<p>I would describe that scientist as risk averse, not as pure. I know scientists who have struck it big financially- not because they focused on finance, but because their passion and drive ended up with a massive patent or discovery or entrepreneurial venture. I know scientists who could have ended up wealthy but made foolish and short-sighted decisions or who didn’t ask for help (assuming that they knew it all) in protecting a commercial asset.</p>
<p>Not every scientist who hasn’t struck it big has done so out of “purity”. Some of them were too arrogant to call a lawyer, or assumed they could do their own Net Present Value calculations-- when in fact, there are other “experts” out there who earn their livings helping scientists protect intellectual capital.</p>
<p>The field with the 20 times earned income is law, not science. For that matter, it’s generally possible to earn somewhat more as a scientist in industry than as an academic scientist, but at the cost of losing the opportunity for self-directed research. There are some exceptions: IBM and Xerox both name fellows, who can follow their own lines of inquiry. </p>
<p>I don’t think it’s very easy to capitalize financially on the discovery of the Higgs boson. Hats and T-shirts with cute Higgs bosons logos? Higgs dolls of Ken’s height, so Barbie can date someone super-duper smart? Higgs bosons as a novel power source? Not sure how you’d do that last one. I am sure that Higgs didn’t make any significant amount by “discovering” the Higgs boson theoretically. Some fields of science lend themselves more to patents or discoveries with entrepreneurial possibilities. But I wouldn’t call Higgs risk-averse.</p>
<p>Sorry Quant, when you referenced scientists I assumed you’d include biologists and neuro-scientists and nano-technologists and chemists and computer scientists and Ph.D’s in aeronautics in the description “Scientists”. I did not know that the only “Science” we were discussing was theoretical physics.</p>
Looking at a few sites, average lawyer salaries may be about $100K, certainly not the
$1mil = 20*$50K that it would take to make your statement plausible. There are partners at big law firms making $1mil, but they are not the norm.</p>
<p>Higgs will receive a fair amount of money when he wins or shares the Nobel Prize. I don’t know Higgs personally, so I don’t know whether he was pursuing the Nobel Prize with his work. In any event, I am sure that he wasn’t pursuing it for the money.</p>
<p>Re blossom, post #2542: I was talking about “a scientist” as opposed to “scientists.” </p>
<p>Some fields have great opportunities for a scientist to start a company and some don’t. Some of the companies succeed and some don’t. It does take a certain amount of risk-tolerance. All of my colleagues who have started companies have been distracted from their research while setting up and initially running the company. In some cases, it takes a few years to come back up to speed in research, after either selling off the company or at least relinquishing control. The view of the trade-off depends on the person.</p>
<p>My uncle, brother-in-law, and the few people I know who are partners in law firms (some with their names on the firm, some not) easily make $2 million a year. My former grad student who went into patent law for a company probably does not make that much, but on the other hand, I know that the University Development (read fund-raising) people fly out to LA to talk with him about donations to the university, so I think he’s doing reasonably well.</p>
<p>Momzie, one of the kids my son knows (he is a couple of years older than my son) is a Chinese American math kid who plays the violin. Somewhere along the way, he developed a passion for Bluegrass music and undertook a self-study of the genre. One of the funniest/coolest things I’ve ever seen is when he took the stage at a school recital – picture it, Asian boy with glasses wearing a tuxedo – and ripped into a foot-stomping set of traditional Bluegrass music. Not what the audience was expecting, and totally blew them away. It was epic. Epic, I tell you. His essay was about the road trip he took with his grandfather through the south following the path of his passion and in a warm, charming, self-effacing way discussing the people he met. This boy did very well in the college admission process and is just a fantastically interesting kid.</p>
<p>Would the admissions committee see this as manipulative and cynical If it’s an important factor in the kid’s hs experience, posed challenges, the kid still did well, was in clubs, etc, it’s a good point for the GC to mention. It’s tricky for the kid to bring up. This is a case where we adults can raise something and effectively speak to it, while a 17 yo may make it come off as an excuse or waste space on the app that could be focusing on more.</p>
<p>Nothing wrong with violin. Of course most kids get started because of their parents. It’s what he/she does with it that matters- be in an orchestra, accompany the school musicals, do something beyond lessons.</p>
<p>I also think the genetics comment is uncalled for. </p>
<p>I also think that always going back to the idea (even if it’s little) that many super duper kids are bullied to get there, is underestimating the great things many hs kids can accomplish.</p>
<p>And, btw, law school is no longer an assured path. As for many comments on this thead, it helps to distinguish between adults we know today and kids fresh into the market.</p>
<p>I dunno about you folks, but I’ve found that trying to bully teens into doing something they really don’t want to do is not an effective investment of time and effort; it’s easier to get a mule to cooperate.</p>
