The 2017-2018 PTF Parent Up Speaker Series launched last week to high acclaim with bestselling author and popular TED Talk speaker Julie Lythcott-Haims. The Performing Arts Center was packed as faculty, parents, community friends and Upper School students all gathered to listen to Ms. Lythcott-Haims in one of three presentations.

 

Ms. Lythcott-Haims is the author of the New York Times best-seller “How to Raise an Adult: Break Free of the Overparenting Trap and Prepare Your Kid for Success”. The book emerged from her decade as Stanford University’s Dean of Freshmen, where she was a fierce advocate for young adults and often observed and grew concerned with the growing trend of parental involvement in the day-to-day lives of college students.

 

Over the years, Ms. Lythcott-Haims noticed that each incoming class was more impressive and accomplished than the last. They were true achievers on paper, yet in reality, the students seemed to be brittle, fragile and breathless — existentially incompetent and less familiar with their own selves. Not surprisingly, the parents accompanying these new college students were seen as overprotective and over-directive of their offspring (the so-called “concierge” parents who do everything for their children, including their homework).

 

Ms. Lythcott-Haims wove powerful and comical analogies with an impactful first-person perspective as a parent herself to explore the issue of overparenting in today’s society. She believes it is driven by parents wrongly motivated by a combination of love, fear, and ego in order to mold their child into a perfect specimen: accomplished, talented, a top candidate for that big brand name university, and ultimately, a financially successful leader in their chosen field. As a result, parents nowadays subject their children to a “checklisted childhood”, where days are a race of enrichment activities, AP courses, hours of homework, competitive sports, languages, and exotic projects aimed at bolstering one’s service and leadership credentials. The result is a child that can’t think and act freely, and who is susceptible to depression, anxiety, sleep deprivation, and isolation.

 

Ms. Lythcott-Haims’ message to parents is to raise the children they have, not the children they wish they had; to treat their children like human beings, not like carefully picked stocks that will someday yield a return on their investment.

 

As for the Upper School students in the audience for her final presentation, Ms. Lythcott-Haims implored them to look within and ask themselves, “Can I dream? Can I play? What am I good at? What do I love?” She encouraged students and parents alike to talk with each other and start figuring out how they prepare for what truly lies ahead in the future.

1.    Stop saying “we” when you mean your kid.
2.    Stop arguing with all the adults in your kid’s life.
3.    Stop doing their homework.

1. First you do it for them.
2. Then you do it with them.
3. Then you watch them do it.
4. Then they do it independently.

1. Be kind.
2. Try hard.
3. Learn how to think and do for yourself. Start making your own way. Be familiar with your own thoughts and your own self.
4. Widen your blinders when it comes to colleges. Focus on fit and belonging; faculty attention; a place where you can thrive.
5. Have the courage to study what you love.