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<p>Is a true generalization a prejudicial stereotype? Is the statement that men are more violent than women a prejudicial stereotype?</p>
<p>“Perhaps my word is too strong, but I really feel the kids who work really hard, have amazing stats, and are hyper-focused <em>do</em> have the same hopes and dreams as everyone else.”</p>
<p>Well, duh, they have the same hopes and dreams as everyone else. But why is it sadder that <em>their</em> dreams are dashed? 95% of the applicants to MIT will have their dreams dashed – why is my heart supposed to break more for the uber-brilliant ones who put MIT up on some pedestal than the mere normal-bright kids who were also qualified and in the ballpark but didn’t get in? Tens of thousands of kids get rejected from their top elite school choice every year. Most eat a pint of ice cream, vent to friends --and then they move on. Why the special heart for these handful of kids specifically? Won’t their hearts heal too?</p>
<p>“I would object to prejudicial stereotypes about people based on race, cultural heritage, gender, sexual orientation, or socio-economic status, in groups to which I do not belong.”</p>
<p>“I see the kid I am scheduled to interview this afternoon is Korean, he must be a textureless math grind” is a prejudicial stereotype, QM. </p>
<p>“I met a particular kid and after interviewing him, found him to be a textureless math grind” is not a prejudicial stereotype.</p>
<p>What if interviews observe that a lot of 2400 kids are indeed grinds? Then what? Each kid has the opportunity to show that he is or isn’t in the context of the interview.</p>
<p>Speaking of TMGs, I can’t find anything on the web that definitively proves Jones said it. Just Golden. </p>
<p>Also want to note that (name not disclosed but all over the web) runs way back. High school class of 1998.The Golden article (2003 wsj) about him is…you guessed it: all about stats. Does someone know more?</p>
<p>QM, Then, what are the “super-top” universities that these “super-top” students really need to go to? Just curious where you draw the line on that distinction? Is one of these type kids doomed if they don’t go to a place like MIT? You didn’t but seem to have done well for yourself. Do you have regrets that you did not go to MIT , feel your life would be substantially different if you had? You don’t have to answer that but I do think some of us are curious where your fixation on MIT comes from?</p>
<p>And let’s also get real. There are smart profs and resources and opportunities at a lot of places. No one is “hampered” in life by having to slum it at Carnegie Mellon or UIUC or wherever. It’s not as though MIT is calculus class and these other places are like elementary school where they are still figuring out arithmetic and our dear sweet genius will be bored. </p>
<p>Maybe our dear sweet genius has decreed that he will feel horrible about himself and like giving up if he doesn’t get into MIT, but that is his choice and his character flaw. And MIT doesn’t exist to protect people from their own character flaws. </p>
<p>If, btw, a disproportionate number of brilliant kids overly idolize MIT, is that a “prejudicial stereotype”? If I were an MIT interviewer, I’d sure want to admit a kid who didn’t act as though the life would be sucked out of him if he didn’t get into MIT, and who gave off the vibe that he was looking forward to wherever he wound up. Confidence (not arrogance) is a desirable trait in a student, and desperation isn’t appealing. And why should MIT reward desperation? So that kids never feel disappointment?</p>
<p>sevmom, I think that a talented student could do quite well elsewhere than the “top” universities. I just think it’s not the best allocation of resources in undergrad ed if a student who is considerably brighter than I am does not get into a “top” school.</p>
<p>I don’t really have an MIT fixation. I don’t think that I personally would have done better had I gone there–and might have done worse. My limitations are my own, and not the result of my undergraduate education! No one else in my extended family has even applied to MIT.</p>
<p>This is not really personal for me, despite my evident intensity.</p>
<p>Honestly, it makes me angry (literally) that anyone would think it is acceptable as a joke to describe a student as “only vaguely human.” mythmom said that she recoils from that. So do I.</p>
<p>I have been surprised at the number of people who brush off that use of words, and similar words. It doesn’t happen that much in Hilbert space.</p>
<p>If MIT felt that its resources would be better deployed by admitting a different set of students, they would … admit a different set of students. If they felt their own internal admission resources would be better deployed by 1) auto admitting USAMO or whatever contest winners and 2) racking and stacking by SAT or similar scores, they’d do those things. What makes you a better judge of how MIT should use its resources than MIT itself?</p>
<p>I will renew my commitment in #1813, that I will not post anything else specific to MIT, if anyone can locate on the official admissions web sites of any other university or in published material any commentary by adults employed by the university that is comparable to the MIT material cited there.</p>
<p>Re: “super-top” universities, and referring to a student who would need to start at the graduate level in his/her major at my current university, as an incoming freshman. (I know specific examples at universities that outrank mine.) I would consider a university to be “super-top” if it offered a reasonable undergraduate-level class for the student, and preferably a class with many other freshmen. I don’t have a comprehensive view of course offerings, so can’t list the universities.</p>
