<p>No, they don’t. Like NSM said, colleges want well-rounded student bodies. This means current high school studies can stop shuttling themselves from oboe practice to the homeless shelter to debate tournaments to French club to NHS. And this is why kids end up feeling like the process is randomized, a crapshoot, because they spent their four years of high school constantly inundated with unimportant stuff rather than daydreaming a little and allowing yourself the time to fall into something that interests you. Burnt out kids don’t take rejection well; passionate kids don’t let rejections stand in their way.</p>
<p>So, go ahead. Read widely–or narrowly, if that’s your thing. Join a few clubs because they have good snacks, but recognize that no one cares if you’re president of Ping Pong Club. </p>
<p>I actually agree with the idea that high school students do many things to get into college that they normally wouldn’t do. I haven’t seen a school club yet where the members were actually involved out of a sense of interest in a cause. They join, become leaders, volunteer hours mostly to improve their resumes. College admission is in large part a game and people play that game. </p>
<p>Not everyone knows how to play, however. The kid with the highest GPA in our school didn’t do that well on the SAT. He’s a white kid whose parents went to college but aren’t professionals. I was talking to him the other day. He told me that he wasn’t even aware that he could take a prep class for the SAT. He just checked out a book from the library and did a few practice tests. He scored an 1900 or something like that. He’s a pretty good athlete who played two sports but not a recruited one. His low SAT meant that he wasn’t going to an Ivy but he did get into UCLA and that’s where he’s going. Had he taken a prep class for the SAT like we Asians there’s no reason to think that he wouldn’t have done about 2200 and made it to an Ivy. I think one of the reasons Asians do so well in college admissions is because they understand and play the game better than most other groups.</p>
<p>grow up. did your parents go to an ivy league school? did they go to college at all? make something out of the college experience - you won’t make it in the real world with this attitude</p>
<p>I used to think like you. But then I started looking at some of those “famous” research professors and other renowned professors at the super schools.I looked at the schools they went to by looking at the faculty pages of the college catalogues and Faculty pages on the iternet. And I found that most of them had their BAs and Bs s from schools most people never even heard of. Get good grades wherever you go, and save stardom, if you still think it’s so important, for grad school.</p>
<p>Getting rejected sucks and its embarrassing, especially when others know what we have strived for and will now know we failed to reach our goal. This rejection causes us to doubt ourselves and to wonder if anything good will ever happen for us, and if we are worthy of such good fortune. All of these thoughts and feelings are human. Weve all been there.</p>
<p>These feelings are also only temporary for most of us,. For a smart kid like you, the sting of rejections will hopefully be replaced by determination the desire not to be average, but to continue striving forward past this obstacle and be the best you can be. Its hard to imagine right now, but with hard work you can look back on this and realize with pride how you overcome this and moved up in the world. You may even decide that being rejected by those schools was a blessing in disguise. </p>
<p>There are a lot of great schools out there. Take stock of your situation realistically and find a school that will be a good fit for you right now, even if its just for one year. Youre only taking core courses during freshman year for the most part, so in many respects it doesnt matter so much where you go that first year. Focus on performing at your best, and see what transfer opportunities are available a year from now.</p>
<p>The Shogun and Professor101,
Its different when you are applying for jobs. A college doesnt care about where you get a job unless it promotes the prestige of the college itself. Having a good athlete promotes the athletics of the school, which is one of the things universities care about the most. And just because you have higher grades and test scores than someone else does not mean you will make more money than them at all. The truly smart people in the world dont even go to college, and many rich and wealthy people dont go to the Ivy leagues as well. And though many Ivy grads make alot of money starting off, how far do they really go?</p>
<p>People fake their intelligence in the real world. </p>
<p>“I got an A on the test and I didn’t even read the book.” 95% of people who says this probably read it and studied it more than others.</p>
<p>“I got 2100 on SAT and I only studied for like a week.” Most likely he did not.</p>
<p>People who say, “I have no idea what we’re doing” or “I don’t know, really” or “something like that, not sure” and get high grades at the end are lying. They know; they dont’ want to tell you.</p>
<p>I think the most common are definitely those who act like they always goof around and never study and still get high grades. They would go to bed at night, get a flash light, and start reading with a pillow over their head. Or any of those variants.</p>
