Are students caught in the race to get ahead? (article)

Parents Forum
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<p>Marite, you and I are in agreement that the counselor in the article seemed only to want to work with sure bets. Julie wasn't a sure bet at Stanford (who truly is??) and so she only wanted her clients to have positive outcomes and not take a chance on anyone applying who was "reaching". She'd take this girl on if she applied to schools like GW only (which is a good school, of course....just talking selectivity now). Then, she'd be assured to be able to claim that her client got into her top choice school, yadda yadda. I certainly think a counselor should be honest and realistic and tell a student the odds. I don't think in this case, the student should have been told she would NOT get in and to not waste applying. Evaluating her chances and calling Stanford a reach is about right. It wasn't a FAR reach, from the info. we know. And of course, telling her she had a very good chance would be quite misleading too.</p>

<p>Yes, selective schools do not want to take lots and lots of kids from any one particular HS and so in that respect, students are competing, so to speak, with others from their HS applying to the same college. The Columbia adcom was honest in that a school like that does not want 50 kids from one HS. But they don't necessarily have quotas. They will take more than ONE. From the vignette in the article, it sounded like three were applying from a top notch high school to Stanford. Conceivably, I can see more than one being admitted. Further, as Marite mentions, just because the other two may have higher SAT scores than Julie had, it COULD turn out that Julie MAY be the more attractive candidate overall or fit a slot in the class better, whatever. If I recall, one year, two kids from our unknown small rural public HS got into Stanford. My D goes to Brown. Her roomie at Brown went to a top prep/private day school. She had 80 students in her senior class. She said SIX got in ED alone to Brown. Then there is our HS, lol, only one kid went to any Ivy school total in my D's class. So, with a HS like Whitman, I think a highly selective college is willing to take more than one kid, just not fifty, even if fifty are strong candidates from that school.</p>

<p>I'd be cautious with a kid, or most any kid, like Julie too when assessing her chances at Stanford. But the article came across as if being a straight A student with a difficult courseload, strong SATs (though not highest), with strong ECs stands no chance and while I know it is a jungle out there, lol, I still believe that the Julie's of the world are the type that should continue to apply, as long as they have balanced lists and not all reaches like Stanford. If she were ranked in the 25%tile, with SATs of 1250 and a GPA of 3.6, not the most rigorous courseload, with weak ECs, then I would say far far reach...perhaps not such a great school to put on the list. But Julie is not so different than my kid and I sure am glad nobody told my kid "forgettaboutit." She had a very balanced list but several were top top schools and she made out just fine.</p>

<p>True there are some kids who walk on water, but not every kid who goes to schools the likes of Stanford are so outrageously extraordinary and unique, but simply very attractive candidates with very strong credentials, like Julie. She may not get in but she stood a chance.</p>

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<p>I first picked this book up during a lunch break from work at the local bookstore. Within minutes, I was absolutely hooked. For four days, as soon as my lunch hour began, I would beeline it to the bookstore and recover a copy of "The Overachievers". Like with all great books, I was dissapointed when the ride finally ended.</p>

<p>I posted a thread in the High School Life forum (a search of "Overachievers" titles only will yield the thread) about the book last week. As a rising senior, I could completely relate to the many juniors/seniors and one college freshman chronicled in the book. The intertwining stories of these kids is part OC (the TV show), part New York Times Education Life, and part CC. It makes for a very entertaining read. </p>

<p>In between the different stories of the teens are various articles written by Robbins, and eerily all the articles sounded exactly like CC-Parents threads! There were articles on the intensity of youth sports (Summer varsity athletics thread), the rankings craze, the CollegeBoard hype, the early admissions game, and too many others to mention. </p>

<p>As I continued to read, I could not help but think of CC with every turn of the page. In fact, if there is one book that could sum up an internet forum in a nutshell, it is "The Overachievers" for CC. There is an ending revelation that will shock you (what is the true identity of "The Stealth Overachiever"?), and the rest of the book is juicy enough to kill many hours on the beach. In the closing chapter, Robbins also introduces some of her own solutions to ending the super-achieving craze, including some that we have heard here on CC: doing away with class rank, de-emphasize the SAT, limit AP classes (this one is new), start school at a later hour, and many more. </p>

<p>I loved this book, as it is an anthem and a cry for change for both overachievers and regular students. </p>

<p>I'm sorry if this post sounds too book reviewish, but it's just that fantastic.</p>

