Intellectual vs Driven

Parent Cafe
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Whenever I see lists of colleges with intellectual student bodies I get all excited, but then I realize that I’m excited because I want to go to one of those colleges :slight_smile: My kids might actually hate them.

If I had to label my kids, I’d say the oldest is smart and hard working, the second one is smart, quick, and competitive, and the third is very curious and intellectual, but not as determined to get good grades as the other two. None of them are heavily into ECs, but I’m working on that.

Finding the right fit for a kid is complicated. I’m not looking for any really specific answers here. I’m just wondering about the schools that always come up on those lists of intellectual student bodies.

When I see descriptions of Reed and Grinnell, and how the kids love discussing ideas outside of school, they sound like places I would have loved. But then I remember how driven some of the kids with the stats to get into those schools are, and I think, ah…, maybe not.

When I see the accomplishments of the kids on here who are shooting for the really highly selective schools, I don’t see any similarity between those kids and mine. The grades maybe, but that’s about it. I think my kids would be very uncomfortable at a school where all of the kids were Type A overachievers, with incredible accomplishments by the age of 18.

I’m wondering if there are schools where the kids are very curious and very intellectual, but maybe not so driven. I know that sounds funny. Are there any schools where the kids are really smart, but they’re a bunch of lazy underachievers :slight_smile: You know, a bunch of dreamers who are heading nowhere. That’s where I think my kids will really fit in :slight_smile:

I’m actually kind of serious though. I think all of my kids would do better in an environment with very smart, curious kids who are average as far as drive goes. Kids who work hard in school, and who plan to work hard when they get out, but who are average in all other aspects of life, as far as accomplishments. I would love to see them in a really intellectual environment, but with a reasonable workload and lots of options for fun.

Does anyone know of any schools that are known for having very intellectual kids who are not Type A overachievers? I’m sure people will say competitive state schools, but I’m wondering specifically about LACs.

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I actually think Reed is closer to this than you think. The intellectual “big guns” are UChicago and Swarthmore, in my opinion. Reed is a step down in test scores. Carleton is a possibility. Hampshire might be a place to look if they have a counter-culture streak. They are fairly academically focused at Mount Hoyoke if you have a girl, and not overly Type A. Kenyon and Macalester might be a couple more.

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Thanks for the suggestions @intparent. Hampshire is intriguing. I just checked it out. My kids are pretty middle of the road, though. It might be too early to tell with the youngest though, so you never know.

I’ve never been to Kenyon, but it sounds great. I wish they still gave out merit aid. It doesn’t look like they give much these days.

Reed is another one that sounds great. I’m going to try to get there at some point. Do you know if they give merit aid? On the web site I checked, it says “Not Reported” for non-need based merit aid.

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I encouraged my kids to go to large Unis because people change, especially from 18-22. The problem with those small “intellectual,” “nerdy” schools is what if your kid doesn’t really fit in or changes as he/she matures. At a large U, a kid can find different tribes, if one tribe doesn’t work out he/she can move on to a different tribe.
I went to a small LAC. I was a different person by the time I graduated and I felt like I out grew the place by the time I was a junior. BTW - I went to college thinking I was a typical smart, nerdy Asian kid, but I don’t think I was ever nerdy, I was just a kid who got good grades.

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Your distinction makes a lot of sense to me, @WalknOnEggShells . It’s been on my mind to try to describe those differences since the thread about highly competitive schools in some NJ towns that’s gotten so much commentary.

I would say both of my kids are highly intellectually curious but not driven. The first was initially against the idea of looking for same students to be around, instead went to an Honors Program in a fairly good OOS school, but was dismayed by the lack of engagement for its own sake in classrooms, and in discussions in general around the school. She transferred to Wesleyan, and had exactly the intellectual experience she was looking for–passionate engagement with ideas, little sense of competition–she truly found her people.

S, four years later, thought he wanted a big school, and went to Columbia. He was drawn by the idea of the Core Curriculum because he felt it would attract the same types of student–there for the engagement with ideas. I would say though, that that turned out to be only partially true–many, he felt, were getting through the Core as necessary stepping stones to Wall Street or other professional gold rings–a lot of drive to get through and get something.

I’m not saying that’s wrong, but as you say, different students are looking for different atmospheres. He got a fine education there, but generally did not have the sense of fitting in to a community which his sister had at Wes.

long story short–look at Wesleyan and similar schools! :slight_smile:

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You are describing my son. Smart, loves to learn for learning sake and couldn’t give a rip about grades. He’s not competitive and lived his life hating the busy work . It ruled out Johns Hopkins and carnegie mellow immediately. Even wake forest (work forest) was out. But he also couldn’t tolerate the dumb party types either. I feel like we found his fit at University of Rochester. Big enough and research oriented to find opportunity, smart student body, but not the over achievers who would sabotage a classmate to get the higher grade.

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I have one of those too but unfortunately we cannot afford the price for colleges like U of Rochester. His compromised gpa although could squeak him in it is not enough for any merit. We are going for the flagship hoping he will somehow manage. It is has been such a torture the last four years hearing from his teachers on his intellectual merits and his lack of drive. I could write a book on the subject :frowning:
It is even a bigger torture thinking that a better gpa could open doors to the schools that fit him better.

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Stop torturing yourself. He IS the kid who has that gpa. The schools that fit him best are the schools that the actual, real him matches up with-not the potentially perfect kid you see in your imagination.

I say this because I had to stop doing this with my two girls (15 & 17)-their IQ suggests they could slam dunk anything and everything they wanted, but their personalities are all about thinking about why they want to do something, why should they do something, and what’s the point of doing something. They are not competitive with each other or with anyone else.

