From time to time, we like to review some of the books available for parents of college students.  There is a wealth of literature available to help parents cope with the transition to college and the changes that occur throughout the college years.  We’ve created lists of recommended reading, and there is something for everyone.  See our Resources and Tools page for suggestions.

This month we’re reviewing Success and Sanity on the College Campus: A Guide for Parents by Diana Trevouledes and Ingrid Grieger.  This is an important book for parents with students who are headed to or already in college.  Success and Sanity is a comprehensive book, covering many of the topics that we have covered on College Parent Central, and they are crucial topics for college parents.

Chapter 1 of the book helps parents understand ”the basic framework for distinguishing between those situations that students should be encouraged to manage on their own and those that require parental intervention.”  This distinction between parental support and helicopter parenting is the basis for the successful parent/student relationship.  We think it is important that the book begins on this basic level so parents can understand their role before moving on.

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From time to time, we like to review some of the books available for parents of college students.  There is a wealth of literature available to help parents cope with the transition to college and the changes that occur throughout the college years.  We’ve created lists of recommended reading, and there is something for everyone.  See our Resources and Tools page for suggestions.

This month we’re considering a book that is intended for your student, but we recommend it for parents to review first and then to pass on.  Parents should read Straight A’s Are Not Enough first because as parents, we, too, need to be reminded that getting an education is about more than grades.  We can’t expect our students to focus on education rather than grades if we don’t value the broader education as well.

But be sure to pass this book on to your student.  The book is intended to help students study better, and smarter, to be able to move beyond simply grades to a true education.  One of the strengths of this book is that, as the author discusses true learning, she fills the book with strategies that are bound to raise any student’s grades in the process.  Chapter after chapter is filled with exercises, review questions, techniques and strategies for better studying — what the author terms the intentional approach’. The book has over 100 strategies for students to employ that cover everything from approaches to learning to notetaking to rediscovering the excitement of reading and mental processing.

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