<p>sorry for unlurking here, but Dad’o’2 you’ve certainly proven the old adage, “Still waters run deep.” I’m still laughing at your verse too. :D</p>
<p>“Their grades are not good enough to get into a conservatory or an elite”.
I’m confused…is this supposed to be a bad thing? Maybe it wasn’t meant to be a dig …but it sure feels like one. I thought we were talking about exposure to the arts - whether it was more or less at an elite vs. non-elite. Are the kids in the elites somehow better because they juggle activities and have good grades? Do I care when I’m listening to music coming out of a window?</p>
<p>sjmom2329–</p>
<p>Captain Underpants?<br>
Excellent reading.
Your S is president of a fraternity now, I assume?</p>
<p>Dad 0 2 - Of course I read those books, too. There are abbreviated versions of ancient philosophers. They are great adventures that kids love. I read the “real” ones when they were older.</p>
<p>Toneranger - No dig at all. Kids who were so passionate about their music that they did nothing else. Unfortuantely, you can’t get into Julliard usually, unless you also have good grades.
The kids I was mentioning had D’s because all they did was practice their instrument.</p>
<p>Actually on the piano thing,some kids who got into conservatory chose state schools because they did not want to be in a conservatory(maybe money too) and some want to major in other things. I thought places like UM music were pretty good but I could be mistaken.</p>
<p>As to my friend SJ you are right. He had won some national competitions and had looked at piano performance but decided on physics so he was just another well rounded kid. Of course that was a long time ago and I was easily impressed with some one who could perform Liszt etudes with ease and Imistakenly compared him to kids I know who got into places like Julliard, Shepherd and the like. Anyway the frat story got me thinking…</p>
<p>I spent time at U of O (Oregon) a few years back and liked going to the dining hall to listen to students (many music majors) who would just sit down and play there. Made me sit and stay and have a few more cups of coffee…unfortunately desserts too.
Given that Animal House was modeled after that school I think it would be risky to put a grand piano in the frat houses there. I have these Belushi images…</p>
<p>Well, Not all the music that one hears at top schools is of the highest quality. Say I after listening to an otherwise quite enjoyable concert at Harvard where the sophomore soloist was definitely not up to the demands of the piece he was singing. As for music coming out of windows, I have memories from grad school of someone massacring Chopin’s Polonaise. It ruined the Polonaise for me.</p>
<p>Dstark:Actually D has changed a lot since I sent hereoff to college after junior year in high school. Think she will make a good clinical developmental neuropsychologist? Go ahead say it three times fast and we give you two more free posts during the next ten minutes…or what is behind curtain number 3!</p>
<p>“I spent time at U of O (Oregon) a few years back and liked going to the dining hall to listen to students (many music majors) who would just sit down and play there”</p>
<p>U of O is among the finest music schools on the west coast, and, in music composition, there is no question that it is the finest. Yale and Harvard faculty compete for the opportunity to take their sabbaticals there.</p>
<p>marite: Oh no, that was one of S’s early favorites. Need to walk under a different window… perhaps the one where the Rubenstein recording is playing.</p>
<p>I can’t say it fast and I don’t know what a … does compared to somebody who is just called a psychologist.</p>
<p>What’s the difference?</p>
<p>mini: You mean it really was good music I heard?</p>
<p>Psychiatrist Dstark who has been to medical school. A psychologist has no M.D. They treat differently also.</p>
<p>mom365: Yeah, but when I saw the acceptance stats to the clinical schools-5 out of 300- I wished maybe she was going to medical school!</p>
<p>oldolddad - You should see the acceptance stats to med school - I think more competitive, no? And when they socialize medicine, what are these Docs going to earn?</p>
<p>Going off track here, but just for fun, I must point out that my MD H, turned high school bio teacher, would be more likely to go back to medicine if they socialized it.</p>
<p>garland, two of the most impassioned proponents of ‘socialized’ medicine that I know are in fact doctors.</p>
<p>You know, I continue to be very troubled by this thread. To put what I am about to say in context: for my own higher education, I have gone only to elites (at least I think most everyone would consider them elites ;)): Wellesley, Cal-Berkeley, Stanford. My S currently goes to an elite, but has also been at a top-tier non-elite U (with merit $). My H went to a second-tier state flagship but does have a graduate degree from an elite.</p>
<p>Here’s what I think we would probably all agree on: at the elite schools, you can be quite certain you will find a group of students combining extremely high aptitude and intelligence along with an extremely high record of achievement (be that academic, extra-curricular, athletic, music or other performance or some combination). This is what the schools seek and they have more than an adequate supply of customers, so this is what they get.</p>
<p>Here is what troubles me: the presumption, assumption or conclusion that you will be hard-pressed to find those traits at the next level of school in any reasonable proportion. That should you, or your child, choose this next level of school - for whatever reason - s/he is sacrificing the ability to mix with peers in any of these realms.</p>
<p>I think that is so very, very wrong. </p>
<p>We are not talking about open admission schools. We are talking about a level of school which offers merit $$ to students of “elite” caliber and, in so doing, attains a critical mass of such students within the student body. Perhaps not the majority of the student body, but still a critical mass.</p>
<p>Yet so many posters are speaking of these schools as if they are, indeed, open admission schools where lectures will have to be dumbed-down, students with intellectual curiosity will be fish out of water, musically talented kids would be outliers if found at all.</p>
<p>I realize not every poster has spoken in this vein. Not at all. But so many have that it troubles me greatly. I am thinking that posters are forgetting, or are unfamiliar with, the types of schools we are discussing here as the “top scholarship” schools - a Rhodes, a Tulane, a Brandeis, a state flagship honors program. I think the whole premise that one sacrifices academic quality and peer interaction at these schools is, well, it’s elitist.</p>
<p>Other things trouble me, too, about this thread:
*that being around your SAT-score equals or superiors can be enriching as can being around talented artists, musicians, writers, etc.;
*but the belief that 18-22 year olds have little (or nothing) to gain from interaction with their academic inferiors and may even be dragged down by them;
*the belief that 18-22 year olds are too young to benefit from what other populations might bring to the table - a larger group of kids coming from less advantaged life experiences; a larger group of kids whose “smarts” are not the academic kind but are “smarts” nonetheless;
*and, finally (maybe I shouldn’t even list this one because I am thinking (hoping) that it reflects maybe only one poster; but, oh, it has stuck with me), the view that those are super-achievers via innate gifts are more worthwhile to be around and better contributors to a vibrant intellectual life than those who have to work hard/study/think things over between classes in order to contribute.</p>
<p>Okay, I hope this has been coherent. At least it is off my chest. I have simultaneously found this thread to be one of the most interesting (absent the snarkiness) and troubling in a long time here on the Parent Forum.</p>
<p>mom365:Just looked up the stat. JHU,WUSTL,Stanford etc med schools about 2%. Actually a bit better than many Clinical Psych.</p>
<p>oldolddad- my son takes after me in many respects- even the wildness…:)</p>