<p>As a community college professor, mythmom, you are in a perfect position to observe “all kinds of minds” in Mel Levine’s terms.</p>
<p>Mythmom another school to add to your list for brilliant underachievers is St. Johns which has a Santa Fe campus to get out of the NE. My nephew is happy as a clam there. He was one of those kids who didn’t always jump through all the hoops in high school to the frustration of many teachers who loved him in class, but wished he was better about turning in hw.</p>
<p>Since that was my statement, I’d like to clarify a little…there are always going to be different interpretations of the term “underachiever.” While for some kids underachieving might simply mean getting a 3.0 at their prestigious prep school but having the SAT scores of a 4.0 student, it might mean barely graduating and having little to no involvement in any extracurricular activity. </p>
<p>I feel like I’m stating the obvious, but it really depends on the applicant, his situation, and his self-awareness and attitude towards his underachievment (that’s not a word, is it?).</p>
<p>Having a child with a “different” mind (learning disabled), I do understand the concept of different learning styles and how that can impact grade performance in a one-size-fits-all educational system. At the same time, I have a disdain for both bright slackers and dull slackers. </p>
<p>I think we’re right to distinguish between 1) the lazy but bright student who doesn’t do the required work to get A’s because he just doesn’t feel like it, or lacks the requisite intellectual curiosity to want to learn what he doesn’t know, or refuses to inconvenience himself by acquiring the discipline and expending the effort required to meet school expectations,
and
2) the kid who doesn’t learn or perform well within the system employed by certain teachers or courses but does better under different cirucmstances (hands-on learning, for ex), or the child who neglects homework and studies because he’s too busy engaged in a worthwhile pursuit outside school (smoking pot, watching TV, and Iming do not qualify).</p>
<p>Also, I have an understanding for the kid who might appear inconsistent on a college application because of a refusal to play by the rules or do what will “look good” if he does not believe that a particular activity or course is instrinsically worthwhile. S is very interested in govt. and politics and wants to make that his career. Yet he never showed the slightest bit of interest in being a hs class officer or running for Student Council, or joining the school’s debate club because in his estimation these were silly and a waste of time. I worried that his application might not show enough “passion” or leadership for the top schools to take him seriously in light of his intended major and career. Maybe some didn’t (P, Y?). But some did and he took off and now holds multiple leadership positions in campus political and career organizations. The difference? The college clubs were really “doing something” and not just playing at it. He had no interest in planning the prom or pretending that any decisions the hs student govt. made would actually impact anything. The college organizations however, were legitimate ones with the power to accomplish meaningful (by his definition) things.</p>
<p>And here’s a tangential rant about certain “play by the rules” kids–you know, the ones who succeed in amassing the requisite looks-good-on-paper resume to get into HYPS but did so for that reason only. D is feeling a good bit of disdain at present for the “over-achieving” seniors who are dropping their involvements like hot potatoes and neglecting their club/team obligations now that they’ve been accepted to college. When I think of an “over-achiever”, I tend to think of the kids who become frazzled by busyness because they are driven to reach a societal definition of success. The stepping stones have no meaning to them beyond their utility as means to an end. It seems to me that ADcoms ought to secretly call high school coaches and advisors to see if their admits slacked off right after the thick envelope arrived–an EC version of the second semester transcript submission.</p>
<p>Continuing the rant several hours later (I feel like Holden railing against all the phonies at his high school)…
The type of student described above, whom I would consider an over-achiever, is an individual who cares more about the appearance of doing than he does about actually doing. In my home, a pet peeve are the students who supposedly belong to both varsity sports teams and clubs–both of which meet exclusively after school. How committed can you be to a varsity sport in a large, competitive school if you miss one or two after-school practices a week, and how committed to an after-school club can you be if you seldom or never make the meetings because you’re at sports practice? (Yes, I know other high schools have greater flexibility with this.)</p>
<p>Recently, the hs added a rule which said a student could only be considered a club member if s/he attended 50% of the meetings and activities of the organization. 50%? Are you kidding me? Would you keep on an employee who only showed up half the time? This was in an effort to control the kids who claimed to be club members but didn’t show. As an adcom, I wouldn’t be too interested in a student whose idea of involvement was 50%, no matter how brilliant. But that’s my bias as more of a drone type, I suppose.</p>
<p>My kids, who are athletes, could basically only list varsity sports as a school EC because they always show up for games and practices and give 100%. If those over-achievers beat them out for a spot in a top LAC, so be it. To me, this is an element of integrity. I worry that an elite school may misjudge a dedicated student with integrity as being an under-achiever. The hope is that the distinction will surface via teacher recommendations, but I know we’ve seen plenty of phonies get accepted at top schools.</p>
<p>GFG, i think your definition of overachiever as one that gets into million activities just for the show is not what most mean by “overachiever”.