<p>So all this hand-wringing over students whose potential is wasted if they don’t get into MIT, yet no sense as to how many other places they could have thrived at? I would have respected your answer more if you had had some kind of list, however imperfect, of a small set of places that make the cut. But if you don’t know, couldn’t it be fairly broad - enough not to worry about our hypothetical genius? </p>
<p>I suspect the geniuses you are talking about may think they are too <em>good</em> for anyplace other than MIT, which is a different story.</p>
<p>QM, you have argued yourself to the point of absurdity, imho. this is as ridiculous as getting upset that there aren’t enough top colleges with classes for the 14 year old math genius with “many other” fourteen year old math geniuses in the cohort.</p>
<p>Really?</p>
<p>As for “Barely human,” the fact that we had an MIT interviewer on here to flat out state that it is arrogance and not awkwardness they are screening for in the interview, perhaps “barely human” refers more to an Idi Amin type than a Bill Gates. </p>
<p>Carry on.</p>
<p>Q, some of us do not wish to research how other schools phrase things. Some of us also have reactions to the interviewer’s phrasing, have made the comments we wish to make, but do not wish to hit the replay button over and over.</p>
<p>You suggested a few could block you; if needed, I’ll explain why some may not choose to respond that way.</p>
<p>The MIT interviewer also introduced the phrase “robotic clones” to this thread, poetgrl.</p>
<p>It’s not that the students think they are too good for other places, Pizzagirl. </p>
<p>Let me give a few examples, one from my undergrad experience and a few from my current institution.</p>
<p>As a senior undergrad, I took a second-year physics grad course in many-body theory, taught from the textbook by Fetter and Walecka. It was a considerable challenge for me, but I learned a lot, and have been grateful that I could take it before starting grad school. Years later, I ran into the prof who had taught the course, and asked how it was going. He said that he no longer taught it, because there were not enough grad students who were able to handle it.</p>
<p>Currently, the delta-epsilon definition of limits, and everything that relies on it, has been removed from the introductory calculus courses at my current institution (except for the honors courses), through multi-variable calculus and differential equations. The reason that this matters to a student who is beyond calculus is this: such a student might start out in real analysis. A generation ago, real analysis was taught from the standpoint that students understood the delta-epsilon definition of limits, the concepts of continuity and uniform continuity, and the definition of a Riemann integral as a limit. Now, it cannot be. A lot of time in the real analysis course has to be devoted to those topics and to the “how tos” of proof. (We take prerequisites seriously.) The course cannot go as far as the Real Analysis courses generally go. This makes it harder for a student who wants to go on to grad school.</p>
<p>Similarly, the course complex variable theory may have proofs of all of the key theorems (in this course, at the undergrad level) or not, depending on the instructor. The quality of this course varies quite a bit from instructor to instructor.</p>
<p>Exie. Not Mikalye. So what? We read it in context.
And all the jargon doesn’t explain why we are hashing and rehashing.</p>
<p>Re #1854. I understand that the remarks were made by two distinct interviewers. In my opinion, that makes it worse, not better.</p>
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<p>Oh, please! How <em>do</em> the peons who attend non-MIT level schools – gasp, even state flagships – make it to grad school?</p>
<p>But this raises a broader question. Is college meant to be a race to cram in the very hardest, most challenging courses you can find at breakneck speed and anything other than something that challenges you to the very limit is just a waste of time? </p>
<p>I guess I just don’t see it as a crisis if our hypothetical genius gets a good grade in a class that is challenging but not limit-pushing, and also enjoys other parts of college life or develops a new interest or spends that time redeployed to learning something else in or out of the classroom. I didn’t always feel this way – I pushed myself very, very hard, thought ill of fellow students whom I (perceived) didn’t do so, and the like. But as I’ve gotten older, I’ve realized that life isn’t a race to the finish line. </p>
<p>To give a specific example: My H and I both took French in high school (though I was more advanced). I tested out of the college requirement, and immediately began taking advanced French classes in college. My H, on the other hand, went took relatively easy French classes because his pre-med science classes were bears, and he wanted to have something that was relatively painless to balance it out so he wasn’t cranking on all fronts. This was a bone of contention between us because I didn’t think it was right that he wasn’t pushing him on all dimensions. But you know something? In the long run, he was right. It didn’t matter. It wasn’t a race. The total sum of knowledge of the human race was not adversely affected or anything. I guess I don’t see why our hypothetical genius here can’t also learn to pace himself. It’s not as though he’s being asked to go down to 1+1=2 or anything.</p>
