Do the Right Thing

It's perfect timing for psychologist Madeline Levine's recent opinion piece for the New York Times -- "Raising Successful Children."  As students head back to school and begin the college application process, Levine, author of Teach Your Children Well: Parenting for Authentic Success, has valuable advice for parenting through those steps -- testing, essays, college visits -- that will come over the next months.

Sometimes it's hard to maintain your perspective when all around you it's "winner-take-all" parenting. No matter how level-headed you are, you can get caught up in the frenzy. So here's some reinforcement for your best instincts:

                The happiest, most successful children have parents who do not do for them what they are capable of doing, or almost capable of doing; and their parents do not do things for them that satisfy their own needs rather than the needs of the child.

Do the right thing now and throughout your student's college search and application process. You can start with Levine's excellent article here.