I think wat most people mean is a person with internal drive who does more than is expected from him by others:
“a student who attains higher standards than the IQ indicated”
or
“one who achieves success over and above the standard or expected level”</p>
<p>Point taken, but I think there’s a fine line between getting into the million activities just for the show deliberately, and getting into the million activities out of a desire to achieve above and beyond the norm and ending up with more than one can handle. Because why is the norm the norm? The norm is what’s considered reasonable given that person’s IQ, abilities, time availability, etc. Consequently, overachievers inadvertently get themselves into untenable situations where they’re in over their heads academically or are overcommitted. If they were handling everything brilliantly, then wouldn’t they just be high achievers and not “over”-achievers? I think people use the word “over” when there’s a chink in the armor, a discrepancy of talent or intelligence somewhere that causes a problem. And whatever that weakness is which the person is trying to ignore rather than accept as as limitation, can transition into phoniness. John can’t really handle being president of 4 clubs, but he’s motivated to achieve, so he doesn’t give anything up. Sally isn’t quite smart enough to be in that AP class so she spends 5 times as many hours studying as everyone else in order to get the same grade.</p>
<p>I’m thinking of a girl we know who is desperately trying to be an Ivy League candidate, but regularly breaks down–emotionally overwhelmed by all her studies and involvements. She’s the kind who might skip school or go in late to finish up homework, or will cry and tell the coach she’s too tired to play in the game that day, etc. Yes, she is still achieving quite a lot, takes AP classes, gets good grades, but there’s a huge price being paid and she’s robbing Peter to pay Paul on a regular basis. To me, that’s overachieving. I think she could cut a class or two and activity or two and still be a high achiever.</p>
<p>Hmmm. I still don’t understand why we categorize and judge different varieties of kids.</p>
<p>Obviously, the ideal student is brilliant, a great test taker, is creative, writes beautiful, has no difficulty with the highest math, plans ahead and gives me than what is expected of him/her on every assignment, has true intellectual thirst in every discipline, and then knows when enough is enough so has many, many stellar EC activities and many close and dear friends who consider him/her as asset in any social situation.</p>
<p>I have never met anyway who lives up to that description so everyone has weaker areas. I don’t know why is to be gained from parsing these weaknesses, and each mind/temperament is unique and resists this type of classification.</p>
<p>I agree with mythmom. Enough with the stereotyping already; I think that this thread was supposed to be about suggestions for particular colleges…</p>
<p>As OP, my point was just to start an interesting discussion (which happened) with a quotation of a post I found in another thread. </p>
<p>I would indeed like to hear of colleges that would be suitable for that ill-defined category of learner called the “brilliant underachiever.” However that term is defined, there are learners like that in real life, and where do they go to college, if at all?</p>
<p>tokenadult: IMO a worthy goal. I listed those that immediately came to mind and a potential problem with them, and I’ll add as I go along.</p>
<p>Actually SUNY New Paltz popped into my head as a place kids I know fitting this description have gone. A less expensive school may give a student of this type “breathing room”, particularly if a fifth year becomes necessary.</p>
<p>Macalester was also a school kids of this description have gone too.</p>
<p>Another student I know who had indifferent grades and absolutely smashing SATs applied to every elite school he could and was accepted only by WashU who must have been in the process of trying to up their SAT range. So a kid could look for institutions whose SAT was lower than peer institutions and try.</p>
<p>Men have the advantage of being heavily recruited at many liberal arts colleges; therefore some students of this description have found a home at Vassar.</p>
<p>The problem becomes staying in school and doing well. The kid at WashU started with a 2.0, but woke up and eventually did quite well. </p>
<p>If the underachieving is from some neurological or psychological pathology intervention may be necessary before the kid can really succeed. (ADD medication for example.)</p>
<p>Oh, another boy of this description went to Drew, went on ADD medication for a while, and succeeded just fine.</p>
<p>I did not intend to come across as judging any particular category of student, but rather tried to define one of the terms being thrown around. Indeed, all of us are born imperfect beings with flaws and weaknesses. However, we have free will to make lifestyle choices and decisions concerning how we will relate to our work and others while setting out to accomplish our goals. Colleges clearly look for certain patterns here. Adcoms themselves have used categories like well-rounded, well-lopsided, and under and overachiever. This suggests to me that they are indeed making some value judgments (maybe institution-specific ones) about the type of peformance pattern they most desire to see in their students. The example of MIT came up, and the idea that they tend to avoid “overachievers” but would take a chance on a brilliant underachiever.</p>
