TOKYO - THEY may be destined to land good jobs in prestigious companies, but they will likely never attain great heights as future leaders - because they are mummy's boys and daddy's little girls.

Officials at universities across the country are flabbergasted at the level of pampering some parents bestow on their children, reported The Asahi Shimbun.

For example, a phone rings at a university staff room, and the person who picks it up is stunned to hear the caller ask: 'Could you tell me when and where we can buy textbooks?'

The call is not from a student, but from a parent.

Other parents' calls which have caught staff by surprise at nine private universities in major cities go like this: 'My son is staying at home today because he says classes are cancelled. Is that true?'

Or: 'My son complains the classroom is full and he cannot find a seat. Why is that?'

Or: 'My daughter could not take a test in class. What should she do?'

The anecdotes seem endless.

University teachers and officials have noted a sharp increase in such questions, along with requests and complaints from 'overprotective' parents in recent years.

Some parents protest after hearing from their children what was apparently intended as a joke in a classroom.

A professor who confides in class that he has a hangover should be prepared to field calls from parents expressing outrage. Some parents resort to writing a letter of protest to the university president.

University staff have also had a hard time making sure their entrance ceremony halls can accommodate all those who want to attend. Each year, Hosei University and Toyo University, both in Tokyo, rent the mammoth Nippon Budokan hall, which can hold up to 14,000 people.

They also limit those accompanying each student to two. Even so, the hall is always full, reported The Asahi Shimbun.

Many parents form a line two hours before the hall is open so they can dash to the best spot to shoot videos of their precious offspring.

At 'open campus' events, which target high-school students hankering for a university education by offering first-hand information, guardians are a common sight too.

'On entrance-exam day, parents used to see their children off at the school gates, but they do not go home now,' said one school official.

'There are so many waiting that rooms set aside for them are often not enough.'

Most teachers and staff attributed the rise in indulgent parenting to a decline in the number of children.

Many also noted that even as children grow apart from their parents, many parents are simply unwilling to let go.

Parents who spoil their children are creating a generation of kids who are 'just waiting around for instructions' and not thinking for themselves, said an official.

That said, pampering parents are not unique to Japan.

In the United States, overprotective parents came to be known as 'helicopter parents' in the 1990s. The term referred to the way they 'hovered' just above their children's heads, monitoring them closely so they could help out quickly in a crisis.

But Professor Masatoshi Onoda, an expert in education systems at Osaka University, believed universities needed to respond to parents' voices 'to some extent'.

'Many parents these days are university graduates. Since they know what universities are like, they want to learn more and request higher levels of 'customer satisfaction',' he said.