<p>Here’s the promo from this week’s This American Life:</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>More info here: [How</a> I Got Into College | This American Life](<a href=“http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/504/how-i-got-into-college]How”>http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/504/how-i-got-into-college)</p>
<p>This will be broadcast on most NPR stations this coming week or next, depending on local schedules. Podcast is available for download from Sunday night (7pm central).</p>
<p>“My second grader has decided on a career in Electrical Engineering, he’s leaning toward MIT”…</p>
<p>I guess it’s never to early to contact your admissions officer. :)</p>
<p>I almost drove off the road today because I was laughing so hard. I hope this radio program was taped and someone can link it here…hilarious.</p>
<p>They had an admissions head for Georgia Tech on and he was talking about college admissions things…that were amusing. I won’t get these totally right but here is the gist.</p>
<p>My favorite…GT received a letter from a parent. It went something like this:</p>
<p>“Dear GT, my second grader has decided to become an electrical engineer. He thought his first choice was MIT but we can’t seem to get them to talk to us about this. I think he might like your southern hospitality better.”</p>
<p>How about an essay to GT:</p>
<p>Duke has everything I want in a college. </p>
<p>Or their favorite overused essay:</p>
<p>"The Mission Trip</p>
<p>Our group flew to an underdeveloped country in central America. We boarded a bus for the trip to our rural final destination. The bus broke down outside of the city.mluckly some very friendly locals helped us. I thought I would be going to this country to help them, but i came back a changed person."</p>
<p>They went on to talk about parents who make phone calls or send emails trying to sound like the kids. Parents also think that demonstrated interest will be the key thing. This one was the one where I almost drove off the road:</p>
<p>“Dear Son, I will pay you $20 for each email you send to GT”</p>
<p>Trouble was…the parent sent that email to GT!</p>
<p>Hey at least the second grader is showing an early passion for his field. Hopefully by fifth grade he’ll have overseen the schematics for the magnets in the next particle collider and not simply moved on to whatever other thing he’s read about.</p>
<p>i will try to track that down, that is too funny. i love the human interest stuff on NPR. The last is my favorite, reminds me of one of my kids early soccer games (grade school) when the kiddo ran off the field after scoring a goal, shouting something to the effect (i hate i’ve forgotten the exact words) of “YEA!! TWENTY BUCKS, MAMA!!” I live in an area where athletic prowess is more highly praised than academic prowess…could be anywhere in the US!! Million dollar football stadiums and science summer internships are cut down to ONE kid as funding has been reduced.Yes, at the same school that the astroturf has been replaced twice in five or so years!</p>
<p>It is this week’s “This American Life”. If you have iTunes you can just search for it and download this edition to your iTunes for free. I think it won’t be available for download until tomorrow night, though (usually this particular podcast isn’t up until Sunday night). So check on Monday morning.</p>
<p>You can listen starting on Sunday evening:
[How</a> I Got Into College | This American Life](<a href=“http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/504/how-i-got-into-college?act=1]How”>http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/504/how-i-got-into-college?act=1)</p>
<p>Yep…that’s it! Honestly hilarious. My guess is it will be on NPR again between now and Sunday!</p>
<p>The adcom from GT was actually chuckling as he was discussing these things. My bet is that adcoms all over the country see and hear funny things!</p>
<p>If you want to listen on NPR instead of waiting, just search for your local station and look at the listing time for This American Life. Some stations do pay to air popular programs like that more than once in a weekend.</p>
<p>You can find when stations broadcast it here:
[Find</a> Your Station | This American Life](<a href=“http://www.thisamericanlife.org/listen/stations]Find”>http://www.thisamericanlife.org/listen/stations)</p>
<p>Many (most?) stations broadcast over the internet as well so if you find a station that carries it that way at a time you can listen, you can listen to it online at that time.</p>
<p>I’ll be interested to see if you find this as amusing as I did!</p>
<p>I loved it! The next story, about the former teacher and the immigrant-kid-now-made-good, was interesting, too, but I have to look it up later because I was interrupted by a certain h.s. senior-to-be (Monday!) with a question.</p>
<p>Ha ha. My son also wanted to go to MIT when he was in second grade. He now is at Yale and plans on majoring in music composition/computer science. Glad I didn’t make that phone call to MIT. ;). Can’t wait to listen to the program.</p>
<p>You can get This American Life via the free Stitcher app for apple and android devices, or via iTunes under Podcasts. The TAL (This American Life) episodes are usually only available for one week for some reason. Other NPR shows are up for longer.</p>
<p>I want to clarify something in the thread title. </p>
<p>This program is NOT produced by NPR – it is a production of Chicago Public Media, which is a separate organization. It is broadcast by NPR-affiliated stations – but it is not The same.</p>
<p>To be exact: the program “This American Life” is a production of “Chicago Public Media” (WBEZ). (Which happens to be broadcast from midtown Manhattan, but that’s another story).</p>
<p>(Someone very near and dear to me is closely associated with the program, and I would not want that person to think I committed the faux paux of calling This American Life an “NPR program”. It’s kind of like saying that a Barnard student attends Columbia, if you know what I mean. Technically, kinda, maybe… but not really. And of course something that I have done from time to time. 
).</p>
<p>Also, everyone – you can download the podcast for FREE at the link that I provided in the opening post. No need to search. </p>
<p>As I said, the Podcast becomes available on Sunday night. That’s when I listen to it.</p>
<p>Head’s up to people in San Francisco bay area: For reasons I won’t get into, KQED has a 1-week tape delay on all TAL broadcasts, so if you don’t get the podcast, this episode will be broadcast next weekend rather than this one.</p>
<p>Well…I heard it live on the radio today. Some affiliates will rebroadcast it. But really…the first part with the fellow from Georgia Tech is hilarious…really hilarious.</p>
<p>One more note: I have an internet radio – picture: <a href=“http://www.gracedigitalaudio.com/i/prod/GDI-IRC6000/new/mondo.howitworks.jpg[/url]”>http://www.gracedigitalaudio.com/i/prod/GDI-IRC6000/new/mondo.howitworks.jpg</a></p>
<p>It works like a regular “radio” except it connects to my wireless internet and plays either streaming media or podcasts. I don’t even worry about the schedule, I can just use the “radio” tuner to pull the current week’s podcast whenever I want. </p>
<p>I got the internet radio to improve my listening experience with Pandora, but I now listen to local FM broadcasts that way as well. So between that and my Roku, I am a very happy camper using my internet connection for tv and radio.</p>
<p>You can download the podcast this week for free:</p>
<p>[How</a> I Got Into College | This American Life](<a href=“http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/504/how-i-got-into-college]How”>http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/504/how-i-got-into-college)</p>
<p>There are some entertaining bits about parents who go too far! :)</p>
<p>So glad you posted. I was only able to hear a portion of it. But I loved the parent email about the son who was in 2nd grade, wanted a career in electrical engineering and was leaning toward MIT. LOL.</p>
![http://www.gracedigitalaudio.com/i/prod/GDI-IRC6000/new/mondo.howitworks.jpg[/url]](http://www.gracedigitalaudio.com/i/prod/GDI-IRC6000/new/mondo.howitworks.jpg%5B/url%5D){kind=link}
