

And that makes you different than 98% of college students.....how?

 

My grades weren't too good my first semester of college (2.15), but they got better, except for one semester when I was in some really difficult classes. The school I went to understood that freshmen usually struggle in the first semester, and only required a 1.0 GPA to stay in school (Under 2.0 was probation).

Plus, my grades weren't too good in the required classes. Once I got into my major, my grades improved considerably, and I even made the Dean's List once.

Until a few years ago, Joe Paterno almost always redshirted his freshmen players. When asked why, he explained (I'm paraphrasing here) that he couldn't expect to pressure freshmen into contributing to his football team when they didn't even know how to get around campus.

Shock: I'd give him a warning, then come up with some sort of plan in terms of paying for classes that he doesn't pass. I wouldn't make him come back to community college. Part of going away to school is the experience of being on your own for the first time. I still treasure a lot of my freshman memories (and regret a few, too).

 

Interestingly, my parents encouraged me to have an active social life in college. I was (still am) very introverted and serious and insanely responsible as a kid. My parents wanted me to have a good time when I was in college.

My grades were not good. I was a straight A/A+ student in high school. But it turns out my high school wasn't very good and really didn't prepare me for college nearly as well as my new classmates' schools had. I was way behind the curve and I realized pretty early in my first semester freshman year that it was going to be tough for me to compete. I got a tutor halfway through first semester for the class that was giving me the hardest time (economics) and it helped. After 12 years of being one of the top kids in my class, it was very hard to accept that even Bs were going to be tough for me to get.

Shockey, talk to your son. You know how he'll respond to various tactics. Each of us has a different relationship with our parents and what works for some on here, won't work for others.

 

Like I, for instance, would be insanely uncomfortable with my father posting the most intimate details of my life on a message board without my consent. :-*

(happy new year, shockey)

 

i've seen colleges where you get a "get out of jail free card" for bad freshman year scores.