Qualified, but cut, what now?

[marite]

Peeges:

Many parents are not "buying" advantage for their students. It's too bad that your high school did not offer APs; it's true that the College Board expects Science AP classes to be a double period. In our high school that is 90 minutes.

I understand your son's disappointment, but he did go about things a bit wrongly. As someone pointed out, a student wanting to study Physics should have taken SAT-II Physics as well as Math 2C, not Chemistry (although nothing wrong with Chemistry). There are review books available and they are fairly inexpensive.

The sad thing is that your son, while very bright, was up against some bright and better prepared students who had gained recognition in national competitions such as AMC/AIME/USAMO/IMO/IPHO, etc...

But there are many great schools that are less selective; if your son is unhappy at UofMn, then he can seek to transfer later. But I feel pretty sure that he will be just fine once he begins classes.

[tokenadult]

My personal feeling is that the "ivies" are making some bad choices in failing to level the playing field and sift out some of these advantages parents are buying their students.

The Ivies are very aware that the programs that curious students use to supplement their educations have financial aid. The best of those programs, e.g. RSI, MOP, TASP, and the like, are free for qualified applicants. It is very important for parents to look beyond what is provided at the government-operated school (even if only to look things up at the local public library) to make sure an avid learner has all available opportunities. There is a lot of money available from third-party sources for young people who are avid about science, technology, engineering, or mathematics.

[latetoschool]

Peege04, I have to say that I disagree re the Ivys - from what I can see, they do a phenomenal job of leveling the playing field, and building classes from an extremely socioeconomic range of applicants. The burden seems to be on the applicant, specifically making the most of whatever options they ARE able to access, given financial, social and family restraints.

I speak from some experience - mine was deferred - then rejected - from Harvard, her first (and for a time, only) choice. She had the numbers and the rest of the package. (If it helps, she has been happy beyond all imagination at her version of U of M for the past four years.)

Since that rejection, I have studied Harvard's admissions almost to the point of obsession, mostly to try to understand if I dropped a ball somewhere, or if perhaps I failed to provide some resource or advantage that might have made the difference. I've looked hard at the aggregate numbers, studied individual admission stories, and everything in between. I've come to the conclusion that the Ivys know exactly what they're doing, and they do it better than - or at least on par with - any other category of colleges.

You can easily see this if you look closely at the admissions for the lower 50% of the socioeconomic ranges, the development admits, etc. And you can also see it in the middle - the 50%-ers.

[JHS]

It's not relevant in this context, but most of the strongest private schools don't offer any any AP courses at all because they don't want to surrender control over their curriculum to the College Board. They believe they can do a better job, and they're probably right.

Even at my son's public school, the strongest science courses are not the AP courses but electives taught by really fine, experienced faculty. For his senior year, he made the decision -- with which I agreed -- not to take state-funded courses at a local college whose student body is less impressive than the high school's, so as not to miss out on the fine teachers and peers at the HS, even if they're not labelled "AP".

[katliamom]

The Ivies have no obligation to level the playing field. They were built for -- and still largely exist for -- the monied and/or intellectual elite. On top of that, they attract huge numbers of applicants, virtually all of whom are qualified. With these kinds of conditions, getting into an Ivy is a bit like winning the lottery.

[peege04]

This is kind of going off track with this discussion of the ivy admission process. My husband and I don't buy into the ivy thing anyway. I've gotten a lot of helpful advice for our son and I thank you for that.

[JeepMOM]

It may go back to that adage......... love thy safety - simple as that.

[btm]

Peege, I respect your choices and I still struggle with mine, so I guess I do not know the answer to many questions I posted. I agree that in your son's situation it would not make much sense to take a gap year. In fact, as pointed out by others, he is in a really good place academically and financially. In just several more years these kids will learn to take responsibility for their choices and face the consequences. I do feel that it is always better to do your homework and make informed decisions, even though you cannot control many outcomes. On a positive side, I am sure he will learn from this experience and maybe he will even start listening to your advice

[JeepMOM]

BTM - well said ^^

[suze]

Buying advantages. As someone whose parents stretched incredibly to send me to a great high school rather than a really inadequate local one, I've heard this many times from kids and their parents who assume my parents bought my ivy admission ticket.

There will always be people who have advantages you don't unless you're a Trump. I went to school with kids who were fluent in French 1 because they'd spent summers in France. Who got internships at the White House because their parents were major donors. And on and on. So I had to do the free stuff. RSI. Volunteer work. My local politician. Paid jobs. And I even studied for SATIIs!

If you're not telling your son his advantage will come from his efforts, he'll miss out. If your attitude is that it's unfair to have more than others if you work for it it'll be hard to excel in America. I've just come back from teaching in China. Talk about your people who understand this.....

[mathmom]

I think for science minded kids places like RPI (Rensselaer) or WPI (Worcester) or Case Western are good match/safety schools. They have pretty high average SAT scores but accept more than half the applicants - in the case of the first two closer to 3/4. (Of course you have to want the nerd culture and not mind the male/female ratio.)

[mathmom]

"At the high school we have a 6 period day. After talking to the principal about the lack of AP Science classes (last year when it was too late for our son, I'm afraid), I found that they feel the 55 minutes allotted to each class is simply not enough to cover the amount of curriculum and lab work in an AP science program. I don't know if that's true, but that's what I was told."

Hey we have to deal with a 45 minute period. What our school does is have lab every other day which is usually combined with the required gym which is then also every other day. I feel your school is really doing a disservice to their bright kids, I hope you are advocating for change!

[hereshoping]

"Plus, this all feeds into a frenzy of continuing to buy an edge for their kids which we personally feel is disrespectful to the vast majority of children who don't have the money or resources to obtain these "extras." - Bravo!

It's kind of like the old --"what if they gave a war and nobody came?"

Only when PARENTS stop buying into the madness of the supposed hold grail of "elite" college admissions will the madness stop.

[Enn]

That's true. I'm transfering to a uni in the states, and my mother thought it was scandalous that I wasn't applying to all ivy leagues ("You're not applying to Harvard? What?") -- and we're from KUWAIT, okay.

[fizik]

My parents and grandparents invested a lot of love, intelligence, time, energy, money, to give me the best educational opportunities that were available to me/them at that point in time and space. None of that was done for the purpose of Ivy Leage admission (for a very simple reason, Ivy does not grow well in Russia). I went on to repay those affords by getting my PhD in physics. Now, I invest the same effort in my son's education. None of it comes even remotely from a desire to gain an admission into the Ivys, but the desire to widen his horizons and develop him into an intelligent human being. His Ivy admission, if it comes, would be simply a by-product of that process, not an objective. How is it unfair? It is my decision to invest in what I consider to be important to me, not into a new car or a bigger house. And after all, this is the money that I earn in a hard way and I feel totally at liberty to dispose of it as I see fit.