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<p>Thanks for posting, Sheldon. As I wrote last Saturday on another thread, this book sounds like a companion piece to Jacques Steinberg's The Gatekeepers. I bought it because it focused on my S's own class rather than for the how-to aspects of admissions. Even though my own kids are done, I probably will read this one, too.</p>

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<p>sheldon: i can;t help but ask, even though it makes me feel like a soap opera junkie. WHAT HAPPENED TO JULIE IN THE END??! :P</p>

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<p>Man, I guess this means University of Maryland for me. If Julie can't even apply to Stanford, well then I don't got a hell of a shot anywhere.</p>

<p>O yea and that guy who got a 1600 sounds like a douchebag, at least to me. I hate people who brag about how little they study.</p>

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<p>
[quote]
When my daughter and I attended an information session at Columbia, someone specifically asked the admissions officer whether there was a limit on the number of students that a selective school like Columbia would take from a single high school. The admissions officer said, "Well, there's no official limit, but we're certainly not going to take 50 people from Stuyvesant, if that's what you mean."

[/quote]
</p>

<p>I've really been enjoying this thread. I just wanted to chime in that Columbia accepted 46 members of the Stuyvesant High School class of 2005. (I don't know how the class of 2006 fared yet.) So I guess the admissions officer wasn't lying!</p>

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<p>macnyc:</p>

<p>46 vs. 50. No, he clearly was not lying! LOL!</p>

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<p>marite: Your Son might even know "AP Frank", a Harvard freshman chronicled in the story (nicknamed because he took 17 AP tests; will be a harvard junior in the fall I think)</p>

<p>jimbob: I PM'd you, in case others want to read without knowing.</p>

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<p>Sheldon:</p>

<p>LOL! Students don't go about talking about how many APs they've taken! I don't think S knows how many APs his close friends took, or what grades they got in their college classes.</p>

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<p>Ahh haha of course, but if he knows a Frank who lives in Mass Hall...chances are it is this Frank. </p>

<p>Your son might also find aspects of the book interesting, as a lot of Frank's story chronicles his freshman year life at Harvard.</p>

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<p>Also, on a side note I picked up the book at the Harvard Coop, and even with the mad rush of visiting seniors that seem to rove around the Square and Harvard Campus in packs, I did not see anyone else in the store reading it! It seemed like they were more interested in "Fifty Essays That Worked" and "Fifty Harvard Applicants", featured so prominently on many of the store's shelves :).</p>

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<p>Sheldon:</p>

<p>I strongly suspect that I will be the only one in the family who will be reading that book as I was the only one reading the Gatekeepers, even though the featured adcom was the person who handled S1's admission! I still have the book, and it still has not been read by anyone else. </p>

<p>If Frank is a rising junior, he would not have been living in Mass Hall last year, as only freshmen are housed in the Yard.</p>

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<p>My own take on all of this was not necessarily that the counselor wanted to work only with sure bets, but that the counselor wanted to work with only sure bets, <strong>if she was going to be shadowed by a reporter!!</strong> In other words it was not merely the fact that "Julie" (I assume Julie and Vera are made up names) wanted to apply to Stanford and the private counselor quit because of it. What I get from this story, and the author herself does take pains to point it out, is that the relationship between the girl and the counselor fell apart because of the fact that Julie's parents were dragging a REPORTER along to these meetings. The counselor, "Vera" , made her hesitations on this count very clear, and while she would have appreciated any good publicity and the chance to talk about her work in general (ie to be interviewed) she was understandably uncomfortable and savvy enough to know the slant a book like this was going to take, especially recognizing that it would be pretty easy for people in the DC area to figure out who she is. What private consultant is going to be comfortable in a situation like that? I also think that any parent who is genuinely concerned about their own child's best interests has rocks in their head to cart a reporter of all things around to these meetings. Introducing the reporter into the mix was bound to change everything. Certainly, a private counselor is entitled to take on (or not) any individual she wants under these rather weird circumstances! </p>

<p>Where "Vera" does IMO get caught up is in her conflict between her own very obvious desire for publicity and her concerns that this may not, in fact, go well for her. She should have put a nix on the whole thing from the start, especially because she also seems to have the unfortunate tendency to put her foot in her mouth and is frequently tactless, unrestrained and generally not of a professional demeanor. In any event, my feeling is that 99% of the reason Vera bagged out was due to the presence of the reporter. There is nothing here to suggest that if Julie had continued to meet with Vera and there were no reporter in the picture, that a Stanford app would have been <em>completely</em> out of the question. </p>

