<p>Didn’t realize my post about teachers would throw up such a maelstrom. </p>
<p>This board gives me a excellent insight into the minds of American parents. That’s what draws me here. That’s why I ask questions. My kid will be raised in the way I see fit. That has nothing, indeed, to do with what I read on this board. So, should I stop posting instead of being curious?</p>
<p>Yes .</p>
<p>If curiosity is what it’s all about, I think IP should ask away. No one is obligated to answer.</p>
<p>patsmom - how did you manage to post without ten characters???</p>
<p>(yea, I know, I’m a moderator and I have no clue!)</p>
<p>Just added a few spaces between the word and the period…</p>
<p>Now you know how we think. Have you questioned any of your own assumptions, such as the assumption that the only EC worth pursuing is one that you have to be passionate about, or the assumption that the goal should always be to be the best or don’t bother?</p>
<p>I would like to ask IP about how it works in India with ECs. Perhaps by understanding the system that he is accustomed to, I can satisfy my own curiosity about the challenges immigrants face when they try to be successful in our system. I am certain there are many struggles.</p>
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<p>Don’t bet on it. Everyone on this board changes his/her positions to some extent. There simply are too many good arguments forcing one to think harder. If you are not challenged you won’t stay, thanks to all posters.</p>
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<p>India is a large country with many different cultures and languages. So I cannot really speak for India. There is no one Indian culture. But I can speak to the culture of the state that I come from. You are supposed to be good in academics, music, visual and performing arts, and literature. There is very little focus on science or math. There is absolutely no focus on athletics or sports. ECs are for … I don’t know what they are for but every parent requires their kids to learn to sing, play an instrument, read literature, paint, so on and so forth. It’s like breathing. You are supposed to do it. ECs are not considered for college admissions. Kids are pushed hard to excel in anything that they do.</p>
<p>I haven’t faced any struggles in the USA. In my experience, USA is a very welcoming country. I have never faced discrimination at work. Academic performance was rewarded as was sheer merit. Financial rewards followed, and at par with Americans. There was no pressure to assimilate. In other words, I couldn’t have asked for a better experience. All America asked of me was to deliver at work, and in return it afforded me the financial strength to achieve everything available to an American. The fast that I lived in a cosmopolitan liberal big city on the coast helped tremendously.</p>
<p>Frankly, other than my performance at work, American demanded nothing of me, and gave back everything it could. This is my home country and the country of my citizenship, I have lived here longer than I have lived in India, and I am loyal to America.</p>
<p>Which is why I was shocked to find out that AA is biased against Asians in college admissions. I couldn’t have guessed that in my 20+ years in the USA.</p>
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<p>That’s a good point. So far, the recommendations have been contradictory, with one group extolling the virtues of kids sleeping 6 hours per night to pursue multiple ECs at 100%, and the other group encouraging only moderate effort on ECs. I am still in the middle. I believe that ECs should be pursued at 100%, but sleep is also important so the number of ECs should be right sized.</p>
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<p>I don’t think I will ever change my opinion that the goal is to be the best. The reason I recommend not bothering otherwise is to be efficient with time. As for pursuing ECs where one has no passion, I am not sure why one should do that. Help me understand why, please, and not use college admissions or being an interesting person to others as arguments. That to me is incredibly shallow.</p>
<p>The benefits of an EC can be learning to work with others / as a team, learning something new, satisfying intellectual curiosity, learning or practicing good character traits such as patience or perseverance, Or just plain fun. None of those require the EC to be a “passion” nor that the person set being the best as a goal.</p>
<p>Could very well be, but I guess I am hardwired differently.</p>
<p>and/or raised differently, or some combination thereof.</p>
<p>IP, you seem satisfied with what you have encountered here in America. I am wondering what you think your child will experience . . . whether you think he will feel more demands to be more Americanized than you, and whether you think he will feel the need to ask some of the questions you have asked here that people take for granted. I’m asking because you state that you have felt no pressure to assimilate.</p>
<p>I have seen the generational and cultural differences (parents born in Asia vs the kids born in the US) cause significant friction between the parents and kids of several of my s’s friends. And there are many things that the children (who are now young adults) unfortunately cannot or will not share with their parents, far more than the average stuff kids don’t tell their parents. One example- S#2’s gf is Indian. She is a sweetie. They have dated on and off for well over a year. She will absolutely not tell her parents she is dating a caucasian. That is just so sad.</p>
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<p>My son’s principal “ECs” in high school consisted of paid employment – first in a library and later in a retail store. He had no interest in pursuing a career related to either of these jobs. He was in it for the money, most of which was used to support his passion of the time, computer gaming, which required him to keep upgrading his personal computer and buy both hardware and software.</p>
<p>My daughter played a sport throughout elementary and middle school and for the first two years of high school, but always on recreational level teams in the community, never on a highly competitive team, and never on a school team. She enjoyed the sport but did not want to give it the time and effort that would have been required if she pursued it at a higher leve. Her main extracurricular interest was something else.</p>
<p>Excellent points, Marian. A job is certainly an EC, and it doesn’t necessarily have to be of the “I’m a budding scientist, so I’ll work in the science lab.” There is value in the work ethic needed to have any paid job, whether or not it relates to a burning passion or future career choice.</p>
<p>IndianParent, do you see / understand (even if you don’t personally agree) how colleges may value a student who engaged in paid employment, especially if said employment helped enable him to go to college in the first place?</p>
<p>For instance–of all the kids who participate in band, some of them are true musicians and aspire to be the best they can be on their instrument, perhaps even major in it in college. Others just like music, and like being with their friends, or just like the annual trip to Disneyland. They’re glad their parents started them on an instrument in 5th grade, but don’t particularly like to practice and may have only middling talent.</p>
<p>But if only “true” musicians participated, it would be a very small marching band!!! :D</p>
<p>Edit: I guess one can conclude that many ecs are social. Key club surely attracts some who want to do good, and some who want to do whatever their friends are doing.</p>
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<p>Ah, now I get it. IP’s inquiry is purely anthropological: “Let me see how the barbarians (AKA American parents) raise THEIR kids.”</p>