<p>do you feel that the high school was as crucial as it seemed to be at the time? I’m assuming that because you are parents on a college website, you guys care immensely about grades and such. I have similar parents, and I come from a hard working family. My sister is insanely smart, easily excelled in school, and went on to be admitted into an extremely prestigious school. As such, my family (my mother, particularly) expects nothing less of me. Grades are to be my priority. I HAVE to get straight As. I HAVE to get into a good college. I HAVE to get a top SAT score. Don’t get me wrong, my parents aren’t the types who scream and go overboard at the sight of a B, but I can see it in their eyes, and all they ever talk about is grades. Right now, I am supposedly living “the most important year of my life” (as my dad puts it), and college is the end of the road. And whether I go to a top college or not determines whether I’m seen as just another kid, or a somebody.</p>
<p>I don’t particularly agree or disagree. I acknowledge the fact that grades are important, and trying your best is paramount in life, and if you do that, getting into a good college will happen naturally. But I also feel myself breaking under the pressure. I understand that everyone feels this way, but I feel like someone’s holding a gun to my head.</p>
<p>Now that you’re all past that stage in life, what do you think? after high school, and college, does it really matter if you’ve gotten a B in chemistry or an A? Are you still kicking yourself because you forgot to turn in an assignment or something?</p>
<p>(I’m not complaining, being ungrateful, or looking for an excuse to start slacking off. No fights please)</p>
<p>No, it’s not that big a deal. I’m sure there are going to be people who say otherwise, but I promise, no one is ever going to ask you what you got in Chemistry when you apply for jobs. The friends I have who are <em>most</em> successful in life – one’s basically a millionaire, others are successful in their careers, happy, all that – were not A students in school, did not get great SAT scores, didn’t take AP courses, even. My single <em>most</em> financially successful high school friend attended took no AP’s, went to a pretty crappy community college for two years, and then got a dual degree at a big non-selective public university. He’s been a top executive at several multinational corporations and is now leaving at CTO-level position to go into consulting. He’s had exactly the sort of education that CCers say is “settling for fourth tier” and as a result, has had high paying work for pretty much all of his adult life. :-)</p>
<p>tikiman - IMHO, you’re very fortunate that you live in a culture that values education. And though I’m certain it’s nearly impossible to see it now, this (your junior year I presume?) is indeed the most important year of your very young life.</p>
<p>Here in Connecticut there is a clear divide between families where education is valued, and families where it isn’t. In my circle, a college education is anticipated for every child. But my niece is GC in a city school where they send one … ONE … student to university every three years or so, and that university is generally a Tier 3 state school.</p>
<p>In a few years you will be your own person, and you can make whatever decisions you wish with your life. My cautionary advice is that it’s a whole lot easier to get OFF the educational track your family has put you on, than it is to get back ON.</p>
<p>PS, What’s the old saying? Luck favors the well-prepared? Something like that.</p>
<p>I think you have to take comfort in the fact that your family loves you and wants the best for you.
I agree with you that later on, small setbacks are irrelevant. Your overall record, though, will give you choices and the stronger the record, the more choices you will have.
