Be careful for what you wish for...?

Colleges and Universities A-Z Massachusetts Institute of Technology
41

<p>I do think it is unfair for people to imply that those that struggle at MIT are somehow not working hard. As I said, I cried more than once out of frustration and exhaustion. The important thing is that I was able to pull myself together enough to break through the obstacles, and I ultimately graduated with a decent GPA.</p>

<p>MIT gets knocked a lot (particularly here) for its focus on "fit" during the admissions process. I can even see why this mysterious "fit" idea would be so bizarre to someone who is not familiar with MIT. But, admissions does it for a reason. You can be exceptionally intelligent, but if you don't have the ability to get up after being knocked down, you probably will not do well here.</p>

42

<p>Resilience is a quality that is hard to argue against, but the way in which MIT adcomm seems to select for it is absurd. That's the problem I and others have with it and MIT's concept of "fit". It seems like in order to guarantee that people will be able to handle failure, they choose people who have had shortcomings academically (such as B's in math and science) but seem to be ok with it. This is bizarre for three reasons.</p>

<p>1) if someone has multiple B's in math or science in high school, they might really be in over their head at MIT.</p>

<p>2) if someone got knocked down (i.e., got a "B" on a test) in high school, hopefully they can recover and get an "A". So an unblemished record may mean that they were resilient, handled getting a "B", and instead of just getting upset, raised their performance to pull their grade up to an "A-." </p>

<p>So ironically, one may appear to have more resililence by just allowing themselves do badly in a couple of classes rather than making adjustments and becoming more disciplined.</p>

<p>3) Some people can have unblemished records in high school and perfect or near-perfect records at MIT. And they don't have to be IMO gold medalists to be able to do this.</p>

<p>The bottom line is that I think you should reward better performance or worse performance.</p>

43

<p>"It's such a serious mistake to treat motivation, priorities, and ability to seek help as choice variables, or matters of willpower or character -- so that if someone loses them, it is a personal flaw. "</p>

<p>I agree that people are influenced by their environments, and that we should all be careful in attributing "flaws" to others, I do think that motivation and priorities are "matters of willpower or character." Why do you view this as a mistake?</p>

44

<p>Of course in a sense you are right. Whether you have the willpower to do the things you are supposed to do is a matter of willpower, by definition.</p>

<p>What I mean to say is that when people lose their willpower and waste their time instead of doing useful things like seeking help and getting good grades, they often cannot will themselves to regain their willpower. It is tempting for those who have not been there to treat this situation as a simple laziness, which the person could resolve if he just "got his priorities straight" or "worked harder". I am trying to point out that the very thing you lose is the ability to get your priorities straight, the ability to want to work harder. And observation suggests that this situation is more like a contagious sickness than a failure of character which can be resolved by reflection and the resolve to be better. Which should be a caution to people who assume that they'll never end up like those people who lose their drive.</p>

45

<p>

Well, don't forget that the world isn't just divided into above average and below average -- there are a sizeable number of average students at MIT, and they do just fine. I've seen evidence that the median GPA of an MIT senior is a 3.2, and anything above a 3.0 will probably get you into graduate school or into a job. (Professional schools tend to be more heavily GPA-dependent.) So most of the school is getting above a 3.0, at least by the end.</p>

<p>

No doubt, but I'm not sure that I believe that someone in the bottom quartile at MIT would be in the top quartile at a Brown or Swarthmore. MIT and Caltech are tough, sure, but science and engineering are tough everywhere, and I don't think it's a safe bet to assume someone would be a standout if not for coming to MIT.</p>

<p>I do agree that most/all of the people in the bottom quartile at MIT could graduate from another school, and probably with a somewhat higher GPA, and perhaps that automatically would have made them better off. But I don't agree that they would all have been excellent students at Brown or Swarthmore, or Big State U, or whatever.</p>

46

<p>We began the discussion 3 pages back, when the subject was the subject of my reply, which, loosely rephrased, is, "what it takes to succeed at MIT". I took the chance of offending a few who might have thought the subject of my reply to be more along the lines of "Value judgments made about people who do not succeed at MIT and other implications about their character". Which is not, in fact, the idea behind my post.</p>

