<p>Just being smart and not working hard won’t get you anywhere in life. Harvard is looking for people that will be successful in life.</p>
<p>etondad, that’s what I’m trying to say. Evan is an extreme case of what people refer to “genius” at Harvard, and even HIS success didn’t just come out of the blue–he had to practice and practice like everyone else. My point is that almost everyone, and maybe everyone, at Harvard is “merely” intelligent and hardworking rather than someone with a truly supernatural intellect.</p>
<p>There are really hardworking students all over that don’t make it to the level of a hardworking student at Harvard.</p>
<p>Genius is everywhere. I know two geniuses. Both are card carrying Mensa members. One is poor and delivers mail. The other is a housewife. Genius only goes so far.</p>
<p>illicit-- and Evan’s “genius” is focused-- I don’t believe that the humanities Gen Eds he has tro take are easy slam dunks for him. But the beauty of Harvard is that kids like Evan who need to support of a college like Harvard can get it-- and by support I mean more than academic-- Evan is considered special at Harvard and as such is taken care of, by the other kids. Anyone who would try to be malicious to him would find themselves in trouble with the other students immediately. THAT is one of the qualities what makes Harvard special-- being an eccentric genius is prized, not derided. And that is a rare thing in a college.</p>
<p>IMO
Genius, no
Industrious, yes</p>
<p>Mensa membership does not equal “genius.” Membership in Mensa requires an IQ in the 98th percentile; “genius” is more like 99.9+ percentile. If you do not know people in the 99.9(9) percentile, it might be difficult to understand how different they are from the rest of us. There is a big, big difference in ability between 98th and 99.9th percentile.</p>
<p>If you attend an average high school with, let’s say, 1200 students, statistically speaking 24 of them would qualify for Mensa. So let’s say odds are the top six students in each class could be members of Mensa, should they choose to join.</p>
<p>How many of you who attend more or less average high schools have observed that the top six students each year attend HYPSM? Would you say that that happens every year, or is it more likely that each year the top student goes to one of those schools?</p>
<p>Hard work will help anyone attain more than they could attain with no effort, but what some of you do not seem to realize is that there are people out there who do surprisingly well while making no effort at all. I don’t know Evan O’Dorney personally, so I cannot say if he is globally gifted or not. But I do know some mind-bogglingly brilliant people who really do appear to just learn by osmosis or to have been born already knowing things that I struggle to comprehend.</p>
<p>Another point to keep in mind is that hard work also only will carry you so far. Perhaps, given enough time, you could master quantum mechanics. But those guys majoring in physics at Harvard or MIT do not need an infinite amount of time.</p>
<p>So, is everyone at Harvard in the 99.99th percentile? No, but many of them are, and those that aren’t I would bet are well into the 99th, anyway.</p>
<p>Since no one here seems to want to own up to geniushood, it seems that the working definition here on this thread of the word “genius” is, “a level of intelligence a little greater than my own.”</p>
<p>In terms of describing folks intellectually, “genius” is a slippery word. By the numbers, there are authorities who have defined genius as having an IQ of 140 on certain IQ tests, and others who make the cutoff at an IQ of 180, with others at various spots in between. There IS quite a difference between an IQ of 140 and one of 180. The problem is that measuring IQs much higher than, say about 145 or so (depending on the test) becomes problematic.</p>
<p>But if one goes with the lower score definitions, yes, a large number of folks at Harvard are geniuses. And although, even at the lower score definitions, one wouldn’t absolutely have to be a genius to get into Harvard, it’d help a lot.</p>
<p>But putting aside terms with slippery meanings, we could re-phrase the question like this: Do you need to be really, really smart to go to Harvard? And the answer to that is, generally speaking, yes.</p>
<p>notjoe, there’s no question that generally you need to be really smart to get into Harvard. The question is whether you can GET really smart or if you just have to be born really smart. On this thread most of us have been using the word “genius” to refer to someone with an unusual level of natural intelligence who can learn whatever he wants quickly and with little effort. If it is in fact possible to become really smart through sheer effort then a very hard worker should not be at all disadvantaged compared to what we call a genius. </p>
<p>Sure, there may be some natural variation in the ability of toddlers to build Lego structures. But you can’t watch someone ace a biology test without studying and blame superior natural intelligence when that person has been spending their free time reading hard science textbooks since the fifth grade. It’s just that when you watch someone in the present you have no insight into the stuff they’ve done behind the scenes.</p>
<p>angry much MITbound?</p>
<p>illicit,</p>
<p>“The question is whether you can GET really smart or if you just have to be born really smart.”</p>
<p>That’s one of the questions I see asked here. The first question was, do you need to be a genius to get into Harvard? The second question was (whether explicit or implicit), just what is a genius, anyway?</p>
<p>The question you cite is perhaps the easiest. Intellectual capacity is in the hand that you’re dealt. </p>
<p>Hard work will help you reach your own personal best. The same goes for someone with an IQ of 100 as for someone with an IQ of 150. If both work equally hard, the latter will outperform the former. Almost by definition. How far a person can go is certainly limited by the intellectual gifts with which he/she is born. How far they will get to their fulfilling their potential is limited to how hard they work.</p>
<p>And students admitted to Harvard are both highly intellectually gifted and very, very hard workers. Those are two of the several attributes for which Harvard is looking.</p>
<p>“On this thread most of us have been using the word ‘genius’ to refer to someone with an unusual level of natural intelligence who can learn whatever he wants quickly and with little effort.”</p>
