Family Gets Lesson in Admissions

Parents Forum
481

<p>"But where's the glory in ascending the scouting pinnacle? No one earns $100,000, gets his name publicized in a national newspaper, or saunters into Princeton for that. Wonder what would happen to scouting if they did."</p>

<p>In small towns and cities, teens get their names in the paper for things like that. Heck, where I live, someone was on the front page after becoming an Eagle Scout. If one lives in a small city or town, what's in one's local paper is more impressive than getting one's name in a national paper that probably few in one's town read.</p>

<p>The more difficult and rare that an achievement is, the greater the likelihood that it will get national attention, which is the way that the world works.</p>

482

<p>In our area, kids drop out of scouts in middle school because to stay in makes one a social pariah. Eagle Scouts are mocked. I give the boys who stay in a tremendous amount of credit for doing so. They have to take a great deal of teasing & tormenting. It's no more work than plenty of other activities, so I don't think that scares them away. Also, plenty of conflicts arise with sports as the boys get older.</p>

483

<p>You are correct that is some areas of the country those that remain in scouting into their high school years take a lot of teasing at best, downright ridicule at worst. But this is not true everywhere.</p>

<p>I've been told that admissions counselors prize Eagle Scout credentials as much (or more) than President of the Class or Captain of the varsity sports team. I suspect this is because they know Scouting is a long term commitment -- you don't just breeze in, get a few kudos, and move on. Instead it requires commitment and staying power. I've seen some kids pushed through Eagle by well-meaning parents, but in most cases if the kids don't really want to be there they quit despite a parent's objection.</p>

<p>What's valuable about Scouting in general, and Eagle Scouting in particular, is that it teaches so many life values -- discipline, commitment, honor, ability to work with others, self-reliance, and so on.</p>

<p>Kudos to those kids that go through it all the way to Eagle. I think I read (or heard) that only about 2% of kids who start Scouting (whether Cubs or Boy Scouts) actually get their Eagle. But what is great about Scouting is that it is ubiquitous -- there are Scouting troops in urban areas, suburban areas, and even in the disadvantaged areas. Granted their activities and opportunities within the troop may vary, but the system accommodates for that and everyone has essentially an equal opportunity. There are troops of predominantly Christian kids, others that are Jewish and Muslim as well.(Before someone say, but in "ghetto X" there is no troop, note that I am speaking of the vast majority of places, not in absolutes.</p>

<p>Bottom line is that Scouting is an important EC (as are Girl Scouts and 4H) that most can participate in.</p>

484

<p>My D's GS troop graduated 7 seniors this year, 5 of whom earned the Gold Award. My S's BSA troop graduated 6 seniors, all 6 earned their Eagle. I know my D didn't hide the fact that she was a Senior Girl Scout but she didn't broadcast it to the general populace either. She certainly put it on her college applications that she was a continuous member of GSUSA starting in 1993 as a Daisy....</p>

485

<p>Originaloog.</p>

<p>As I said there's prepping and there's prepping. And in between the two there's a whole gamut of possibilities. S2 did take the SAT for CTY in 7th grade. For the "real SAT," all he read was the 10RealSATs. $30, maybe a couple of hours. I consider that prepping. As opposed to my going cold into the GRE, which in retrospect was very silly of me.
Then there are the kids in the school who get some free tutoring from college kids. I don't know how effective that is, but it's till prepping. Then there are the parents with vocab flash cards, stop watches, etc... Again, probably not a $750 outlay, but still prepping. Then there are the expensive but general classes and lastly there are the one-on-one tutoring that can cost several thousand dollars. In fact, the parents with the flash cards may spend as much time prepping their kid as expensive personalized tutor. Cost in and of itself is not a good gauge of how extensive the prepping is. </p>

<p>The same kind of fuzziness attaches to the term "packaging." </p>

<p>On top of that, kids who have been given access to different kinds of resources and made the most of them get lumped with kids whose life has been scripted by college counselors and stage managing parents. </p>

<p>This may be why this thread is so circular.</p>

486

<p>Marite, you are exactly right. From the time we teach our kids to tie their shoes we’re on the road toward getting them out of the nest. But there is a line that’s crossed when parental guidance becomes packaging and gaming the system. I’m not sure where it is, but I can recognize it, or suspect it, every once in a while. Who was it who said “I know porn when I see it”? Sort of the same thing.</p>

487

<p>


You could say "circular". It feels a bit more like Groundhog Day to me.</p>

488

<p>Cur: I did not watch Groundhog Day, so I could not make a reference to the movie. :)
Doubleplay: Yes, of course, except that what got banned in Boston did not get banned in many other cities. Very much a case of depending on the eyes of the beholder.</p>

