For Parents of High School Kids

One day not so many years ago, I read two long articles, back to back, on?the role?parents?play in their children’s stress and success and I made a decision.?When they came through the kitchen door that afternoon, I said, “Girls, I have a major announcement.”?They looked alarmed.?“I no long want to see or discuss your grades.”?Georgia wanted to know what I meant,?exactly.?Claire was sure it was a trick.?[I am not a casual parent.?I know what I want for my kids and I’m both serious and direct about my expectations.]

“If,” I said, “you want to talk about a book you’re reading or a paper you’re writing or ideas of any size or shape, I’m all in — but grades and grading scales and whatever you need to get on the final to get whatever grade you’re trying to get for the semester??That stuff is off limits.” Based on the position of their eyebrows, I felt compelled to go on.?“Dad and I are not registering for Infinite Campus or Schoology.?We won’t be checking your assignments or test scores online.?Your grades are your deal.”

Habits are notoriously hard to break and grade fixation is no exception.?Talking about school without talking about grades required new conversations,?which?is to say new questions.?All my chatty standbys — how was the math test??Is there extra credit??How long is your paper supposed to be? — were pointing us in the wrong direction.?The intersection between the answers to these questions and my vision for my kids is the null set.?One of my new conversation starters became?Who did you eat lunch with??Another:?What surprised you today??When my conversational kindling wouldn’t catch,?I tried doing something together, like watching?Kate McKinnon?skits online, playing Rummikub or rearranging?their bedroom furniture.?On a very good day, say once a year, we might put on music and fold clothes.

Even with this excellent first step toward redefining our goals for our kids, we made huge mistakes,?the biggest of which came down to overemphasis.?My husband and I talked about college?way more?than was useful.?Our interest was flagrant.?Even though I knew that high schools kids everywhere have 10x the information they need.?Even though I knew that many of my girls’ friends had older siblings in college and were reporting back real time.?Even though I knew that my kids used sites like College Confidential to read anonymous posts by?current?students.?Even though I knew that how I picked a major or why I worked part time in 1986 was, shall we say, stale information.?And we were too excited about where any kid we knew was going.?What felt to us like curiosity landed as pressure — more and more pressure, on them.

I have regrets, sometimes I beat myself up, but I do recognize that it is dreadfully easy to get this wrong.?What do I wish we had done? There’s one thing I would suggest.?I wish we had decided how many times we wanted to say the word?college?within ear shot of our kids.?Literally put a number on it.?100? 30? I would bet we said the word 1,000 times.?There’s no undoing that.?Message received.

You know why we owe this to our kids??Because today counts and we’re not acting like it does.?We’re all acting like sacrificing?here today?is a small price to pay for?somewhere better, some future day.?But today is real and we owe it some attention.?As for my expectations,?I?hope like hell that both girls come to understand and care for themselves so that they might have the exquisite satisfaction of knowing and loving others.?This takes, among other things, curiosity and patience.?Call me a Tiger Mom but?I’ll be damned if I’ll let them ignore the one thing that — across time, culture and class — drives happiness, productivity and contribution:?meaningful connection to others.