<p>very smart, neongreen.</p>
<p>The best advice I have is to get off of college confidential. It can be addictive, and you will spend time discussing what to do to get into a good school instead of actually doing it. At the very least restrict your posts to once every 6 months or so until you get to junior year.</p>
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<li>Get off CC and don’t come back until after January 2013</li>
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<p>Secret Asian Man: haha. I am SO getting off this website. It’s a waste of time. I only joined because i had a couple of questions, and apparently you’re not allowed to delete ur account. So, farewell I guess. :))</p>
<p>I disagree with the other CCers. I think you should be conscientious of your grades and what you do at this point, but not to the point where it takes over your life. Definitely start taking APs ASAP and all that good stuff. Do summer programs, such as that JHU program you were talking about. I, more importantly, think now is the time to build a strong circle of friends. Having a group of people to chill with and fall back on is ESSENTIAL to building who you are. I can’t tell you how profoundly my friends have impacted me. I started high school trying to be popular, so I didn’t really have a good group of friends. New Year’s Eve sophomore year I was ditched by my “best” friend and other “good” friends. I don’t think I can fully describe how terrible of a feeling it is to go through that. My entire world was flipped upside down. Please take this to heart. Find your friends. Make sure they are GOOD, NOT necessarily GOING places. What I mean is you will notice that you will be excelling in your classes, where as others may not be. A good friend may not be successful academically, but they may be that person who is willing to pick you up if you are stuck in a bad neighborhood at 2 in the morning. The people you associate with will hold much greater value than simply keeping your face in the books ALL the time (even though you will be most of the time). Get out. Have fun. Make SINCERE friends. Get good grades. Then maybe you will get into MIT. We shall see huh?</p>
<p>From “What High Schools Don’t Tell You”:</p>
<p>“I have seen that a large percentage of teenagers - even those at the top of their class - fell directionless, jaded,or depressed, and only work when badgered or bribed. There’s little correlation between school and fun in their lives. And they see so little hope of achieving their dreams that most have simply abandoned them or settled for less…”</p>
<p>and then she spends the book talking about hundreds of opportunities for kids, ways to get involved in arts, science, travel. It sounds like fun.</p>
<p>And while going outside, as K4r3n2 suggests, can be fun, too, I don’t understand the negative reaction to this book. It sounds like the author is concerned about the SAME things you are concerned about, Mikalye.</p>
<p>geomom - I don’t see why these thoughts conflict. Yes, one can enjoy school, enjoy the work s/he’s doing, etc - but that doesn’t mean that it’s all fun and games. How can it, with grades and deadlines and exams and expectations? The point is that it’s good to have a release where you don’t have to worry about how your performance is going to affect your future.</p>
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<p>I don’t think other CCers were telling the OP to not maintain decent grades.</p>
<p>That said, I don’t think “take x do y focus on making friends” is the right answer, anyway. The focus should not be on getting into MIT. The focus should be on yourself as a person - explore your interests, take classes that you think you’ll like. If you end up being the type of person that would fit at MIT, great, apply! If not, great, don’t apply! Personal development, all that, etc. As for the focus on a social circle thing - I don’t necessarily disagree per se, but the idea of focusing on a social circle lends too easily to building popularity, people-pleasing, etc. I find my strongest friendships emerge when I’m - oh god the cliche - being myself and having fun my way.</p>
<p>I don’t see why these things conflict either, Piper, but K4r3n2, does:</p>
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<p>All the book does is outline a lot of great ways to explore your interests.</p>
<p>The OP introduced the book as something that was instructing her on ways to get into a good college. The vast majority of the books that I’ve read to this effect are full of ways to make yourself stand out from the crowd / differentiate yourself from other applicants, as though if you don’t do these things, you’ll never get into college. Maybe I’m wrong about this particular book, but I don’t understand how it’s <em>not</em> preying on students’ fears to say ‘these are the things that you have to do in order to get into college’.</p>
