Megan Della Selva, who has already traded e-mail messages with her mom, just to say hi, is a ______.

Megan Della Selva, a sophomore at George Washington University, has already traded e-mail messages with her mom, just to say hi, Maria Minkarah, the friend she is having lunch with, has just talked to her dad, to report on a doctor’s visit and her latest thoughts about studying abroad. The young women keep in close touch with their families, discussing matters big and small, academic and personal. Interviews with students on a variety of campuses suggest that many turn to their parents for help with everything from roommate troubles to how to improve the paper they e-mailed home. Perhaps the most striking thing was the tone students had when talking about their parents: fond, warm and admiring. The sense of parents as people to be admired was widespread.
     Not all college students are this closely connected with their parents. But university officials, students and their families say that the generation gap is nothing like what it used to be, now that baby boomers, once so alienated from their parents, have become parents themselves. "This generation of parents is more involved," said Jennifer Bell, coordinator of the parents office at North Carolina State University. "Thirty years ago, parents were content to drive their kids to college, drop them off, and pick them up at graduation. Now there are different expectations, because they’ve been involved in their kids’ lives all through school."
     Cellphones and e-mail have a lot to do with what university administrators and parents alike say has been a big change over the last decade. Hundreds of colleges nationwide have recognized the new reality by giving parents a stronger presence on campus, through a host of offices created to deal with parents’ queries and concerns.