Quote:
Originally posted by 33girl
Do the majority of students live that close that their parents are constantly keeping tabs on them, or have the babies not cut the apron strings yet?
If they're making pledges do their laundry and such I agree that they shouldn't - I just don't understand why/how these parents are so up in their kids' business and furthermore, why they think deferred would solve any problems.
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I myself am not sure that deferred would solve the problems. And not being from North Carolina, I can't say for sure what's going on with parental involvement --- however . . .
Over 80% of the student body at Chapel Hill is from North Carolina, and Chapel Hill is either for all intents and purposes in or reasonably close to some of the major population centers: Raleigh and Durham in particular, with Greensboro and Winston-Salem not all that far away. So it's possible that parents may be fairly close. Another factor may -- I emphasize may -- be that Chapel Hill is a high-prestige, highly selective school, and thus likely to have a good many parents who are concerned about / involved in / perhaps even "over-invested" in their children's success and well-being (from kindergarten on, in some cases). Dad and Mom may have been bursting with pride that their straight-A, loaded-with-activities, high-SATs kid even managed to get admitted . . . and may be ticked if the kid reports that he's stressed because of, to use your example, doing someone's laundry.
Which brings me to a side observation: sure, a few parents might be spying on their kids, but I'd guess in more cases the parents are hearing gripes from the kids. Some parents then apparently pass that along to the trustees, if the Tar Heel article is any indication.
Ya know, along the lines of Firehouse's advice to "just say no," I do think it's a shame that more pledges / new members don't feel empowered enough or comfortable enough, or safe enough, to say "no" when ordered or requested to do pointless personal-service activities.
Just speculating, of course.
It is interesting that, at least as I take the article, the complaints seem to be with fraternities, not with the Greek system as a whole.