<p>Sure, I could be completely wrong. This book could encourge you to explore your interests and say that you will get into a college as long as you’re passionate and do things that you love, and it could even concede that you can get into a good school if you don’t do any of these activities or join any of these clubs. But somehow, I doubt it does. In fact, I bet that it, like most books like this, markets itself as a sort of recipe book for getting into a top 10 school. I bet that it tells you that you won’t get into a good school without a ‘hook’. And I bet that it certainly doesn’t give a list of ways to explore your interests as ‘these are things that kids who like math and science and other things typically enjoy’, choosing instead the more popular ‘these are things that colleges look for / these are things that will make your application stand out’.</p>
<p>Sure, I could be wrong about this particular book. Maybe it is different from every other book out there on the college application process. Maybe this is the singular book that doesn’t seek to make you paranoid that you will never be able to get into college. But somehow, with a title like “What High Schools Don’t Tell You (And Other Parents Don’t Want You to Know): Create a Long-Term Plan for Your 7th to 10th Grader for Getting into the Top Colleges”, I don’t think that I am.</p>
<p>The most interesting and engaging students that I’ve ever met never had a plan beyond ‘go somewhere that I fit in and that will challenge me’. They didn’t obsess about books, they didn’t join clubs or activities in order to help their college applications, and they certainly didn’t have long-term plans starting in 7th to 10th grade. And these are the students that I meet at MIT. So, ultimately it’s your call, but I personally find these books disgusting.</p>
<p>So suppose you have a plan to ‘go somewhere that I fit in and will challenge me,’ but you don’t know where that is (you’re just pretty sure it’s not your mediocre high school). Wouldn’t you find a book that lists hundreds of camps, summer programs, etc. helpful? Wouldn’t you like a book that gives advice on how to approach someone who runs a lab to ask for an internship?</p>
<p>The OP didn’t ask for ways to get into MIT, she asked how to prepare for MIT. That actually seems to be a good way to think about it. She didn’t sound paranoid to me, she sounded young and eager.</p>
<p>Sorry you found a book you’ve never read disgusting. Perhaps you should give books (and people) a little more benefit of the doubt.</p>
<p>^^^ I’m pretty sure she can google ‘math summer programs’ or ‘science enrichment programs’ or ‘how to program’ or ‘physics brainteasers’ or any number of variations.</p>
<p>Personally, I find the internet a much better source of information than a book, especially since I can quickly search for biases or contradicting information, and I can even search databases that verify their information before including it. Add to the fact that the internet is free, and I don’t see any reason why you would ever need a book to tell you what to do when you can easily and inexpensively find it out on your own. This does, of course, take a lot more initiative than walking down to the bookstore and looking for a book to tell you what to do. I suppose I had a lot more motivation than most people.</p>
<p>Then again, I would have been extremely upset if my parents had suggested that I do any sort of an extracurricular activity in order to get into college. I respect the OP for coming and asking for advice, and I’m glad that it wasn’t her mother asking for advice for her daughter. I suppose I’m more offended by the assertion that it is a parent’s job to start preparing his or her child in 7th grade for college.</p>
<p>I also suppose when the OP asserted that I had no idea what the college admissions process was like and that I needed to read this book, that also struck a nerve. Although it was nice how I gained credibility immediately after informing her that I had already been admitted to, and am currently attending, MIT.</p>
<p>Clearly we have differing opinions on what is necessary to gain admission to a top-10 university. I still think that the best thing that a student can do is to be independent and to do research on what interests them, and to take full advantage of the opportunities presented to them. And, if they choose to read one of these books, I would like them to know that the books are trying to sell copies, and that they don’t necessarily have their best interests in mind. I don’t want any student to come away thinking that, if he or she hasn’t read these books, they will never gain admission. I can see where you’re coming from, in finding the book a valuable resource. I just think that there are far, far, FAR better resources out there, even if they take a bit more effort to use.</p>
<p>Hahahahahah k4r3n2, you are my hero. :P</p>
<p>geomom - Ah, I missed what this thread was about. That’s what I get for just reading the last response of it. I don’t know if anything in this book would particularly set me off, but how-to-get-into-college books often seem to lean to the “How to get your unborn fetus into Harvard by plotting his/her life “perfectly”.”</p>
<p>I wonder how many readers of such books actually end up at top universities, because of all the conversations I’ve had with people about how we ended up at MIT, I’ve never heard, “Well, my mommy read this book…”</p>
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<p>Ah, that’s just what they want you to think.