<p>I think you and I however, Ben Golub, are essentially saying the same thing. Those who have done everything right (sought all the help available, surrounded themselves with mentally healthy people, picked the right major for themselves, set their priorities... etc) and still have their spirits broken by MIT have clearly chosen to come to the wrong school. </p>

<p>You ask me if I honestly think it's someone "fault" that their willpower has been crushed by MIT/Caltech. But, I guess to borrow your phrasing, I normally find you to be such a level-headed debater that I'm surprised by the naivete of this question. Do I think that homeless people are to blame for their condition? I think society has of course in part failed these people and I'm certainly not going to kick one in the face and tell him to get off his ass and get his life straight, because it's not that easy. Maybe his spirits have been broken by the system. Maybe he was particularly susceptible and mentally fragile. But do I think that the choices he has made (wittingly or unwittingly) has largely contributed to his current state? Well, yeah. Of course. I wish with all my heart that he could rewind back to some of those pivotal moments in his life when he could have done something just different enough to not have ended up here. I don't think anyone is destined to become homeless. You don't have to come to MIT. You don't have to double major. </p>

<p>Of course, MIT is not society, but similarly MIT is not designed to be that difficult. I agree with Mollie that I don't believe someone who fails at MIT is likely to succeed wildly at a similar tier college, though, of course, they can. I personally believe it is designed so that a normal, healthy, smart kid can navigate through it in 4 or 5 years without being snapped in half. If you have chosen to come here, I assume that you've evaluated yourself and found that you fit this criteria. If that is the case, then my first post in this thread is advice on what you can do to succeed. I disagree vehemently with the posts that insinuate that suffering severe depression at MIT is somehow acceptable, or that it is worked into the system. I think those people that do should transfer and be happier elsewhere.</p>

47

<p>okay well you didn't say that much there to disagree with :). </p>

<p>You pointed out the crux of this issue, which is really where the line is drawn between environmental influence and personal choice. That's a question I don't aim to answer.</p>

<p>What I really wanted to convey, I guess, is a caution. Wonderful support systems and reasonable professors are often cited in these discussions, and they're important, but they are mostly used by people who are already doing great, like pebbles. Those are not the primary rubrics on which you should evaluate what you would come out with from a school.</p>

<p>The basis for your judgment should be the experiences of a broad range of students. When you visit, ask what the happiest living groups are and the unhappiest ones. Talk to outspoken people in both. Go out of your way to find out both happy and bitter views of the school, and make your own judgment.</p>

<p>The posters on this board are a wonderful but somewhat unrepresentative sample... and nevertheless we managed to get some useful points out on both sides. I agree with pebbles' earlier point that it's fair and good to have this talk, and you should continue having it with as many students as you can right up until you make your choice.</p>

48

<p>Oh, for those who don't know, the only classes that you HAVE to take at MIT are the following:</p>

<p>18.01 - single variable calculus
18.02 - multivariable calculus
8.01 - intro mechanics
8.02 - intro E&M
7.012 - intro to biology
5.111/3.091 - intro to chem - no lab (with either chem dept or material sciences dept) </p>

<p>there are of course more advanced versions of all of those classes, but if you've got your panties in a bunch in 8.022, you have more than a month after school starts to switch into 8.02 and up until three weeks before finals to drop the course altogether with no consequence and take 8.02 next semester. </p>

<p>I think Caltech is a lot more unforgiving, with requirements in physics up to Quantum, which is completely unreasonable for someone hoping to major in management or music. And I think the math requirements there are more extensive as well.</p>

<p>It's interesting about the living groups that don't complain about work. I'm not sure where on campus they don't complain about work, I certainly have not been there. But I notice that in certain living groups, there's more of a pressure to choose the most "hardcore" majors (I'm speaking largely for where I live, EC) and to take on way more of a class load than ever necessary or reasonable. Maybe these people complain more because there is more to complain about. I love EC, but I've found that mentality to be it's biggest "flaw" if I'm allowed to make a value judgment :P</p>

49

<p>no no value judgments how dare you. hateful person.</p>

<p>caltech is definitely way more unforgiving in terms of basic requirements. 5 terms of physics (through quantum and thermo), 5 terms of math (some of them with real proofs!). be verrrrry careful. :-)</p>

