Advice for son who does not care about grades

Parents Forum
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<p>One poster mentioned it above, but I would re-iterate the value of a part-time job. My son did a 180 on grades after making relationships with others much less fortunate than him. (Less fortunate by being born in Central America/Mexico, less fortunate in terms of academic ability, less fortunate in terms of educational opportunities, less fortunate in terms of parental support.) After about 3-4 months on the job, he connected the dots between goals in the future and sacrifices now to reach those goals. </p>

<p>Good luck. I worried a lot over the last 2 years, and while he is not going to tippy-top college, we are very happy with the results of college admission process. YMMV</p>

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<p>D. has witnessed good number of valedictorians from private HS changing their professional goals after first semester of college at state school. They were lacking in efforts, valedictorian status was not enough to fly at college level. However, if it is understood, that attitude will need to be adjusted, it might work. My S’s grades improved in college, because he actually realized that work needs to be done, it needs to be done very well and on time if the goal is surviving in very competitive environment (also at state school), even when talent is absolute must (graphic design).</p>

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<p>'It is tough for me to sit back and allow him to “learn his lesson” when he has so much potential."</p>

<p>But he will still have that potential if he doesn’t go to MIT – and even if he doesn’t go to any college right after high school. It’s not going to go away. Taking the long view, whether he starts college at 18 or 21, and whether it’s MIT or Purdue, isn’t going to be a major factor in the course of his adult life. It’s the choices he makes, and how hard he works, DURING college that will matter.</p>

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<p>

</p>

<p>There are several distinct issues that could be addressed

  1. Should his dream be to attend MIT?
  2. Should he care more about his grades?
  3. Are there opportunities for him to be exactly the way he wants to be and still be successful? </p>

<ol>
<li>MIT is very competitive. Only so many people get in. Many highly qualified people do not. MIT will even tell you (at least the EECS department does) to have alternate plans. They reject many people who they would like to admit. I remember that someone in one of their admissions blogs said that most people who are admitted score above a 700 on the CR part of the SAT. It would seem that one needs to do well in English and social studies too. </li>
</ol>

<p>He should plan on applying, but don’t fall in love. Make other plans. </p>

<ol>
<li>Should he care more about his grades?</li>
</ol>

<p>Perhaps, but if he’s is doing the best that he can, or if it would detract from what he really loves doing - the math- then I’m not sure. It’s really hard to be that good at the math - few people are. He certainly shouldn’t participate in any academic dishonesty and given what he told you, I’d be careful not to send a signal that he might mistake for an encouragement to cheat. </p>

<ol>
<li>There are many great alternatives to MIT that would be happy thrilled to have an unbalanced superstar. For one thing, Oxford or Cambridge in the UK would only care about his math prowess for their programs. I think that Waterloo (has a serious competitive math culture), Toronto, and McGill in Canada would take him just the way he is. In the US, there are a lot of great schools where he will surely get in and do just fine. </li>
</ol>

<p>Tell him that you are very proud of what he has accomplished. I really think that the best approach is to make sure he understands what it takes to get into MIT, and that he’s a long shot with his current grades. In a positive way, let him know what realistic opportunities are if he doesn’t improve his English and SS grades, and that they are not that bad. Make sure that he understands that you are supportive of the person he wants to be. Ask him how you can help?</p>

<p>Then let him become who he wants to be. You can lead a horse to water…</p>

<p>He may not get into MIT, but he can become a superstar math guy anyway.</p>

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<p>My two cents:</p>

<ul>
<li><p>I wouldn’t encourage my D or S to put all their eggs into one basket (one particular college). Nothing is a sure thing, especially MIT. (My D has three top choices among the 9 she applied to; got deferred at one of the three; now has two top choices to hear from).</p></li>
<li><p>My D doesn’t have MIT-like scores, but I was in the same boat as you when she was a sophomore in terms of trying to convince her to study, study, stury. I didn’t want to be the only telling her that grades matter. Started taking her to college admissions talks so she could hear from someone other than me that grades DO matter. What do I know anyway? </p></li>
<li><p>Kept telling her that she wanted to have CHOICES about where to go. Not just go to the school that would take her. That didn’t really have an impact at the first several schools we visited because they didn’t knock her socks off. Finally, when we hit one that she loved, she looked at me and said, " Mom, can I get in here?" All of a sudden her grades mattered.</p></li>
<li><p>When it came to studying for SATs, I would only contribute so much to prep classes. Told her she needed to self study more. Reminded her that I already went to a great college. So she got what she got. (And, I’m quite sure that if her SAT was 100-150 pts higher, she would have definitely got into that top school that deferred her. Oh well.) </p></li>
</ul>

