How Often Should College Freshmen Go Home?

You miss your college freshman. You’re glad your child gets to have the college experience, but you want your child to visit home regularly. But how does visiting home frequently impact your college freshman?

Personally, I did not live close to home until graduate school. But I did gather experiences and thoughts from students who lived within a few hours or less from college. While each freshman is different, college freshmen experience more negative than positive effects if they come home too frequently.

4 Ways Frequently Visiting Home Hurts Your Freshman

1. Your freshman fails to develop independence.

Living away from home can be uncomfortable and lonely. Living away from home with people you barely know makes this experience even more difficult.

Your child may be experiencing some homesickness or maybe even student imposter syndrome. Encouraging your child to visit home frequently may temporarily help your freshman feel better. But these habitual visits can actually harm your child’s college experience.

Your child needs to develop adult skills. These skills include basic tasks like doing laundry, exercising, eating right, dealing with roommate conflict, organizing a schedule, etc. These habits will help during and after college.

Your child needs to get out of his comfort zone. Being at home is a more pleasant atmosphere for most freshman. But that doesn’t mean it helps prepare your child for adulthood.

Your freshman also needs to know what he believes and why he believes it, developing independent thought. Up to this time, your freshman probably agreed with you on most social, political, moral and cultural topics. While there is nothing wrong with this, your freshman needs to wrestle with the “why” behind his beliefs.

Personal note: In my two years teaching freshmen, I noticed that many students struggle with developing critical thinking skills. They have a hard time connecting the dots between ideas. In addition, they usually don’t know what they think about current topics without parental guidance. While having your child echo your every viewpoint is flattering, this copy-cat thinking can actually harm your student’s ability to objectively process information.

This time in college is precious and limited. These college years also help develop adult skills. But visiting home too frequently can stunt your child’s growth into adulthood.

2. Your freshman misspends valuable time and money.

Depending on how far home is from college, your child may be traveling for hours just to be home for one day. This effort shows how highly your child values times at home. But your child may be spending valuable time traveling, when he should be spending that time on homework.

Realistically traveling home includes much more than travel time. It includes factoring in time to spend with family, friends, etc. It also includes catching up, going on outings and more. Traveling home may negatively impact his academics, because these fun activities leave little time for studying.

While cost may seem like a minor detail in this discussion, it isn’t. College is expensive. (I don’t need to tell you that.) Tuition, college textbooks and room and board add up quickly. If you add the expense of traveling, frequent trips home can burden your freshman financially.

Depending on who controls your freshman’s finances, this may be a non-issue for you as a parent. But if your freshman is spending money on gas and missing several days for which he paid rent, traveling home every weekend may cost too much for your financially-strapped freshman.

Frequent trips home, especially during freshman year, can cost your freshman dearly. Encourage your child to prioritize academics in this unique time of life.

3. Your freshman struggles to develop college relationships.

If your child is traveling home every weekend, developing relationships with other college students will be difficult. It will. Many town students can attest to this. If you don’t live on campus, it is much more difficult to get involved in college opportunities. Even if your freshman does live on campus, getting plugged in requires intentional effort. Weekly visits home make getting plugged in even more challenging.

Having a good college experience requires intentional effort, because integrating into a college atmosphere takes time. But when he is integrated, your freshman will feel more confident.

At the beginning of my freshman year, I didn’t feel like I actually was a college student for a while. And (from hearing others’ experiences) this is pretty normal. I felt like I was a campus visitor for about the first month of my freshman year. But as time went on, I felt like I belonged more and more.

Help your freshman integrate into college life and have a positive college experience by encouraging him to stay at college during most weekends.

4. Your freshman wrestles with navigating long-distance relationships.

This time of life is a new step for your freshman and for you as a parent. Any change comes with challenges. And this new phase of life is not an exception.

Helping your child develop long-distance relationships is important. When your child graduates and gets a job, he will most likely live away from home. Some college graduates live at or near home for a few years. But eventually your child will move away.

Family relationships are important. But your child won’t know how to maintain his relationship with you post-college if he doesn’t start learning during college.

Romantic relationships are important too. If your freshman has a boyfriend or girlfriend back home, visiting home weekly may be more of a temptation. Adjusting to a long-distance relationship is difficult for any couple. But frequently visiting home robs your freshman of the full college experience.

Let your child adjust to long-distance relationships however tough the growing pains may be. Your freshman will need these skills post-college too.

Every freshman is unique. Some freshman may handle the adjustment of college very well, while others may struggle with homesickness for weeks. In any case, consider the impact of your child’s frequent visits home. Help your freshman develop independence, save valuable time and money, develop college relationships and navigate long-distance relationships. Your house will always be home to your freshman. It just will feel like more of a break from college.