If a farmer's barn is on fire, yet the farmer does not see it, does not want to see it, cannot see it or is too preoccupied to attend to the fire ----should the fire department not respond if they know the fire is burning?
If a Good Samaritan tries to tell the farmer that his barn is burning and yet the farmer smiles and does nothing or shrugs his shoulder and says "What do you think I should do?"--should the Good Samaritan call the fire service for the Farmer? Uh, Yes.
But what if the fire service dispatcher tells the Good Samaritan "We can't respond, you are not the owner of the barn, we must wait until the farmer calls us!" "You are not the owner of this barn!"
I ask these questions rhetorically and use an analogy to illustrate a problem--this blog entry is not about William Faulkner or Barn Burning or structure fires and emergency responses----It's about people trying to help students and bureaucrats getting annoyed by this.
Some parents do not know how to best advocate for their own children. Some parents want to do what is best for their children, but they often let things slip and do not make the right decision for their students--hoping and believing that the system will make sure their students are appropriately looked after.
And well-meaning staff do their best in most instances but even still sometimes mistakes are made. The wrong class is assigned, the wrong GPA is calculated, the wrong information is given, and the list goes on.
So what happens if a parent that is not necessarily sophisticated with the world of college eligibility requirements, GPA calculation, or academic scheduling asks another parent for help navigating the
