Idiots

The holidays are almost here. The end of semester has been filled with the usual challenges and successes. First semester freshman are discovering that they have what it takes, or that things did not go as planned. Staff have been dealing with deadlines for final exams, graduation, commencement, grades, petitions, and insufficient sections of required courses to meet demand. Everyone is tired, the students have gone, and we are all looking forward to spending a little time with our families and friends.

Of course, we all know that somewhere between our now quiet university and some distant locale is that one complete idiot who will decide that December 23 is the perfect date for her perfectly wonderful child to visit the university that he wants to attend "more than anything else in the whole world". And she will stop at nothing to try to make this happen. She will never acknowledge that she has been given all the tour dates, and we don't do them this particular week. She will not consider that if it were really that important she might want to bring her wunderkind to campus when he can actually see something. She won't even admit that she screwed up the office address -- even we don't have what it takes to direct an obnoxious parent to "a pole barn on the Vet Med complex."

Here's how it goes down: Mrs. Idiot I'm-the-Only-One-in-the-World Who Matters, calls a week before the university is closing down to schedule a tour for her baby Einstein. We explain that we'll be glad to meet with her and her son, but that we don't have tours available, the students have gone home, labs are closed for the term, etc. We arrange a meeting with the department that her son just has to meet with, but she can't find a way to program campus addresses into her GPS. So, she contacts the dean - not once, but twice - and says no one will help her. She has to travel "hundreds of miles" to reach us. Oh, dear, your area code is in-state. You gotta love this. She's already pissed off every single person her son will need as a resource if he actually comes here. I hope it made her feel powerful.

So once again, my favorite rant: if you are really interested in a college or university, then plan your freakin' campus visit so that you can get something out of it. If your college visit is so low on the priority list that the only day you can squeeze it in is when "your college of choice" is closed, then maybe it's not so important after all.

We go out of our way every single day for our students, both current and prospective. I suspect that this particular mother either wants her baby closer to home, or is trying to make up for the campus visit being an afterthought on her part.

Have a nice holiday, Mrs. VIP. Bask in the hassle you have created, and understand that you have done your son no favor at all. It's not all about you.