<p>My mistake, I should have referenced the thread.
<a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parents-forum/1462037-how-did-he-get-129.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/parents-forum/1462037-how-did-he-get-129.html</a>
The comment came after some posters were claiming that gifted students are best served at top universities.</p>
<p>We do use the concept of standing out. A lot. But it’s not about being different. It’s about standing out in the personal qualities evidenced. Not at all about a tightrope walker, national gum chewing winner, taking 15 APs or usamo. ← this literalness misses the qualitative.</p>
<p>lookingfoward, we cross-posted. Why don’t the colleges highlight the unusual personal qualities of the students, then, instead of their unusual activities?</p>
<p>A number of posters have pointed out that there are many roots to success. A student can go on to a highly successful career regardless of the undergraduate institution (or lack of an undergrad degree, as in the case of Bill Gates or Steve Jobs–for different reasons). That is one of the great features of life in America. A student who is interested in an academic career can go on to a top-ranked graduate school from many universities in the U.S. If students who are interested in a STEM career (or their parents) are concerned, I recommend that they take a look at the lists of winners of National Science Foundation Pre-Doctoral Fellowships, Goldwater Scholarships, and Udall Scholarships, just to see that they come from all over.</p>
<p>While paths to every kind of success remain open, more or less regardless of the undergraduate institution, I do also support the idea that a genuinely exceptional student ought to go to a top school, for the reason that the academic experiences as an undergraduate will be different there.</p>
<p>To provide a non-STEM example: I am pretty sure that mathmom has posted elsewhere that she took beginning German at Harvard. In the spring of the first year, the class read Durrenmatt’s Der Richter und Sein Henker. (Sorry, I don’t know how to do umlauts.) I went to Not-Harvard, and also took German, starting from the beginning. In the middle of the second year, the class read Durrenmatt’s Der Richter und Sein Henker. How much German mathmom and I now know has a lot to do with our post-college experiences (so “success” can be reached via many routes), but from that one comparison, I am pretty sure that mathmom had the stronger introductory course.</p>
<p>In one regard, the difference might have been advantageous to me. Although I am not a STEM-Uber-Alles type (again, can’t do umlauts) as Pizzagirl sometimes seems to be alleging (?), I do work in a STEM field. The fact that my German course was going a bit slower freed some extra time for me to work on my abstract algebra course, and that was really useful from a STEM perspective.</p>
<p>QM, I do believe a lot can be gleaned by looking at the sorts of kids they tout. But you have to filter for the context, venue, purpose.</p>
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That’s not psychiatry, that’s typing.</p>
<p>QM - it wasn’t THAT unusual of an EC - just something a little more unusual and unexpected. It was still within “mainstream” parameters, if that makes sense.</p>
<p>MODERATOR’S NOTE: The norm on CC is that you report a post that offends you with an explanation. We take down the posts of some of the most prolific members here despite the belief that they are being guarded in someway if we believe there is an issue with such a post or edit out what might be considered offensive.</p>
<p>I recommend strongly that you make use of the report problem post button if you see issues.</p>
<p>Nobody sticks around the parent’s forum because they DON’T care about education. Most of us have elite school educations, or grad schools, and most of our kids, do, as well, although some children are more annoying in this regard, like my youngest who only recently decided to focus on her academics… “perfect timing,” as my husband likes to say.</p>
<p>So, we all can take a poster’s interest as read, imho.</p>
<p>Then people have their positions: some are all about cost and value, and some are all about stem vs. humanities, and some are Ivy or bust (though that seems a doomed position to many of us, these posters do exist)… etc…</p>
<p>I think the forum and threads would be pretty boring if we all agreed all of the time, and I can’t think of one poster on this board who I “like” who I haven’t debated with or argued with, from time to time. It’s counterproductive to take that seriously or personally, imho.</p>
<p>All that said, I’m just glad that UNC’s abysmal basketball season can now be officially over and we can all prepare for next year. Go Heels! ;)</p>
<p>I’ve been reading this thread and since I think that I am the Asian STEM parent poster that was referred to, I think I will jump in. I am probably not going to make anyone happy!</p>
<p>I do see your point, whatitsays, that there is a negative reaction to those who seem to be trying too hard to get into an elite school. I was a little surprised when most people recommended backing off or somehow second guessing my parenting style. I think I fell too easily into the tiger mon stereotype (which by the way is not all true in my case although I do have my moments).</p>
