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<p>Is there actually that much of a benefit to such “honors colleges”? Now, honors courses may be of interest to the strongest students in each subject, but it is not necessarily true that each honors course will be composed only of students who would be in the “honors college” (if there were no such enrollment restrictions).</p>
<p>Full disclosure - D attends a public HS that tests for admittance and only accepts the top 1% or so applicants scoring 887 out of 900 points scale from ~ 15K applicants. This means she has become accustomed to being surrounded by her peer group. The school is still pretty diverse - in the kid’s thinking and socioecenomic backgrounds - kids come from ~30+ zip codes. Quite a few really quirky kids (my D is one), eccentric kids, and general (with all due respect) oddballs. Nerds paradise - sorry for the steroptype. However, D visited on of her colleges for an overnight and reported back to me that there were like 50 prophies and 50 hosts - and that she “was the coolest kid in the room”. Now I know my D and she did not mean it in a superior way - she was simply stating an observation from her point of view. Of course, this coming from a kid who would rather be knitting on a Saturday night that partying, so…that’s pretty drastic observation. Despite this, she had a wonderful time there and was able to engage with the other kids just fine. But she still seemed a little worried that she didn’t want to necessarily be the leader of pack in coolness, haha. This may all sound silly - but it gives a small glimpse that the peer group at school does impact kids in ways that it is hard to quantify and really understand - from their perspective.</p>
<p>post #437</p>
<p>I don’t think, personally, any education turns anybody into an elitist SOB. I think there are elitist SOBs everywhere, even in addiction treatment centers, even on football fields and on the climbing walls or in the fiveK race or Pfizer labs. In the art studios and recording studios and dance studios. There are elitist SOBs in the kitchens of restaurants and wine cellars.</p>
<p>But, when somebody comes on a thread to discuss how they have to dumb down the things they say so that other people can “understand” them because of their superior IQ? Give me a break.</p>
<p>FWIW, theGFG – I have never really heard (IRL, that is) people “bash” elite schools / elite students the way you do IRL. </p>
<p>My experience, for what it’s worth, is that there are a lot of average-joes out there who, if forced to think about these schools (which they don’t), might consider them “for people not like me / people who are kind of upper-crust ooh-la-la” but in the same manner that they think they wouldn’t enjoy a fancy French restaurant with all the fancy forks and knives and spoons and would prefer a more down-to-earth diner or backyard barbecue. </p>
<p>Which is a little different from “those kids have no common sense, they are isolated in ivory towers and think they are above the rest of us, they are grade grubbers and / or were pushed by parents, they’re there only because of Daddy Warbucks.” I haven’t really ever heard those sentiments IRL. Again, FWIW, which isn’t much. </p>
<p>I do think it’s interesting that you seem to inhabit a world in which both of these things are true: 1) there’s a lot of pressure for kids to get into the “right” schools (and only a handful at that) but 2) those schools / their students are constantly being dissed.</p>
<p>OK, but when was the last time you saw an article in print about the deficiences/snobbery of students who attend the honors college at a state flagship that was passed around on the internet and then appears regularly here on CC? </p>
<p>Here, the honors college at the state flagship is promoted on a regular basis as a cheaper equivalent of the elite schools (in terms of education, at least) and lauded as the prudent choice of hard working successful families who don’t have to put up with the elitist liberals in the Ivy League, where admittance is based not on merit, unlike in the honors college, and full of only the very wealthy and the very poor, because of outrageous sticker prices and generous financial aid policies.</p>
<p>I think I did a good job of summing up the feelings of some (many??) here on CC about elite schools.</p>
<p>Oh well. I don’t think anyone at an elite university has to worry about that, skrvr. If it is such a horrible problem in their lives, they are free to stay away from honors colleges and elite schools.</p>
<p>Nobody feels sorry for the prettiest girl in the room, either. It’s just the way it goes.</p>
<p>For the record, I think a kid should go to the very best school they can get into and reasonably afford. I think the ROI of a great education goes far beyond any monetary returns, and I am “making” my child go to college before she goes to culinary school, even though many question the value of this…</p>
<p>But, not being able to talk to someone because you are “too smart” is just one of those things that is an elitist idea that has no basis in reality. Unless you are on the spectrum.</p>
<p>“kids come from ~30+ zip codes” - is this a boarding school or just in a large city?</p>
<p>Sounds like their admit rate is just over 6%.</p>
<p>“Nobody feels sorry for the prettiest girl in the room,” - I suggest many become plenty jealous too.</p>
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Who’s insisting on this? Not I. And I don’t really see anybody else doing so, at least on this thread. My claim is much more modest: that many really smart kids will have a more enjoyable college experience if they are surrounded with mostly other really smart kids. This seems to upset some people so much that they have to translate it into some more extreme claim like the one quoted above.</p>
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<p>exactly. So why all the shock? and hurt feelings? and whining?</p>
<p>poor, poor beautiful girl. Poor little rich kid. etc…</p>