<p>I should add that I know that all-around she is a great kid, conscientious, etc., so wherever she goes will be fine - have a good time and do well. If you work hard and get everything out of college, you can be successful. Doesn’t have to be HYPS.</p>

<p>We still have a great relationship and I only nag her about applying for scholarships now…</p>

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<p>My son was seriously unmotivated by grades. No interest in doing homework. Not a compliant student, which is what it takes to get As in the modern high school, where “get ahead by hard work” is the current educational paradigm.</p>

<p>His grades in math and science were consistent As and he did well at state and national competitions in science and math. His FIRST Robotics team, which he founded, won regionals their first time out; he received a special judges award for his work. His SAT scores were excellent. His grades in non-science/math subjects were Bs and an occasional C. He never scored higher than 83% in French.</p>

<p>He was admitted to MIT at the end of his junior year in high school; he was waitlisted by CalTech. He graduated from MIT after 7 semesters and started his own company six months after graduation.</p>

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<p>“I am glad to hear that so many bright but unmotivated students have fared so well. It is tough for me to sit back and allow him to “learn his lesson” when he has so much potential. Is that my only recourse? How sad.”</p>

<p>Let’s put things into perspective. There’s nothing dreadful about going to a second tier college. It’s not as if your S is flunking out of high school or appears to be headed for a criminal life.</p>

<p>I’d rather have my kids learn lessons about life by not getting into their dream schools due to their own lack of hardwork than to be people like Madoff who are learning some very tough lessons at a much older age.</p>

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<p>The MIT dream does not have to end with undergrad. There is always grad school at MIT.</p>

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<p>Ok…I have the same issue and S is a senior now and we nagged/helped organize/positive reinforcement/nagged some more…some issues were organizational but most came down to not doing what was perceived as busy work (ie homework, weekly updates, etc.). AND god forbid he be seen like a grade-grubbing brown-nosing only cares about grades student!..</p>

<p>Nagging and reminding him to do the small stuff kept him generally in the B region in English and social studies. I am convinced if we had just left him alone he may have become a C or even D student. Nagging did not transform him but it did keep him from totally killing chances at good merit aid at good school (thank you Ohio State!). However, he knows he blew his chance to go to top 20 (probably) by having as many Bs as As even if he shows amazing talent in his specialized areas…His attitude closed some doors but my nagging kept some of them open for him. He got a life lesson in how his lack of effort killed some choices but he is not discouraged and knows that he still has some good options. Positive outcome from nagging!</p>

<p>I am sorry, but I think it is wrong not to use my years of hard earned wisdom to tell my son what to do and not to do because he can’t judge the consequences of his actions as well as I can. I won’t eschew nagging because it may “harm our relationship”…that is our relationship–parent and child–not best buddies–based on a strong foundation of love plus nagging/lecture/quiet advice/setting good example/etc! </p>

<p>Did you nag your child to brush their teeth and wear retainers? absolutely…they have no concept what poor oral hygeine means in terms of future pain and financial cost . Is my relationship ruined because I nagged them about this? I don’t think so. </p>

<p>Never would I impose draconian measures on a kid to make As but I will nag to remind him to do homework, organize his desk, keep a calendar, etc. and also point out how a some of his lazy-Bs and even a C limited his access to some merit aid, some top colleges and some honors programs. Do I think he “gets” the concept about hard work being necessary for success–yes but his frontal lobe is still in the unconnected phase and intellectual knowledge and action are only just now beginning to coordinate.</p>

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<p>"I am sorry, but I think it is wrong not to use my years of hard earned wisdom to tell my son what to do and not to do because he can’t judge the consequences of his actions as well as I can. I won’t eschew nagging because it may “harm our relationship”…that is our relationship–parent and child–not best buddies–based on a strong foundation of love plus nagging/lecture/quiet advice/setting good example/etc! "</p>

<p>What I found with my sons was that once they got to a certain age, nagging didn’t help. They still continued to be disorganized and to not put full effort into their schoolwork. What did make a difference was when I stopped and-- for instance-- younger son didn’t get around to applying to college, and then didn’t get around to doing lots of his senior year high school assignments</p>

<p>As a result, the last week of high school when his peers were having fun times doing things like camping out on the school lawn, he was cranking out late science lab reports and English assignments and hoping that his teachers would accept them so he would be able to graduate.</p>