<p>However, I can see why that reaction is so common when I look at the bigger picture. There ARE lots of kids who are overly pressured and suffer, whether depression or insecurity or other for not meeting parental or peer or self- expectations. I think others have mentioned the “how do I tell my parents I don’t want to be a doctor thread,” as a recent example. There are also multiple people who are ungracious in accepting their college accept list, whether by slamming URM or female or legacy or athlete admits, or whining about their perfect scores and saying why did that other person get in over me?</p>
<p>Overall there is something unattractive about that style of thinking whether from a parent or a kid. </p>
<p>So I think that is where the initial knee jerk reaction came from. However I will say that most were gracious and while expressing concern, also gave me the benefit of the doubt. With the exception of a couple of posters who I ignored (not PG). </p>
<p>Overall I think that is probably the best way to deal with posters that rub you the wrong way. Starting a big post battle will probably just result in the thread being closed. </p>
<p>That being said, I think we should return to the original idea of the OP, which from my POV is does “gaming” the system work? </p>
<p>The consensus seems to be that overall it doesn’t or at least that its not worth it. The kid who follows his passion and has a strategy to find a good college fit will do well even if its not at HYPSM. </p>
<p>I think I overall agree although my current struggle as a parent is how much to “interfere” with my kids. Specifically, how much to limit their video game playing when even our cleaning lady yesterday said she thought they played too much. (Sorry if that sound elitist but just wanted to make the point that the sentiment is not from a tiger mom but from multiple persons even peripherally involved in my kids lives.)</p>
<p>Sorry if I seem to be rambling</p>
<p>Well, gaming can actually be an addiction. So, I can understand your concern with that.</p>
<p>My biggest thing with anything is: does it interfere with life? Life being: work, friends, play, dinner with the family, getting outside. If something interferes too much with life in a negative way? Then there has to be a conversation about how it needs to be handled.</p>
<p>At one point, I did make my daughter do her homework on her laptop in the dining room after dinner for about six months because she was getting distracted by the social media. Also, H took her phone from her at bedtime (when she was younger) because she was up too late at night texting with friends. </p>
<p>She turned out to be a sleep texter. She keeps her phone on her desk at night, out of reach. But… there are lots of parenting issues, and gaming issues can be one.</p>
<p>Good luck. That can be particularly challenging, imho.</p>
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<p>QM, but here is where you go literal again. No one is saying that it’s automatically “better” to raise komondors versus golden retrievers, or that komondor-raising should be awarded more points than golden retriever-raising. It’s what the kid chose to do / report / learn from his dog-breeding experience. In the case of the komondors, yeah, you could write something clever about how no one knows the name of the breed and you could riff that into some interesting commentary about names and popularity in general; in the case of the retriever, you could write something about how common and ubiquitous goldens are but you learned something special from raising these particular goldens and that was (blah blah blah). That’s just an example, and probably a bad one, but the point is – it’s not the breed that matters. It’s what the student observed, learned, about himself, about others, about the world from doing this particular EC. THAT is the story worth telling, whether it’s goldens or komondors. And reducing it down to believing that komondors are a hook and goldens aren’t – is missing the point entirely.</p>
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<p>I think there are schools that are excellent even if they aren’t elite. And that’s my issue with the tight-circle-drawers. They perceive the membership of elite as having a 1:1 correspondence with excellent, and relegate all else to “eh, decent enough, I suppose.”</p>
<p>If you want to get literal, I suppose I might draw the circle of elite somewhere around the top 20 range, and excellent somewhere around the top 40 - 45. But I don’t operate in such a literal fashion and I’m not interested in hearing someone grab #38 or whatever and argue with me about it. I consider Georgetown plenty elite even though it doesn’t crack the top 20, that type of thing.</p>
<p>Which is why I could easily say (and did) - if, hypothetically, my kids got into all of the top 20 schools, I’d want them making their decision based on personal preference, not on some measure of “prestige.” </p>
<p>And which is why I could easily say (and have, repeatedly) that my kids’ #2 choice schools (to which they would have applied ED II if ED I hadn’t worked out) were LAC’s ranked in the 20’s/30’s somewhere and I would have been just as happy if they had gone to those places, because they are still excellent schools and there wouldn’t be any dearth of smart kids on the ground.</p>
