<p>“And then you get to hear the Intel finalists’ parents or neighbors complain about it on CC, because they “can’t understand” why it’s not all about grades or very specific competitions.”</p>
<p>They most certainly have and will. </p>
<p>What’s the big deal though? Don’t you think that when there are “sufficient” number of such cases, kids and parents will no longer treat these competitions as path to HYPSM? Isn’t that what you want?</p>
<p>Personally, I have no objection to anyone doing anything. As long as the adcoms are doing their job, hopefully holistically, the end results are going to be fine.</p>
<p>How can I say the following nicely? You really do not get what I wrote, or are twisting my words in a lot more than I expressed. Why are we talking about “paying a prize” as this represents a proxy for … not being given an advantage? </p>
<p>NOTHING, absolutely nothing precludes students who have shown an interest in scientific researcg at a young age to CONTINUE at the next level and obtain their just rewards. This is, however, quite a departure from not getting an advantage in college admissions, especially when the colleges are relying on the integrity of competitions that have shown to exhibit very little until the very end of the competition, and this if we were to accept that the interview process ferret out the pretenders from the real talented aspiring scientists. </p>
<p>For the nth time, you CAN have all the competitions and money rewards you want; the only element I’d like to eliminate is the implied boost in admissions stemming from the DELIBERATE early annoucement. I maintain that those competitions have become popular for that precise reason, and that eliminating that angle would be beneficial for the scientists who do it for the love of science.</p>
<p>If you really believe I am wrong about the PRIMARY purpose of the Intel competition, you should be entirely supportive of delaying ALL semi and finalist annoucements until June.</p>
<p>Spend a bit of time googling for the background on the stories, and your appraisal of the role of the mentors might change. Especially after doing it for a few years in a row.</p>
<p>After a while you might see how repetitive the following words become:</p>
<p>That’s why I support Intel ISEF- to first of all get there, you get rigorously grilled in your regional fair, sometimes get grilled again at a nationwide fair and then get questioned at the International fair. </p>
<p>STS, I think has a paper app first and then interviews. They ought to do interviews with the submission of a paper and then announce semis. I know for a fact that a kid who has no clue what they’re doing will not come out well if he’s properly judged. A kid I knew who got to a certain non local fair didn’t really know his stuff, even though his results were interesting so he didn’t win at all. At the same time, kids who had less impressive stuff but understood their work did better. </p>
<p>That being said- as I stated in some pages back, even a savy kid needs help. Experience is important.</p>
<p>The point being made is not that these kids have no clue what they are doing. You couldn’t fake it at this level. The point being made is that these opportunities are wildly, wildly unevenly distributed. So, you want to take a few of these kids, but you don’t want to “reward” that at the broader level because you don’t want to send the signal that you have to be well-connected, born on third base to make it to home plate.</p>
<p>From that story:
‘First, I would like to express my admiration of [the two students] for their amazing dedication and work ethic. […] Second, I want to emphasize the extent to which each of them drove their research - these are two independent young scientists; they formulated and executed their projects on their own with minimal input from me and Dr Role.’</p>
<p>Jack Andraka recently won an Intel ISEF prize for research on pancreatic cancer. He seems more persistent than well-connected:
[Wait</a>, Did This 15-Year-Old From Maryland Just Change Cancer Treatment? - Forbes](<a href=“http://www.forbes.com/sites/bruceupbin/2012/06/18/wait-did-this-15-year-old-from-maryland-just-change-cancer-treatment/]Wait”>Wait, Did This 15-Year-Old From Maryland Just Change Cancer Treatment?)