<p>It's also not the case that Vera ever said that GW was the "best" Julie could do. What she said was that <em>if it weren't for her excellent ECs</em> that would be the case. However, Vera does seem to contradict herself later when she tells the reporter that Julie is not likely get into a good school! In fact, it's pointed out that Julie is not a recruited athlete for Stanford, but since there has been interest expressed by Williams, we get the feeling Vera feels there's a better shot at an ED app there! </p>

<p>So, it's obvious that what this counselor is trying to do is come up with an approach for Julie to maximize her chances for an elite college admission result. She's a strategist playing a numbers game, and there are still plenty of families out there who will line up and pay big money for advice like that, as misguided a way to go about things as most people here on CC would tend to think that is in the case of a kid of Julie's calibur who had her heart set on Stanford. But we do get the impression that more than a little part of Vera's counsel is influenced by the effect of the reporting of all of this on her own reputation. Maybe it's giving her too much credit, but perhaps Vera recognized that and felt it was in the family's interests as well as her own under the circumstances not to continue the professional relationship. But, although it's certainly implied, we really don't have <em>quite</em> enough evidence here to accuse Vera of operating this way in other students' cases.</p>

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<p>There are also some things we still may not know about Julie's profile. The one thing that puzzled me was Vera's description of Julie as "not a great student" Why would she say this? Julie had 8 APs (very common at Whitman) and a straight A average (unweighted, though). Although the description calls Julie's schedule rigorous, was it the MOST rigorous possible at that school? Is it possible that some of the As were in nonhonors classes and that weighted GPA or class rank (or quintile) was a factor here? It doesn't seem so, in that Julie feels she's got just as good a record as compared to the other two candidates to Stanford, but maybe. Her SAT scores were 1410 and SAT II scores were not revealed here but said to be "good " (I take that to mean not great). It's a given that Julie is, indeed, from one of the most competitive college admssions areas in the country, and does not have a geographic hook working to her advantage. It goes without saying that if Julie came from a more underrepresented area in the country, there wouldn't even be a question about her qualifications.</p>

<p>Also, notable in the context of the discussion of stats is the fact that Vera did not discourage Julie from applying to an elite school, but she obviously wants to be able to guide her to the one where she feels she'd have the best ED shot and not have as much competition from other students in her class. Again, the article implies but doesn't elaborate on the fact that Julie may have received some recruiting interest from Williams and that Vera thinks it may be a better ED bet. Williams is a pretty darn selective place, too, to understate it just slightly, but Vera obviously felt there was more of a chance there for her for these reasons.</p>

<p>With all that said, I did not think Vera came across well in the least but she may have been trying to cut her losses in the end by refusing to deal with the reporter . At least, the most outrageous of the things she said - the editorializing that Julie would not get into a top school - were not said outright to Julie or her parents but "confidentially" :rolleyes: to the reporter. </p>

<p>To be honest, the only sympathetic character in this whole mess is Julie. The parents, Vera, and even the reporter(who should never have tried to press her case with Vera at Julie's possible expense) ALL acted inappropriately in my opinion!</p>

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<p>I wanted to know, so I skimmed the full story today. I won't spoil the book for anyone, but I felt completely confirmed in my prior opinion: Julie had no need for a fancy counselor in the first place, she pretty much knew what she had to do, both in terms of making herself a stronger candidate (yes, she retook the SATs; yes, she talked to coaches) and in terms of making up her mind about what she really wanted and what her crush on Stanford meant(California? prestige? not running?). I said before that she was straight down the pike, and the rest of the story was that she was straight down the pike, all the way. </p>

<p>Vera, on the other hand . . . it's hard to believe that the portrayal of Vera is factually accurate. I'm sure it is an accurate portrayal of Julie's and the author's separate emotional responses to Vera, who upset both of them terribly.</p>

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<p>


</p>

<p>Edit: caliber, not calibur. </p>

<p>Well, being that I probably won't read this one I'd love to hear what happens to her in the end. Feel free to send me a PM!</p>

