The Parent-Child Relationship in the College Years

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There’s a moment, toward the end of a parent’s trip to drop their child off at college, when it feels like the world is changing. Many describe the joy and loss that mingle in those five minutes walking back to the car. But some parents stay quite enmeshed in their child’s emotional life long after they leave campus. My colleague Faith Hill reported earlier this summer on the new age of endless parenting, and how parents stay in much closer touch with their college-age children than they did a few decades prior.

Before they say goodbye to their kids, many parents will give parting advice. But “usually,” Ezekiel J. Emmanuel wrote this week, that advice “will be wrong.” “When it comes to their children, parents are innately conservative,” Emmanuel writes. “They want them to be successful and to lead fulfilled and happy lives. To many parents, that means counseling them to pursue what seem like paths to guaranteed success.” But that conservatism doesn’t help students get the most out of their college experience, Emmanuel argues.

Today’s newsletter explores how the parent-child relationship changes during the college years, and how to help guide students through all that college brings.

On College

The Worst Advice Parents Can Give First-Year Students

By Ezekiel J. Emanuel

Today’s college students will have ample time to figure out their careers. Before that, encourage them to take risks.

Read the article.

What the Freshman Class Needs to Read

By Niall Ferguson and Jacob Howland

It is no small part of a liberal education to show students the broad range of meaningful lives they might aspire to lead.

Read the article.

What I Learned About Life at My 30th College Reunion

By Deborah Copaken

“Every classmate who became a teacher or doctor seemed happy,” and 29 other lessons from seeing my Harvard class of 1988 all grown up

Read the article.

Still Curious?

• How college changes the parent-child relationship : The distance can actually strengthen the bond, Alia Wong wrote in 2019.
• The new age of endless parenting : More grown kids are in near-constant contact with their family. Some people call this a failure to launch—but there’s another way to look at it, Faith Hill writes.

Other Diversions

• Marijuana is too strong now.
• The growing gender divide, three minutes at a time
• The words people write on their skin

P.S.

I recently asked readers to share a photo of something that sparks their sense of awe in the world.

“Here’s a picture from our backyard, after a summer shower last week,” Kristine S., 49, from Portland, Oregon, writes. “I noticed this raindrop-covered web among the cedar branches. Spider webs are one of those ‘everyday wonders’ that seem never to cease to amaze me!”

I’ll continue to feature your responses in the coming weeks. If you’d like to share, reply to this email with a photo and a short description so we can share your wonder with fellow readers in a future edition of this newsletter or on our website. Please include your name (initials are okay), age, and location. By doing so, you agree that The Atlantic has permission to publish your photo and publicly attribute the response to you, including your first name and last initial, age, and/or location that you share with your submission.

— Isabel