The Advantaged are now The Disadvantaged

Pre-College Topics High School Life
1

<p>Here is my reasoning:</p>

<p>If you are a successful black, hispanic, or native american high school student, then you have overcome the negative stereotypes and accompanying discrmination associated with your ethnicity and defied odds to achieve your high school goals. You are "Highly Desirable" to colleges.</p>

<p>If you are a successful student with a disability, physical or learning, then you have overcome that disability, the jeers and taunts of your peers and the challenges of getting good grades or excelling at sports. You are "Highly Desirable" to colleges.</p>

<p>If you are a successful student born in the slums and surrounded by gang activity, you have overcome the difficulties presented by your environment and a lack of opportunities. You are "Highly Desirable" to colleges.</p>

<p>If your parents have never gone to college, you are a pioneer, a blazer, someone who has worked independently to achieve more than his or her forefathers. You are "Highly Desirable" to colleges.</p>

<p>But what about your everyday White-as-Wonderbread girl whose parents are relatively well off, who lives in suburbia, attends an average school, is pretty and popular and quite smart? What about your Asian Geek who attends a Magnet or IB, whose parents are computer programmers, who can afford 80 dollar piano lessons and has been in SAT prep classes for the last 3 years? These kids were born advantaged, but they were also born disadvantaged just because they had no obstacles to overcome. Faced with no stereotypes, disabilities, or lack of resources, their main obstacle is themselves -- their challenge is simply to be extraordinary. To be a great student is not enough for these folks. </p>

<p>But just as a congenital quadruple amputee or the daughter of illiterate 18 year olds does not ask to be born with those circumstances, neither does the wealthy jewish kid with lawyers for parents ask to be born in his circumstances.</p>

<p>Those who are "advantaged" are at a disadvantage when it comes to the college process. Ironic as it sounds, they have been given no life - long obstacles to overcome, and that is their main flaw. </p>

<p>Thoughts?</p>

2

<p>Puh-lease. Have you taken a look at the numbers of traditionally disadvantaged groups getting even as far as applying? Or how racialized the educational system is all the way into college, if drop-out rates for black kids are any indication?</p>

<p>This is at its core an issue of power. As a privileged kid, you have it. For other groups to at least somewhat level the playing field as a whole -- you'll have to give it up. You've benefitted from your race and background at the cost of those who didn't. It's a matter of accepting this, hopefully even fighting for it so your own children won't face the same moral dilemma.</p>

3

<p>Besides accepting that institutionalized discrimination exists in today's society, what would you have "us" advantaged kids do to impress colleges? Don't just say, "work hard", because if I work hard AND a kid from the slum works hard, colleges will choose the slum kid, because remember -- he was the disadvantaged one. Working hard is enough for someone who is disadvantaged, but working hard is not enough for someone who comes from an average or above average background.</p>

4

<p>Well, you should strive to be an equivalent of a URM that has overcome his/her challenges and obstacles, except you have many more opportunities</p>

<p>Take advantage of your opportunities.</p>

5

<p>radicalolita: Your point is actually not a terrible one, but what it is is misguided - you said the solution yourself, in your post.</p>

<p>You say that kids who haven't had challenges forced upon them - by discrimination, socioeconomic status, familial issues, whatever - are at a disadvantage applying to college? Maybe, but the kids who are really exceptional realize that they're not being challenged, and make challenges.</p>

<p>They do independent research, excel exceedingly well in artistic endeavors, win prestigious academic competitions, and so on. So yes, to have excellent chances one must not be great - one must be so good as to stand out from the pack of privileged students who are all great.</p>

<p>Is that a disadvantage? Yes, but so is everything else you mentioned, regarding race, socioeconomic status, and whatever. Your post betrays a kind of "well, all kinds of kids deal with it, it must not be that bad." Remember, the kids you hear about coming out of slums and going to Harvard are the exceptional ones in their context - just as the talented athletes who compete in math olympiads and do science research are the talented ones in their context.</p>

<p>Frankly, I think this whole post is a little flawed. If you'd like a demonstration of why, go say everything you just said to a black kid living in a gang-ridden slum, and then ask them if they'd like to change places so you can get rid of this "disadvantage". I think both of us know you wouldn't do that, because really, at the root of this, you know that you have the advantages, and you know that even though you have to achieve more than some others to get into great schools, it's ever so much easier to do so. You might reason around it, but in your gut you know it.</p>

