How do you get your child to overlook "naturally" smart classmates?

Parents Forum
101

I would agree with @cobrat on this one. If anything, post-bacc programs are more costly than ever, and intensifying competition for medical school admissions makes them risky for many students.

Also, most schools have some GPA requirements for post-bac students that are similar to those for transfer students and the requirement for a pre-health post-bac could be a 3.0 or higher in all attempted science courses and overall.

I did notice when I was in college that many pre-meds loved to brag about how easy they found their classes, and how little they studied, perhaps to deflect the stereotype of the pre-med grind who is not “naturally smart.” And, some really did seem to breeze through tough classes of all types without losing sleep or breaking a sweat, while I was aware that others worked long hours and avoided classes outside of their comfort zones.

102

Well, perhaps, but regardless, once in medical school and beyond, the days of going “without losing sleep or breaking a sweat” are over for many, many years, if ever. They are very soon quite out of their comfort zones, and even the smartest kid on the planet cannot avoid the long hours and stressful existence which defines that experience.

103

I dislike the usage of the word “hooks” anytime someone outside the typical stats does something. There will always be outliers that fall beyond two standard deviations. Special circumstances do not always fall into the “hooks” realm. reasons for having a low gpa are not necessarily “hooks”. Using that as an explanation sounds like accusing the person of getting favors.

There are a few students who will always fall on the right side of any curve and not need to do what 99% of the rest of the students need to do to excel. The majority of medical students do need to study harder to learn a ton of not hard to grasp material (much memorization is required of a new vocabulary, facts and learning how to learn new material as it becomes available in the future) during the first two years. The last two years include a lot of time not under the student’s control.

But, all of this is deviating from the OP’s topic.

104

@1stgenmom:

I have been thinking about this question for a while since you posted it and tonight thought that perhaps the approach of “overlook”-ing the smart kid is an unnatural and impossible thing to do in real time, as is overlooking the disruptive kid. I would like to share with you that even the kid who aces the work (for whatever reason) would like to know that the other kids feel they can relate to him/her, and would like to be looked at as able to fail, to get it wrong everyone in a while without losing a place on the rung of perfect humanity that others have placed him /her on.

As many have said, we never know how the kids with the near-perfect scores, or the kid who blazes through classroom discussion whom we assume to have near-perfect scores, achieves those scores. I can tell you that those kids are often not spoken to with the usual ease and fraternity as everyone else, and while they try to brush it off, sometimes it does bother them.

My suggestion? If it can be managed, a simple, friendly lean-in by one kid to another can really dispel the legion of myth that lies between them, and certainly make for more organic exchanges outside of the realm of “What’d you get?”
Talking with the “acer” kid, even if only briefly, about anything other than the test can be a real breath of fresh air for that kid.

It gives all the kids a chance to see and appreciate each other outside of the numbers and scales.

105

My kid has friends from MIT who are now doing residencies and fellowships from strong (not off-shore) med schools with the kind of GPA’s that most people would say “don’t bother”. They majored in tough disciplines, they weren’t trying to “protect” their GPA by staying inside their comfort level, and their involvement in either community based medicine (paramedics, volunteer public health roles) or scientific research (whether life sciences related or not) clearly showed med school admissions committees that they had the right stuff.

Are these things a hook? Certainly wanting to be a scientist is a “hook” for med school- vs. gunning for a perfect GPA by taking a bunch of gut courses outside the required med school admissions curriculum.

106

"My kid has friends from MIT who are now doing residencies and fellowships from strong (not off-shore) med schools with the kind of GPA’s that most people would say “don’t bother”. - This may not work any longer. The competition has increased dramatically since my D. applied (who is also a 1st year resident). I would consider the examples of last year applicants over examples of those who applied some 5 years ago. My own D. and her pre-med friends had no problem getting accepted from in-state public, including to the top 20 medical schools. Their choices were great. They had tough time choosing, not tough time getting accepted. Again, all of that was way too long ago.
I never heard of anybody who "Certainly wanting to be a scientist is a “hook” for med school- vs. gunning for a perfect GPA by taking a bunch of gut courses outside the required med school admissions curriculum. " - this would not fly applying to medical school at all as an applicant has to have a very high science/math GPA wich is reported separately from the general GPA. So, this strategy sounds like a bunch of … The high GPA is not a hook by any means whatsoever. It is a simple requirement. Many adcoms will discard an applicant automatically if the GPA is below their “cut”. There are about 5000+ applicants to every Medical school in the USA every year, to the every single one, including the ones on the bottom of the ranking. Adcoms cannot go thru all of them, no way. Some applications are simply ignored. D. did not hear from one of the schools that she applied, not a peep from them, no rejection, nothing. Apparently, she did not meet their criteria, which may be as simple as her living location. These medical school accepts applicants from the very low ranked UGs, despite of being in the top 5 - 10, not sure about current ranking. I know that, because I was checking the roster. the UGs are usually listed.
If one wants to attend at MIT, why not? But the MIT will not simly pave the road to the medical school, will not happen.

