<p>"Well, she’s wrong. "</p>
<p>She had a sample of one and she succeeded with that sample. Who cares what anyone else thinks about it since she has succeeded.</p>
<p>Personally, I have no doubt that if she wanted her daughter to go MIT and USAMO was the way to do it, she would done whatever it took her to get the daughter there.</p>
<p>It is not necessary that everyone who tries gets there. It is quite possible that 1-2% are capable and that is a number in thousands.</p>
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<p>Her kids have some pretty good genes; both the parents are on the faculty of Yale Law School.</p>
<p>Of course, maybe the parents’ achievements are solely due to effort.</p>
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<p>One thing to also think about was that Chua herself and her husband are both Yale Law faculty and their D is a Harvard College legacy through her mother and if you count HLS…a double legacy as both parents are HLS alums. </p>
<p>While having a parent who was an alum at a private elite college alone isn’t enough to trigger legacy admissions*…being well-connected as they are and/or wealthy enough to donate huge sums consistently(Probably something like $10k+/year) along with that factor will substantially increase the odds of the legacy factor being in play. </p>
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<li>Donating nothing, inconsistently unless it’s a ginormous sum, or just a few dozen/hundreds per year won’t be enough from what I’ve read and heard about.</li>
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<p>[Charles</a> Murray’s “Coming Apart” and the Culture Myth - The Daily Beast](<a href=“Charles Murray’s ‘Coming Apart’ and the Culture Myth”>Charles Murray’s ‘Coming Apart’ and the Culture Myth)</p>
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<p>A school’s culture is largely a function of the kinds of children who attend and the kinds of parents they have.</p>
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<p>Well, that’s the whole issue. I think the number is quite smaller based on my observation of a large pool of talented people who tried to make USAMO, but it’s an open question.</p>
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Genes! 
From the Wikipedia:
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<p>No they shouldn’t, but shouldn’t it also be factored in if the student has a Steinway in the living room and weekly lessons at the NEC? Compared to an equally talented student who takes lessons from a local instructor? Shouldn’t that matter as well?</p>
<p>Lots kids in the world have good genes and some have great jeans. I suggest they do something else with those other than pursuing Math accolades. </p>
<p>In the two largest countries in the nation, the kids are constantly cramming for elite college admissions from the time they are 2. There are several posters currently posting that the only kids getting into MIT from those countries are medal winners from competitions/olympiads/whatever. All MIT has to do is acknowledge it might be true and the preparations will commence at age 2 for them.</p>
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I think there is a big difference in magnitude between the “large” pool who 1) knows about USAMO and 2) wants to make USAMO for the sake of making USAMO, and the pool who 1) knows about MIT and 2) would kill for a spot at MIT.</p>
<p>Again, the point is not whether or not the kids end up making USAMO or not. It’s whether they spend their time trying to make USAMO, instead of something that they enjoy more and/or are better suited towards.</p>
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<p>Maybe Amy’s father’s achievements were solely due to effort</p>
<p>The chicken or the egg. Take your pick!</p>
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<p>I’m fairly sure Juilliard doesn’t subscribe to this type of reasoning. It’s my impression they just take whoever has the better audition.</p>
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<p>Along with most other top conservatories including Oberlin and NEC. </p>
<p>Incidentally, it’s one factor in the differences of student culture between the “Connies” and the College students at Oberlin. </p>
<p>Connies were much more formal, focused on the improved practice of their instrument/art, and nowhere near as politically active or engaged in classes on the college side as their college counterparts when I attended. They also tended to dress much more formally due to recital/performance requirements. If an Obie is wearing a suit on campus, that’s almost always a dead giveaway…</p>
<p>"economic divide is a social divide as well, as the elite tend to cluster among themselves in selected cities—San Francisco; Austin, Texas; Washington, D.C., New York—and in particular in what Murray characterizes as “super ZIPs,” neighborhoods@</p>
<p>Huh, then I wonder why Austin doesn’t get more representation in these contests.</p>
<p>I could be wrong about this, but I think it is possible to rent space at Carnegie Hall, for one’s child to give a performance. This is different from an invited debut at Carnegie Hall.</p>
