As midterms pass and finals loom just over the horizon, many seniors are busy trying to secure jobs and living arrangements.
But as national salaries fall and college loans rise, some students are considering a drastic measure typically dreaded by college students everywhere: moving back in with their parents.
The term "boomerang kids" refers to students who move back in with their parents after graduating from college. Instead of simply taking it easy, these students are aiming to save money by living at home while working or looking for a better job, and strengthening relationships with their parents at the same time.
In a survey conducted by MonsterTrak.com, 48 percent of 2007 college graduates said they planned to move into their parents' homes after graduation. According to the same survey, 11 percent of graduating seniors did not expect to receive a job offer by graduation. As the U.S. economy seems to draw closer to recession, these numbers could dip even lower.
Although many Jumbos have already secured jobs, some Tufts students will be joining the masses flocking home after Commencement.
"In Career Services, we do hear students talking about the financial need that may lead them to move home if they haven't secured a job by graduation," Career Services Director Jean Papalia told the Daily in an email.
Papalia described the ways different students can view the option of living at home. "There are some students who are quite adamant about ... [living] independently and in some cases, this is powerful motivation for finding a job," she said. "Likewise, we also hear from students who say they're happy to live at home. They like their parents, and appreciate the comforts that
are offered."
Aaron Mehta (LA '07) is one such boomerang kid. After graduating last May, he moved home for a short time, and is now in the process of
moving back out.
After graduation, Mehta spent two months in Asia before moving back home to Wellesley, Mass. He got a job working on a local political campaign and played with his band, Melodesiac, before looking for jobs in Washington, D.C. Had Mehta needed to worry about paying rent, the political campaign job would have been financially impossible.
Mehta said that among his peers, moving home is acceptable for a short period of time. "I know a few people who have moved home, but fewer than I thought," he said. "The general consensus seems to be that it's cool, as long as it's for only a year. After that, the general feeling seems to be that you need to move on."
Some students worry that living under a parental roof with little financial obligation will undermine students' independence.
"I think that moving home is of course a good way for young adults to save money - money that will foster their later independence," Child Development Professor Fred Rothbaum said in an e-mail. "Whether it is a good way of fostering independence in the short term, while they are at home, I suspect the answer is very mixed."
Rothbaum explained that some parents and their children find it hard to move past their old roles of parents as caretakers and children as those being taken care of - but if older children can limit the extent to which their parents act as guardians, then being cared for in age-appropriate ways can actually help them in their quest for maturity.
Rothbaum also believes that because many college students tend to drift away from their high school buddies during their college years, reconnected childhood friendships can become another benefit of moving home.
"Those who move home may be the ones who have proven most successful in renegotiating the old childhood relationships and have made them more mutual or reciprocal," Rothbaum said.
While moving home does have its financial and familial benefits, there are many household logistics to work out. Moving back home after living almost unrestricted in dorms and apartments at school can be a shock to those who settle back into their childhood bedrooms. Parents often struggle over whether or not to instill curfews or new rules on noise and visitors.
For some students, this may be the first time in years that parents are looking over their shoulders again.
Still, Mehta found many advantages to living at home, and said his parents gave him freedom.
"Well, I've been unemployed for a few months now and I still need to lose weight, so clearly someone is feeding me," Mehta said, laughing. "I basically live for free, aside from taking the trash out."
As for the drawbacks?
"I'm living at home with my parents and I'm 23," he said.
