George Will's "The Last Word" on College "Acceptance"

[divides_by_zero]

kc

well then you proved my point - finaid is great - but if you hadn't gotten it, would you still have gone to BU?

(Besides, I know BU is a good school, my ex is on scholarship there doing math research - but I still have to mock it because your mascot is a Terrier and you have no football team :-P )

I don't know if the students were really encouraged per se to 'dumb it down'. Perhaps by parents, but I don't think it was the system. But then, I know I experienced a lot of general skepticism about my own abilities (but I attribute that more to my being female than the school holding students back in general as the male students definitely received much more encouragement - that's another rant though).

But then, perhaps that is the key. A lot of overly praised and encouraged students do end up complacent. It's the ones who feel they have something to prove that end up striving for success.

[The Ocho]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Rick,

I dated a girl for a bit who went to Exeter. Those places are crazy.

[/ QUOTE ]

Oh yeah, my parents made me apply to Exeter and Andover but I didn't go. Thank the Lord.

[/ QUOTE ]

why are you glad you didnt go? hear some bad stories or just run across some crappy PEA/PA alums in college and beyond? im interested only because i had a pretty awesome experience at exeter and would recommend it to anybody fortunate enough to have the desire, talent, and means to attend.

[miajag]

[ QUOTE ]

I grew up in Southern Maryland (Calvert County for those in the area), which is extremely rural compared to the suburbia that is Montgomery County. My parents were/are both teachers, and stressed the importance of education to me growing up, so I did enough to get A's and make them happy. I graduated top of my HS class, had great SAT's, got in everywhere I applied, and ended up at Maryland on a full ride. When I got there, I was stunned at how much smarter some of the top Montgomery County kids were than me. And not in an aptitude sense; I could still pick new concepts up more quickly than just about any of them, but it was so obvious that the Montgomery County kids were like 100x better prepared for college than me.

[/ QUOTE ]

My story is pretty much exactly the same except I'm from Wicomico, which I'm guessing is fairly similar to Calvert in terms of ruralness (also my parents aren't teachers, but did stress education very highly). It was a big shock to see the difference between my high school (which I still wouldn't consider a "bad" school; I did have a good # of AP credits) and some of the big Western Shore high schools.

What year did you graduate from Maryland, UMTerp?

[UMTerp]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]

I grew up in Southern Maryland (Calvert County for those in the area), which is extremely rural compared to the suburbia that is Montgomery County. My parents were/are both teachers, and stressed the importance of education to me growing up, so I did enough to get A's and make them happy. I graduated top of my HS class, had great SAT's, got in everywhere I applied, and ended up at Maryland on a full ride. When I got there, I was stunned at how much smarter some of the top Montgomery County kids were than me. And not in an aptitude sense; I could still pick new concepts up more quickly than just about any of them, but it was so obvious that the Montgomery County kids were like 100x better prepared for college than me.

[/ QUOTE ]

My story is pretty much exactly the same except I'm from Wicomico, which I'm guessing is fairly similar to Calvert in terms of ruralness (also my parents aren't teachers, but did stress education very highly). It was a big shock to see the difference between my high school (which I still wouldn't consider a "bad" school; I did have a good # of AP credits) and some of the big Western Shore high schools.

What year did you graduate from Maryland, UMTerp?

[/ QUOTE ]

Civil Engineering, 1999.

[guids]

I went to a fairly expensive private school, it was nothing like that here, they taught us more comradere, how to be decent people, and how to learn rather, than how to cater to the SAT and admissions douche bags, and a lot of our alumni went ivy league. But there were no chicks either, I think that has a lot to do with it.

[Smarty]

I thought this type of thing was standard at most schools. It might just depend on where you grew up and the friends you had in high school. I constantly discussed these issues with friends and guidance counselors at lunch during HS.

Despite putting up fronts about how little people care about grades/scores at colleges, the competition is just as bad, if not worse. Everyone knows where everyone else is working for their summer internship or full-time. For example, I have had random acquaintences walk up to me and congratulate me on receiving offers from certain elite firms. I guess when you are embroiled in this environment you don't realize how atypical it is.

[The Ocho]

[ QUOTE ]
I went to a fairly expensive private school, it was nothing like that here, they taught us more comradere, how to be decent people, and how to learn rather, than how to cater to the SAT and admissions douche bags, and a lot of our alumni went ivy league. But there were no chicks either, I think that has a lot to do with it.

[/ QUOTE ]

most people were great at my school. lots of comraderie, goodwill, and support while still being highly motivated and competitive young people.

there were a few obsessive psychos who accounted for 90% of the drama. of those few, i recall that most were girls.

[guids]

Thats what I figured really, I also went to a private co-ed grade school, adn there was a lot of the things in the OP, but to a lesser, and more inane degree, and it was all caused by the girls/mothers.

[NickMPK]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]

I also grew up in Montgomery County (and still live there), and went to the somewhat well-known math/science magnet program.

[/ QUOTE ]

Blair?

I grew up in Southern Maryland (Calvert County for those in the area), which is extremely rural compared to the suburbia that is Montgomery County. My parents were/are both teachers, and stressed the importance of education to me growing up, so I did enough to get A's and make them happy. I graduated top of my HS class, had great SAT's, got in everywhere I applied, and ended up at Maryland on a full ride. When I got there, I was stunned at how much smarter some of the top Montgomery County kids were than me. And not in an aptitude sense; I could still pick new concepts up more quickly than just about any of them, but it was so obvious that the Montgomery County kids were like 100x better prepared for college than me. And through no fault of my own - I learned what I was taught. These kids knew 2 years of physics before they got to college, they all came in with 20-30 AP credits, etc. I was actually a bit jealous of the opportunities they had that I didn't. Why did I deserve to be so far behind the curve? That's probably a result of all the competition they had among each other in high school.

I could only imagine how far behind I'd have been if I wasn't near the top of my high school class, or if I grew up in an area with really inferior high schools.

Of course when I got to college, I liked my new-found freedom too much and drank every night and rarely went to class. Made it through OK though.

And I live in Montgomery County now too.

[/ QUOTE ]

Yes, I went to Blair.

And I had a number of friends who also went to UMD despite being accepted at Ivy league schools b/c they got Banneker-Key scholarships.

The Blair Magnet might be the best math/science/computer high school program in the country. You could very easily graduate from there with three full years of calculus courses, and a full of year physics beyond the AP level class (including courses in quantum physics, thermodynamics, optics, etc.) Everyone also took the advanced computer programming AP exams as sophmores.

But I really didn't get the impression that most students took these course because the wanted to get into the best colleges, but because they were genuinely interested in the material. Many of the students who took the most advanced Magnet courses also didn't really have the sort of "balanced" resumes that Ivy League schools like.

I, on the other hand, was thoroughly fed up with science by my sophomore year and went into political theory, at an Ivy no less. And I never took a math or science class that wasn't a core requirement.

[turnipmonster]

[ QUOTE ]
Something is wrong with your education system if the brightest kids you're churning out are settling for a small state school.

[/ QUOTE ]

agreed, although my high school wasn't really that small (around 2k kids), and like mass, the state universities in nc are decent and very cheap. it's relatively rare for nc residents to go to someplace like duke for this reason. one of my best friends went to ncsu, and then went on to stanford for his phd. he was probably the smartest dude in my graduating class.