I’m worried to hear you describing the stress you are feeling now in such strong terms. Have you talked to your family about how you are feeling?</p>
<p>What I learned in high school I use every day. What I learned in grad school, I use for my job occasionally. What I learned in college - not so much. I do have some regrets about making better use of my college years.</p>
<p>I totally agree about choices! When our family talks about the value of high school, it’s about choices, about how doing well isn’t about being a better person, about your value, or about proving to others that you’re special or gifted or superior. It’s about creating more choices for yourself, for your life and future. I don’t pretend that Pre-Calculus will be profoundly valuable for my children as adults, but that doing well in HS can help open up opportunities for more choices. Having choice is a good thing. </p>
<p>But as for what people will think of your HS record when you’re 22 or 25 or 30 or 40? FAR less important than it feels at the time. I have C average friends who are astoundingly happy and successful and <em>liked</em> in life, and A+ average friends who feel like they were promised astounding things that never materialized if only they aced all tests and won this or that award.</p>
<p>I completely agree with TrinSF. Success should be defined by you, not by others. Don’t allow anyone to make you feel inadequate. You strike me as someone who will do well in life whether you follow the path others have set for you or not. It’s good to have choices, and doing well in high school and college will give that to you. But make the choices yourself and know that with every closed door plenty more are wide open.</p>
<p>I can understand a certain amount of pressure put on you to maintain top grades and get high scores because, along with other factors, it gives you a shot at the very top colleges, but not only that, it can mean the difference between getting a sizable scholarship or not getting it. If your family is counting on merit scholarships, or getting into HYPS with a generous FA package, then that could be what is driving your parents obsession with grades.</p>
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<p>This I disagree with. It’s just not how it is in America. While there are certainly bragging rights attached to attending some colleges, that really is not the thing that determines whether you are ‘somebody’ in our society. What you accomplish is what matters and you don’t need to go to a “top college” to accomplish great things.</p>
<p>Oh, no, haha, I think you misunderstood me. Maybe I should have put that in quotes or something. When I was talking about how important grades and college were, I was reiterating the message/tone of the voices around me. I wasn’t actually saying I think that I’m going to be some failure if I don’t get to Harvard or something. I was just expressing the kind of attitude I see around. Hope I cleared that up and nice responses</p>
<p>tikiman, I can understand where your parents are coming from. The better the grades/test scores etc, the more opportunities to higher education you will have. I am from the school of thought however that you are what you make of yourself. It matters not whether you go to a tier 1 or tier 3 school. What matters is that you get through it, you learn to become an adult who can think for yourself and you seek out and seize opportunities that come your way. I can tell you that of all my contemporaries that I socialize with, NOT ONE went to an Ivy and probably all make very comfortable livings in the six figures. They are what everyone else would deem a success and they went state schools, some with cc’s before transferring. </p>
<p>Work to the best of your ability so you won’t ever question “what if” and enjoy this time of your life.</p>
<p>Take your own sentence and fill in the blank above. Big difference if you fill it in as, “my mom” “my parents” “other people” “my sister” “my cousins” or “me.”</p>
<p>Man, if your senior year of high school is the most important year in your life, that means it all goes downhill after 17, and that’s really depressing.</p>
<p>The truth is, there is no year in high school that I would count as the “most important year in your life”. I actually don’t think there is any one time in life that is most important. Each year builds upon the next to bring upon better opportunities.</p>
<p>That said, no, high school is nowhere near as crucial as people make it (and neither is where you go to college, for that matter). Other than a few standout events, I don’t even remember high school, particularly what my grades were beyond that I graduated with a 3.6 (and I’ll probably forget that soon, too). High school friends were replaced by college friends, who were replaced by graduate school friends. No one cares what I got on my SAT, and honestly, at this point very few people care where I went to undergrad, too (because I’m getting a graduate degree).</p>
<p>Whether you are seen as a “somebody” depends entirely upon what you do at college and beyond rather than where you went. That’s not say that you should mess up deliberately in high school – no, you should get the best grades you can get. But don’t kill yourself over As and joining every possible club and making 2200+ on the SATs. After you make it into college, no one really cares.</p>
<p>I worked VERY hard in high school. My parents weren’t pushy, I was just self-driven. No, my 98.8 (unweighted) GPA didn’t matter later, although I’m still proud of it! What my hard work DID do for me was prepare me well to study engineering in college. While a lot of my classmates struggled with the math, science, and writing, I pretty much sailed through. I partied a lot more in college than in high school! I also got a full fellowship to grad school.</p>
<p>So I encourage my kids to do well in high school for that reason, not the prestige. I want them to have some choices about which college they attend, and I want them to have fun while they’re there.</p>
