<p>The question and concern simply indicate that the OP believes HYPS to be superior to Caltech and MIT, where D has already been accepted.</p>
<p>"Again, it would be easy for the competition organizers to remove the doubt by delaying the annoucement of winners until May of the senior year and not announce the semi-finalists publicly. Would this change anything as far as honors and scholarship?"</p>
<p>It will dramatically reduce the number of kids who are participating.</p>
<p>"The point was to convey that Stanford seems to prefer sports over academics, which in my view is not proper. If you look at the graduate school admissions at Stanford it heavily favors international students because most of the sports quota under-graduates fail to make it to the graduate school at Stanford."</p>
<p>There are several reasons for that. None that supports your theory. Somehow native students don't want to pursue graduate studies. Forget Stanford. If you look at graduate student population at ANY University you will find that more than 60% are internationals. One of the other reason might be that Professors HAVE to PAY you. They don't want slackers.</p>
<p>"Most undergraduate programs at top research universities strongly encourage their students to do their graduate studies at other institutions."</p>
<p>That wording is mild. My son was told in not so many words not to waste his application fee.</p>
<p>Post #142: "It will dramatically reduce the number of kids who are participating."</p>
<p>Not necessarily. All 40 finalists get at least $5,000 scholarship (on top of $1,000 semi-finalist price) and a laptop. Top 10 get $10,000+. Not a small amount of money to walk away from (even though some posters think all kids who win come from high income households with lots of money to support their research!) For kids who have truly enjoyed their research opportunities, the chance to share a week in Washington with Nobel Laureates, members of Congress and like-minded contemporaries is also a strong draw.</p>
<p>A big problem with later notification is holding the finals later. AP exams are in early to mid May, and many school-end events start by mid-May. STS doesn't want to make kids choose between a very special week-long experience in Washington and home town events that many kids have been looking forward to during all of high school.</p>
<p>Making the due date later (if the notification is later) might actually increase the number of entries! There aren't really that many entries. This year's press release said 1608. As noted in prior threads...entering the Science Talent Search is actually more work than almost every college application --- and that doesn't include the research and write up!!! Entrants need to answer a substantial number of essay questions, get recommendations and transcripts etc. The research write up, and all of the other materials, are due around the same time as EA/ED applications. So....some students skip STS to enter their research in other competitions that don't require as much prep, or have different due dates.</p>
<p>
[quote]
The question and concern simply indicate that the OP believes HYPS to be superior to Caltech and MIT, where D has already been accepted.
[/quote]
Not true, as MIT is very high on D's list and she wouldn't have applied early if it was not the case. She started with Yale but it changed after a visit to Yale during the summer.
The question was to just know if this update makes any difference.
Now realizing that it won't harm to update but may not boost chance to more than what it were to begin with.</p>
<p>"The question was to just know if this update makes any difference."</p>
<p>I think you acknowledged that you knew the answer. I am with Pizzagirl on this one.</p>
<p>As for the college app factor, seniors who participate in ISEF and the National Junior Science and Engineering Symposium do not have results until after they have to commit to a college (ISEF- mid May, Symposium early May). However both allow younger students to participate (ISEF- 9th through 12th; Symposium- 11th & 12th). Just an interesting comparison. Last year at the Symposium, almost all of the Intel STS Finalists were competing. And there are stories on these boards about students who have continued chasing 2400 well after college app season is over.</p>
<p>Just a point of reference - Stanford athletics consistently ranks among the top universities in the graduation rate of their students with a 93% graduation rate (scroll to the bottom to see all athletes) </p>
<p>Scout.com:</a> The Bootleg's Graduation Rate Analysis</p>
<p>It is interesting to compare that to the graduation rates for all students at various colleges:</p>
<p>Best</a> Colleges - Education - US News and World Report</p>
<p>Harvard 88%
MIT 83%
Cal Tech 82%
Stanford 80%</p>
<p>Perhaps these schools should be admitting more athletes :)</p>
<p>OSU beats Stanford, Saturday, 77-62.
