Tag Archives: transfer colleges

college guidance, college planning, parenting

Should your student be allowed to transfer colleges?

 

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unhappy college student

If you have a high school student thinking about college, be prepared to hear these words after their first few weeks, “I don’t like it here. I want to transfer colleges”. As your heart sinks and a hundred things go through your head, remember that I told you it would happen; and if you read this article it might help you handle those words without your heart and brain exploding into a million pieces.

Before you say anything listen to their reasons

Don’t scream and yell, listen. Your student is upset and needs to voice how they feel. It may not be logical or even feasible, but they need to vent and you need to listen. Stay calm and approach this by treating them as an adult. Use reasoning first and see if that helps.

Give it some time

Most freshmen get immediately homesick, especially if they don’t get along with their new roommate or their coursework is overwhelming them. They miss the stability and comfort they had at home and they want to bail. But give it some time. Usually by the end of the first semester they have settled in and have made some friends. Usually.

Approach it financially

In the case of my daughter, her scholarships were attached to the school and paying for her education. If she transferred it would be impossible for us to pay for her education. There may be very good financial reasons for them to stick it out and then re-evaluate at the end of the first year. It’s rare that your student will use finances as an excuse to transfer, but if they do, be prepared to answer with a logical explanation.

Outside influences

Is there a friend or a boyfriend encouraging them to move back home or join them where they are? This is the worst reason. Help them to understand that they made the choice to leave and it’s time for them to move on with their life. Holding on to the past will only cause them to miss the benefits of the future. They may be adults but you, almost always, hold the purse strings.

Stand your ground

In most cases, you should stand your ground—at least until the end of the first year. Tell your student that if he/she still feels the same way at the end of the year you can revisit the option. It’s my experience that most students, later in life, thank their parents for giving them some tough love when they needed it.

I’m not saying it’s easy to listen to their pain and not act. And in some instances their mental health is much more important than drawing a line in the sand. But you know your child and you will know when they are just too unhappy and miserable to remain where they are. In some cases, they just chose the wrong school.

To steal a line from one of my favorite movies, The Big Chill, “No one ever said it would be easy; at least they never said it to me.”

college majors, college planning, parenting

To transfer or not to transfer-that is the question

 

transferring collegesParents often have to make tough decisions where their kids are concerned. And while you want the best for your child, and that desire influences your every choice, even you have to admit that you don’t always choose correctly – parents are just people trying to do the best they can! At some point you’re going to have to let your teen take the reins and make his own decisions, even if you think he’s making a huge mistake. But as a parent it’s still your job to help him in any way you can. While you might not exert the same influence over a teenager as you did over a toddler, your opinion still matters. So when it comes to ensuring that your child end up at the right institution of higher learning, the one that will help him to maximize his potential and prepare for a successful and fulfilling career, the onus is on you, to some degree, to make sure he has all the facts needed to make an informed decision about his future.

Even with all your input and exhaustive research, he could end up at the wrong college with the wrong major. Here are just a few things to consider when determining whether your kid is at the right college or if he’s in need of transfer to a more suitable school.

What are the reasons?

There are plenty of reasons why a college might not end up being the best choice for any given student, but when it comes to your child you want to be sure. After all, this can be a fairly costly mistake, what with the complications inherent in transferring to a new school. As a parent, your job in this situation is to determine whether your college student is truly miserable and misplaced at his current campus or if he is simply making a mountain out of a molehill when it comes to complaints about his current situation.

Have your student’s interests changed?

You and your student will no doubt put a lot of time, effort, and deliberation into selecting the appropriate college. But things don’t always turn out like you hope. Even with the help of a comprehensive ranking system, information from school advisors, and visits to college campuses, your student may eventually discover that the school he has settled on isn’t what he wants, for one reason or another. Perhaps he’s looking for practical studies and it turns out that the program for his major is largely theoretical, analytical, or historical in nature, just for example. He may decide partway through that he wants to change his major to something that his school of choice doesn’t specialize in or that it isn’t highly ranked in, at any rate (this is more common than you might imagine). So if it turns out that your student went for a major in contract law when what he really wanted was an urban planning career degree, discuss this change with him and determine the financial consequences of his change of interest and/or passion.

Is this a rash decision?

It could be that your student has selected a campus that is far away and the homesickness is too much for him to handle on top of all the other stresses of entering college. If your college student asks to transfer, tread lightly. It could be more than the wrong educational choice. It could be homesickness, not fitting in, or even the feeling that they are overwhelmed. Make sure it’s not a temporary response to stress. Encourage them to finish out the semester and then make a well-informed decision.

If he discovers that the courses offered aren’t going to help him to get the knowledge and skills needed for his career of choice, then perhaps you should consider supporting his move to another school that can meet his needs. A happy student is a successful student.