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<p>Well, I liked the question the article's title asks. For many it's true, and they do go off and "pad" their resume to what people have come to think colleges want (ie EC's, community service, high test scores, etc.). For the most part, that's probably their simple screening. I don't know how admissions work at every single college, but I'm pretty sure most have that initial screening (especially for prestigious places) where they take a quick glance at your SAT scores, just to make sure they're not too far below whatever they consider acceptable. I've read they do this just to make sure that the student, if admitted, will be able to keep up with the coursework. Then, they go on to the more important parts, like the essays, and recomendations, though I disagree that recomendations are a good idea. The thing Vera says about coming from Mongolia, or being in a civil war highlights this, impying that who a person is much more important than what a person is, and I agree with her on that. That's the reason why so many perfect score students, and "overachieving" students like Julie are overlooked (at least at top colleges). In Julie's case, it seems, she is a good person, and is actually interested in what she does. For students like her, who might look like the generic "padder" there's the essays, which in this case (or at least from what I could tell from that excerpt) would be the deciding factor in her admission anywhere. Vera failed to see that.</p>

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<p>But really . . . they're not overlooked. Maybe once in a while, but not generally. There's a happy ending for almost all kids like that, as long as you don't define a happy ending as "only Harvard" or "only Stanford".</p>

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<p>I agree with JHS. Let's all remember Andison's story.</p>

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<p>Roshke, you make some good points. This was just an excerpt and so not enough to make any conclusions and I think it is true that the presence of a reporter affected this counselor, and somewhat understandably. She seems fixated in getting a kid into a presitigious school and strategizing with that goal in mind. She seemed to care mostly that the outcome, if followed by a reporter, was going to be successful with success defined at into a top school. While admissions involves some strategy, the foremost goal should be about getting into a school you really like where you feel you will thrive and that meets your college criteria. It seems like this was a search to find an ED school (as if one MUST have an ED school and one that will work out) and the point that Stanford didn't seem likely enough to the counselor and that Williams was a better "bet" for ED is the part I cannot relate to. Who cares if Williams was the better bet for ED if that was not the school the girl wanted to go to most of all? True that Stanford is no sure bet, but if that was her favorite, what harm to apply ED since she had a chance there and if she didn't get in, hopefully she had a balanced list and had the RD round. ED should be for a school one wants to go to more than any other school...not a strategy game entirely. Maybe this girl shouldn't do any ED. The counselor seemed aimed at finding the ED school where she would likely get in, not the one she wanted to go to most of all where she was a reasonable reach candidate and if she didn't get in, so what...there was RD and she could and should have a well balanced list of odds schools. The counselor didn't seem to care about using ED for a favorite school but more as a strategy to get into the most prestigious school she could be successfully admitted to in the ED round. </p>

<p>I also agree with JHS that for kids like Julie, there usually IS a happy ending if they have a good list and if the happy ending is not narrowly defined as "only Ivy". </p>

<p>It's funny but I was on the phone with my 17 year old D today (rising college soph, away all summer in another state working in her field) and she reads the NYTimes every day and so she says, "Mom, I read a review of book in the Times that you have to read cause it has to do with what you do!" and for a moment the title slipped her mind and after being on CC, I had an inkling of the book and voila. She was like, "it has to do with driven achievers who go to people like you!" and I'm thinking, "oy, I don't think like the counselor in that vignette!" and I'm telling her how I had the opposite reaction to the girl, Julie. So, I guess I will want to read this book now. </p>

<p>JHS, I know how you have been saying that Julie did not NEED a counselor and she was "straight down the pike," but I don't think everyone who uses a counselor does so with the reasoning that the counselor can get them into a good college. We (independent counselors) don't get kids into college. We are the resource in helping to guide them through the process. We aren't going to get them into some place better than they could get in otherwise. But even for the Julie's of the world, they may feel a need for a counselor to assist them through the admissions quagmire, not to GET THEM IN but to support them along the way. As you must observe on CC, there are tons of kids and parents with very high achievers and yet, they come here with questions and need for support. Also, someone who is strong across the board, doesn't necessarily "stand out" in a pool of other tip top applicants readily (unless some big hook of some sort) and so, in some ways, a student like that needs guidance of how to showcase themselves on the application to their best advantage. As well, some very good students and families are not realistic when it comes to college admissions. They say, "great student"= "can get in almost anywhere" which we all know is not so these days, and they create very unrealistic college lists. I have seen such lists on CC. No matches, no safeties, crazy. Every sort of student can benefit from guidance in this process, for different reasons.</p>