<p>When his peers were graduating with a variety of academic honors and heading to top colleges, S was graduating – thankfully-- but he expressed disappointment in himself that he wasn’t graduating with honors. When his peers were headed off to college, S was headed to Americorps, a year that he got a great deal out of, but still I think he wished that he had gotten his act together to have been going to college instead.</p>

<p>Result: He goes far out of his way to be organized in college, and he greatly appreciates the academic and extracurricular options (including guest lectures, concerts, community service, clubs) that college offers.</p>

<p>. Despite working 14 hours a week, having a full schedule of courses including one that requires an 80-100 page paper to be written this semester, and spending hours evenings and weekends doing theater tech, he has managed to stay on dean’s list throughout his 3 years in college. </p>

<p>Telling him what would happen if he didn’t work to his potential didn’t get him to do that. It may work for some young people, but didn’t work for him. All nagging did was cause him to either become angry at me (instead of being annoyed at his own laziness) or it caused him to tune me out. Letting him feel the consequences of his actions seems to be what motivated him to work to his potential.</p>

<p>It would be great if our kids learned from our wisdom, but often they aren’t able to do that: They need to earn that kind of wisdom the hard way. Sometimes nagging them just delays their learning important lessons.</p>

<p>" I will nag to remind him to do homework, organize his desk, keep a calendar, etc. and also point out how a some of his lazy-Bs and even a C limited his access to some merit aid, some top colleges and some honors programs."</p>

<p>I’ve noticed that S is able to figure out on his own how his under performance limited his options. I bite my tongue so I don’t say, “I told you so.” I just hold him responsible for his own behavior. S knows full well that he wouldn’t have to work during the school year and summers and take out loans to help pay for college if his high school grades had been as high as his scores were. He would then have qualified for a full ride plus a laptop like his roommate got.</p>

<p>H and I always told our sons that we expected them to get the grades to be able to earn some merit aid. They are very bright guys and we were supportive parents in that we exposed them to a variety of enrichment activities. They knew that H and I wouldn’t go way into debt to send them to their dream schools unless they had worked hard to get the grades and scholarships to help attain those dreams.</p>

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<p>His weighted GPA is probably not that bad because he took 4 AP classes and got As in them. He is getting Bs in his non math/science classes. I don’t mean to be melodramatic when I say that Bs are “bad”. I am just comparing the GPAs of those accepted to MIT from his high school.</p>

<p>I know that there are many great schools out there so please forgive me if it seems that I am obsessing about MIT. There are clear reasons why he wants to go there. Foremost, he has made many friends in his circle of mathletes who aspire to go to MIT and will most likely matriculate. He does not make friends easily so I am very thankful for this group of teens. It warms me to think that he could be around kids who appreciate his talents and that he could be doing math to his heart’s content. </p>

<p>I do not think that I would have a problem with him getting Bs and Cs in required humanities classes in college. Is that wrong? I know where his strengths/interests lie and it is difficult to argue his points sometime. Clearly he can read and write (CR 67, WR 73 on PSATs) and he can’t understand how memorizing historical facts will be useful to him. </p>

<p>As I mentioned before, he is not lazy. He is quite motivated to learn and study his math. You would be hard pressed to find any person who is competing at the olympiad level to be lazy or unmotivated.</p>

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<p>I don’t know that much about any of this, but it seems to me like it is unlikely all the nagging and cajoling is going to work if it hasn’t up to this point. As long as he keeps going to SS and Eng classes his SAT scores will probably improve. It seems he is already pretty focused intellectually and socially in the math world. Bs are not horrible grades, particularly if you are one of the top 10 math students in the country. I would assume if he managed to make the traveling team for the IMO, took some advanced math classes at a university and kept reasonable grades in other weighted courses (esp science) he’d have as good a chance as anybody. But he should always have some alternatives.</p>

<p>And there is no guarantee his entire cadre of friends is gong to make it in either, btw.</p>

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<p>fineartsmajormom, I assume you mean that your son is a high school senior? Please post again in a year, and then in 4 years… so we know how it all works out once your kid is living away from you and navigating college on his own.</p>

<p>I wish you and your son the best and certainly hopes that he matures and is able to manage all the deadlines and requirements on his own once he gets to college. But as a parent of a kid who stumbled in college, I know that smart but disorganized or poorly motivated kids sometimes don’t have the self discipline to hold things together when they are on their own in college, without the backup of the parental nagging. Some of those kids shape up and do well… others don’t. </p>

<p>Sometimes its better to learn some of life’s lessons early on. So I’m not saying that you have been wrong to nag – just premature about predicting long term outcomes. </p>