<p>If this post was a hypothetical thought exercise, well, I think it's a little misguided. On the other hand, if this was a real complaint on your part - you think that your lack of disadvantages is in itself a disadvantage to you - then all I can suggest is that you push yourself. Work hard, then find things to do that no one else thinks of, and work hard at those. Be the standout from the crowd.</p>

6

<p>The amount of URM:s that go on to and are accepted to colleges is miniscule. Advantaged students that make good use of their opportunities are still in the overwhelming majority -- if you from a purely selfish perspective aim for the most elite education, which of course is perfectly understandable, simply do the obvious thing armando points out - work it.</p>

7

<p>Seconded, 1of42. Create academic, social, personal challenges for yourself. You have the means to do so.</p>

8

<p>"I think both of us know you wouldn't do that, because really, at the root of this, you know that you have the advantages, and you know that even though you have to achieve more than some others to get into great schools, it's ever so much easier to do so. "</p>

<p>I can't believe you've said this. First of all, nobody should be making such a statement. I come from a life of privilege. I don't know what kind of background you have -- privileged or "disadvantaged", but you can't have come from both. Since you haven't experienced both lifestyles, you cannot judge to say which is easier. </p>

<p>For what it is worth, my life is NOT easy. I can't tell you how many times I've been on the verge of giving up my ECs and academic habits. I have a 4.0 UW and a 4.95 weighted -- I'm in a prestigious and selective, fully magnet school.. I have ECs, I volunteer, I am doing research with a professor at a uni that I personally solicited and have been doing since the summer after my sophomore year, I'm in several leadership positions at my school both student selected and teacher selected, and I don't think it's enough. I honestly believe that I challenge myself as much and whenever I can. I can't tell how you many of my privileged friends have considered suicide because they are under a great deal of pressure to succeed -- I know you won't believe me, that it sounds ludicrous and overdramatic. I can't tell you what their parents do to them when they get a B on their transcripts, but physical abuse is involved. I can't tell you that yesterday I found my best friend punching the wall of a bathroom stall and sobbing horrendously during lunch because of a bad test grade. I can't tell you about another friend who spent an hour crying over his cello because he had a major competition in a week and his piece wasn't ready. I know these things sound stupid. Who cares if you get 1 B in high school, if your parents rough you up a bit? But to us 'privileged' kids, 1 B can make or break us. After all, so many other privileged kids have straight A's. Every single asian student from my school who got accepted to an Ivy this year and last year had a 4.0 UW. Many with impressive ECs and other stats who got B's in freshman year were listed or rejected. </p>

<p>I never once said in any of my posts that privileged kids live easier lives than disadvantaged kids. I also never said that disadvantaged kids live easier lives than privileged kids. I cannot make either statement because I don't know -- nobody can, because nobody knows. I don't think that college adcoms can safely say that disadvantaged kids overcame more challenges than privileged kids, yet that is what the adcoms do.</p>

9

<p>I'm not for affirmative action but not because of your logic.</p>

10

<p>Roflmao. I don't mean to sound condescending, but perhaps you should come and hang out in the slums for a while and get some perspective. I appreciate that it is hard to find it, coming from what seems a very isolated environment, but it is ultimately up to you to reach out to real life -- then put the one you lived before into context.</p>

<p>Roughed up? Try getting robbed and beaten up on a regular basis, dealing with alcoholic and unemployed parents, having no social safety net, hideously underfunded schooling socially sanctioned against by peers who have more or less chosen a life of utter rejection of "academia" and other markers of upperclass domination. Try homelessness. Try no parental guidance into what academia even is or does. Try having your parents depend on you for survival. Ugh, seriously -- try perspective.</p>

11

<p>Radicololita, you have no idea how much myself and every other Hispanic overachieving student would love to be able to do those things too though. :) Just enjoy them and the fact you have the options to do all those things.</p>

12

<p>I have no doubt you will be extremely successful, or at the very least way out of the danger zone, in life regardless of where you ultimately end up. The same is definitely not true for working class kids. Understand this, be humble, give back to the community that has enabled your situation.</p>