<p>But then posters, including me, started to defend the different categories and why they’re all lovable and worthy of appreciation. So I just tried to express who might be the type of “overachiever” that a school might not want and why. I meant to point out that maybe it’s not a personality type that’s being rejected, but a specific behavior pattern: 1) a method of achieving which could eventually lead to burn out or cracking under pressure, or 2) a method of achievement which could entail doing many things but none of them particularly well or even irresponsibly.</p>
<p>But yes, call me judgmental, but I do not condone a selfishly-motivated failure to live up to the commitments that come with leadership and membership in an organization. It’s fine if someone mistakenly out of good intentions overcommitted himself. If the overcommitment is temporary, then the leader can perhaps delegate the job to someone else who will do it well. If the overcommitment is likely to be long term, then an honorable thing to do is admit it and step down. It’s dishonest to keep the position and not do what is required, thereby letting down other members.</p>
<p>To me, a lot of times the brilliant underachievers are the ones neglected by the schools. I am speaking about the pathetic public high schools here. The brilliants don’t want to perform because they hate the ways the teachers teach. A lot of times, the teachers don’t understand the brilliants and de-motivate them.</p>
<p>So many messages here blame the underperformance of brilliant underachievers on anyone and everyone BUT the underachiever him/herself. The school seems to be the most frequent culprit.</p>
<p>Have any of you blamers stopped to think why some “brilliant” kids underachieve, while other “brilliant” kids perform in such same environments? Yes, our schools are not perfect. Neither are our homes. Neither are our kids…but some rise up and some don’t. Tells me it is the kid that makes the difference, not the external factors. Use whatever adjective you want (bored, lazy, “too smart for this place”), whatever. The problem is still with the kid. Do external factors matter? Don’t know. Expect they do, which is why tokenadult’s questions make a lot of sense.</p>
<p>So maybe a bit more positive emphasis on how to help these brilliant underachievers achieve? </p>
<p>And a clarification on my post 61 which seems to have hit a nerve for so many of you: My disdain is not for any “brilliant underachiever”. My disdain is for that subset that spends their time telling others how smart they are while doing little to show it, or worse, doing little to use their talent. I admire those “brilliant underachievers” who are comfortable with not changing the world and such. But I don’t think it is fair to equate someone who is smart and uses their smarts with someone who is smart and doesn’t, such as “she’s just as smart but…”</p>
<p>newmassdad: Yes, the problem is with the kids. Some kids can survive the environment. Some kids cannot. But, the question is: should our education system leave no child behind? Why do we concentrate more on helping the ones that are at the low end of the intelligence scale and neglecting the other end? Einstein loathed his physics teacher but he became a brilliant physiscist. We could save some more Einsteins here.</p>
<p>coolweather,</p>
<p>Einstein “saved” himself. And that’s what successful smart people do. They don’t complain and blame their failings on others (at least not all the time 
). They do something. </p>
<p>Look, I see nothing wrong with a kid who accepts lower grades when he blows off homework as busywork, to use an example, or who does not excel in the required course on american history because history bores him. But I do see something wrong with praising his underused intellect, if indeed he has that, or blaming the system for (a) requiring and grading homework or (b) requiring USH for graduation. Don’t like homework or history? Fine, but do something else even more rewarding instead. Don’t just use the extra time to videogame.</p>
<p>Newmassdad, I think the criticism here isn’t that US history is required, but that it’s taught to the lowest common denominator. I have three kids - one bright but with a learning disability and two who could reasonably be described as “really bright underachievers.” The public school system had a lot of accommodations for my oldest son, but except for one year in the fifth grade for one of my other kids did almost nothing to provide them with an education appropriate to their abilities. </p>
<p>Not every kid who is bright is also able or inclined to create their own academic enrichment opportunities. Some are - that’s where your Einsteins come from - but most lack that additional self-sufficiency along with their innate intelligence, just like everyone else. I think we’re wasting a lot of intellectual resources by failing to provide education appropriate to the brightest kids’ learning abilities in the public schools. A lot of the time the “advanced” courses are no more intellectually challenging than the “regular” ones - they just have more busywork.</p>
<p>So by the time they go to college a lot of bright kids who have been inadequately or inappropriately challenged to that point either change gears quickly or have some trouble adjusting. Which makes the OP a pertinent one, I think - which colleges do the best job of taking these previously underchallenged bright kids and unleashing their capabilities?</p>
<p>kluge, as I said above, blame the school, not the kid. I guess it makes everyone feel better?</p>
<p>newmassdad - Actually Enstein’s great dad saved his son. He pulled the “troubled” child out of the bad school and sent him to school that was more suitable for the genius.</p>