489

<p>Marite made the point I was trying to make so much more elegantly - thank you. I guess I was astonished to find all of those things lumped together and was questioning the bounderies. There are some of us so far removed from "packaging" that we'd have to go 200 miles to find anyone who knew what the heck we were talking about. Even the idea of studying for the SAT is foreign to me because my H and I sure didn't and didn't know anyone who did - but I'm kind of warming up to the idea that it's probably not all bad to be just a little pro-active. Reading this thread has obviously opened my eyes to the excesses that abound in the one-upsmanship arena, and I was trying to define the limits in my own mind. How far is too far? I apologize if I'm coming in on a conversation you've all had before - just trying to figure it all out.</p>

490

<p>Backfin:</p>

<p>There is no right or wrong way, really. Each kid is different. Some need nagging to do their homework, some don't. Some cram for their finals and do well, others study regularly. Some are anxious, and others nerveless (I have one of each). I had a roommate who pulled an all-nighter and produced an excellent 30-page paper. I could not do that in a million years.
What has been a bone of discussion (contention) is to what extent the kid in the article benefitted from dad's connections and dad's expertise as his SAT scores seemed weak for an Intel finalist.
I am only speaking for myself, but I personally don't see prepping for the SAT as unethical, whether it is with flash cards or by paying someone thousands of dollars. Giving a kid an advantage that many others do not, yes, but there are so many other ways that life is unfair.
Personally, I think it's really unfair that I'm not any taller. But c'est la vie.</p>

491

<p>"I am only speaking for myself, but I personally don't see prepping for the SAT as unethical, whether it is with flash cards or by paying someone thousands of dollars. "</p>

<p>I agree. It would be unethical to cheat on the SAT, but prepping to get the best score possible is no more unethical than is studying hard and getting a tutor in one's academic courses.</p>

492

<p>
[quote]
From the time we teach our kids to tie their shoes we’re on the road toward getting them out of the nest. But there is a line that’s crossed when parental guidance becomes packaging and gaming the system. I’m not sure where it is, but I can recognize it, or suspect it, every once in a while. Who was it who said “I know porn when I see it”? Sort of the same thing.

[/quote]
doubleplay, nicely put. I haven't worried too much about the unethical part in this thread, just because I am sure no one on cc would be unethical:). It's the just when does providing support turn to driving them, and just when does driving them turn to packaging them, and at what point for which kids do you do them service or disservice? </p>

<p>Very complicated. And face it, we've all been dealing with this from the moment someone told us to let them cry through the night, and we said no, that's not my values. Or someone else told someone else nursing was the only way, and they said, no, that's not my values. At some point you have a right to do it your way with your values. And at some point, you have to question your values to see if they are really in support of your kids.</p>

<p>All along the way.</p>

493

<p>Prepping is not unethical, but a high level of prepping -- through private tutoring and courses -- skews the results in terms of comparison among students, and favors students with more resources. It is simply not a level playing field. </p>

<p>I mean, it is not unethical to give a kid $1000 every month as an allowance, but if a school held an auction, the kid with the big allowance would be easily able to outbid all the kids who have no allowances or only modest allowances. And if I were to opine that the parents of the kid with the $1000 monthly allowance are overindulgent, it would not necessarily imply a criticism of the family that gives their kid $25 a week. There is a spectrum running from minimal to reasonable to excessive. </p>

<p>We see kids on this board retaking the SATs multiple times to boost an already high score even higher. When the colleges are comparing the scores of untutored kids to extensively prepped kids, they are in a sense comparing apples to oranges. They do not know which kids have been tutored and they do not know how the untutored kids would score if they had more test preparation. So they are making a purportedly objective judgment based on a test that in reality is extremely subjective, based on the circumstances under which it is administered. Of course there is no way for the colleges to know which kids are which. (I think the test prep issue actually came up because someone commented that the ~1380 that the USA Today All Star kid had could have been unprepped -- and I pointed out that the the picture showed that kid owned a lot of prep books, so he probably had studied -- but that had absolutely nothing to do with "packaging" - which is a different issue entirely).</p>

<p>But the "packaging" issue is the same: it occurs along a spectrum of minimal to excessive. If a parent suggests that their kid volunteer a few weekends at the local homeless shelter because it would "look good" for colleges, that is very different from the parent who comes up with an idea for a charitable cause and then goes out and charters a nonprofit association, gets their rich friends to donate a few thousand, and sets their kid up as the founder. Which was pretty close to what allegedly happened in the Blair Horstine case, along with the plagiarism and manipulation of GPA to achieve valedictory status. </p>