<p>if you are the best at something? People will say all sorts of things. they will even come after your earnings. This is the way of the world.</p>
<p>Wow, poetgrl, are you always so quick to discount other people’s experience? I grew up in a blue collar town, and I was given a hard time just for carrying a book around, and yes, if I used a word that was unusual, I was mocked. So I learned not to use those words. My point was not that I couldn’t speak to other people because my vocabulary couldn’t be restrained; it was that, going from that kind of atmosphere, in which reading was considered a really odd thing to do, to a good school where I didn’t have to watch what I said all the time in case someone took offense that I was so uppity as to use a word they didn’t know, was a very freeing feeling, like taking off tight shoes.</p>
<p>Not everyone went to a good high school with AP classes and a supportive environment. Before you decide that I’m just some egotistical know-it-all who likes to show off her IQ, that I’m “on the spectrum” (and Jesus, what kind of thing is that to say?), maybe you should entertain the notion that I had a different experience than you can imagine. People do, you know.</p>
<p>I wouldn’t expect anyone to feel sorry for the pretty girl because she’s pretty, but I also don’t think it would be fair for people to malign her simply due to her beauty.</p>
<p>I do entertain that. But you spoke as if this is something you still have to do today. I think that is about you and not about other people.</p>
<p>My father was a high school drop out. He thought the only school worth the money was trade school. Seriously.</p>
<p>I managed to find common ground with all sorts of people in my life, regardless of my IQ. Same with most people. I find it an affectation for an adult to say they have to dumb themselves down to interact with other people. You aren’t going to change my mind on this.</p>
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<p>But, please? this is exactly what they will do.</p>
<p>Since time immemorial.</p>
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<p>I wasn’t, either, that wasn’t really what I meant. I just found that speaking aloud the way I think internally put space between me and my peers. Vocabulary was really only a small part of it – my thinking patterns and especially my use of language (idioms, allusions, etc.) were not something most people my age were familiar with. I don’t mean I was quoting Shakespeare all the time, but I found that if I said the things that popped into my head, I’d often have to explain either what I was referring to, what a word meant, why I thought the way I did, etc…not vocab specifically.</p>
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<p>It has nothing to do with my IQ. I started reading when I was 3 years old and by kindergarten was reading middle-grade novels, high school by 6th grade, etc etc. It’s a common story, but I read for hours and hours a day and it affected the way I spoke. So yes it was uncomfortable speaking to kids who were still learning the finer points of grammar.</p>
<p>PS: I communicate fine now, I just filter myself. I’m talking about when I was about 5-10 years old. So I’m definitely not saying “smart” adults can’t communicate with “dumb” adults or whatever.</p>
<p>PS 2: All that said, it will be an interesting and exciting experience for me to be somewhere where almost everyone will understand my unfiltered conversation.</p>
<p>I think there’s a big difference between being one of a number (even a small number) of really smart kids, and being the only one in your high school. Maybe “smart” isn’t even the word–maybe “intellectual?” Or maybe, interested in arcane stuff? Like, if you are reading books that you can’t recommend to a single other person you know? It’s far from the worst problem to have, as I said, but it can get a little lonely, even if nobody is maligning you. I wonder if the availability of the Internet has mitigated that problem these days.</p>
<p>Anyway, as several people have said, if you’ve had that experience, it’s really cool to go somewhere where other people already know who W.S. Merwin is.</p>
<p>I’m not referring to high school students. I’m referring to those of us out in the world who have to work with all sorts of people and interact with all sorts of people.</p>
<p>As I have said repeatedly, I think every kid should go to the best school they can get into and reasonably afford, and I do not consider the ROI on an education to be measurable monetarily. Past a certain point, the marginal benefit needs to be determined, of course, but it’s not all dollars and cents.</p>
<p>But a grown woman or man who thinks their intellect makes them different than others in a way that is different than all the gifts and talents make everyone unique is navel gazing.</p>
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What if you think your intellect makes you different from others in the same way as other gifts and talents? You wouldn’t begrudge a person with musical talent wanting to join the better community orchestra, would you?</p>
<p>But I don’t begrudge anyone anything Hunt.</p>
<p>Well, I thought I detected some begrudgement there. Or possibly begrudgery. Begrudgitude?</p>
<p>And yet some people DO need to dumb their language down under certain circumstances. I used to work with PhD students and faculty at an Ivy League school. When explaining their work to me their first pass would often result in a “errr…” response. The majority had to dumb down their explanation both in terms of language and content. It wasn’t that I was stupid (I gots me a fancy Ivy edumacation too!), but rather that I was not educated in their field of study. It was just not something in which I’d ever been particularly interested and as a result I couldn’t keep up with them in this area.</p>
<p>I do sometimes filter what I say. I don’t think it’s a horrible thing.</p>
<p>Poetgirl - I tell my daughters exactly same thing as your dad (only engineering counts!) but them girls just don’t take me seriously either. Whats it with girls?</p>