The Delicate Balance Found Between Addressing Needs Of Adult Students & Their Parents

#16
Prada's Meadow said:
Hi - your question is an excellent one. In the 1970's or there about the drinking age was raised to 21 by most if not all states. This was the result of the increasing number of deaths as the result of drinking and an attempt to reduce that number. There is no link between those laws and the laws that govern the age of majority and the laws that govern the right to give consent to sexual relations. They are all over the lot, particularly in the South. Some of this is based on biology - we know that the frontal lobe of adolescents does not fully mature until the late teenage years and some of it is based on the educational system - most people are 18 by the time they graduate from high school. Unfortunately, there really isn't any way to apply logic to all this - there are too many conflicting agendas that come into play in setting age limits. The control that the parents of this college girl did have was to take her out of school by stopping her tuition - after the age of 18 the only control parents have is financial.


Just my opinion and thoughts.
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Thank you. I wasn't sure. In my country the legal drinking age, the age that you can marry w/o parental consent and the age of majority is the same - 18.
 
#19
hm, my perspective on this is essentially a German one - I am saying that bec here students are totally disconnected from the University. they go to their classes and take exams - other than that the university does not involve with the students' lives. no counselling, no paying attention to their social lives etc etc. once we leave school at 19, guys do their army service (very few nowadays - most get out of it) or else do a social year, and girls get to study straightaway. you are out of the school system you are an adult and on your own. it is down to your friends and family to take care of you or be aware of any changes.

I know this will be out there but anorexia is pretty obvious - her parents probably closed their eyes until it was too late. I know this bec I have had my own, albeit different, issues in the past and in the end my family confronted me. also if everyone saw that she self-harmed her family must have too. to me this is like trying to deal with their mistakes - I firmly believe that a student at university is an adult - let me ask you in another way: say she was working rather than studying and the same happened - would they blame her employer for not stepping in? not everyone studies at 22 - in UK where I studied a lot of people are finished at the age already.

also she requested that kind of privacy explicitly - I used to work in an environment where decisions about privacy were made and phone calls from parents could not be answered bec a student did not want that. but in all cases the parents were already aware what was happening.
 
#21
Keep the privacy, but have Universities provide more comprehensive mental health care. Many mental illnesses start in young adulthood. If the schools can take away the stigma and stress how acceptable proper care is, perhaps the rate of suicide and "slipping through the cracks" will be dramatically reduced.
 
#22
IDK...I know it's a little selfish, but the my first thought at the universities providing more comprehensive mental health care was "How much will that raise tuition?" ...I know health coverage in the US sucks, but my parents medical plan covered me till 23, and I always knew help was available if I needed it--from my family, not the university.

I'm always a little irritated when people expect the schools to be responsible for so much more than education.
 
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