So, I am an upcoming junior confused with parental pressure. My parents want us (My older sister and I) to go to some Ivy League school. They do a lot for us, especially with the amount of driving there is to do. My mom is the type of person who is like “you do something for me, I’ll do something for you”, therefore it feels necessary to repay them by going to a prestige school.However, I feel like they really just want to brag to their friends. My sister got her SAT scores back, the first question was, "Is it good enough for Ivy League?"As soon as I asked why do we have to go to an Ivy League, they all literally looked at me like I was crazy. I don’t feel like I am good enough for an Ivy League school, yet they naively assume that with perfect scores, we are. My parents don’t really place the pressure on me because my sister is having a harder time. My mom has been going on and on how she (my sister) will end up going to community college. It irritates me because they don’t know a lot about the college admission process. I guess, comparitively, I am more obsessed than my sister. I kept up with my grades, now I have this some sort of pressure to be great and go to Harvard or something.
I know I am not some sort of genius and most of the time I feel average. We have this really competitve school nearby where even if you have a 4.0 gpa, you won’t be in top 10%. This is what I imagine those elite schools would be like. I don’t think I could handle that. I just want to focus on becoming a good doctor ( Which is what my parents want us to become. I think I do too, I have never really looked at anything else.) If I don’t make it, I feel like I would have disappointed them, and more so, myself.
Its amazing how we stress over so much on school and we are expected to create a life for ourselves when the path has always been created. Go to school, learn these classes, do this and do that… In real life,there won’t be a gold star or A+. Its all so materialistic. I don’t know what I want, or if my passions are really my passion or I tell myself they are. I don’t know if I am doing this for college or myself. Its all so confusing.
Then there are people who are struggling, whose parents barely have time for them, who have to take care of their siblings rather than do homework. These people work way harder than I do, they deserve to go to these elite schools, to have opportunites opened to them. The maid my parents hired is more of a hard worker than I will ever be, more deserving than I can ever manage to try to be.
I’ve probably spent a really long time on this website just looking at RD results of different colleges, of all these amazing people who deserve to be accepted.
I don’t really know what the point is of this long rant but I guess I just would like some thoughts or opinions. No idea which forum to put this in either.
Are your parents immigrants? Some people wrongly think that only certain schools ensure success and it may be that way in some countries but it is not like that here. College will be easier for you no matter where you go, likely. It is another way of working and you will get away from these demanding parents. And you will get exposed to other ideas and courses of study.
- Even if you have perfect grades and perfect exam scores and perfect ECs, it still is entirely possible to be denied admission at every single one of the Ivy institutions. That happens to lots of students every single year. So when your mom starts talking about the Ivy and Ivy-peer places, give her a big kiss and tell her that you do hope you can get into one of them, but just in case you are one of the perfect students who ends up rejected, you are going to apply to two or three places where your grades/test scores/ECs are likely to get you in, and one or two places where you know for a fact you will get in. For safeties, see this list: http://automaticfulltuition.yolasite.com/
- If you don't have a dedicated college fund in excess of US $300,000 in a safe place, then you need to know now how your family plans for you to pay for your education. Ask about that. How much are they ready, willing, and able to pay, and under what conditions. For example, some parents will scrape their pennies together to cover the full cost of an Ivy, but won't pay one cent if the kid chooses a non-Ivy.
- If your primary problem is that you have Asian immigrant parents, then do what you can to find someone who can help them better understand the US higher education system and the college application process here. They might benefit from a visit with the guidance counselor at your school who can give them a good sense of where students like yourself and your sister have been admitted in the past. Sometimes that works. Sometimes it doesn't - in which case you and your sister will have to work on your mutual support system and mastering the smile-and-nod-and-ignore technique.
- Medical school is fiendishly expensive, and admission is based on GPA, MCAT score, letters of recommendation, and medical related ECs. The name of the college or university on your diploma barely matters at all. So if you are serious about pursuing medicine as a career, your best option may well be to complete your undergrad at your own home-state public U on the cheap, and save your money (and your parents' money) for med school.