<p>I don’t understand the objections about using the USAMO as the “sole qualifier,” when I have posted numerical estimates multiple times–I estimate the group scoring above a threshold on the USAMO, who aren’t being admitted to MIT anyway, as about 10-15. Thus, they constitute about 1% of MIT’s admitted group. If the USAMO scorers are only 10% of the hyper-talented math students, we are still only talking about 10% of the number of MIT admits, if MIT took all of the hyper-talented math students, USAMO or not.</p>
<p>I have acknowledged several times that some very strong students don’t hear about USAMO, or their schools don’t offer the first exam, or they really are not into competition math. (That is fine.) I don’t think that people who back out of competition math are necessarily doing so because they can’t score well.</p>
<p>In my estimation, the USAMO questions are sufficiently difficult that no one can be bullied or prodded into being able to solve them by age 16, if they don’t have considerable talent and interest both. I think this would be true, even if one started trying to develop a child’s math skills at birth.</p>
<p>I do think that many people could acquire the ability to solve the USAMO questions through persistent effort. However, I would guess that for many people, the day would not arrive until age 35+. Meanwhile, the early scorers are on to deeper issues.</p>
<p>collegealum314 has made the broader philosophical point–in a way, the USAMO is just a stand-in for an indicator of truly unusual intellectual talent. It does not make sense to me for an academic institution to reject such a student just because his/her personality seems bland (aka “textureless”) on the surface. For a country club to prefer someone else–sure–or for a finals club, eating club, or senior society–yes, I understand that there are significant social aspects of all of those. But I believe that a university is at heart an academic institution. (Call me naive.)</p>
<p>Finally, in case it got lost in the set of posts: lookingforward asked whom I would displace, in order to admit 10-15 additional students who are hyper-talented.</p>
<p>I have suggested that they could displace the students who don’t work very hard in the first-semester courses, on the grounds that the grades don’t go on their transcripts.</p>
<p>TPG, motivation is one thing. A fat wallet is another. And in the Chua case, that is what was needed to book one of the smaller venues at a cost of a few thousand dollars. She played at Weill, but that did not stop the eager media and publicists to confuse the location with Stern.</p>
<p>So how much does a Carnegie Hall rental cost? It really depends — and that’s no joke. The base cost of renting out Stern on a Friday or Saturday night during the 2012-13 season is $16,810; a Saturday afternoon at Weill can be had for $2,025, before any other charges are considered.</p>
<p>QM. And how does that work? Fail them out in December? Even those admitted on quantitative brilliance? First semester becomes pass or out? Leave their spots empty and add that many seats to March decisions? What if a prof protests or the kid has an excuse? Then it’s OK to get subjective? Think how this would work. But not a proposed formula based on assumptions. K?</p>
<p>I’m curious how many do fail first semester. And if you go to pass or out, wouldn’t you think more would focus on passing and then…</p>
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<p>Schoolwide weedout policies are usually implemented at large mostly publicly funded universities around the world and in US institutions where admissions standards are very low/effectively open admission for most/all of the matriculating students as a way to do the following:</p>
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<li><p>Provide every citizen/in-state resident or in the case of a lower-tiered private…any student with full-pay parents/FA a chance for a college education. </p></li>
<li><p>Maximize limited classroom, facility, and Professor/staff resources of the university…especially if the low/open admission policies are a condition of receiving public subsidies. </p></li>
<li><p>Performing a “quality control” check of students so those who don’t meet the university’s academic standards due to motivational or lack of preparedness reasons are culled before graduation. </p></li>
<li><p>Ensure only a minimum of the public spending on the institutions’ students are spent on those who don’t meet the grade. Especially if public subsidies are involved</p></li>
<li><p>Ensures the good reputation of the college by producing graduates who have met sufficient academic standards so that the chances employers/grad schools contact the college to complain about the quality of its graduates is minimized. </p></li>
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<p>If the admission standards are already as extremely as high as that of an elite institution like MIT or other exceedingly selective institutions highly desirable by many topflight applicants, what’s the point of having weedout policies? </p>
<p>Frankly, at this point implementation of institutional weedout policies would serve little more than an exercise in sadistic masochism by whatever college board/admins are warped enough to do so.</p>