What you said…
“One other way to get these parents to think about all of this differently is to ask them what they think becomes of the highly talented students who do NOT get accepted to the top 5-10 colleges?? Do they really think these students go away quietly into the night? No, of course, not! They’ve all attended somewhere else and have brought their incredible talents to that other place!”
EXACTLY this. Same goes for all those PhDs scrambling for hard-to-find academic positions. They’ve got to land somewhere…