Oregon</a> State University Official Athletic Site</p>
<p>don't worry, CC Parent's is the only place where I can safely brag about my S, anonymously. :)</p>
<p>Xiggi: You claim Intel has competitive inequities and infer its sole purpose is to grease a pipeline into top colleges for a select few PRIVLEDGED and CONNECTED kids. I’ve already shot part of that down by mentioning that my S was just named and he did his experiment – by himself – in our modest 10x10 kitchen. I believe another poster mentioned a similar situation. </p>
<p>I still take away that you are saying that Intel is the ONLY competition of any sort that has potential inequities, since you continually refuse my offer to name any others. I say that any competition in any field where there is any subjective judging is open to potential “gross inequities.” Does the best right tackle get named to the all-state football squad, or is it the one whose coach does the best and most aggressive PR job? Name a field of endeavor and I can site an example.</p>
<p>Science fairs? How about ALL science fairs? Our HS has had only one Intel finalist ever. A magnificent genius. At a smaller science fair leading up to Intel, his future Intel project lost outright to one from a classmate of his, a project that was slapped together at the last minute and could have been done by a 10-year-old. The kid who won was actually embarrassed and didn’t even want to bring the trophy home. But, of course, that kid got to list that honor on her college app and the eventual Intel kid went home empty-handed that day. Subjective judging. </p>
<p>What my son has learned on the science fair circuit is, you win some; you lose some, but if you’re good and you’re lucky, you win more than you lose. If you win, you give thanks and then list it on your app, just like anything else you won. </p>
<p>And so, I go back to saying, if you are inferring that ONLY Intel’s results are questionable, then I strongly disagree with you. And if you say that, nonetheless, it should hold back its results until after college decisions, again I ask you, why ONLY Intel? You assiduously never answer that. I know that because I “read what you wrote” and I’m not intimidated to “try again.” I ask you questions; you sidestep them and never answer them. So here’s YOUR chance to “try again.”</p>
<p>BTW ... I hope you noticed that Dbate, who seems like a great young scientist and whose efforts I sincerely applaud, did NOT actually ever enter Intel. If Dbate had, he or she may have won; who knows?</p>
<p>
[quote]
"Our HS has had only one Intel finalist ever. A magnificent genius. At a smaller science fair leading up to Intel, his future Intel project lost outright to one from a classmate of his, a project that was slapped together at the last minute and could have been done by a 10-year-old. The kid who won was actually embarrassed and didnt even want to bring the trophy home. But, of course, that kid got to list that honor on her college app and the eventual Intel kid went home empty-handed that day. Subjective judging. "
[/quote]
</p>
<p>This is VERY true especially on a local level, the year I did not win an award it was myself and another student who clearly had the best projects. His was actually better than mine, it was AMAZING. Unfortunately, many local judges at the Greater Houston Science Fair question that ability for student to do high quality research and so judge accordingly. That year second place studied if cold water froze faster than hot water. That project qualified for state but ours did not. That was my tenth grade year.
The next year I had to dumb down the title from Evaluation of Photon Tunneling Probability (the official title used on my research paper) to Entering the Photon Tunnel to make it appear more "high school like" -_-, and my brother had suggested that the catchy titles win. But I placed that year so yay!</p>
<p>Oh and 4th house I am really interested to hear what you son studied. Xiggi I can tell you that not everyone who competes and wins Intel comes from the privileaged, in fact the girl who won Intel my sophmore year did a project where she built a mass spectrometer for $300, they normally can cost up to the thousands so it was impressive. From reading her description of the work she did it at her house too. That same year the girl who I think placed like 10th studied the Brazil Nut Effect in her home laboratory. So it does happen.</p>
<p>
[quote]
"Xiggi: You claim Intel has competitive inequities and infer its sole purpose is to grease a pipeline into top colleges for a select few PRIVLEDGED and CONNECTED kids."
[/quote]
</p>
<p>What I have noticed is that most, if not ALL of the winners of science fair come from suburban districts and normally are affluent or have parents who are well in the scientific community. This is so true that a former worker for MIT posted this in the MIT forum:</p>
<p>
[quote]
"I think it's often more impressive to MIT and other colleges to see an applicant take initiative and do research on his or her own with limited resources. They are definitely aware that many formal research opportunities for high schoolers arise because of connections -- mom knows somebody who has a lab at the local university, that kind of thing. Doing your own research like this shows that you're really taking advantage of the resources you have, and I think it's great.</p>
<p>Marilee Jones used to say that MIT was looking for kids who built crazy things in their basements -- that MIT was looking for people who did creative things on their own time. They're not just looking for polished projects, they're looking for sheer joy in the scientific experience."