<p>As for the OP… MIT is merely the name of a school that sounds good right now. There are MANY, many options for a kid who has a lopsided focus on math but doesn’t want to jump through hoops at high school, and very possibly a scholarship and open arms waiting at the type of colleges that would love to have more students like him. And the opportunities for him might be greater at a school where he stands out a little more, especially in areas that leads to internships and jobs. </p>

<p>Here’s my advice to bogibogi, which involves a little bit of reverse psychology, but also will help to soothe parental anxieties. Do some research into schools that might be your son’s matches and safeties, given his expected profile. Depending on where you live, you might look at your in-state public options as well. Then talk up those schools. I’m thinking of conversations that begin along the lines of touting the benefits of the Colorado School of Mines or RIT or Georgia Tech or or Purdue. Colleges of varying levels of selectivity – but not at the MIT mega-selective level – that are known to be strong in math and engineering, but not might be on your son’s current radar. </p>

<p>Also look at colleges not traditionally recognized for math/engineering, but may be trying to strengthen those departments and look favorably on applicants with particular strengths in those areas. Many LACs, especially those with a strong gender imbalance towards women, might fit that bill – those places might also be the type of school particularly likely to offer attractive merit aid toward a kid like your son. </p>

<p>Looking at those schools will help YOU (the parent) get a more realistic sense of what your son’s options will be, and may help you relax – and you may even discover programs that will leave you wondering why you ever thought MIT was such a perfect fit. Talking about those schools may get your son thinking more realistically – or it could get your son asking why you’ve dropped the MIT talk. So, instead of feeling pressure to improve his grades or to keep MIT in his sights from you – he may start to get a better sense of reality. If it seems that you are giving up on MIT because of his grades, then he may be motivated to do better – and if not, you will certainly have developed a good range of alternate options.</p>

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<p>"I know that there are many great schools out there so please forgive me if it seems that I am obsessing about MIT. There are clear reasons why he wants to go there. Foremost, he has made many friends in his circle of mathletes who aspire to go to MIT and will most likely matriculate. He does not make friends easily so I am very thankful for this group of teens. It warms me to think that he could be around kids who appreciate his talents and that he could be doing math to his heart’s content. </p>

<p>I do not think that I would have a problem with him getting Bs and Cs in required humanities classes in college. Is that wrong? I know where his strengths/interests lie and it is difficult to argue his points sometime. Clearly he can read and write (CR 67, WR 73 on PSATs) and he can’t understand how memorizing historical facts will be useful to him. </p>

<p>“As I mentioned before, he is not lazy. He is quite motivated to learn and study his math. You would be hard pressed to find any person who is competing at the olympiad level to be lazy or unmotivated.”</p>

<p>Top colleges, however, are able to select students who are willing to work hard in subjects even though those subjects aren’t the students’ main interests. Someone, too, who only studies the classes that interest them may end up flunking out of college.</p>

<p>Older S was very motivated in subjects that interested him, and he handled his academically-related EC with the kind of work ethic top professionals have. However, he flunked out of college freshman year because he cared only about his EC (which he won a regional award in), not about classes. </p>

<p>He can do math to his heart’s content at many schools.</p>

<p>Many of his mathie peers who want to go to MIT won’t end up going there. The competiton is stiff even for students very talented in math.</p>

<p>As for what you consider acceptable grades in humanities, etc., he’ll be an adult then, so your thoughts on his grades probably won’t matter anyway. </p>

<p>He just needs to be aware that when it come to admission, MIT cares about more than math grades. MIT probably may not be interested in accepting for admission students who only plan to work hard in math classes. MIT has excellent humanities and other courses and also attracts applicants who are strong in math and in humanities and social sciences.</p>

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<p>

The best thing would be for him to find out how those mathletes are doing in non-math/science classes. Those I know did very well (Some IMO gold medalists went on to combine math and humanities studies). They are the ones who are in the best position to motivate him to try harder in those areas he is not particularly interested in.
History is not just one d…n thing after another. Analytical skills are very important, more so than memorizing facts that can always be looked up. Good writing involves clear, well- stated arguments arranged in logical fashion and supported by evidence. Some of the skills needed to excel in math can be transferred to the social sciences and humanities!</p>

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<p>There is no one right answer. People can tell you nagging doesn’t work. That’s perfectly true of some kids. But, believe it or not, there ARE kids for whom nagging does work. Whether you should nag your kid depends upon your kid, the relationship you have with your kid, and your own and the other parent’s values and personalities. </p>