Wishing you all the best!
Okay. I’m going to start by telling you to breathe. You are more than an SAT score. You are more than an “Ivy.” And the reason I put quotes around it is that Ivy League schools are not the end-all-be-all of superb education. I mean, they are spectacular. I’m at Harvard AS WE SPEAK and I can tell you that the community of scientists and academics here is like nothing I have ever seen. Sure my undergrad institution is wonderful and I have learned so much to get me to Harvard, but the community (for graduate school, mind you) is very different.
Now, the reason I’m saying all this is because I want you to know that it doesn’t matter where you rank in a program. HS kids kinda get caught up in the ranking, but beyond that, it doesn’t mean much. You have to choose a school where you feel comfortable. If that’s Harvard, that’s great! If that’s the University of Montana, that’s wonderful! If your parents are paying for your school, they will have the ability to tell you what they won’t pay for, but you don’t have to go where they want. You can work to find a middle ground. (And not that I’m saying you should do this, but if I REALLY didn’t want to go somewhere and Mom and Dad were going to make me go there if I got in, I would probably sabotage the application. Only if I knew I’d be miserable there.)
But the thing is, you have 2 years to decide what makes you happy. Because 4 years is a long time to hate somewhere. And if your parents weren’t educated at ivies, then maybe there’s a little bit of vicarious living going on. Although they do make me want to introduce the backside of their heads to a Punishment Salmon.
Don’t focus on if you want to be doctor or if you’re going to go to Harvard and if you’ll graduate summa or magna cum laude. It simply doesn’t matter right now. What does matter is finding out what is important to you. So ask yourself an array of questions:
Do I want to live in a city?
Do I want to go to a big school?
Do I want to live on the East Coast or in the South, Midwest, Southwest or West Coast?
Do I want a religious school?
And most importantly, what subject makes me happiest? Is it math, science, writing, history, foreign language, music, art, economics, business, computer science, design, or something else? That’s as specific as you have to be right now. Chances are your goals and interests will evolve in the next 4 to 6 years, and you don’t want to have tunnel vision and miss the rest of everything because you could only see DOCTOR and your parents could only see HARVARD DOCTOR. (And by the way, “premed” students DO NOT STUDY MEDICINE. They study science. So really think if you like science that much to study it for 4 years then go study it some more while being trained to be a physician. Don’t think that you’ll go to university and it’ll be med school. So many people make that mistake.)
@MomoThe Peach
I’m not sure if there was anything other than a need to rant and release the pressure valve. And I can see why. But while your parents are putting the pressure on you and your sib, it also feels to me that you are putting it on yourself as well. First, no matter what your parents want, if you don’t get into an Ivy, there isn’t much they can do about that. But the more important question is do YOU kind of want to go, or are you thoroughly confused? The existential crisis of the value of what is important in life starts with you. Your parents aren’t helping in this department, but don’t expect them to. All I can advise you to be is realistic and true to yourself. If you want to go for an Ivy, then go for it, but don’t kick yourself in self-defeat because you don’t think you are deserving of it. There are a lot of kids that deserve to get in that don’t, but it didn’t stop them from moving on. And yes, the Ivy league are not the only schools that offer great educations…your parents need to be educated on this subject. With this…now…
Stop whining about yourself and get to living life for you, not your parents. Few are genius, many go to competitive schools, some have no idea what their passions are, but they keep trying. If you think you don’t work as hard others, what are you waiting for? Get to it. No one is stopping you. College is great where YOU want to be–where YOU will thrive.** I’d rather you have choices because you worked for them instead of giving up because you don’t think you deserve them.** You will not find your passions unless you just live and figure it out as you go. Ignore your parent’s obsession with the Ivy league and live for yourself. And if that ends up being where you do hope to go to school, then go for it. Just try to remember that this is your life, no matter how overbearing your parents get. You don’t have to tell them you disagree, just work hard for yourself and end up where you will be happy.