50

<p>I strongly agree with collegealum314's most recent post (about selecting for resilience), and it saves me the trouble of duplicating it.</p>

<p>Separately in response to Ben: ("The problem with people who end up in trouble is that they lose their drive, priorities, or willingness to reach out for help -- but that's not generally their fault. Do you really, honestly think it is?")</p>

<p>I'm one of a certain breed of a MIT student in that I semifrequently reach this kind of a state - in the past I have failed to attend any class for months at a time - and yet still do quite well, as the result of correctly having chosen subjects of study (math, eecs, econ) in which the teaching style matches up properly with my learning style. You know what, if I'm in a crisis situation and can't be productive, then in that case I'm pretty sure pebbles is right - it's almost entirely my fault (and she should bonk me, please).</p>

<p>But I want to bring this into perspective and perhaps unify it with Jessie's viewpoint by throwing out another, maybe iconoclastic idea. I maintain that the Old Guard of classes at MIT have a teaching style, organizational structure, and exams that are designed for a rather specific type of thinker - namely, I claim, people like me. There are plenty of people that find the basic requirements at MIT relatively effortless, and a majority of them strike me as having personalities kind of similar to my own. For instance I feel that the GIRs emphasize raw deductive power and lateral combinatory problem solving over all the other useful talents, even on material (parts of 3.091 and 7.012) where this emphasis seems frivolous or contrived.</p>

<p>But MIT admits plenty of people that don't emphasize the same thinking functions in the same order as the professors that wrote the syllabi. And that's totally appropriate. But what if you don't seem to have a learning style that matches up with MIT's traditional teaching style. Perhaps the way in which the GIR's are presented feels tiring or unnatural. You can still succeed, and having gone through a struggle should even provide you with an ancillary background that allows you to push boundaries in what is natural. Not everybody is supposed to love 8.01. It is extremely important to find the classes that speak to you at MIT, and trust me they do exist. When I first came here, I went through the subject listing and read every course description in every department. That simple act probably benefited me a lot: one thing I've done is take many graduate level classes even early on, which might seem scary but the material is actually more specifically interesting to me and the teaching style much easier for me to stomach.</p>

<p>If you are one of these people that has had trouble adjusting to MIT, or if you're afraid of that happening to you, I don't think it is because of the workload in most cases. It's not because of not having enough hours in the day, certainly. You can definitely work hard and play hard at this school (although you have to remember that academics is your day job). The key is not to enter a crisis mode; most of time you love MIT but sometimes you hate it. The institute is not as competitive as popularly assumed, it is designed so that each student can reach their potential. You merely have to find the right path, and the right friends. And just a little bit, you have to believe.</p>

51

<p>
[quote]
if someone got knocked down (i.e., got a "B" on a test) in high school, hopefully they can recover and get an "A".

[/quote]
</p>

<p>Anyone who thinks that getting a B on one test is getting "knocked down" is in for a very rude awakening at MIT, even if they turn out to be quite an excellent, successful student there. Even the straight-A students I knew at MIT had a few tests/major assignments where things went poorly (and by "poorly", I don't mean a B).</p>

<p>I think, collegealum, that your idea of how Admissions regards resilience is a little hyperbolic. They still want top performers - I may have had, say, relatively low math grades in high school, but I had high math stats/credentials in other areas to balance it - but they do want top performers who will survive setbacks. One can, however, have perfect grades and still show evidence that one can survive setbacks. One can also have less-than-perfect grades and show evidence of being an academic star.</p>

52

<p>River -- inspirational!</p>

<p>Nevertheless, :-P. When you said
[quote]
for a rather specific type of thinker - namely, I claim, people like me

[/quote]
did you mean a four-letter acronym?</p>

53

<p>jessiehl: When I was talking about getting "knocked down" by a "B" on a test, I was referring to getting a "B" on a test in high school.</p>

