Is spike absolutely necessary for Stanford/Harvard/Ivys?

Lindagaf
Wed, 11 Dec 2024 15:38:04 +0000

stanleyb1:

Its just heart breaking to see dedicated kids putting in all for a dream school and it may not happen.

Is this heartbreaking for you, or the student? Is heartbreaking the right word? I ask because there is a false idea, especially here on CC, that a student who works really hard deserves to go to a college with a single digit acceptance rate. Probably 99% of applicants to all the most elite universities work really hard. There isn’t room for all of them.

Parents and students should keep at the forefront of their minds that hard work and dedication pays off in life, not just by getting into Stanford. We see kids here on CC every year who feel that, because they didn’t get into HYPSM or whatever and only got into the honors program at their state flagship, that all their effort is worthless. THAT is the narrative that is heartbreaking. Getting into HYPSM doesn’t guarantee anything in life.

There are Stamps Scholars, Coca Cola Scholars, Jack Kent Cooke Scholars, Questbridge and Posse Scholars who can blow the pants off many Ivy League students. A lot of those students attend schools many people don’t consider super prestigious, such as U of O, or Barry U. Maybe they attend a smaller college, like Denison or Swarthmore, which are not household names to most people.

There are many ways for your student to succeed in life. I suggest that above all, you let your child enjoy their childhood and not view his college process as “Ivy League or Bust.”