‘His advice for kids (and their parents) trying to figure out what to do with their creativity and imagination: Make sure to be passionate about whatever it is you get into, because otherwise you wont put the right amount of work into it. Andraka was rejected by almost 200 researchers in his search for a lab to do his nanotube strip work until one scientist at Johns Hopkins gave him the space to work.’</p>
<p>I realize that this was quite a while ago, but in post #2421, lookingforward objects to part of my analysis leading to my estimate of 18 students (annually) who meet my USAMO auto-admit criterion for MIT and are not disqualified by character or other issues. </p>
<p>lookingforward questions my guess that 2/3 of the USAMO-scorers who apply to MIT are admitted as is. That is where the 2/3 in post #1754 (cited by lookingforward in #2421) fits into the analysis.</p>
<p>Does that mean that you accept the earlier stages of my estimate, lookingforward? I am purely guessing that 2/3 of the USAMO-scorers who apply to MIT are admitted. If the fraction is higher than that, then there would be fewer than 18 additional students who ought to be admitted to MIT due to their USAMO performance, in my opinion.</p>
<p>Perhaps MIT is admitting fewer than 2/3 of the USAMO-scorers who apply. In that case, I think their admissions decisions are worse than I am giving them credit for.</p>
<p>Pizzagirl #2412, I don’t think that you meant this post the way it comes across. Sure, in certain ways it would be nice to have parents in the “highest income levels” with “social capital already made” so that the kids didn’t have to be “super-duper smart,” but could instead spend time perfecting their interpersonal skills and leadership.</p>
<p>You express a certain level of scorn for the “wannabes.” “Wannabe” what? Wealthy?</p>
<p>No doubt a few of the families that are encouraging their kids to be “super-duper smart” aspire to high incomes.</p>
<p>However, I know a lot of scientists who are “super-duper smart,” yet have chosen research positions that are not particularly financially rewarding, but where being “super-duper smart” actually makes a difference to the type of science one can do. Nobody can make a child “super-duper smart.” It is possible to bully a child into being “super-duper accomplished,” but that’s not the same thing.</p>
<p>If your “speculations” are in fact true, which means 1) the students in Intel/Siemens/USAxO/… are pretenders whose sole goal is to gain advantage in admission, 2) the competition organizers have unsavory hidden agendas, and 3) the college adcoms are being doped, then I agree with you completely to remove any and all such advantages from college admission. </p>
<p>Unfortunately, I still have more faith in people than you do, and I still advocate true holistic evaluation of all materials of all applicants, and let adcoms do their job.</p>
<p>Lots of kids are “super-duper smart.” Anybody that is super-duper “accomplished” has been bullied? Wow. Scientists are pure and never consider finances. Nice to know.</p>
<p>I start wondering how influential essays really are. Some adcoms are so impressed that they write applicants personalized comments. But I don’t remember seeing here on CC a poor white boy (not first generation) gets such attention with $60k per year cost covered.</p>
<p>People are always bragging about how their kids essays got notes back from adcoms.</p>
<p>How the heck else are the adcoms going to show they read your app and liked it - “Great GPA Joe, that 4.4564 just rocks it!”</p>
<p>there are 3 schools in top 20 that don’t care about essays - Harvard, Dartmouth and Wash U. They make it easy to file an app as long as you fill out your common app.</p>
<p>Lake, because you are only looking at CC (at least, in your statement.) With more first notices going out by email- and wanting to speed up that last phase, between decisions and notification (and probably save money,) I think a number of schools are phasing them out. My impression is they were about encouragement.
Texas— holistic, not stats only. How do you know who doesn’t care about essays?</p>
<p>Is it unusual to get personalized letters from the elite schools that accept you? My son got 3 of them (just not one from Northwestern); I figured it was a New England elite tradition and that everyone gets one upon acceptance.</p>
<p>LF - There are 3 schools in top 20 that don’t care about essays since they don’t make you write more. That does not make them non-holistic, just not essay obsessed.</p>
<p>LI - I am making the comment about parents being so delighted without realizing it is a way to reel you in. Essays are the only things adcoms can comment on to make it a personal note.</p>
<p>So you don’t think they bother with the CA essay and short answer?</p>
<p>Lorem, don’t know; my kids only applied in the NE, but as far as I know, not all admits, from those schools that did it. (Except if it was very short, just a “good job!” And, I just don’t recall many posts ever that mentioned getting a few sentences, until recently-?)</p>
<p>Not true; my son’s letters were about the things he did that impressed the committees, no direct comments about his essays. And, yes, I thought they were written to help improve yield by offering a personal touch.</p>