<p>I vehemently disagree with the posts that suggest that it is possible to KNOW the outcome of your choice to nag or not to nag in advance. Not every smart kid who blows a chance to go to a CalTech or MIT by coasting through high school suddenly has a light bulb come on which causes him/her to graduate at the top of the class at a less prestigious college and go on to graduate school at MIT or to some other highly successful endeavor. </p>

<p>Not every bright kid who does this will say “I brought this on myself. I’ll do the boring work in the future so I can get where I want to get.” Believe it or not, there are kids who will say “I blame my parents. They just let me do what I wanted. I wished they’d been stricter. When I have kids, I’m going to make them work. I’m not going to let them limit their options before they understand what they are doing.” </p>

<p>I nagged. Did it work well? No, definitely not. Did it work at all? Yes, I think so. Oh, the grades certainly COULD have been a lot better, but they could also have been a LOT worse. I think they would have been a lot worse if I hadn’t nagged at all. </p>

<p>Mark Twain said something like “When I was 17, my father was a fool. It’s amazing how much he learned by the time I was 21.” </p>

<p>I don’t think you should worry that much about your relationship with your son. Nagging–at least reasonable nagging–is unlikely to destroy it. If you nag, he’ll probably understand why you did within a few years anyway. Even if it didn’t work, even if he thinks it was stupid for you to do it, it’s still probable that he’ll understand you did it out of love.</p>

<p>Bottom line: Go with your gut. You know him better than we do.</p>

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<p>I wouldn’t go to MIT just because I knew other people going there. It is just not a good reason. A good reason to go to MIT might be that this resonates with your son:</p>

<p>[MIT</a> Admissions: The Match Between You And MIT](<a href=“http://www.mitadmissions.org/topics/pulse/the_match_between_you_and_mit/]MIT”>http://www.mitadmissions.org/topics/pulse/the_match_between_you_and_mit/)</p>

<p>Or that he watches the OpenCourseWare videos and says, “MamaMia! These are my people,” or that he browses the MIT course catalog in a dreamy reverie.</p>

<p>The way to start thinking about college is to find a safety that you love. Fortunately there are a lot of colleges where he can learn math with brilliant people to his heart’s content. I can’t even begin to name all the good possibilities.</p>

<p>Now to address your grades problem: there is almost nothing you can do. He is getting to an age where, really, he is autonomous. You can’t push a string. I hear in your posts that you are not sure you can trust him. You are not sure if he can do it without you pushing him, you are not sure he can make new friends other than his MIT oriented group. You have to learn to believe in your son. </p>

<p>That said, there were a few things that helped us motivate our son. The first was to couch things in terms of his goal (someday owning a tech company). We pointed out that clients would someday ask him to do nitpicky things (just like teachers do). Would he do what the client asked on small points to keep a big project? This seemed to help him understand why he should do the “dumb” stuff. The second was to enroll him in upper-division college math classes in high school. Somehow truly being challenged in a class made him realize school could be different. In the hard classes he <em>wanted</em> the A+.</p>

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<p>“I vehemently disagree with the posts that suggest that it is possible to KNOW the outcome of your choice to nag or not to nag in advance. Not every smart kid who blows a chance to go to a CalTech or MIT by coasting through high school suddenly has a light bulb come on which causes him/her to graduate at the top of the class at a less prestigious college and go on to graduate school at MIT or to some other highly successful endeavor.”</p>

<p>If I could do things over, I would have stopped nagging older S when he was a high school junior, and then would have let the chips fall where they did. That probably would have meant that he wouldn’t have been organized enough to apply to college, but that would have been a good thing because --as ended up being the case with his younger brother – older S probably would have spent a gap year living at home and working, and that may have allowed him to mature enough to have been able to handle college well instead of flunking out.</p>

<p>I know that nagging them didn’t work for my sons. Maybe, though, nagging has helped other students. People do vary a great deal in terms of what motivates them.</p>

<p>Are there any parents here who have success stories about nagging?</p>

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<p>Another option is for you and your son to look together at websites of schools that would be of interest to him: MIT, Caltech, but also Chicago, Princeton, Harvard, Harvey Mudd and a few other schools known for their excellent math programs and check the gen ed requirements. That might motivate him to put more effort into courses other than math, unless he prefers going to Cambridge University and focus entirely on math.</p>

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<p>“I wouldn’t go to MIT just because I knew other people going there. It is just not a good reason.”</p>

<p>Of course that is not the only reason. He has been to campus a couple times to compete at the Harvard/MIT competition and declared it to be his dream choice. </p>

<p>I will be sure to share this thread with my son so that he can see some of your brutally honest comments. Maybe that is the kick in the pants that he needs to care more about his grades.</p>