<p>Of course, there are exceptions, but the number of people I hear who do that are in the vast majority at my school, which only means that most of them are faking or else I’m really THAT lucky to be surrounded by full of geniuses.</p>
<p>Beretta–some people are just “smarter” than others in that they learn more quickly or retain more from one reading of the text. </p>
<p>Why would anyone hide under the covers to study? And do you really think people don’t tell you what’s going on so they’ll get a better grade than you? Though it’s possible they think you should pay attention so you’ll know what’s going on for yourself.</p>
<p>My S got 2300 on the SAT and didn’t study. He took a practice test the week before, then took it “once and done.” (Actually, none of my kids “studied” and they all got at least 2250…I forget the actual figures as they’re not really important.)</p>
<p>And sometimes people say “I don’t know what we’re doing” but when it comes down to it, they realize they DO know, or they are able to figure it out pretty quickly from context or from another source.</p>
<p>Preferences like these never make any sense to me because the subject is already presupposing that it must be either this combination or that one. Why not brilliant, happy, and fulfilled?</p>
<p>I doubt the existence of a disparity between ratio of geniuses who are happy and fulfilled to their entire group’s population and of non-geniuses who are happy.</p>
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<p>Never got this one either. Why are others’ plights mitigating factors to one’s own?</p>
<p>To the OP: There are no average people except in a statistical sense. The number of “geniuses” in the world is very small. If intelligence were to be measured by IQ alone, the man with the highest recorded IQ didn’t go to Harvard but to Colorado state. To suggest that top schools go after latent ability alone is ridiculous.</p>
<p>Whatever disparity you may be picking up can and probably is attributed to varying amounts of accumulated advantages, a quality in which there are no thresholds, no barriers–just time.</p>
<p>Harvard hosts many students of unspectacular “ability.” Your local state college hosts many students of spectacular “ability.”</p>
<p>Lastly, college rejections do not betoken you as average, just as college acceptances by an above average do not signify you as above average.
If you were referring to the qualities that may have lead to said rejections, then none of them are outside of your control. Absolutely none.</p>
<p>“I think the most common are definitely those who act like they always goof around and never study and still get high grades. They would go to bed at night, get a flash light, and start reading with a pillow over their head. Or any of those variants.”</p>
<p>There really are people like this. When I taught college, one of my best students was a good looking, popular guy who acted like he was goofing around all of the time. He’d say nothing in class except make jokes. However, he made excellent use of office hours and worked his butt off to produce great papers. When he’d get his A papers and tests back, though, he’d deliberately sigh as if he had flunked.</p>
<p>The other students were surprised when he was named to the department’s honor society.</p>
<p>He somehow thought it was cool to appear to be not too bright. It was too bad, too, because he was admired by many male students who thought that by barely passing, they were acting like him.</p>
<p>"I’d rather be a fulfilled, happy average person with friends than a bitter, friendless genius. I’m not suggesting that geniuses are bitter and friendless. I am saying that I’d rather be average and happy and fulfilled than brilliant and miserable.
Preferences like these never make any sense to me because the subject is already presupposing that it must be either this combination or that one. Why not brilliant, happy, and fulfilled?</p>
<p>I doubt the existence of a disparity between ratio of geniuses who are happy and fulfilled to their entire group’s population and of non-geniuses who are happy."</p>
<p>You’re missing my point. My point is that the OP and some others seem to think that there’s something terrible about being average and something extremely fulfilling about being brilliant. That’s not true. People who get into Harvard are probably no happier than are people who go to the local community college.</p>
<p>Saying this, incidentally, as a Harvard grad who for fun takes arts classes at the local community college. I saw happy and miserable people at Harvard, and the same is true of community college. I’ve known Harvard grads who were not successful at their careers. I know community college grads who are highly successful, including being bank officers, electel officials, successful artists and performers, and having other jobs that many people would be impressed by.</p>
<p>Are you suggesting with your last sentence that lcc students are average and harvard students are brilliant? If so, that’s OK. But if not, then that does little to suggest any sort of correlation. I could’ve just as easily picked any two other places or two groups of people. </p>