<p>At some point a line is crossed between what is reasonable and what is out of line. We can differ as to where that line is -- but I don't see how it can be argued that the line doesn't exist.</p>

494

<p>
[quote]
As opposed to my going cold into the GRE, which in retrospect was very silly of me.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>I took the GRE's in the early 70s. I didn't know anyone who prepped for them, and, in fact, I was unaware that there even WERE prep books. (I'm sure there were none published by ETS at that time, because (a) they were not yet under duress to publish their tests and (b) they steadfastly asserted that test preparation didn't affect scores.)</p>

<p>There were some 3rd party prep books for the GRE back then, but there certainly weren't any available to me in the small college town. The only bookstore in town was the small college bookstore, which carried very little besides required texts and a few reference books. </p>

<p>So I went into the GRE's blissfully unaware that there was such a thing as a test prep book. In effect, my only test prep for the GRE was having taken the SAT (once) four years before! (No test prep for that either, except for the PSAT--which was true "prep" in those days, since it was a separate test from the NMSQT, National Merit Scholarship Qualifying Test. In the late 60s, PSATs were given in fall of junior year, and NMSQT in February of junior year. Students could also take the NMSQT for practice, unofficially, in sophomore year. Our school required all sophomores to do this.)</p>

<p>That was, in retrospect, a completely adequate amount of test prep. I suppose there were people who did more than that (with unofficial third party books) but I was blissfully unaware of them.</p>

<p>And I'm glad I was blissfully unaware of the possibility of additional test prep. </p>

<p>I spent my free time happily and voraciously reading all kinds of interesting and stimulating books (which, in retrospect, is the best and most valuable "test prep" I know for the verbal part of the SAT) and helping younger siblings with their freshman algebra and sophomore geometry homework (in retrospect, helping my siblings was probably the best possible test prep I could have gotten for the math part of the SAT--but I didn't realize it at the time--I just did it because I enjoyed helping them.)</p>

495

<p>"But where's the glory in ascending the scouting pinnacle? No one earns $100,000, gets his name publicized in a national newspaper, or saunters into Princeton for that. Wonder what would happen to scouting if they did."</p>

<p>I think scouting is wonderful, but I really don't get why there seems to be so much hostility to science competition winners or why anyone would think that being an Eagle Scout is an accomplishment on a par with being the Intel STS winner.</p>

<p>Eagle Scout (and the Girl Scout Gold award, I think it is) is an outstanding accomplishment that says as much about a person's character as it does their accomplishments, but I would guess nationally that there are hundreds, even thousands of Eagle Scouts a year. </p>

<p>I am not picking on the poster I quoted above, but all the cynicism toward kids who have a passion for science is really disheartening. </p>

<p>The ONE Intel winner per year is selected over some remarkably gifted and accomplished young people, and is grilled for days by Nobel Laureates and other leading scientists, in the areas of their expertise. It's not just factual questions that can be memorized; they get asked questions that involve applying scientific concepts to everyday life or to hypothetical situations, or that require the student use reasoning and creativity to suggest solutions to complex issues in science. </p>

<p>Frankly, I have a hard time believing any of us at home has a better fix on the scientific potential of children we've never even met, than a panel of people like the Nobel laureate discoverer of dark matter, who have personally interviewed each child, and been able to ask whatever they wanted. </p>

<p>Also, I don't understand how anyone who understands reliability in measurement can that think the Science Service (who adminsters the STS for Intel, as they did for Westinghouse since the 1940s) does such a horrid job at selecting the honorees or is so easy to fool. The years have shown that the Science Services' evaluations stand the test of time; they have high inter-rater reliability, even when ratings are taken at long intervals.</p>

<p>In lay terms, the Intel winners go on as adults to win more than their share of the most prestigious science awards, including the Nobel. Watson (of DNA-discovering Watson and Crick fame) has called being an Intel finalist the single best predictor (mathematically) of whether someone will go on to win the Nobel prize. If it was really just all about having someone hand you a paper, or getting a big-name mentor to give you access to working on a hot topic, you simply would notsee large numbers of these kids remaining at the top of their fields throughout very long and challenging careers. </p>

<p>For those of you who think that $100,000 is excessive for the Intel winner, consider this. The hundreds, perhaps even thousands, of athletes on full-ride scholarship to most high dollar private schools are getting double (about $200K) what the Intel awards to the ONE winner per year. </p>

<p>Are we really supposed to resent an amazing young woman like Shannon Babb for getting HALF of what we wouldn't bat an eyelash about, if only she could kick a 50 year field goal or bat .350, instead of just spending a big chunk of her adolescence researching an issue with significant public health implications for rural communities?</p>