107

If I needed a Doctor I would rather have the one Blossom describes than the grade grubbers Miami describes

108

To the OP. Appearances can be deceiving. I wouldn’t assume that those super-smart kids who “barely study” aren’t really studying that much. Yes, they may not have to put in as many hours of study as merely mortal very smart kids. But they may have their own ways of studying that aren’t so obvious. My son almost never studied, as far as we could tell from what he did at home. But when on occasion we had to dig through his backpack, it had numerous graded papers that he had written and we’d never seen before.

How did that happen? He did his math homework in his Spanish class, his Spanish homework in his English class, etc. No doubt this didn’t impress the teachers in those classes, but at least he wasn’t talking or acting out – he was busy at his desk! For sure, he was very quick to grasp new concepts, and he was a super-fast reader, but he hated busywork. He certainly didn’t want to waste his hours at home on homework!

Instead he spent his hours at home reading and prepping for his debate team. He excelled in that realm, based on spending 20-30 hours a week in research, team practice, and tournaments.

Now that he’s a “fully grown adult” I see this same ability to concentrate deeply on his work in odd circumstances. A 2-hour drive to an airport for me is a 2-hour work period for him in the back seat – working on his computer, linked to the internet. He’s always got some ongoing problem or writing project going on in his head, even while he may be at a sports event.

I see this as something of a family trait. Except maybe he’s fundamentally smarter than most of us. And he actually works very long hours.

109

Miami- MIT publishes its med school admissions stats every year (not sure what is online vs. sent out only to alums) and the numbers would shock you since there are students getting into US med schools every year with GPA’s which you claim are not med-school worthy.

I have no axe to grind- I am not a physician, nor are any of my kids. But there are multiple paths to becoming an MD- one of which is the route your D chose, which sounds like it worked beautifully for her. There are also kids who major in philosophy who do a post-Bac (works for them); kids who are in the military who get free medical education courtesy of the taxpayers of the United States (works for them), kids who go to schools like MIT and get into med school with GPA’s which likely would not get them admission were they applying from U Mass Lowell or Quinnipiac college.

Your D’s path is not the only one to becoming a physician but of course you have every right to be proud of the path she’s taken.

110

Blossom,
I agree with your post 108 100%. Apparently, you did not read my post entirely. So, I repeat the end of it here again: “If one wants to attend at MIT, why not? But the MIT will not simly pave the road to the medical school, will not happen”. Yes, there are different paths to become a physician, including obtaining the PhD from Harvard as one of D’s classmate had done. This person still had to have high GPA (which I assume that she had as she was accepted to the PhD program at Harvard) and reasonably high MCAT score along with other requirements.

For those who thinks that I described “he grade grubbers”, I only can tell that the grades that D. got in her minor -Music - happened to lower her GPA, not push it up. There was no way to push up her GPA anyway, because her UG did not give any additional points for the A+, but subtracted points for A-. So, one cannot push up from 4.0, but D. lowered her GPA taking singing classes of her Music Minor, she simply did not have any voice coaching, neither ever sang in choir prior to college, she just plunged into un-known because of her interest in music. Well, I would say that her college Stats class and her college Chemistry class were more like “grade grabber” classes, than her singing classes, but the last 2 were part of medical school requirements that everybody had to take. So, my guess is that every single pre-med is a 'grade grabber" because they have to take such easy classes as Stats and Chemistry. Interesting idea, never ever heard of this aspect of pre-med’s life, “grade grabber”, I have to tell my D. so that she can laugh her head off, she desperately needs some R&R after working those 30 hour shifts where everybody appreciates her efforts including very many very sick people.

111

Many selective colleges publish such stats, and the numbers generally don’t fit well with the comments in this thread. For example, WUSTL has a GPA MCAT grid for their students at https://prehealth.wustl.edu/Documents/HANDBOOK.pdf . The med school admission rate by GPA are below for applicants with WUSTL’s median MCAT score range. Note that students claim the mean overall GPA at WUSTL is above 3.5 (haven’t seen official source). The number of applicants peaks near the claimed WUSTL overall mean GPA with a normal GPA type distribution, and applicant test scores decrease as GPA decreases, so I don’t think WUSTL is blocking a large portion from applying in 3.0+ GPA ranges. Below 3.0 has too small a sample size to draw meaningful conclusions.

3.8-4.0 : 92%
3.6-3.8 : 89%
3.4-3.6 : 87%
3.2-3.4 : 73%
3.0-3.2 : 65%
2.8-3.0 - 53% (small sample size)
2.4-2.8 - 38% (very small sample size)

112

The points I was trying to make I thought Blossom said very well. There are always lots of easy Gen ed classes kids can take to boost their gpa. Also stats or physics for life science majors are not always the most rigorous classes out there if one is overly concerned about their gpa

113

I don’t know what to make of your posts, honestly. I don’t know how you can manage to conflate a thread about “naturally smart” kids with suggesting that people here are not properly appreciating your daughter.

