<p>Today’s Washington Post acknowledged today’s significance with two opinion articles related to college admissions. This one is a law student’s concern that many superlative students may not be truly “nice.” Not my observation, but what do you think?</p>
<p>[washingtonpost.com</a> - nation, world, technology and Washington area news and headlines](<a href=“http://washingtonpost.com%5Dwashingtonpost.com”>http://washingtonpost.com)</p>
<p>You have to register to read the linked article.</p>
<p>I would say, some are and some aren’t.</p>
<p>Yeah, I can’t read it either, but I’m going to agree with MoWC. You can’t really make a generalization one way or the other about the niceness of superlative students. I’ve known folks on both ends of the spectrum there.</p>
<p>I think “niceness” is an independent variable. In my experience, superlative people are equally (not more, not less) likely to be nice as ordinary people.</p>
<p>The author of that article seems to have just come to this realization- and is disappointed. I didn’t find that article too insightful.</p>
<p>Yes, they are, in my experience.</p>
<p>There’s a Peanuts cartoon where Linus says, “I love humanity; it’s people I can’t stand.” I think maybe the author of the editorial was running into some people with that outlook.
But I essentially agree that niceness is independent from superlativeness.</p>
<p>I think niceness is seperate also, but it depends on motivation.
I have known " high achieving students" who were motivated by competitiveness which was encouraged by parents.Those students not so self aware, not so nice.
I have also know students who were competitive with themselves or simply driven to learn, who were socially mature and aware of themselves and others, who are very high achievers, but also very warm and generous and totally straightforward.
They would be nice anyway, I suspect.</p>
<p><a href=“From%20the%20article”>quote</a> I’m saying that sometimes some of these students will denounce world hunger but be unfriendly to the homeless. They will debate environmental policy but never offer to take out the trash. They will believe vehemently in many causes but roll their eyes when reminded to be humble, to be generous and to “do what is right.”</p>
<p>It is these people, though, who often climb America’s ladder of success. They rise to the top, partly on their own merits yet also partly on the backs of equally deserving but “nicer” people who let them steal the spotlight…
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<p>Interesting article.</p>
<p>“I’m saying that sometimes some of these students will denounce world hunger but be unfriendly to the homeless. They will debate environmental policy but never offer to take out the trash. They will believe vehemently in many causes but roll their eyes when reminded to be humble, to be generous and to “do what is right.””</p>
<p>Shocking! Why, they sound like teenagers!</p>
<p>They do not get to the top ahead of “equally” deserving students- those students lack the drive necessary to make it to the top. One also needs to be aware that the macro and micro views of an issue are vastly different, they are not even the same. Didn’t read the article, the quote makes it seem like a poorly done one (writing and thought processing).</p>
<p>Like the song in “Hair”:</p>
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<p>Did anyone see the House episode where Dr. House assumed the patient’s extreme niceness was a symptom, because no one could naturally be that nice.</p>
<p>I would hope that in describing my kids, people would use the word kind, as opposed to nice. Nice implies something more superficial than kind. </p>
<p>So how would people answer the question, are superlative students kind?</p>
<p>At our high school, I’d say kids could fall into the both nice or kind category (or neither). I also would need clarification as to what superlatives you’re talking about. </p>
<p>My high school did not have superlatives. But some of the ones my kids’ school has awarded in the past are appearance based (best hair, best eyes, best physique) and I guess people could win those awards without having an ounce of niceness or kindness in their bodies. Another one I think is totally stupid is ‘worst driver’. Oh yea, let’s give recognition for this one.</p>
<p>Even my kid who is going to be a priest never offered to take out the trash!</p>
<p>teriwtt, I believe smdur intended for “superlative” to be read as “exemplary:” the best students, not the students who win superlatives.</p>
<p>A girl in my grade drove her car into a house. She deserves that Worst Driver award.</p>
<p>I can’t access the article, and automatically assumed that superlatives correlated with the awards given to senior students. Can someone please summarize what the article was about then?</p>
<p>Best and Brightest, but Not the Nicest </p>
<p>By Amelia Rawls
Thursday, May 1, 2008; Page A19 </p>
<p>Today is the deadline for high school students around the country to formally notify their colleges of choice that they will be matriculating in the fall. For my family, the application process this year was a happy one – my younger sister was accepted at an Ivy League school. I was thrilled for her and excited to answer questions about my own university experience. But when she asked me what students at the “top” colleges were like, I realized I was disturbed by my answer. </p>
<p>During four years at Princeton University and nearly a year at Yale Law School, I have been surrounded by students who dazzle. These are the students for whom application processes were made. They include published novelists, acclaimed musicians and Olympic medalists. They include entrepreneurs, founders of human rights groups and political activists. If they have hobbies such as stamp collecting and belly dancing, by golly, they are the best stamp collectors and belly dancers in America! These youths live a life of superlatives, a life in which being No. 1 is not just an aspiration but the status quo. They can be inspirational, and I am lucky to be able to learn from them. But they are not always nice people. </p>
