A new mandatory program for freshmen underscores UI officials’ increasing desire to act as parental figures.

Launched in 2008, the program — Pick One — now requires freshmen to participate in campus groups to improve their overall university experience. By Oct. 1, all first-year students must register for at least one activity through the Pick One website.

Forcing freshmen to participate in an extracurricular activity is overbearing. Officials should go to greater lengths to make sure freshmen know what opportunities are available rather than mandating participation.

Students and faculty both know the challenges that come with starting at a new university. Most freshmen are moving away from their homes for the first time. They’re coming into a city with tens of thousands of strangers and have to learn to balance a full-time course load with a flourishing social environment and, quite possibly, an off-campus job.

For a student sitting through 15 or more hours of class per week, completing required readings and homework, and working 20 hours off-campus for some extra cash, requiring involvement in one more activity may be overwhelming.

Measuring their participation is difficult to monitor as well: Officials cannot always track whether students are actually there.

“We’re not necessarily checking in with students in May,” said Sarah Hansen, the coordinator of the Student Success Team, the group that started Pick One. “We expect them to choose one activity and register on the site.”

Hansen said the main goal of the program is to get students involved on campus to promote their overall success, noting a 2006 UI study showed student who were involved in activities outside the classroom generally had better cumulative grade-point averages and reported fewer instances of binge drinking.

But those results are not universal for all students and should not be treated as such. Students are individuals; each works differently from the next.

While we agree with Hansen’s view that having responsibilities outside of going to class is advantageous, an expansive policy that applies to all freshmen is unnecessary.

Pick One offers a wide variety of activities students can get involved in — including campus employment, intramural sports, and even an option of proposing an original idea for approval.

Involvement in a fraternity or sorority counts as participation in the new program. If you decide to rush the first week of school and join a house on campus, it is enough to meet the requirement. But people who join houses do it because they want to — not because they are forced to.

And students who need to work off-campus jobs to pay tuition and living expenses — whether it’s as a door man at Summit or an office assistant at a local business — are still forced to choose another activity, even if they have no interest.

This fall also marked the first year freshmen were required to attend the UI’s welcoming convocation — another example of a mandate-happy university.

Although Hansen said the Students Success Team aims to get students involved in university-related groups, it’s safe to say students can participate without being required to join a group.

Iowa City is a university community. The city and university regularly hold events, such as concerts and theater productions, that attract students and residents alike. Students don’t need university officials forcing extracurricular activities on them.

After all, the prefix “extra” is there for a reason.