Really. Wow.

114

Is it just me (and the family of Libby Zion) or do you really want to be treated by a first year resident in hour 29 of a 30 hour shift???

115

Hi,
I go to a school with many asians (I am one myself), and I believe the real reason I see many more asians in honor classes and with better grades is that they ask other people (friends, relatives, teachers, the internet) for help when they are stuck with a concept or lesson. By doing this, they don’t give up when they feel like they don’t know something, they continue working to try to understand the concept, which helps in a lot of areas in life.

Tell your kid not to lose hope and stop working hard. Most Asians (in my experience) are willing to help teach you a concept if you ask them to explain it, so tell him to ask those “get good grades easily” people. Good luck with helping your kid!!!

116

I haven’t read the whole thread, but I’ll respond to the OP.

I went to a small grammar school, and I thought I was a hot shot. High school was very different. I remember very clearly the day that I realized that someone was way smarter than I was.

It was AP Physics, and I actually talked to my teacher about it after class. I suddenly felt stupid, because my classmate seemed to already understand the concepts that I was still grappling with.

I can’t remember exactly, but I’m pretty sure that my teacher tried to convince me that my classmate had self studied the material, before the class had started.

I think she just saw that I was shaken, and thought she was doing me a favor. She might have been right, because I was young and insecure.

I’m not really sure what the best approach is, but I think it definitely depends upon the kid.

My parents instilled humility, so I think that helped a lot. I think for very competitive kids it could be much harder.

To the OP, we could all give you ideas, but it’s so hard to figure out where a kid’s head is at.

As an adult, I have a strong center, because I know that I’m halfway intelligent, and I’m a good person. That makes me feel good about myself. That’s enough. If someone else is smarter than me, I’m excited, I have someone I can learn from. But as a kid, that was definitely not enough. I was wracked with insecurity.

So I think my advice would be to just do everything you can to boost your son’s self esteem. If he feels good about himself, he’ll realize that being the smartest person in the room isn’t the most important thing in life.

117

gphi777,
" There are always lots of easy Gen ed classes kids can take to boost their gpa." - how is that going to affect the science/math college GPA that has to be reported to Medical school separately and has higher requirement as well as heavier weight on the application than general college GPA? This opinion is kind of a joke, any pre-med will simply laugh at it, especially considering that most of them are so busy with everything that they actually require to take and be engaged in that they do not have time for this type of crap which is not even applicable to their situation. And most of the pre-meds took care of many Gen. ed. classes by taking HS AP classes or having dual enrollment classes, considering that vast majority of them were “grade grabbers” by definition on this thread which translates to the HS valedictorian status outside of this thread definitions.

Anyway, all this is bogus when entering medical school. Everybody will be on the same footing. Graduating from MIT, having PhD from Harvard, Having Masters in Science from JHU or coming from the in-state public college will not make any difference whatsoever, because specific medical school chooses their future class among those who will be successful with their specific curriculum. No wonder that good number of Ivy’s graduates in D’s medical school class later regretted attending at Harvard and such as it gave them no advantages in medical school.

I would suggest that talking about it is a complete waste of time here, it would not affect anybody’s decision, why bother?
To tell the kid to be “grade grabber” or not strictly depends on the specific family values. In our family, we look at it very positively. I do not see why to be engaged in anything without having 100% effort putting into it. Others are saying, that it is OK to slack, then go ahead tell your kids to slack as the grades are not important for you. But do not repeat over and over to them that others have As because they take much easier classes, this is just a bunch of …well, untrue…

118

“No wonder that good number of Ivy’s graduates in D’s medical school class later regretted attending at Harvard and such as it gave them no advantages in medical school.”

If that’s the only reason they went to Harvard, to get an advantage in med school, then they should regret it. I hope many of them were happy to have a great education, to have experienced the bonuses at Harvard like great professors and speakers and debates and traditions.

119

Miamadap

Any Doctor who thinks going to Harvard or MIT has no value is not a doctor I would want to use for myself or my kids. Any Doctor who thinks not having advanced degrees has no value is also not a doctor I would want to use. I think twoinanddone hit the nail on the head.

At Harvard for example they offer calculus for life science majors which is Math 19. It is nowhere near as hard as math 21,23,25, or 55 for freshman. For pre med Harvard offers physics 2A and 3A. It likewise is not as hard as the physics 15 series or physics 16. There are lots of other similar examples from other universities

I think there is way too much focus on grades without considering them in the context as blossom as tried to do.

120

It is outrageous that colleges offer watered down science classes especially for premeds. With all the competition and hoopla associated with med school admissions, can they not even get applicants who could handle real calculus, real calculus-based physics, etc? Why do we accept that our physicians can’t master the same basic-level freshman science classes as scientists?