<p>Well, QM, I doubt we can have a “mission” to produce more STEM grads AND have only the passionately advanced math students in the schools, as well. Which do you prefer? When you can’t have both. Because you cant. Have both, that is.</p>
<p>Look, I “get” that you are disappointed that you didn’t go to MIT. I wish you could go back and do it over again, back when MIT was still a bastion of human compassion and wouldn’t dream of using the word “robotic” to describe a person’s affect. However, now that even the STEM majors are taught about personification in class, and given that “robotic” is just a term to describe a human fantasy of what a robot would be like if it were “human,” I really think it’s insane that you are going on and on about this.</p>
<p>Also, if MIT admissions is not as “compassionate” in their language as is the language of those at an LAC, then maybe you ought to be arguing less for stats and scores and MORE for holistic humanities slants in their curriculum. Again, it is so much to ask. Prefer the scores, an equation of admissions that could be objectively computerized and then complain about the “lack of humanity” in the blog. </p>
<p>For you, QM, I would recommend you look at some of the research done on humor theory. I know my oldest did a massive paper on ethics in humor and the need for free speech in order to create change in the culture. There is plenty of peer reviewed literature on the subject.</p>
<p>I truly like to believe that most competitive colleges take a holistic view of every application. And that some students whose GPA are not quite 5.0 or SAT’s are not as high as other candidates can shine in other areas of their application that might just register with whomever is reading their file. Perhaps they had a kick ass essay or have had some intriguing experiences in life that can add an interesting dimension to the in coming class. Perhaps they have legacy or some very important Alum write them a reco - you just don’t know how one person is selected over another. In the perfect world everyone would be accepted to their number one college - bummer it doesn’t work that way!</p>
<p>These posts are starting to be really personal and attacking QM, which I don’t understand.</p>
<p>You are free to disagree, but as I understand it QM is saying:</p>
<p>1) Society as a whole as an investment in educating specialized minds in going as far as they can go. This is where discoveries and inventions come from.</p>
<p>2) Specialized schools have dedicated themselves to this function.</p>
<p>3) We should get the strongest thinkers into the specialized schools set up to educated them.</p>
<p>I don’t see why this is so controversial. We don’t expect Julliard to have holistic admissions. I’m pretty sure, my S, a violinist, has a better personality than some of the kids at Julliard. I’m also sure that Julliard doesn’t give a rat’s a**. My S is just not that talented. It’s true. He isn’t.</p>
<p>We don’t expect the school of the NYC ballet to accept dancers based on holistic standard. If they did, maybe my D would have been accepted. But sad, to say, she’s not that talented a dancer.</p>
<p>We didn’t expect their other qualifications to counterbalance this basic lack of talent.</p>
<p>Harvard, Princeton, Yale and other elite schools, free to use holistic admissions. QM is merely saying that a specialized school set up to educate in one area should take achievement in this area as paramount in its selection process, and when it does, society as a whole benefits and we train the best engineers, physicists, math theorists, whatever.</p>
<p>Just like Julliard produces some of the best violinists and the school of the NYC ballet produces some of the best dances.</p>
<p>We are all free to disagree with her premises, but I see what she is talking about.</p>
<p>I don’t see why attacks are necessary. As far as I can see, she is just trying to communicate something that is very important to her. Maybe she should have given up, but she really cares about science education and she really cares about how it’s done.</p>
<p>And I agree that focused people who do one thing more than most folks shouldn’t be called robotic clones, just as we don’t condemn the violinist who practices six hours a day a robotic clone. In fact, its almost a requirement.</p>
<p>There are many different kinds of intelligence that are just as valuable to society and definitely to the individuals and the individuals who know them. I don’t think that’s under question. And Ivies and Northwestern and U Chicago and Duke and Rice and and and and state flagships have good reasons for using holistic admissions.</p>
<p>QM is just arguing that there are a handful of folks so talented that we might want to suspend holistic considerations in their cases. And if we reject them there’s no reason to use character assassination like “arrogant” and “robotic clones” to justify decisions.</p>
<p>Again, I understand there are disagreements to her position, but I think it bears merit and deserves civil consideration, even if you ultimately still disagree.</p>
<p>MIT doesn’t think that there are folks who are so talented that they have to suspend holistic admissions and automatically let them in. (Or, put another way, they may admit some students whom they secretly think are brilliant but jerky – but that doesn’t mean they have to admit EVERY student who is brilliant but jerky.) If MIT doesn’t think auto-admission is necessary to achieve their mission, how can any of us claim to know better than MIT what best supports their mission?</p>