[/quote]
</p>
<p>4th house, I did not read Xiggi's post as implying that Intel was "corrupt" or did its dealings / judging in less than good faith. I read it as an indictment of the system, insofar as the entries are EXTREMELY regionally skewed (NY winning 115 / 300. How can you not say that it's simply not known in many parts of the country?) and EXTREMELY skewed to very specific high schools, most of whom have affluent parents with scientific backgrounds and access to labs themselves, and a mission to push and win Intel prizes. That it's a case of the kids with money entering something that's virtually unknown to the kids whose parents happen not to live in the Northeast, happen not to have money, happen not to live in the "best" school districts. It's not to downgrade the accomplishments of the Intel winners, but to make the point that surely colleges have caught on that being aware of Intel in the first place is the province of those already born on third base.</p>
<p>4th house, I did not read Xiggi's post as implying that Intel was "corrupt" or did its dealings / judging in less than good faith. I read it as an indictment of the system, insofar as the entries are EXTREMELY regionally skewed (NY winning 115 / 300. How can you not say that it's simply not known in many parts of the country?) and EXTREMELY skewed to very specific high schools, most of whom have affluent parents with scientific backgrounds and access to labs themselves, and a mission to push and win Intel prizes. That it's a case of the kids with money entering something that's virtually unknown to the kids whose parents happen not to live in the Northeast, happen not to have money, happen not to live in the "best" school districts. It's not to downgrade the accomplishments of the Intel winners, but to make the point that surely colleges have caught on that being aware of Intel in the first place is often the province of those already born on third base.</p>
<p>And of course xiggi is not saying that "only" Intel has that. Inner-city schools don't offer lacrosse or water polo or AP European History either, and inner-city kids don't have the money to hire tennis coaches. There's a big fat duh that more well-to-do kids will always have advantages. If Intel winners are consistently coming from JUST a relative handful of schools that share common demographic characteristics, though, that's telling you something, because there's no reason to believe that scientific aptitude isn't evenly distributed across the country and up and down socioeconomic classes. </p>
<p>Your son's win is all the MORE laudable because of the system.</p>
<p>"If Intel winners are consistently coming from JUST a relative handful of schools that share common demographic characteristics, though, that's telling you something, because there's no reason to believe that scientific aptitude isn't evenly distributed across the country and up and down socioeconomic classes."</p>
<p>It tells us what kids can achieve when they have consistently strong mentorship.</p>
<p>Right. And that strong mentorship is easiest to find among the haves than the have-nots.</p>
<p>Read back I never said that Intel was simply not known in other parts of the country. That appeared to be someone else's issue.</p>
<p>"And that strong mentorship is easiest to find among the haves than the have-nots."</p>
<p>And that is exactly right. The goal must be to increase that mentorship where it is lacking. Then we will see broader distribution of such winners.</p>
<p>Pizzagirl: Read back; I never said that Intel was "simply not known in other parts of the country." That appeared to be someone else's issue.</p>
<p>Pizzagirl: "And of course xiggi is not saying that "only" Intel has that (advantages for wealthy kids from wealthy school districts)."</p>
<p>That's what I read. YOU just said it, and I don't disagree with you. But take credit yourself for that argument; don't give it to Xiggi. </p>
<p>I would go on to agree that most all wealthy and privileged students in every field start out with an advantage (much to my family's chagrin, too). That is a large part of my argument with Xiggi, who is only pointing to Intel. Either accept that truism as it is or, as I suggested, hold back announcing recognition of all awards in all disciplines (debate, music, sports, etc ...) where, as you so eloquently stated, wealth also creates advantages. </p>
<p>Dbate: S had a chemistry entry dealing with forward osmosis desalination. He was concerned with the world water crisis as a public policy issue and struggled to find an experiment that might assist in some small way. He studied voraciously, went down a thousand different paths, and ended up in an area which was relatively new and thus offered experimental opportunity. He emailed people and companies, got materials donated for free, and the rest is history. I can't recall if he spent a dime on the project. His teachers gave him lists of contests, such as Intel, that he could enter, but, to the best of my knowledge, did little to nothing and gave no assistance insofar as the experiment itself. I think Intel requires that a teacher sign off on the forms as a "mentor," or something like that, and so he did, but that's about the size of it. </p>
<p>Happy to answer such questions. People only avoid answering questions when they know they have to concede a point and can't bring themselves to do so.</p>
<p>There is no question that success at these competitions is aided by a high school that has a program promoting research in some manner, whether it be an in school program or a program linking interested students with university labs. You can see high schools that offer this kind of support clearly demonstrated on the list of semifinalists because you will see more than one semifinalist from the high school. This does not mean that the student did not conceive of the idea and do all the work, it just reflects support and encouragement of scientific research. And then you have public high schools like the one my kid attends that do not support scientific research and despite my kid's past successes at ISEF, Seimens, etc. still do not. Now the entire school district has its first Intel semifinalist ever and they think it reflects on the science program at his high school. It makes me chuckle. The kid had two teachers that offered encouragement but no substantive guidance and no help finding a university mentor. So the kid did it all alone and keeps working on it to this day, despite there being no more competitions to enter.</p>