j/k</p>
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<p>I know what you’re getting at, but at the same time, I think it’s dumb to be so prudish about where one gets their information (book vs. internet) or about making long-term plans. I see this conceit on this board about being “pure of heart”, where one would never look at a college admissions book, take a practice SAT (or, horrors, a test review course), or consider what colleges want in their decision-making. The truth about most top students is that, yes, they are truly passionate about academics, but they also want to present themselves in a form which will maximize the reward from their talents.</p>
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<p>I think the outrage that you sense from so many people here is not that people get information from a book, or that people attempt to make long term plans. Rather, there are many people here who are vaguely outraged at the fear, uncertainty and doubt that are fed by the producers of such books. There are undoubtedly some good ones, but most exist by fanning the fear that you will never get into the college of your choice, and then explaining how if you only follow their plans, you suddenly will. </p>
<p>Those who know more about the admissions process know that gaming the system usually doesn’t work at the top schools, and that these books work to develop feelings of inadequacy in an effort to sell more books. In this regard, they are very similar to those spam ads for p3nis enlargement pills on the internet, in they are designed to make you feel inadequate in order to sell you a product that will not actually do that much to assist with the nonexistent problem that they have identified.</p>
<p>Now as I have said in an earlier post in this thread, I cannot comment on the specific book discussed (though I share k4r3n2’s suspicion that any such book which even mentions 7th grade on the cover is unlikely to be good), but there are several MIT students and alums posting on this thread and they are universally rejecting the idea that you HAVE to follow some laid out plan in order to “Demonstrate your independent thought like thousands of other candidates.”</p>
<p>Yeah, but people have begun to game the system by learning how to act like they aren’t gaming the system (i.e., vapid talk about passions, etc.)</p>
<p>My philosophy is that you can’t perform at a high level unless you both have passion and talent, obviating the need to try to subjectively assess MIT-worthiness of admission candidates by whether they appear to be trying too hard to please people/colleges.</p>
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<p>This is certainly true, but one of the things that makes MIT what it is, is that it is highly evidence-based. Hence, the issue is always less about how you discuss what you feel strongly about, and much more about how you evidence this behaviour. Certainly, when I am interviewing,“vapid talk about passions” doesn’t go very far. And indeed, I have seen myself that CollegeAlum314 is right, people are waffling on more about their “passions” than they were even a few years ago, and unless they are producing staged versions of the last days of Christ, then I am just not buying it.</p>
<p>And that is the crux of it. When I look back at the accepted students that I have interviewed, and even the waitlisted ones, I have never had to struggle to find evidence of what drives the candidate, what excites them, how they have expanded on that, whereas with many of the bolt-on interest candidates, I really do.</p>
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<p>This, this, completely this. Also, ha, re: the analogy to spam ads 
I suppose I could make the argument that scientists and engineers need the sort of inherent creativity and curiosity that can’t be taught, and that, since you’re <em>highly</em> unlikely to find a how-to book entitled ‘How to Get an A in Every MIT Class’, you should start being independent early. But really, they just feel like the snake-oil of my generation, and yes, that bothers me on a very deep and personal level.</p>
<p>Also, for the record, I don’t think that anyone who wasn’t genuinely passionate about learning would be even remotely happy or successful at MIT. As far as ‘gaming the system’ goes, I’d point you to the collection of Rush videos on Youtube (search ‘$any MIT dorm REX video’ to see them) to see just how genuine our passion is.</p>
<p>Since I was the first one to bring up this book, I feel I should clarify. I met the author BEFORE she was an author… when she was another mom who had 2 kids who were bright in science and math. She was asked to share the experiences her two boys had while in high school. She addressed a group of parents of middle school kids who were taking part in a weekend program which was introducing them to more complex math than they would get in school (number theory and such). Her boys had completed this program a few years earlier and the professor running the program invited her to speak.</p>
<p>The idea for the book may have resulted from all the questions we deluged her with about resources and programs that our math-centered kids would enjoy – many in the audience weren’t thinking about college at that point (mine was a 6th grader!) but we were looking for advice on solid math/science programs that weren’t simply “write a check and you’re in” kind of thing.</p>
<p>That’s why I mentioned the book to the youngster who seemed eager to find such programs. It’s not the typical Get Your Kids Into the Ivy League kind of book.</p>