<p>I don’t even remember anything I did in high school anymore besides the ACT test and the AP I took for fun. It’s funny, I have an English friend and she is 16 and already has to choose what she wants to study in college so she takes the appropriate courses in order to apply, and if she fails her exams it can destroy her academically for life. Given that we always have the option of going to community college and then kicking butt there, I don’t think high school needs to be taken so seriously as THE MOST IMPORTANT THING EVER-- it’s important to do your best and do as well as you can, whether that means straight A’s in all honors, or B’s and C’s. But it’s not the be all end all of everything. What you’ll accomplish in college and most importantly what you’ll learn in college, about your field and about life, is going to be more important than anything in the long run. But you’ve got to do good enough to get to where you want to be to have that experience! I’m definitely not saying that high school doesn’t matter, far from it. I kind of wonder if when you get to college your dad might say, “LISTEN, THIS IS THE MOST IMPORTANT YEAR OF YOUR LIFE, WHETHER OR NOT YOU GET A GOOD INTERNSHIP MAKES YOU A SOMEBODY!” Because that attitude in college, I think, is much more warranted than in high school.</p>
<p>Your high school grades only matter for getting into college, and your college grades matter for getting a job and getting into grad schools. Yes, there are people that were successful without a college degree or didn’t do too well in college, but it’s not as likely. You decide what you want out of your life, and what’s the best way of getting there. </p>
<p>I barely remember high school, college was better. It’s not until I was on my own, have enough disposal income that I started to enjoy my life. I was able to because of my hard work in HS and college. I missed out on many parties in those years, but I know if I hadn’t put in the time when I was younger I wouldn’t have been able to pay for college. Hind sight, I am glad my parents kept me focused, even though it was painful at times.</p>
<p>I did a LOT better in college than DH - my GPA was a full point higher than his. Yet 5 years later, DH was already making twice as much money as I was, even though we were both in the same general field (financial services). DH is a very hard worker, and has a very friendly and cooperative personality. His boss wrote in one performance review, “DH is all that and a bag of chips.”</p>
<p>Among the wealthiest people we know, the main breadwinner went to: UMass, St Joe’s (Maine), BC (two families), and University of South Carolina. All over the map in terms of “prestige” but all have been quite financially successful.</p>
<p>The most important things you learn in hs and college that relate to success later in life are: time management, delayed gratification, focus, communications skills (especially being able to write clearly and effectively), and how to work with other people. I’m also a big believer in EC’s, especially being an officer in a club/fraternity/charitable group. Knowing how to run a meeting, delegate, follow-up, time-manage a project, get cooperation from other people - those things are what most people actually DO at work. </p>
<p>HS is a time for learning academics, and also a time for having fun, making friends, and pursuing your passion, whether its a sport, art, music, etc. Don’t throw away your teen years worrying about what an Ivy League Admissions officer will think of how you spend your free time.</p>
<p>In our house, I rarely even looked at report cards or grades. I could tell whether my kids were working hard, and whether they were learning something, without grades. Our-two college age kids are at Ivies. Our daughter, at college, still does not look at grades, and tries to help others “chill” a little on this subject. Grades should not be the goal: they are just one way to evaluate learning.</p>
<p>We value education, which is very different from obsessing about grades and scores.</p>
<p>I can’t believe the stress you are under, and it is all for the wrong reasons. Try to enjoy your last year of high school, work hard to learn and to follow your interests, and things will work out. Your parents may need counseling to help them ease up on you a little. You are not the problem here.</p>
<p>p.s. tell your parents to read “Punished by Rewards” by Alfie Kohn, for a start</p>
<p>Work for your personal best (even if that includes a B now and then); set and strive for your own goals; choose a field that makes you happy and the money will follow. Most importantly, know yourself, and follow your own path to success.</p>
<p>Only naive, well intentioned people new to this country and overwrought 17 yr olds think that success can only happen from HYPSM. The funny thing is – go to any nice suburb of any major city. The bulk of people living in the nicest areas are state school grads who did just fine for themselves. Half of the Ivy educated women I know are now home with kids. Opportunities are great but people also make their own life opportunities.</p>
I’m sure there are going to be people who say otherwise, but I promise, no one is ever going to ask you what you got in Chemistry when you apply for jobs. The friends I have who are <em>most</em> successful in life – one’s basically a millionaire, others are successful in their careers, happy, all that – were not A students in school, did not get great SAT scores, didn’t take AP courses, even. My single <em>most</em> financially successful high school friend attended took no AP’s, went to a pretty crappy community college for two years, and then got a dual degree at a big non-selective public university. He’s been a top executive at several multinational corporations and is now leaving at CTO-level position to go into consulting. He’s had exactly the sort of education that CCers say is “settling for fourth tier” and as a result, has had high paying work for pretty much all of his adult life. :-)</p>