<p>You know what I mean by “nice.” I mean the kind of “nice” that involves showing compassion not merely because membership in community service groups demands it. The kind of “nice” that involves sharing notes with a student who is sick or lending a textbook to a friend who doesn’t have one. The kind of selfless, genuine “nice” that makes this world a better place – but won’t get you accepted to college. </p>
<p>Of course, top universities accept hundreds of individuals who have demonstrated the highest levels of citizenship. These teenagers have volunteered in more food banks, sponsored more fundraisers and lobbied more officials than any previous generation. They earn, rightfully, the gratitude of their communities and the plethora of honors that come with it. Colleges at the top of U.S. News and World Report’s rankings would balk at the notion that these students are anything but the best and the brightest. </p>
<p>I’m not saying different. I’m saying that sometimes some of these students will denounce world hunger but be unfriendly to the homeless. They will debate environmental policy but never offer to take out the trash. They will believe vehemently in many causes but roll their eyes when reminded to be humble, to be generous and to “do what is right.” </p>
<p>It is these people, though, who often climb America’s ladder of success. They rise to the top, partly on their own merits yet also partly on the backs of equally deserving but “nicer” people who let them steal the spotlight. Before they, or we, know it, they are the politicians and corporate executives subverting the very moral positions they espouse. They are the (frighteningly) many figureheads who purport to be leaders even as they embarrass our country and mar our history books. </p>
<p>Watching the race for the presidency, I cannot help but wonder whether our candidates, with their prestigious degrees and impressive credentials, are nice people. I wonder if, in their trek to the top, they have pushed aside the kind of quietly brilliant altruists who mean what they say and say what they mean. I wonder if our society is crippling itself by subjecting its youths to an almost-Darwinian college selection process. </p>
<p>The writer is a first-year student at Yale Law School.</p>
<p>“The kind of selfless, genuine “nice” that makes this world a better place – but won’t get you accepted to college.”</p>
<p>She is so wrong about this. Actually, Amelia, the people with the highest chance of being accepted are those “quietly brilliant altruists” who are also highly accomplished. Indeed, a lot of not-as-nice will slip in there, too., but I hate generalizations such as this:</p>
<p>“They rise to the top, partly on their own merits yet also partly on the backs of equally deserving but “nicer” people who let them steal the spotlight.”</p>
<p>I’m wondering if she’s talking about herself. I say that because “truly nice” attracts truly nice & tends to “overlook” & instinctively avoid the un-nice. At least that is true of all the truly nice people I know, including my daughter, who nevertheless (as MofWC reminds us) has an occasional moment of flawed human-ness now & then. ;)</p>
<p>(The author also sounds unrealistic about people.) Not a balanced, thoughtful, or accurate article, i.m.o.</p>
<p>Maybe it’s more true at Princeton? It really reads as a kind of sour grapes article.</p>
<p>I was a graduate student at Oxford in the 1980’s and I agree completely with the editorial here. My sense was that many of my classmates had been trained to view everything as an argument where the main point of the argument was to win. In other words, I remember attempting to make conversation and getting brutally cut down by the incredibly, cruel, cutting Canadian feminist grad student who thought the point of every interaction was to make the other person look stupid so that she, by contrast, would look more intelligent. ("Hey, is that hummus on the salad bar? Looks good. . " "Well, of course it’s hummus. Perhaps you’ve never been outside the United STates, but I’ve very familiar with hummus . … . . . ")</p>
<p>People like that may be smart but they sure aren’t fun to hang around with. And get an organization that’s mostly full of people who really enjoy competition and view it as their default mode of communication and the results can be downright nasty. </p>
<p>Also, it’s like that truism about ‘too many chiefs and not enough Indians.’ If everyone at the university has previously been the president of every organization they ever joined, many actually have few skills in providing the kind of behind the scenes, nonglamorous roles that are necessary to make an organization function. Furthermore, they have no desire to fulfill these roles, feeling that they are beneath them. I remember noticing how many people never stayed behind to clean up after the party, the speaker series, etc. I would argue that some of it is parenting. </p>
<p>If you’re more interested in growing a child who is the fastest racehorse than one who is a good and moral human being, you shouldn’t be surprised at the results. I know of some kids who will tell you point blank that they’re too good to do supportive roles (handling correspondence for the organization, organizing a phone tree, sending e-mails, etc.) and frequently they’ll tell you that they know this is true because their parents have told them so from the time they were little. I think the author is onto something there –</p>