‘Don’t leave campus’: Parents are now using apps to watch their kids at college (2019) | Hacker News Reader

‘Don’t leave campus’: Parents are now using apps to watch their kids at college (2019)

washingtonpost.com

16 pointsctoth15 comments

I think it's wrong of course to monitor adult children like this under any circumstances. The only thing I'd add though is I'd guess many of the kids expect their parents will still pay for their university, car, etc. There is a "their's no such thing as a free lunch" lesson embedded somewhere. It's super shitty of the parents and no doubt destroying their relationship with the kids and probably creating all sorts of emotional problems for them. But the kids (who are adults) could also choose to stop being dependent on their parents if they prioritize independence.

These parents would be happy living in Oceana, I guess. Their kids will build it.

Your parents income( really expected family contribution) is used to calculate your financial aid eligibility. This would make it really hard for many students to choose to stop being dependent.

A few friends of mine found a workaround. Parental income is not used if you are married. They filed papers for that. Applied. Undid. Worked.

You're not seriously arguing all students do that, are you?

not at all, just providing interesting info

The kids could also just ditch their phones and learn to live without them for a few hours when they wanna leave campus. Or buy a cheapo used one and use WhatsApp/Messenger off WiFi if they need to communicate with friends.

Not that I'm saying the parents doing this are in the right, just that it's pretty easily defeated IMO. Kids have been sneaking around behind their parents back since the beginning of civilization doing things they wouldn't approve of, this is just the next step really

I agree. It's ironic then that the unexpected effect of this solution is that now these young people are arguably less safe because without their phones they are A) more likely to get lost or wander away from safe areas and B) They cannot call for help in an actual emergency.

That was actually addressed in the article with a parent noting that a hike the kid went on didn't show up in the app.

Between overreaching parents and parents who make it known that you are a despised blight on their life, hearing anecdotes about parents who seem to care so much about their children as to be an ever-present pest in their ear sounds completely foreign.

Another comment brought up the idea of "no such thing as a free lunch" which essentially waters down the issue to that of "be grateful". You should be able to be self reliant while also able to attend college full time.

But the economic reality often pierces the veil of how unrealistic that scenario actually is when your parents refuse to spend a dime on you or your education.

I graduated from college in 1988. Here's the total extent of my parent's involvement in my college career:

Mom: Pulls up to my apartment at the start of sophomore year. Gives me enough time to pull out a couple of suitcases, a few bags of groceries and a cooler of beer. Then she digs in her purse and pulls out a $50 dollar bill and hands it to me. I ask her if she wants to come up and see the place. She says no because she has to get back home for some reason or another.

Dad: "Where do I send these checks"? "Don't waste my money"

That echoes my experience in the same timeframe.

I am ever so thankful that cellphones weren’t a thing for the first half of my life.

We dropped off our kid at college in the late oughts. We spoke over the phone now and then--perhaps it was once a week, probably less often. We had only the vaguest idea of what classes he took, and as far as I know never saw his grades. It would never have occurred to us to engage in surveillance.

To be fair, college was much cheaper back then

(2019)

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