<p>“I do not accept that a middle schooler has no business dreaming of an elite university.”</p>
<p>The recent discussions have prompted me to think about exactly how kids get the notion that they want to attend an “elite” school at either the high school or the college level. </p>
<p>I’d guess that for a few, it does come from within. For the rest, I think it comes from peers, parents, and educators. As I noted in another thread, in our neck of the woods, some clusters of kids are talking about what boarding schools they’ll go for high school as early as 6th grade. It’s because their parents did or maybe an older sibling or other relative did. Then kids who don’t have that tradition in their families start to think maybe I should look into that…and the parents without BS experience do likewise after talking to parents with BS experience. At least that’s how I think it might work.</p>
<p>But I personally think it is a very rare middle schooler who is thinking about college, elite or otherwise. My older daughter is in 10th grade, but couldn’t tell you the difference between U Penn and Penn State beyond the fact that her dad went to one for college and her uncle went to the other one for medical school.</p>
<p>Truth be told, I kind of like that about her and see no reason to push her in either direction based on “prestige”. If anything, I’d steer her away from PSU, but only because I’m not a fan of its status as a party school.</p>
<p>If there ARE 13 year olds who “dream of going to Harvard” absent any outside forces (parents, peers, educators), I have yet to meet one.</p>
<p>I am personally uncomfortable with planting the seed of attending an super selective college. That seems to me to be a recipe for disappointment and resentment. I know that I certainly won’t be going that route, Penn sheepskin notwithstanding. While I know that I did as much for her BS path, for college that seems like a bridge too far…at least for me.</p>