@ProfessorPlum168
you’re missing the point - this isn’t about potential and certainly not about being demure.
However, many parents from specific Asian countries where high-pressure entrance tests are mandatory for success and math often defines who is academically apt (where the parents themselve proved “apt”), “push” their kids past what’s developmentally appropriate - there’s a difference between responding to a child’s needs and pushing the kid. This isn’t uniquely Asian: Nigerians do the same, it’s very common among Korean, Chinese, Indian families, but isn’t very common among Filipino, Hmong, or Bangladeshi parents. So, the point of bringing up Asian Americans is that many Asian American families, especially in California, have an intense focus on math. It’s just a fact if you look at the classes, who pushes and who doesn’t, etc. It has nothing to do with resentment or jealousy. (For example, I took Prealgebra in 6th grade and Algebra in 7th, and quite happily took IB Math Studies, now “Math Applications SL”).
@ucbalumnus : it’s not just PHD attainment. It’s coming from a culture where a specific track and a specific test, where math matters a lot, lead to specific outcomes in life. Math is like predetermination - so of course parents want to equip their kid. It’s led to a race to nowhere because the US values non conformity within a certain framework over outranking other students in math. Applying for Philosophy, French, or Anthropology is more likely to help a kid stand out to UCB than MVC or even higher math.
“utmost potential” shouldn’t be defined as “reaching calculus before anyone else” which is just a form of keeping up with the Jones, using math instead of materialism. Helping gifted kids is a good thing, but all these kids taking calculus in 10th or even 9th grade can’t be gifted, this isn’t Lake Woebegon. In addition to being too much for most kids, it’s counterproductive for college admissions and not necessarily what’s best for non STEM majors who really should discover other forms of quantitative and logical reasoning, especially statistics, forms of CS, forms of philosophy and logic…