They stubbornly resist (I say this with adoring tongue in cheek) being superstars, and once I learned to be ok with that, everyone was a LOT happier.

Where they end up is where their path leads them, and that’s cool.

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D1 wasn’t grade focused, either, was definitely more interested in the intellectual climate.

But she described wanting a place where driven kids would “lift” her to perform higher. Not so much compete as just keep her on her toes.
So consider that angle. She found what she wanted in a very good LAC.

I think all the usual suspects competitive LACs can offer the intellectual. You want to check the specific depts, though, how they’re structured. See if they’re the right match.

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^I agree. I would not want him in a school above his head. My comment was mostly concerning money. He did get in a smaller school (not top or elite!) that I think suits him better being more intimate but he did not get any merit.

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^^ I totally feel you with respect to the money aspect. That’s giving us some serious gray hair…

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OP, you can see info on merit aid by Googling “Common Data Set” and each college name. And a lot more good info, too. Kenyon gives merit – my D2 got $15K/year., same at Macalester She got more from Mount Holyoke. She did have great test scores, though. Reed and Carleton don’t give merit (Carleton just $2K for NMF, nothing else). Case Western was mentioned above, that might be another school to look at.

I see comments above about GPA and merit. My unhooked D2 had an unweighted GPA of 3.7 – good, but not stellar, and got merit at several schools. I think colleges care more about test scores when awarding merit. It is more visible when people look at the academic quality of the college, and most of them dearly desire students who raise those stats. She even got a small amount of merit from UChicago. Good test scores open up a lot of options.

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OP, is merit aid (or lack thereof) a deal breaker?

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RE: Intparent’s comment, I would argue that Carleton students tend to be quite driven…my motivated, bright DS found the pace to be very demanding at times. Could be the pressure he put on himself, but it isn’t a school for slackers.

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So glad to read this post. This discussion gives new perspective to the idea of finding the college that is the right fit for your child. And a continuing challenge to love (and find the right fit for) the child you have, not the child you think could be possible. A much needed reminder for me.

Any thoughts on how you go about digging into a school, get past the admissions marketing, and figure out what the academic environment really is?

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I think the demanding pace at Carleton is due more to the 10-week trimesters than the students being exceptionally driven/competitive with each other. Certainly, to get into the school kids must have some snap and the stats, but I would never have described my Carl – as a HS kid or now, post-graduation – as being academically driven. Smart, quick, competitive? Check on all those. But driven in what, for me, is a negative connotation? Never.

OP, reading about your kids’ traits Carleton was the first college that came to mind. But the lack of ECs would be a big knock, I think. Carls are intellectually curious, which often translates into lots of interests and, therefore, lots of ECs.

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Why not let your kids do some of the driving here? Some kids have good internal compasses: Mine visited many LACs and the last one was Grinnell - at the end of that day, he said ‘this is it.’ He knew at some gut level that it was a fit. (We surmised it might be which is why it was on the list.) Not all kids have that ability to see the fit - and sometimes there just aren’t any schools that meet all the criteria (including the financial test) - but many kids do know when they have found their sweet spot. Put some of the onus on them to find it.

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I think that you also have to be careful with assuming how a school will be by looking at it from the outside and judging it, for example, by the test scores and such of the kids going there. Some places are natural pressure cookers (MIT comes to mind), and there the image is probably pretty close to the reality (though I also would be careful to assume that MIT students are all a bunch of driven nerds who care about nothing besides technology and geekdom, even there there are kids who are curious and love to talk about things outside tech, have met/worked with more than a few).

Yes, the Ivy league schools attract a lot of goal driven kids, who see going to one of those schools as just another hashmark on their way to law school or Wall Street, but the thing about almost any school is that there are likely to be likeminded people there, unless the school is particularly small, and while there will be those where knowledge is about taking classes and figuring out how a teacher grades to get an A, there will be those who genuinely are interested in things besides whether it can make them their first million or not, and I know enough kids who have gone to the elite schools to tell you that not all of them are the product of tiger parents (or if they are, when they hit school, they start seeing there is more to life then what their parents programmed them for).

A similar example is found at music schools like Juilliard. Yes, there are the uber competitive, driven music students whose idea of music is to be ‘number 1’, who see themselves as the next great soloist or principal player in some top orchestra, and you would think that is all that goes to a place like Juilliard et al, based on perceptions, but that isn’t true. Yes, to get into those programs you have to be pretty self driven, you have to be at a high level, but as a friend of the family told our son (when entering the pre college program there), you will gravitate towards kids like yourself who love music itself rather than on achieving goals, and that I have found is true. Yeah, there are kids going to Juilliard on violin who enter every competition they can and spend their time trying to show dominance over everyone else, but there are also kids, like a friend of my son’s, whose goal is to find a way to bring music into kids lives through her playing and love of the music…it does depend on the size of the program, too, there are some small, elite music programs with a small number of students where I suspect the ‘driven’ type is probably most of the students, and there are probably some small schools where everyone is the type of driven student the OP talks about (the larger the school, the more likely to find your own ‘flock’ of people).

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I didn’t read this thread as referring to “slackers.” A student could work very hard, but not be into competition or getting ahead on a proscribed ladder.

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I totally agree with oldfort that big schools are better suited for kids who are still “growing” intellectually. In fact, I’d say all too many kids grow OUT of the small liberal arts colleges out in the middle of nowhere, and INTO the bigger research schools that offer a varied student body and a world of opportunities.