<p>To say one isn’t after power and prestige is akin to saying one isn’t after academic/professional success. Neither one is causal to the other, but they are all caused by the same thing.</p>
<p>It would be like saying, “I want exercise to be healthier, but I don’t care about being bigger, faster, or stronger.” Well, your goal may be to get healthier, but lifting weights and running is going to make you bigger, faster,and stronger because they are caused by the same things. </p>
<p>Similarly, if your goal is academic/professional success but you specifically preclude things that would garner money and prestige, you’re hinering yoursef because they are all caused by the same thing. </p>
<p>My experience, once again, is that people who deny the fact that academic pedigree matters (not exahaustively, not deterministically, but rather influentially) to the tragectory of one’s success in most fields is either telling themselves a comforting lie to excuse their own lack of pedigree or they have a very low view/awareness of what success is. I used to think $60k a year was a great professional success, until I saw 27 year olds making $500k per year. Similarly, one may think being a lab tech is a great success, until they see someone younger running the lab. </p>
<p>In my experience, the one great flaw of Christian education is that it teaches students to accept mediocrity in their ambitions. Much lip service is paid to, “money/prestige etc doesn’t matter” but if you’re going to do the work anyways, isn’t it common sense to be as influential as possible? That’s like saying, “I am going to practice every day but winning doesn’t matter so I won’t practice as best as I can.” If you’re going to go out there and compete, you might as well win.</p>