13

<p>And I agree with frrph, that if you knew what it was like to be live in the ghetto, you would appreciate your life more. When I lived in a low class neighborhood, kids were abused, the cops were around all the time, we had cops monitoring our bus stop, drug trafficking all over the place, wasn't safe to be outside after dark, tremendous amounts of gang activity, vandalism, people's apartments got robbed, racism (oh look, it's still here), and I was basically isolated from the academic world.</p>

14

<p>"Roughed up? Try getting robbed and beaten up on a regular basis, dealing with alcoholic and unemployed parents, having no social safety net, hideously underfunded schooling socially sanctioned against by peers who have more or less chosen a life of utter rejection of "academia" and other markers of upperclass domination. Try homelessness. Try no parental guidance into what academia even is or does. Try having your parents depend on you for survival. Ugh, seriously -- try perspective."</p>

<p>As I have said before, kids from urban areas must overcome an entirely different set of challenges than privileged kids. The slum kids who get into Ivies overachieve, and surpass their stereotypes as well as gang activity, violence, lack of parental support, etc, etc. This is extremely impressive. </p>

<p>But I don't think that they have as much pressure as we do to get a perfect transcript, to win state or national awards (local competitions are useless for the privileged at my school), to score perfects on the SAT. Colleges have lowered requirements for these kids on the basis that they already have other challenges to overcome. We have our own challenges to overcome. To me they are so difficult. Yes, on the surface it seems that supporting one's family while still doing well in school is far harder than getting a perfect on the SAT. But I do not think that you, frrrph, have tried both -- have you? Unless you have, you can't speak based purely on what "seems obvious".</p>

15

<p>But how could they possibly be compared to the pressures of surviving and making it out of the slums (with your family!). </p>

<p>And some of these same kids that live/lived in the ghetto do even better academically than you do (perfect transcripts and all). I'm one of them (granted you're probably a higher grade and such). That's twice as many challenges.</p>

16

<p>I have a perfect gpa right now, but it came at great costs and immense effort to 1) WANT to go to academia, which has pretty much cost me all of my childhood friends, 2) be able to get a foot into the door without any guidance whatsoever, 3) succeed even if completely unfamiliar with the system. I've done all three. But then again, I'm the exception, and still fully understand and even emphatize with my old friends. Especially in my former country the educational system was so absurdly racist it was hardly worth even trying to hang on within it without losing all of your self-respect.</p>

<p>I'll just reiterate what I replied to the PM you sent me -- you may experience you are being punished for your accidentally being born into privilege. However, that privilege has worked for you, and will protect you for all of your life. For people like me, getting even a bachelor's degree is a question of starve or not starve. I either succeed, or I risk losing it all. You'll - hopefully - never have to be in that position. Why not be extremely thankful for everything you DO have guaranteed in life?</p>

17

<p>"But how could they possibly be compared to the pressures of surviving and making it out of the slums (with your family!). "</p>

<p>Is it even remotely possible for you to imagine that what "seems obvious" to you may not be the truth?? Yes, I admit that it SEEMS that getting out of the slums is infinitely harder than getting a couple of A's in high school. </p>

<p>But for hundreds of years, slavery seemed completely acceptable. For hundreds of years, black people were considered akin to gorillas or apes, were considered naturally inferior to their white counterparts. For thousands of years, everyone thought the Earth was the center of the universe and that the planet was flat. People never questioned these ideas for ages. It was a "duh" thing, right? Of course the land is flat, I can't see it curving!! Of course we're at the center of the universe!!</p>

18

<p>Basically what I'm saying is this: even with parental pressure (you're lucky to have parents that encourage you to do well in life beyond just staying alive and out of trouble!), getting a less than perfect transcript or to a less than elite school is NOT a comparable obstacle to the intense, high-pressure world of the slum poses. Getting a B- does not = getting arrested, being denied decent housing or employment, etc. You'll get by just fine. Many, many, many kids in the slums won't.</p>

19

<p>OMG, you did NOT just compare your rich kid plight with slavery. Please tell me you didn't. Please tell me you... did... not.</p>

20

<p>frrph, read my posts more clearly. I was trying to show that what SEEMS TRUE is not always true. It SEEMS that kids getting out of slums is harder than kids getting 2400 SAT. Equivalently, 300 years ago, it seemed that white people were superior to black people. I am equating two WAYS OF THINKING, not two PEOPLES. Can't you not jump to conclusions?</p>