<p>I personally feel that I’ve read plenty of kids on CC who are, in essence, bullied by their parents into pursuing only a very limited set of colleges and pursuing a limited number of careers, so I would not be surprised if some of them were bullied into certain ECs. After all, Amy Chua (the Tiger Mom) bullied her daughters into piano / violin. There’s no other way around it.</p>
<p>The student who has to be bullied into participating in EC’s is not generally the ambitious, active and inquisitive type of student that produces a high school record worthy of a top school. That said, plenty of parents force their kids to “do something,” because there are lots of regular 'ol high schoolers (unlike most of the children of CCer’s) who just want to come home after school and watch TV, play video games, or chat on FB. The parents of said teenagers understand that college apps are approaching and know their kid will need that “something” to put on them. However, these parents tend to be unsuccessful in stipulating what EC their kids end up doing. Dad may suggest Robotics Club or mom might push for the Debate Club, but the kid will choose Ping Pong club and Anime club.</p>
<p>The ambitious, active and inquisitive kid can be bullied as well, but in a different way. They’re usually pretty on board with the game plan of elite college admissions. But what I’ve seen in the case of the Tiger parents in our town is that they’ll force their kids to forgo what they perceive as meaningless social activity (just hanging out; texting; not the sport itself but the pre-game pasta parties, T-shirt decorating nights, and team bonding stuff; not the play itself but the cast parties, etc.) in favor of more time studying, more hours practicing violin, or more time doing the academically-oriented EC they believe will be useful for college admissions.</p>
<p>“The student who has to be bullied into participating in EC’s is not generally the ambitious, active and inquisitive type of student that produces a high school record worthy of a top school.”
-Every single kid has interests. If parents are pushing kid to something else, then they are NOT worthy of raising this kid, he will end up very bitter and negative person. Discovering kid’s interests is one of parents’ responsibilities. Setting priorities to a 5 y o is up to the parents, 5 y o does not understand. I know because I have checked with mine when she was 5 y o. Did you check with your kid? If not, you missed a moment of tremendous opprotunity to straighten them for life. I told her what are priorities (and she was very involved at 5 with activities that continued all the way thru college) and never had to repeat. It sinks in at 5 much better than at 15, they trust you more, they llok up to you, they are such a soft dough to build anything you want, positive person with great attitude who is used to listen to his own heart and follow his own dreams or bitter individual fed up with everybody telling him what to do. It is not a kid, it is up to the parents.</p>
<p>You contradict yourself, Miami. Not even a brilliant 5 year old knows which 5 interests, out of a whole universe of interests and activities, he most wants to do for years to come. Furthermore, there will be some that he can’t do until he is much older. If I ask my 5 yr. old S if he wants to join Cub Scouts, it’s going to be pretty tough for him to answer that question. He’s never done Cub Scouts before, might have only seen the Scouts at our door selling popcorn, so how does he know if he’s interested or not? It’s the parent that chooses when they’re young. Sure, you hope the parent is looking at some natural propensities when deciding, but for the average kid it’s not cut and dried. Besides that, there’s the issue of resources and community accessibility. If my 5 yr. old kid had said he wanted to play golf, we’d have said no because of the cost and distance from courses. Does that make us bad parents?</p>
<p>The high-achieving child will try the various things made available to him by his parents and then will eventually choose from among them or go beyond them to find what he likes best and dedicate himself to that.</p>
<p>“The high-achieving child will try the various things made available to him by his parents and then will eventually choose from among them or go beyond them to find what he likes best and dedicate himself to that.” Wholeheartedly agree.</p>
<p>We exposed both to as much as we could; each chose a different interest(s). One went towards athletics; the other went towards science. The athlete made it to a great school. The science one went the way of science fairs (beginning in 8th grade when there was no admissions boost) and community service - and is heading somewhere next year. At one time or another, both needed to be coached by people who were experts in various fields and we were very happy to oblige their needs to get better and deeper into their interests.</p>
<p>^No need to be brilliant at all. Just give them choices, they will know, not only at 5, even at 4. Mine knew, all kids around her knew, good parents listened. She said NO to soccer, so she ended up playing once in her entire life, we just wasted money paying for whole session. No contradictions. She dragged me around into 5 activities at 7, I was patiently waiting for her to finally see that she does not belong into some. Well, few years later, she did. At the end it was only 3. However, what I told her at 5 was not about her EC. I have asked her at 5 about the most important activity in her life. And when she gave incorrect answer, I corrected her and that is still with her today. I told her that her homework was the most important, it did not matter that it was a 10 min. assignment in kindergarten.<br>
The problem is that this type of life creates people who want to try everything in a world and getting all As at the same time. Well, dropping some of these activities usually creates certain sad moments that they have to work on.</p>