<p>Stupid question... what's this mean?</p>
<p>"Bright well-rounded kid". Currently presumed by the cognoscenti to be a "negative" way to package oneself for admissions to the most selective colleges.</p>
<p>Ah! Thank you. XP I've been so confused. Figured out the other little short hands... not this one.</p>
<p>There have been lots of discussions going on about this.
BWRK = Bright, Well Rounded Kid
The term is used in a rather disparaging manner when talking about applicants to uber-selective top schools, such as (but not restricted to) Harvard, Yale or Princeton. BWRKs are not URMs, they did not win any Nobel Prizes, are not legacies, nor are they recruited athletes or the children of famous parents. Besides that, BWRKs are great people.</p>
<p>Ah! So would BWRKs be the kids who are all around good but just lack an evident "hook"?</p>
<p>Yep. I'm crazy about my BWRK, HYPS be d***ed.</p>
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Ah! So would BWRKs be the kids who are all around good but just lack an evident "hook"?
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That would be the theory. Not saying I endorse it, but that's the idea. Don't know when the adcoms are going to get tired of the left-handed-oboe-playing-built-a-robot-when-11-years-old "hook" approach, returning the BWRK to top of the heap.</p>
<p>jmmom, hopefully soon-hopefully very soon.</p>
<p>Most people would only know the "code" if they had read the particular admissions book which discussed it (at some length), or if they happened to read this board which discussed it (before you probably joined, looks like).</p>
<p>A problem I have with it is not only that the author used it as a pejorative (already discussed previously), but that I think the acronym is a misnomer. The students singled out --it seemed like about 80% of Duke applicants,BTW- would have been better labeled EWRK or H-AWRK (Excellent or Highly Accomplished). These were not B+ students who dabbled in lots of areas (also, in itself, not such a bad thing!). As I remember, they were stand-out, sometimes in one area, sometimes in several -- multiple awards, achievement, leadership, service, etc.</p>
<p>Some of us are still trying to figure out where these "rejects" (hmph!) are going, since some Ivies have said they could fill <em>another</em> freshman class with them. Are they spreading out to various LAC's? Are they going to all regions of the country -- & beyond? Are they going to major publics? (Or all of the above?)</p>
<p>At a school in my city, a magnet public high school, you gets points, yep points, if you are a minority (but only specific minorities- everyone goes to their family tree), a child of a single parent, gone thru a hardship, have a parent who is into drugs, in jail, on welfare or wic, medical, </p>
<p>us, we are hawrk- middle of the road, in tact family with no addictions</p>
<p>I am not trying to be flip, but perhaps a bit frustrated, I understand the need for making sure the school is diverse and giving kids a chance to be in a great school, but it seems that if you as a family have tried to do it right with no issues, you are at the back of the line</p>
<p>cgm, I agree. (And also one of the points discussed on this earlier thread in the Parents' Forum; you might want to take a look; much of it supports what you say.) Many highschoolers have similar (sometimes greater) pressures as the Duke applicant who succumbed to anorexia but was accepted after writing a soap-opera essay about the pressures of being from a rich family who has high expectations of you. (I think I'll just let that provocative comment sit out there.)</p>
<p>
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Some of us are still trying to figure out where these "rejects" (hmph!) are going, since some Ivies have said they could fill <em>another</em> freshman class with them. Are they spreading out to various LAC's? Are they going to all regions of the country -- & beyond? Are they going to major publics? (Or all of the above?)
