<p>If I remember correctly I left the community service section blank for all my applications ... surprisingly didn't hurt me in the least bit.</p>
<p>I don't find it a big deal, I just don't see any of this as making that much of a difference in the end because admissions officers have to know a stacked application may or may not be entirely truthful.</p>
<p>Are you offended by "foundation" acceptances created by the universities to bring in donors?
Are you offended by parents who send their kids to private school and become trustees to help engineer their child through school insuring letters of recommendation from teachers and the principal? Then you watch as this game actually pays off and junior with a C average actually matriculates into a top school pushing someone else out? ( Couldn't do it without the help of the college though!)</p>
<p>Are you offended by parents who send their kids to Viet Nam where they stay at a luxurious hotel, take the tour and create an event of note out of the experience? </p>
<p>How about the parent who buys all of the hockey equipment, uniforms etc. and forms a league comprised of kids who play as poorly as his child does and purchases awards to give out to his own son with the coach on the payroll. (my personal favorite)</p>
<p>The list is endless. You can't fake the SAT's or AP scores though haha. But I guess that is why I blame the colleges for taking these students.</p>
<p>I don't see anything wrong with parents initiating a philanthropic project for their kids to get involved in. I think the parents do set the tone for this sort of involvement and the parents making it a priority sends a good message to the kids for the future. </p>
<p>Most teens needs a bit of a push in this direction.</p>
<p>coffee, I'm not offended by some of those examples; a better descriptor would be I have <em>disdain</em>. </p>
<p>The high roller donor- I don't care. They're contributing very valuable resources, even if it ain't their son, so in the end it benefits everyone. </p>
<p>The sports analogy- I'm assuming it isn't a school varsity team because I've never had exposure to a coach that's willing to <em>lose games</em> with substandard talent in a high school varsity environment- so who cares if some loser club team wants to be crappy to make some rich guy happy. I'm sure the colleges aren't impressed- if the kid wants to play ball with them, he better be good (they'll find out one way or the other).</p>
<p>The C student who gets into a top-notch college over an A student, strictly on the recommendation of the GC because his folks are on the BOT? Never heard of that, it would be a new one for me. I'd say that GC is going to start to lose her credibility if she does this too often.</p>
<p>The remainder (that leaves the all-expense luxury trip to Vietnam)- yeah, I kind of feel sorry for someone who goes to that kind of trouble just to pump up their kid. <em>I'm NOT talking about all kids who go to exotic locales- I'm using coffee's example in the strictest sense</em></p>
<p>Lily,
Yes it is great for parents to involve their kids in philanthropic work.<br>
The OP is referring to a situation where the parent manages a project and then encourages his kid to take credit for management and leadership that he did not do. This is akin to lying, IMO.</p>
<p>It's not lying to apply to college and get in because your parents give a lot of money, or because you're a legacy. That's just the way it is. And it's not lying to get into college because you took a bunch of prep classes and bumped up your SAT score by 400 points, whereas the poor guy down the block doesn't have that opportunity. It's not lying to get in with crappy grades and scores because you can run faster or throw a ball harder than any human has a right to. All those things may be "unfair" but they're part of the system, and students may legitimately take advantage of them. But allowing or encouraging your son or daughter to perjure herself on an application is a very slippery slope- not because of getting caught but because it sets up a precedence.</p>
<p>As far as mom and dad writing term papers and doing homework...those things are just as reprehensible. I'm not surprised that a parent who does those things would allow their kids to fabricate their level of involvment in a philanthropic project.</p>
<p>Edit: AllMusic made a very good point. A student who has been "engineered" by their parent will in most cases be unable to replicate their level of involvement or success in college. From a parenting and mentoring standpoint, it is in your child's best interest to do whatever is appropriate for developing themselves at their level of maturity and leadership. If that means something simple like collecting cans or poptabs, or being a camp counselor, or working their way up from stockboy to nightshift supervisor...those are the type of things that will inevitably give them a springboard to do even bigger and better things on their own. Doing a big project for them and giving them credite, is nice and will probably get you something in the short run, but not as useful for their own personal development.</p>
<p>"I am <em>not</em> assuming that every student is lying. I'm thinking specifically of cases where you know the person, or your kid knows the person, and you know they really did not spearhead a project."--doubleplay</p>
<p>Yes--that is what I meant by my "cynic" comment. If you're involved at all in community endeavors in your town or school, you soon learn who the volunteers are. It's a lot of the same folks who are the Girl Scout and Boy Scout leaders, PTO members, snack shack workers, sports team coaches, organizers and workers for the annual charity events, school service club members, etc. It just strikes me as rather suspicious that all of a sudden, in their kid's junior year, these parents plan a huge charity event or fundraiser for which their child receives much publicity. You've never seen hide nor tail of these folks before, so you have to wonder. It's possible they had an epiphany about the value of volunteerism, their life circumstances changed and they have more time to be involved, or they came across an issue that aroused their interest. No one knows for sure of course, but the timing is interesting. </p>
<p>Doubleplay is right about the scholarship issue. Competition for scholarships is pretty stiff. I can't speak for other places, but at our high school the majority of the local scholarships awarded are based on community service so there is some money to be made this way.</p>
<p>I did consider the fact that the end result is a good thing, regardless of any ulterior motives which may or may not be present.</p>
<p>emk -- send the stuffed turtle over this way. My kids never sell 800 boxes. They have lazy parents . . .</p>
<p>I teach HS. We all know who the parents are who do their kid's work. We have one mom who gave her son a fax machine as a HS grad gift so that she could continue to do his work for him at a local state school...no lie. </p>
<p>My DH coaches youth football. At the end of the season the coaching staff gets together to decide who gets awards. Well, one member of the staff was so sure that his son was deserving, inspite of the votes of the other 4 coaches, that he went to the trophy store, had one ingraved w/his son's name and "Best All Around" and snuck onto the awards banquet table unbeknownst to any of the other coaches. Then, the dad presented the trophy to the boy in front of 200 or so people and made it seem as though this award was truely earned. Oh...and this was a peewee team of 2nd, 3rd and 4th graders?</p>
<p>historymom -- Okay, I know someone who did some college work for her son who was attending one of the HYPSM. She and her hubby were very open about it. The husband told me his wife got an A- in the class! Gurg. And they are so proud of their <em>brilliant</em> son. <em>Brilliant</em> my . . . oh never mind!</p>
<p>But that second example -- is that true? So did everyone think the son got an award from the coaches? How did the Dad word his speech? Or did everyone, more likely, know what was going on and just didn't call him on it? At anyrate, amazing brazenness. That poor kid. What are the chances he'll turn out normal?</p>
<p>It really happened. No one but the Peewee coaches knew it at the time. Although many, like me, probably thought it was strange that the PW team gave out one trophy more than JV and Varsity. My DH coached JV and he got a call from the head pw caoch after the banquet. In order to not hurt the boy's feelings, I'm pretty sure that the number of people who know that his dad was behind it is fairly small. Though the head pw coach called the dad on it and he will not coach next year.</p>
<p>The speech went something like...</p>
<p>" This boy came out strong and really performed for us on both sides of the ball this year. He achieved (insert stats here) and that's whay we give the Best All Around award to ...." Big applause. </p>
<p>The audacity of some people astounds me. </p>
<p>I feel badly for the rest of this man's family. He has a very troubled older son, this 4th grader and a daughter going into 7th grade. She gets ignored and the boys seem to get conditional attention tied to their athletic performance. I don't know who has it worse. The mom tries to smooth things out for the kids but I think she's bullied too.</p>