And some parents will pressure their kids to go to expensive prestige schools while expecting the kids to take on all of the loan debt (despite parental income that disqualifies them from financial aid), even when much less expensive schools are available.
Starting your college application list with an automatic full ride safety may give you at least one financially reasonable choice in these scenarios.
A few things that might help you:
-
Medical schools care very little where you go as an undergraduate. They are not prestige sensitive. They care mostly about your grades and your MCAT score (and your state of residence for state schools). That means you want to go to college where you think you have the best chances of being at the top of your game academically. For many students, that means NOT going to a high pressure, highly selective college - in fact, many students at those highly selective schools get weeded out in the first year. Had they been at a less high pressure college, they might have not been weeded out.
-
The fact that your parents will be disappointed if you don’t get into Harvard is their problem. They can join the other 95% of parents of applicants who were not admitted and commiserate if they wish. You know better, however, than to beat up on yourself for something outside of your control and so irrelevant to your success. And they will get over their disappointment when they see how well you are doing where ever you eventually end up.
-
Black-mailing your kids emotionally into good behavior should be clearly acknowledged as exactly that. When you cave to blackmail, you just leave yourself open for future blackmail. You can love, honor and respect your parents while at the same time acknowledging that they are imperfect and not always able to love you and treat you in the way that would be most helpful, respectful and kind. The ability to act with that understanding is part of what being an adult means.
I appreciate all the replies. @rubberfall You’re right. I honestly did want to just rant. I understand what you guys mean. After being on here so long, I really just wanted to become good at what I want to do regardless of the school. I guess thats the only way you can truly make a difference. As for my parents, they’ll get over it. @biochemgirl67 Thank you for the advice, I really do appreciate it. Its kind of funny how I told my friend the same thing yet I didn’t really seem to believe it. I know my parents are really just concerned considering how hard med school really is. (Thats why they also talk about those 8-7-6 year programs too XP)
@N’s Mom
@ucbalumnus
@BrownParent
@happymomof1
Thank you all for your advice. It really truly did help.
Ask your parents to inquire where their doctor friends went for undergrad, and even med school. Ask them to check the family doctors too. Might be an eye opener.
I think you have a really great perspective about all of this! It’s important to know what would make you happy, and it sounds like that is not an Ivy League school for your undergraduate education. You’re not the only one–that’s exactly how I felt when I was applying 14 years ago. I knew myself, and I knew I wouldn’t be happy in that kind of environment.
Now it sounds like you’ll probably have to apply to a few Ivies to make your parents happy–do it to see what happens, because they may be shocked to find what you already know, which is that many fantastically qualified students are rejected from Ivies. Or you’ll get in, and go from there.
I would have an honest conversation with your parents, and it will benefit your sister, too, to have it. Talk about applying to a range of schools–reach, match, safety–and explain that you, too, care about your education and you’d like to approach all three tiers with strategy. Especially if you are a great student, your match schools will still carry prestige. And then for safeties, perhaps a good strategy (especially if money isn’t an issue for your parents) would be honors programs at state universities. Or, if money is an issue, your safeties would be schools like Alabama for their automatic scholarships, and privates that are generous with merit aid.
Ask how many schools your parents will pay for you to apply to–some parents, frustratingly, will not “allow” their child to apply to schools of which they don’t approve which can cause issues, but hopefully they are willing to support your applying to a generous range, including less prestigious schools.
It may actually help if your parents were to come on CC–do you think they’d be up for that? One dip into the Parents forum might set them straight, re: Ivies or bust…
Good luck!
<<<
I know my parents are really just concerned considering how hard med school really is
[QUOTE=""]
[/QUOTE]
Yes, but going to an Ivy League school does not make med school easier.