[/quote]
Don't forget that most applicants apply to more than one ivy, so its probably not 8 perfectly acceptable freshman classes they're rejecting, but probably more like four - still a substantial number, but it's slightly easier to explain their disappearance.</p>
<p>Hmm, I thought I said some Ivies, not all. But with HYPS, that would be minimum 4, possibly 5 or 6 -- throwing in Columbia & a combo of the others -- & still accounting for cross-application. Just my guess, based on variety of sources.</p>
<p>Of course, it just means that it takes much more family research into alternates for a student that will serve him/her about as well as those 1st/2nd choices. Not an impossible effort, but does become more difficult if -- as with my own 2 D's -- location is a major factor, & a factor which relates to that academic program.</p>
<p>cevonia:</p>
<p>it maybe a regional thing, but I know of few top kids in SoCal that apply to multiple Ivies; ususally just one for that lottery chance.</p>
<p>The earliest references I have found to the rejection of "well-rounded" in favor of a collection of "niche" applicants dates back to the mid-1970s. </p>
<p>The trend has obviously taken on steam since then. IMO, it is the intellectual justification for race-based "slotted" admissions. In other words, college administrators are uncomfortable admitting that they admit "x" number of applicants based on their race or ethnicity. So, the "intellectual justification" is that they admit ALL of their students to meet some carefully constructed mix of diverse attributes. Thus, race-based quota slots are the same as oboe-based quota slots or speedy wide receiver based quota slots.</p>
<p>There is no way to back off from this model at this point, because the colleges have sold it to the Supreme Court in order to preserve the legality of affirmative action. </p>
<p>Of course, the loser IS the bright, well-rounded, kid. The odds of acceptance to an elite college without an a narrowly-drawn "identity" is, indeed, difficult.</p>
<p>I think there is a second factor that has driven admissions in this direction. After the intellectually stimulating campus activisim of the 1960's and 70's, college administrators grew frustrated with the increasing blandness and conformity of the college students of the 1980s and beyond. The "I've gotten straight A's, edited my school newspaper, and want to get into a good law school to land a top job with a corportate mergers firm" is not a pitch that has much appeal to academics rooted in their own college experiences during more activist times.</p>
<p>
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The "I've gotten straight A's, edited my school newspaper, and want to get into a good law school to land a top job with a corportate mergers firm" is not a pitch that has much appeal to academics rooted in their own college experiences during more activist times.
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I am drawn to your theory. As a flower-child era college kid myself, I can really see my cohort - now in the power elite of academia - thinking precisely as you outlined. Of course, the admissions gang is by and large a much younger group, so this idea would not be innate with them. It would have to trickle down from the President's office/Trustees etc for your theory to hold. Do you think that's how it works?</p>
<p>jmmom:</p>
<p>I don't think it's trickle down as much as it is a pervasive culture in academia, in much the same way that the nation's colleges are at the leading edge of "political correctness". The admissions departments don't operate in a vacuum. They eat, sleep, work, and live in the academic community.</p>
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Most people would only know the "code" if they had read the particular admissions book which discussed it (at some length).
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The book is Admissions Confidential, by Rachel Toor, who was a young and somewhat disaffected admissions officer at Duke for 3 or 4 years. </p>
<p>Toor's book gets annoying--an awful lot of it seems devoted to demonstrating how cool and creative she herself is--but I also feel it includes some useful (if somewhat discouraging) insights into the admissions process. Still, it's nowhere near as enlightening as The Gatekeepers, by Jacques Steinberg; or--believe it or not--On Writing the College Application Essay, by Harry Bauld, who worked in admissions at Brown and Columbia and offers some side-splitting but illuminating glimpses into the minds of weary admissions officers slogging through dozens of boring, conventional essays. </p>
<p>Personally, I believe there are plenty of BWRK's who get into top schools, but it helps to make an application stand out if the kid can find a way (through essays, ECs, etc.--though not through some cutesy gimmick) to express his individuality.</p>
<p>The term was "released" to the public in Rachel Toors' book on college admissions based on her experience on the adcom at Duke. There are a slew of admissions shorthand terms but that one hit home because it does fit the vast majority of candidates. Even accepted candidates. Don't know what they call the candidates who are bright but not well rounded. </p>
<p>The "hook" business has gone a bit crazy since several of these adcom tell all books have hit the shelves. The fact of the matter is that most 17-18 year olds do not have real hooks. There are a small number who are URMs (which is really not a hook but just a state of being that is so underrepresented), there are the legacies (and that is really more of a tip at the most selective schools, unless your parent is also a major contributor and known at the university), there is development (again a tiny category), there is celebrity (another tiny category), and there is the athletic card. These are all the more visible hooks. The biggest hook anyone can have is if you happen to have a skill that the college wants or needs that particular year. That general athletic hook is useless in an unimportant, overrepresented sport, or if there are too many like you applying that year. And contrary to beliefs, it is not the left handed oboe player who builds robots, that catches the adcoms' eyes. There are specific wish list things in composing a class. The current admissions pool and current state of things at a school determine all of this.</p>
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Don't know what they call the candidates who are bright but not well rounded.
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According to Rachel Toor's book: "We look for well-rounded kids, but we also look for 'well-lopsided' kids. If all you do is music--you don't do sports, you don't do community service, you don't do student government, you just do music---that's fine. We're trying to create a well-balanced class, that consists both of well-rounded people and of those who are more focused. We look for impact and commitment...."</p>
<p>And I also agree with jamimom--it helps if you happen to be committed to the particular sport or musical instrument or science research that the school is actively seeking that year.</p>