<p>Side note: I don’t have prep school experience, but looking way back to college days, kids sat around the first few days on campus, chatting up their backgrounds, trying to compare who had what SAT score. That got old really fast. Anyone who sat around talking about SAT scores was discounted very quickly. I imagine the dialogue on SSAT’s will follow the same pattern at prep school. 99% on the SSAT won’t mean anything after the first day of classes. What have you accomplished today!</p>
<p>^^ I agree wholeheartedly. Doesn’t matter what you’ve done. Especially if your going from 8th to 9th. Middle school really doesn’t matter at all.</p>
<p>Yeah once you get to bs no one gives a crap about your old grades, or ssat scores, or what awards you’ve won, people look at you like you’re crazy if you even bring it up. All that matters is the person you are at the moment and how you present yourself.</p>
<p>Some of the people on here kind of annoy me…</p>
<p>“Many silver spoon types do not (although as gobigred states there are many privileged kids who are very motivated). It does seem like the majority of kids expelled are FP not FA.”</p>
<p>I wouldn’t quite call myself “silver spoon”, but I am FP and I work very hard in my private school, and I intend to work even harder at Andover because (1) I didn’t choose to go there (my family is moving for the 9th time and wanted to me have a constant place for the rest of my high school career so I applied to boarding school) and I want to make the best out of my situation. (2) To not do well in school would be to fail at all I strive for. Its not as if If don’t study until the night before or lose my homework a lot, but I try and I succeed. I am determined to prove to those around me I am a formidable arguing opponent and one to come to for advice. I personally HATE being generalized, because I know that if I don’t work hard in Private School, I’ll fall way behind and I’ll have wasted my parents money that they work hard for.</p>
<p>I will admit though that many of my rich friends tend to be less caring (like throwing the food they don’t want on the table and expecting the cleaning staff to pick it up) and make more work for others, but there are a ton of more privileged kids (like me) who (1) Don’t act selfishly and are very intelligent (I often have moral chats with them) and who (2) don’t get super good computers and TV’s in their rooms and private tutors because (1) their families understand they try hard and tutors would be a waste and (2) getting the best education and allowing their family to gain a more “global understanding” by traveling. For example, when my sisters and I were young, they decided to travel with us and provide the best education they could rather than spoil us with technology and such.</p>
<p>I do not take what I get for granted because I know I could just as easily have been born into a lower family and I have seen extreme poverty during my trips to help oversee and set up the Girl’s Education Mission in Tanzania.
I think most expelled kids are FP because their entire life they are told to uphold all these standards, and they feel oppressed by them so they act out in ridiculous ways.
FA kids tend to have had harsher lives in general, so they understand what happens when you act out.</p>
<p>I am a FP candidate and I will be the first to say that FP students take more for granted. When god gives you everything you ask for people tend to take things for granted. I am not saying this is you. I am not saying this is me. It applies to most FP candidates…</p>
<p>No reason to get irate about that fact of life… </p>
<p>Edit: And believe me I know what rich kids act like… People around my community are spoiled rich, like burning plastic.</p>
<p>Benevolent: Me, contentious? You do know that the word “contentious” is generally applied to topics, right? Unless I all of a sudden become a popular subject on CC I think a better way to describe me would be as a “devil’s advocate” or maybe as just “argumentative” if you feel like being an ass about it</p>
<p>I just think that it’s funny at this point, now that everyone has accepted that rich kids are generally given more opportunities, that the rich kids on this board need to take it one step further and make all these ridiculous claims about lower class families. Jasmyn, the jail types you talk about are, I would assume, not the types who would be cut out for boarding school in the first place, and whoever it was who asserted that lower class families have more familial disputes than upper class families, take a hike. You guys watch too many movies</p>
<p>how would being FP have you more distracted , if anything FA kids might worry if they are dragging down on their families economic situation and often come from public schools that arent very strict on rules and so those kids are more misbehaved. usually the FP students would come from strict families or private schools that are very formal. just a guess.</p>
<p>Well, in all fairness, 40% of FP applicants got into Exeter this year. I still can’t believe she fell into the top 40% but still… I guess we’ll have to have istoleyournose and the various other Exeter CCers verify her existence</p>
<p>may i just say that i AM FA??? that i DIDN’T meant to sound elitist especially because i am NOT rich??? that i ASKED to not be ripped to shreds if my guess happed sound incorrect??? that i am NOT saying that the poor are stupid??? </p>
<p>i was just trying to make a guess as to why FA vs. FP admissions at need-blind schools were not consistent with the numbers that applied, as per the stats that appeared before me on this thread, in a way that made a little bit of sense. the stats probably were not accurate.</p>
<p>Wow TomTheCat, sorry that I’m not a genious. Not everyone that goes to top schools has 99% SSAT’s. Man, you got to cool down. If all BS kids are as condescending as you, then I really ought to reconsider.</p>
<p>will you seriously ignore any sort of sense that my thought made in order to insult me and call me “elitist”. it’s really stupid, especially considering that there is no way in hell i could ever afford BS on my own, even plane tickets and supplies will be a stretch. </p>
<p>you have transformed my opinion into an attack on non-rich people (which includes me).</p>
<p>MY OPINION, in its purest form:
Obviously intelligence is not based on wealth. there have been so many crazy smart/talented people who were very poor (i.e. Michael Jordan).
However, someone who comes from a rich family is MORE LIKELY to be raised with ideas about BS, and have ample time to spend lots of extra money that most people do not have on things to pad their applications.
admissions officers are NOT omniscient. are you s***ing me? if they come across a super-EC candidate that has years of experience in a myriad activities they will pass them up just because they probably started them with BS in mind? that is ludicrous.
Aditionally, don’t tell me that if your BS education makes an Ivy education more possible, and you become very successful, you will not try to provide your child(ren) with every opporotunity to join an activity that could potentially help their application. </p>
<p>yes, you have a chip on your shoulder. we can all see that you both have drive and determination that did not spring from gobs of money. looking down at rich people will get you nowhere.</p>
<p>yes, they can see padding, but what exactly is wrong with it? if i had known about BS (outside of Hogwarts which I DID hold out for until my 11th birthday) early on, i WOULD hav padded my app. there’s a reason people pad. it helps. and if your posts on other threads are correct, you have an ungodly (meaning it makes everyone else feel insignificant) amount of ECs which is, essentially (even if you had no intention of it being), padding.</p>