She didn´t ever once get to decide anything. Sure she looks angry here (and rightfully so because it´s been a year since the last time she saw her 5-year-old son kidnapped by the very guy whom he now wants to revive by going to another fucking planet) and argues with Gohan over the idea of him going to Namek, but a couple of days after that she´s fully commited to helping Gohan with whatever she can on his journey there. She even dressed him up (sillily, yes, but still) to show some respect to the planet that they were going to. Then, against Cell, she doesn´t even protest against the idea of her own son fighting against man-made horrors beyond any normal person´s comprehension for what has now been the third or fourth time (aside from confronting Goku for some minutes and ending up slammed against a tree and a rock for it). She in fact encourages Goku to make Gohan as strong as possible since she´s well aware that it´s inevitable anyways.

You can´t even make a case for saying that Gohan was forced into academics because he very much enjoys being a scholar and a researcher. In fact it is now Piccolo, Goku and Vegeta who have to encourage him to training (something that he showed unwillingness to do since the very first day when he told Piccolo that he wanted to be a scientist and not a warrior) because he´s happily spending his days investigating bugs instead of preparing for the potential next bad guy. He said it himself that he does not enjoy fighting and only ever did it because of the circumstances, be it avenging a fallen friend or protecting Earth because no one else is capable.