496

<p>


As is your seeming antipathy to athletes and idolization of these Intel competition or fair , I don't know the diffeerence, kids. I'm sure some are smart. Real smart, but that does not mean they are more accomplished than other equally smart and differently accomplished applicants. Different folks see things differently.</p>

<p>If you are actually trying to say these kids are the best and the brightest , well - we'll see how that works out for you. ;) (garland, I told you it gets to me , too. :( Try as I may. And believe me, I'm trying. )</p>

<p>If you don't mind (since most of us have said where our kids fall on this line) would you disclose the source of your intricate interest and knowledge of what you discuss , Intel award winners?</p>

497

<p>I actually think the Intel contest picked the winner for interesting reasons this time. The guy who got 2nd really deserved to win--his mathematics-related project was brilliant--but the girl who won seemed to have gotten the prize for political reasons. She's probably brilliant too but my point is that even Intel rewards kids who better society through their talents--not just for their passion for science and math. The girl's project was more useful for society than the 2nd place mathematician's. See? Even your beloved Intel is conceding that pure genius isn't the point of life...There has to be some sort of social conscience to what you do, and Intel decided to reward that. Maybe the Eagle Scouts got something right after all...</p>

498

<p>conyat #495 -- very nicely said</p>

499

<p>The kid we were talking about is NOT the Intel winner. Someone pointed out to me about a 50 or so posts back that there are two separate "Intel" competitions, one which apparently is more prestigious than the other, and the kid who was the subject of the article was one of many who participated in the bigger, less prestigious contest who qualified for finalist or semifinalist or whatever he was. </p>

<p>The question isn't the value of the award, it is one of how much parental involvement there might have been, both in terms of prodding and in terms of helping. I have nothing against 5th grade science fairs either, but it's pretty obvious that some of the science projects at that level are put together by the fathers, simply from the carpentry skills involved in assembling the boxes or gadgetry on display. The kid who wins the prize isn't always the one who is the most capable.</p>

<p>Xiggi did some internet sleuthing and found the paper the kid wrote for the project which specifically acknowledged the father's contributions. What we don't know is how much the father may have contributed. I am sure that Intel must have some rules, but I'll bet whatever rules they have are frequently broken by overzealous parents. Somewhere earlier on this thread there was a big brouhaha over parents who fill in all the college app forms for their kids because they decide that their kids are "too busy" with their high school courses and EC's to have time for all that typing. Apparently, if the kid is "busy" enough with something seen by the parent as more important, then the parents think it only natural for them to pitch in and pick up the slack. I would assume that parents of science competitors might think the same thing - if their kid was "too busy" that month with school or athletics or running the charity they created, then the science competition parent might help out with recording data, or working out mathematical formulaes, or typing the paper up, or checking citations to other research, or whatever else that parent figured was o.k. since obviously their kid can't be expected to handle all of his myriad responsibilities all by himself. If daddy happens to be a scientist he can help; if not, then the kid is going to have a problem when he is up against a deadline and has all the other obligations. </p>

<p>So, at least for me, a tell-tale sign of too much parental participation and involvement is when the kid's resume seems to have too many accomplishments in it for one kid to do all by himself during years consisting of 24 hour days. I personally think it would be pretty hard to do everything required to become an Eagle scout at the same time as doing serious scientific research (and attending a high school while taking the most challenging courseload possible), but maybe I am mistaken about either the level of commitment required for scouting or for the research. </p>

<p>My own kids were handicapped by having two parents who were generally "too busy" with their own careers, so if they ran into problems with deadlines or competing activities, they generally had to drop or cut back in some area, unless they could find some other kid to cover for them. The list of activities my daughter dropped because of time conflicts is probably much longer than the list of things she could stick with, and generally when she insisted on keeping up with too many things at once, she ended up with a subsidiary or reduced role in some of the things. It was fairly easy for her to participate in many different things, but it it was not possible for her to be #1 in everything. </p>

<p>So that's where my personal skepticism comes in. I just don't believe that there are enough hours in a day for some kids to have accomplished some of the things they claim to have accomplished, without getting a lot of help from somewhere.</p>

500

<p>See post #227. Conyat's D was a finalist this year. yes...this thread is very circular!</p>

<p>Curm -- I think you have indicated in prior posts that you were not familiar with Intel/STS when your d would have been at the right time in her HS academic career to work on a project and submit. In retrospect, if you had known about it, and with her interest in medical studies, do you think you would have shared the information about it with her to see if she had any interest in seeking a mentor, preparing a project, and entering the competition?</p>