<p>“A study shows that couch-inhabitants are happier than those who spend their time at home asleep on their beds instead of watching TV on their couches.”</p>
<p>“Urban…rural”
“Nebraskians…Iowains” (sorry if I got the noun wrong)</p>
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<p>I dont necessarily believe one to be terrible and the other extremely fulfilling; however, I do think that, given a choice between one or the other, one would be a fool to pass up on being a genius, if that were indeed a possibility.</p>
<p>There are absolutely no negative aspects that come with being a genius. Happiness and many other qualities are more dependent on extrinsic factors such as relationships, quality of food, and ultimately, success.</p>
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<p>I think that, if you had to resort to focusing on only the worst of the former and the best of the latter, then the argument is already over.</p>
<p>"Are you suggesting with your last sentence that lcc students are average and harvard students are brilliant? If so, that’s OK. But if not, then that does little to suggest any sort of correlation. I could’ve just as easily picked any two other places or two groups of people. "</p>
<p>People who go to Harvard are likely to be gifted in terms of intelligence . People who go to community college are likely to have average intelligence. I’m only making a comparison in terms of probable intelligence since that is what the OP appeared to be referring to in the OP’s fears that due to being rejected by Ivies, the OP is “average.”</p>
<p>“There are absolutely no negative aspects that come with being a genius.”</p>
<p>Not true. One negative aspect that immediately comes to my mind is having difficulty finding a peer group. Things that are interesting and are obvious to geniuses can seem boring, incomprehensible or strange to nongeniuses.</p>
<p>I don’t think intelligently gifted people exist. I’m no psychologist and you may or may not be one yourself, but you can’t tell me that at second one of two infant’s respective lives, one is destined for an Ivy while the other is not.</p>
<p>What I do believe is that, by age 17, some people may be better equiped to be accepted by Harvard–but only because of 17 years worth of accumulation of the tools and skills necessary.</p>
<p>Some people may learn faster than others and some may be able to retain certain things better, but that can’t be tied to biological or physiological factors.</p>
<p>In general, Harvard students may be more apt at quoting Cartesian dissertations at me but I don’t think that makes them more gifted. </p>
<p>But for the purposes of defeating the OP’s and many others’ misconception, I suppose it’s good enough.</p>
<p>Intelligence can’t be tied to biological factors? Why not? Very nearly everything else can - in fact, your entire formation as a human being is biological, including the formation of your brain. Are you saying that mentally ■■■■■■■■ humans were on the whole made that way through their life experiences? And if intelligence can be harmed by biological factors (if you admit to that), why can it not be aided in the same manner?</p>
<p>my point is that it is well known that a high test score and excellent grades will NOT automatically get you into an ivy. however, those same characteristics, and those characteristics alone, are very valued in the workplace in many fields like law and engineering. thus if you get dinged for being a “boring” smart kid, don’t be too concerned because you can still find great success in life.</p>
<p>I am still amazed at all the angst about ‘good schools’. The best school is always the one that you can excel at, the place where you fit in. </p>
<p>Colleges are an industry. They sell soap and dreams. You pay your money and get out of it what you can. May be soap, maybe vinegar.</p>
<p>Do yourself a favor. Enroll in a local Community College for a year. Work part time. Take some hard classes. See what you like and why. When you apply to a four year college, you will have an advantage in two ways.
You will prove that you can do college level work
You will know yourself a lot better.</p>
<p>Check out some of the ‘top’ (by whatever definition you chose) schools and compare the acceptance rates for incoming Freshmen vs. Transfer students. You will see quite a difference, as the schools see value in a bit more maturity than the average 18 year old has.</p>
<p>Want another upper? Check the lists in Forbes or other business magazines… the schools that Fortune 500 CEO attended. Notice ALL the public universities? Note how many never graduated?</p>
<p>The college industry is just that, an industry. Maybe the soap you get smells good and makes you more attractive. Maybe is was just a waste of money. Hard to tell. But, you can be sure that the schools and most people posting on these boards cannot tell either.</p>
<p>Look around, see what the world needs, and provide it.</p>
<p>For those who are using ‘intelligence’ in the loose sense, that is scores on a SAT or ACT, check out the article in yesterday’s WSJ about dyslectic people, and why so many have done well in business and life. It is quite telling, especially the comments about how as children and young adults, those suffering were labeled as ‘stupid’ or ‘lazy’. No doubt they would NEVER get into a vaulted Ivy. Well, unless they could prove they where 1/32 Native American ;-)</p>