When do they get to be adults?

The Last Psychiatrist has posted about a new program at Vanderbilt University that seeks to create a "special environment" (quotes mine) for freshmen. Read the article; it's not that long. OK, here's my question:

How long before we need to create a special sophomore environment to coddle the "new" second-years? When do we finally expose these students to the real world? To real life? To real, adult responsibilities?

All right, that was more than one question, but it does make me wonder.

When my mother was a freshman at Ohio State, she stayed in a freshmen women's dorm. OK, in 1951 that made sense because she had just turned 17, and was still a minor on anyone's calendar. And let's not forget the quaint notions of that bygone era that said young women needed to be protected and sheltered from men. Adult men, in particular.

When do we push children from the nest and make them responsible for themselves? Clearly, this shouldn't be attempted too early in their lives, because our kids really deserve a chance to be children, at least for a time. But as a child enters high school there should be a gradual movement toward more and more responsibility and self-reliance. Then when your young man or woman is ready to leave home and go to college (assuming that's what they do) they're already doing things mostly on their own recognizance. No special freshman cocoon necessary. Or wanted.

Once someone is able to vote and join the army, we should accord them all the responsibilities of adulthood. They may have problems from time to time, so we should be willing to help (when asked), but otherwise they deserve the chance to make or break it on their own. Maybe that's not always going to work because the world is becoming more complex and difficult (i.e., changing faster than our ability to adapt), but we still do have to ask: If not now, then when? For individuals this point should vary, but in general we need to decide: If 18 is the age of consent, then that's the point we should all be working toward to have our children prepared for adulthood. And the same goes for them, to be ready for it.