Students, parents differ on career choice
Delhi University admissions are a tussle between parents and children, with both having starkly contrasting expectations.
Delhi University admissions are a tussle between parents and children, with both having starkly contrasting expectations, a first-time special study in South Campus has found. The survey was conducted on Saturday morning during a counseling session.
“Some students were accompanied their parents. In a few cases, parents and their wards came separately. The significant part of the session was the expectations of the parents. A majority preferred their children choosing conventional careers like teaching. However, students wanted to experiment with unconventional options like a course in languages, fashion designing, horticulture, forensic studies and others,” said Sawsti Vohra of the department of applied psychology.
The common ground between both groups was that they wanted to know their career prospects once they choose a certain stream. There was also a tussle on the issue of choosing money over interest in a particular career. Issues like lack of trust are key areas which emerged in this study.
“One parent, for instance, did not trust the choice of career of his child because the child was a ‘poor performer’ and had not lived up to his expectations. We dealt with several such cases where parents were encouraged to stand by their children's choices,” she added.
Amid this all, there was a category of parents and students who were very clear on the choice of career. “A lot of parents wanted to know about the academic future in India if reservations were introduced. They were curious about education prospects abroad and there were queries on other universities,” Vohra said.
An interesting fact thrown up by this study was that students who had older siblings pursuing successful careers post-MBA, were very clear about choosing or not choosing the same field. “They were aware of the demands and late-work hours. Interestingly, everyone had a course charted for themselves beyond graduation,” she said.