<p>I took a multi-variable calculus class in high school that was taught by a PhD in math from Berkeley. It was more like 18.024 than 18.02, and most of the people in the class couldn't even handle the homework. It was hard enough that even a guy who made honorable mention on the putnam barely scraped by with an "A-". I wasn't completely going all out, and got a "B" on one of the tests and was in danger of getting a "B" for the class. Most people in the class kind of just gave up. In contrast, I became more disciplined and aced the rest of the class and got an "A." However, this isn't something I told anybody about. Frankly, I felt it was somewhat unprofessional to mention this in an interview or in the essays. I approached college apps as if I was applying for a faculty position. In a faculty interview, you would never bring stuff like this up in order to prove that you had resilience, in spite of the fact that resilience and perseverance would be invaluable to a researcher. And I did treat it as a minor crisis even though it is taboo around here to talk about grades as being important. I had assumed that getting a "B" would have cost me admission to Caltech and MIT. Back then, I probably was right. </p>

<p>I had other major obstacles in my life that I was unwilling to discuss for similar reasons, namely the fact that the schools tried to slow me down academically because I was too advanced. I was always focused on performance instead of the past, and I felt uncomfortable talking about such things. Like I said, in a faculty interview (interview to get a faculty position) or a NSF fellowship grant, bringing up such things would be considered unprofessional.</p>

54

<p>
[quote]
In a faculty interview, you would never bring stuff like this up in order to prove that you had resilience...I was always focused on performance instead of the past, and I felt uncomfortable talking about such things.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>Well, that's why these days the MIT application has you write an essay about it.</p>

<p>
[quote]
And I did treat it as a minor crisis even though it is taboo around here to talk about grades as being important.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>Hyperbole, much? I haven't heard anyone here say that grades aren't important. I have heard plenty of people say, correctly, that having perfect grades isn't important.</p>

55

<p>I actually added a small 100-ish word essay as supplemental info to MIT and caltech talking about how I got an 86 in the first quarter of calculus in tenth grade (after teaching myself algebra 2 over the summer/teaching myself precalculus concurrently with calculus), doubled my workload and did extra homework for a few months, and ended up teaching myself calculus BC even though I was in an AB class/got a 5 on the AP, being one of the top two scorers on calculus team, etc. I got into both MIT and caltech. I think that it was important for them to know that I took a bit of a risk, had difficulty, and learned to meet the challenge - and I felt like all of this wasn't really conveyed in my "93" on my transcript (still the lowest grade there, actually, but probably the one that means the most to me.). I actually thought admitting this to caltech might make my chances decrease, since they're all about the grades/scores (more-so than MIT)... but apparently not! So, yes, I think it is acceptable to talk about such things on college applications, and even to value the experience of getting over hurdles like that, rather than being embarrassed/not wanting to talk about it/etc.</p>

56

<p>also, jessiehl- I was really confused for a minute when you described collegealum's thoughts as hyperbolic. ("How could a hyperbola model anything about her expressed views.....?"). :-P</p>

<p>and... maybe i'm just really slow, but which four-letter acronym are you referring to, Ben Golub?</p>

57

<p>MCAT</p>

<p>i swear</p>

58

<p>oh Ben, are you happy to be included?</p>

<p>edit: i don't want to be like really controversial here, but I was thinking of xNTx (myers briggs types); normalized for IQ, I think that those with strong extroverted intuition or thinking processes will adjust most easily.</p>

59

<p>"MCAT</p>

<p>i swear"</p>

<p>pebbles...the princess of pithy remarks...</p>

60

<p>pebbles: "Of course, MIT is not society, but similarly MIT is not designed to be that difficult. I agree with Mollie that I don't believe someone who fails at MIT is likely to succeed wildly at a similar tier college, though, of course"</p>

<p>Having taken many undergrad classes at a couple of top-tier institutions and having taught at a state university, I have to disagree. There is no comparison between the rigor and volume of the coursework, the grade deflation, and the competition at MIT vs. other elite colleges (with the exception of Caltech.)</p>

<p>Also, Robert Woodward won the Nobel Prize in chemistry after failing out of MIT his freshman year. After failing out, he worked as a chemist for a couple of years, came back to MIT, and then took all of his undergrad and grad classes plus research and finished his BS and PhD in only one year. Those of you who took orgo may recognize the name Woodward from the Woodward and Hoffman rules. Along with Corey, he is arguably the greatest synthetic organic chemist of the 20th century. Had he not died in his early 60's, he would have won a second Nobel Prize for the Woodward and Hoffman rules (Hoffman won for it shortly after Woodward's death.) </p>

<p>So I think it is fair to say that MIT is quite a bit harder than even other top tier institutions.</p>