<p>This is different from the previous question and is a little misleading. You can always make something tough enough to stump even the most brilliant person. My son took Physics 16 last semester, a tough course. He struggled. He got by. He got a good grade. During the first weeks of the class, it was clear that there were three or four students who were “physics geniuses.” The first weeks, they weren’t breaking a sweat. But as the course progressed and got increasingly difficult, even the “geniuses” bogged down in the struggle to keep up. The course became sufficiently difficult that no student was able to “learn whatever he want[ed] quickly and with little effort.”</p>
<p>“If it is in fact possible to become really smart through sheer effort then a very hard worker should not be at all disadvantaged compared to what we call a genius.”</p>
<p>No, it isn’t possible. You can only develop that with which you start off. That being said, a hard-working person with less initial intellectual capacity may well outperform someone who has more capacity but does little with it.</p>
<p>I think this thread suffers from a nebulous definition of “genius.”</p>
<p>Work with the definition. Because that’s what the thread is about.</p>
<p>Or the admits could be recruited athletes, development cases or legacies.</p>
<p>how do i get to scattergram?</p>
<p>notjoe, what you said might be true. It’s certainly in line with conventional wisdom about intelligence. But as far as I know there is no conclusive proof that there is such a thing as what you call “intellectual capacity” that is determined at birth by the genes you inherit. I cannot imagine a test for toddlers capable of measuring intelligence while normalizing for previous life experiences. </p>
<p>What does intellectual capacity even mean? Certainly it’s not specific knowledge. Is it the ability to learn new material? From my experience this skill is just as trainable as anything, and there is definitely no hard limit on, say, critical thinking. </p>
<p>I agree that if two 18-year-olds, one with IQ 100 and the other with IQ 150 both put 200 hours of equally rigorous study into learning theoretical physics, the 150 guy will come out far, far ahead. My problem is with automatically attributing this difference in learning speed to inborn intellectual capacity. I’d argue that nothing in a baby’s DNA dictates his IQ 18 years down the road.</p>
<p>illicit,</p>
<p>“I’d argue that nothing in a baby’s DNA dictates his IQ 18 years down the road.”</p>
<p>Then you’d argue with a great deal of research over the decades that suggeststhat intelligence is largely heritable, and that all things being equal, intellectual capacity (whatever the degree of heritability) isn’t something that one can give to oneself through diligent effort.</p>
<p>Even talking about “IQ” is to talk about intellectual capacity.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Standard Social Science Model</p>
<p>(you’re stuck in the 1900’s)</p>
<p>I have often debated the merit of a predetermined IQ or intelligence assigned genetically at birth. I don’t buy it. Let me tell you a little story:</p>
<p>When I was younger, my middle school diagnosed me as having ADHD; the school also claimed that I was mentally challenged. Neither of these claims turned out to be true. Although in hindsight, that could have been caused by bureaucracy and pharmaceutical corruption.</p>
<p>In high school, I nearly failed my freshmen year. Soon after, during my sophomore year, I scored a measly 160 on the PSAT.
Yet, in the two intervening years between then and now, I am positive that I have, indeed, gotten smarter.
First, there’s the evidence backed up by standardized testing: I was able to score a 2350 on the SAT with a perfect score on critical reading (a section I had previously deplored) as well as on math.
But, my reading speed also increased dramatically – I now read at a competitive level.
And, my comprehension skyrocketed – I can now understand complex material at twice or three times the prior rate.</p>
<p>How was I able to make such an astonishing leap from mediocrity to excellence?
I read voraciously. I worked tirelessly to improve my math and critical reading skills. I practiced memorization and recall. I mercilessly targeted weakness and exterminated them.</p>
<p>Is a 750 point jump on the SAT possible according to the College Board? They wouldn’t like you to think so.</p>
<p>Is intelligence, in fact, predetermined?
I don’t know for sure.</p>
<p>But what I can tell you is that if you believe your intelligence is predetermined, you’re likely to be the rule, not the exception.</p>
<p>I agree with most people on here however there are some undoubted geniuses at Harvard. A kid who’s currently at Harvard from my school last year was one of them. He could study physics, Calculus, anything and score perfectly. He studied for the Physics AP for a total of two hours and got a 5. He entered a national science competition to do research and placed in the top 10 among hundreds of thousands of applicants. And its a real competition where the winner recieves 100k. Even being in the top 10 pharmaceutical companies are buying his research and are actually going to use it. The kid is literally amazingly smart. But then I also know a girl who has a moderate amount of intelligence but definitely not a genius- and she just worked really hard and was able to get in.</p>
<p>Most studies suggest an improvement of 1 SD from age 13 to 17 is normal. </p>
<p>Son scored -2SD on 7th grade SAT (below 1200). So he was expected to score something below 1500 (M+V+W) in senior year of high school. Based on his standardized test scores and middle school curriculum evaluation, he was tracked for Alternative schooling (High school without honors and AP level courses). He was assigned an Alternative School GPA on a 4.0 scale as opposed to 5.0 for regular students.</p>
<p>Here is what happened at the end of high school, after refusing to attend an alternative school but stuck on a 4.0 gpa scale:</p>
<p>He was +2 SD in both 12th grade SAT (2150+) and 11th grade PSAT (213+). In other words he achieved a change of 4SD. He took 10+ AP courses. (Jr yr: 4,5,5,5,5). He took 10+ Honors courses. He scored 750 on both SAT II (Math II and Biology) Subject Tests. In addition, scored perfect scores on all state exit tests and has a lexile score above 1500. </p>
<p>I am not going to talk about the steps that were taken by the school admn. to make it look like he was not doing well in school to justify the low assigned alternative school gpa. that would prevent him from gaining auto admit to the state university. Humans do not fit these neat boxes that we would like to think they do. These are very dangerous ideas that are used to unnecessarily keep URMs out of the competition. (low gpa really?)</p>