<p>Novimom, I also have a son who games way too much. I believe that college is a sanctuary for him because he can game as much as he wants without me nagging him about it. I just have to trust that he is doing the work that he needs to do. </p>
<p>I was having a discussion with some friends who have concerns about their kids’ addiction to screening at the detriment of getting their work done. One mom confessed that her secret was to turn off all internet/computer access at 9 pm. Her kids then knew that all schoolwork that needed computer access needed to get done by 9 otherwise they were out of luck. I thought this was pretty clever although I don’t think that this is something that I can enforce in my home.</p>
<p>Well, the kids I know from my S’s class who got into HYP–and I know them well, have since they were 6, and like them–radiate a belief that THEY are special. They are good at self-promotion. They are very intelligent, driven to succeed, and neither introverted intellectuals nor particularly modest. (Nor are they braggarts, I hasten to add.) Please note that I am not criticizing them: I think that this quality will stand them in good stead and help make them “successful.” I think that that is the kind of person, generally-speaking, that HYP wants. I have observed this quality in the majority of my niece’s H roommates. The rest of the Ivies are not so obsessed with that personality, as far as I can tell. I also have the impression, going back to my HS classmates and students knew then, that HYP were not as into it back then as they are now.</p>
<p>One of the things I have come to realize is that MY kid was not their “type,” and probably never will be. (Frankly, he could use a dose of that talent for self-promotion, and as he has matured, I have seen him develop the ability to network, put himself forward more, and so forth. That’s a good thing.)</p>
<p>I often see people on CC who are upset about their stellar kid not getting into a school where it is clear their kid is simply not the school’s “type.” Yes, the kid is every bit as accomplished, if not more, than those who are accepted. But as far as I can see, the adcoms at those places have an almost unerring ability to sniff out what they are looking for. And it isn’t necessarily the smartest, most intellectual, nicest, most talented, or most sincere kid who applies.</p>
<p>"But as far as I can see, the adcoms at those places have an almost unerring ability to sniff out what they are looking for. "</p>
<p>At least from the perspective of a random faculty, you are giving the adcoms way too much credit in terms of their ability.</p>
<p>Part of the problem on CC, though, is isolating HYP as even more “special” than any of the rest, or parsing more finely what THEY are looking for as if they are kingmakers. Their adcoms are just like all other adcoms - they are trying to find the right students for that particular school. That’s all. Nothing more. A day at HYP is like a day at any other elite school. Really. Enough already with their elevation. It exacerbates the issues on CC.</p>
<p>“Well, the kids I know from my S’s class who got into HYP–and I know them well, have since they were 6, and like them–radiate a belief that THEY are special. They are good at self-promotion. They are very intelligent, driven to succeed, and neither introverted intellectuals nor particularly modest. (Nor are they braggarts, I hasten to add.) Please note that I am not criticizing them: I think that this quality will stand them in good stead and help make them “successful.” I think that that is the kind of person, generally-speaking, that HYP wants. I have observed this quality in the majority of my niece’s H roommates. The rest of the Ivies are not so obsessed with that personality, as far as I can tell. I also have the impression, going back to my HS classmates and students knew then, that HYP were not as into it back then as they are now.”</p>
<p>Another of the many, many generalizations on this thread. Wow. My son just got into Harvard and you will never meet a more humble kid. He is what you would call an “intellectual introvert.” He is, in fact, very modest. </p>
<p>Do you know all the kids that have been accepted to HYP? Or, is your small sample enough to make this statement.</p>
<p>I have never seen more people making generalizations over and over about things they seem to know so little about.</p>
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<p>This became a concern and battle for us when our son was in 6th grade, so we literally took the xbox system away and threw it in the trash (away from our house, obviously). Yes, a tantrum ensued, but he got over it very quickly. I preferred that he sit on the sofa and stare into space thinking, if that was the only alternative. I don’t think any kids were ever stunted by being denied video games in the home.</p>
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<p>My opinion is that most viable candidates are more than “good enough”. The ones that do get selected just happen to be incredibly lucky. Whether that means a quirky essay that a particular adcom liked or a recommendation by a teacher who liked their personality or coming from an underrepresented state, etc. I really don’t think that adcoms are that savvy that they are “unerring”.</p>