<p>Great post Blossom. If it is true that a sign of intelligence is being able to cut to the chase then you are a true genius!</p>
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<p>It’s pretty easy to sum up people’s posts by making up things they didn’t say. I didn’t say you couldn’t identify gifted people at an early age. And I wasn’t talking about musical prodigies, because if you actually read what I responded to it was a comment that most of our accomplished writers, scientists and “mathfiends” were young sprouts -(the implication being teenagers because the poster was using it to critcize a school teacher). </p>
<p>If you want to believe that the majority of mathematical, literary, and scientific achievements in history were accomplished by teenagers, that’s your delusion. Don’t rewrite my words. Only some of the posters on here could nastily bash a teacher for denying that she is constantly beset by teeming hordes of little Chopins.</p>
<p>Okay. I re-read my own posts and although I stick by my premise, I think maybe I’ve lost my sense of humor here for some reason. Blossom’s post is actually rather entertaining, as are most of her (his?) posts.</p>
<p>Not only that, I agree that the thread has really gone in some wacky directions. Maybe the lady on the other post about trigonometry could refer her kids here to learn about tangents. And I think I may be particularly guilty.</p>
<p>The reason for my original post was because of some comments about a schoolteacher lacking something becuase she hasn’t come across a bevy of geniuses in her career. How often do we read posts from kids saying they got recommendations calling them “a once in a lifetime” student. Maybe the circles people travel in here are extremely rarefied. I think it is possible for a good teacher to go through a career without encountering many, or even any, students which seem to be typical to so many on here. That’s it.</p>
<p>bovertine, good save. ;)</p>
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<p>Hey, join the club. I got unwillingly (and unwittingly) dragged into (it’s dragged 
) some fictional anti-i-banking “group,” despite no malice aforethought. I’m sure they’re wonderful people, too. I even know a lovely one – a Harvard MBA grad. (Confess to not knowing his undergrad.) However, the majority of HYP grads are not necessarily i-banking-bound, nor were they even 5 years ago. It’s convenient mythology, but that’s all it is.</p>
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<p>The point and the VALUE of this thread would be pretty clear to anyone who reads the story of the OP and tries to see the positive message. However, the reasons why some of us who were familiar with the OP and the success of his daughter had recommended to leave the proverbial cat in the bag are now also pretty darn clear. </p>
<p>The message was that someone CAN overcome the odds of a system that rejects about 90% at its most selective point. If there was a subtle message that the schools that rejected this successful scholar might have made a mistake … so be it. The OP does NOT have to hide that the rejections WERE painful. And, no matter how we slice and dice it, the rejections that WILL come in the next months are indeed painful. </p>
<p>And again as some of us predicted, this thread HAD to take the usual meandering path paved with irrelevant elements and personal agendas. And, fwiw, the fact that the “OK” school happened to be the University of Chicago had much to do with the debate about intellectualism, or pseudo-intellectualism. Anyone familiar with the repeated discussions about the “Uncommon” applications and the type of essays requested by Chicago would easily recognize the patterns. Hint? Where being different becomes an overplayed synonym for " I am better or smarter than thou!" </p>
<p>The saddest part is that positive message that could have helped many is now buried under a few feet of intellectual but still irrelevant horse manure.</p>
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<p>Yeah, that sticks out. I did it on purpose by the way.</p>
<p>Thanks for noticing.</p>
<p>xig, great post.</p>
<p>Why does this thread exist?
“The experience of an IVY reject?”</p>
<p>The experience might end up great?</p>
<p>That’s a revelation?</p>
<p>Congrats to the OPs daughter.</p>
<p>bovertine, I was offering friendly grammatical correction to curm, actually, not to you. 
Did you also make that accidental error? Or are you “playing” with roles for the entertainment of garland et al.?
:)</p>
<p>Well, heck. Lost my badge, didn’t I?</p>
<p>Here I thought i-banking meant internet banking (which I love) and couldn’t figure what the point was. </p>
<p>I guess some of us out here in real america travel in different circles.</p>
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Heck, I confessed without getting caught!
I did it on purpose. “Drug” is far more evocative to me. That’s the ticket.</p>
<p>I believe in always using the more evocative term, "ir"regardless of whether it is correct, or even an actual word for that matter. Actually, I was horrified to see my error, but not horrified enough to change it.</p>
<p>Good post xiggi.</p>
<p>“I guess some of us out here in real america travel in different circles.”
Uh-oh…do I detect another tangent?</p>
<p>Count me as one who found the OP to be helpful and timely. I enjoyed reading about a kid who was rejected from all her top choices and went on to incredible academic accomplishments. FWIW I think HYP, etc., all made a mistake, and yet everything worked out well in the end.</p>
<p>The debates seemed to start when somebody noticed that Chicago is not exactly chopped liver. But the point is, this particular student had her heart set on some other schools yet was still able to make the most of her college experience. Maybe the lesson would have been clearer had she attended a lower-ranked school; there are plenty of examples of that on CC. Post #364, for instance:
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<p>But why all the hand-wringing about going off on tangents in this thread? That’s what naturally happens in conversation and I don’t see any reason to limit discussion to the points in the initial post.</p>
<p>Is this silly season on C.C? </p>
<p>A lot of threads are going in many different directions with some intensely serious arguments interspersed with random light hearted statements sprinkled with some random but profound observations.</p>
<p>ETA: anneroku? No hand-wringing here, just marveling at the random meanderings of threads.</p>
<p>TheDad is digging himself in deeper. People have a lot of time on their hands–clearly!</p>
<p>whose parents are so hyperbolically involved in their lives. Wonder what the correlation is between good parent self-esteem and lack of engagement with a child’s college app. journey.</p>
<p>“…have I got it all?”
No, you left out the posters who apparently read the thread solely for the purpose of feeling superior to all the other posters, and to have a good laugh at their expense, yet have been somehow forced against their will to post on it in order to tell us so.</p>
<p>It would be interesting to see how the reponses to the message of this thread would vary depending on the alternative choice of school.</p>
<p>Suppose, for example, that the OP’s daughter has her heart set only on Harvard and Princeton, only to be rejected by those two schools. Instead, the OK choice is Yale and she enrolls there and goes on to win the Rhodes…</p>
<p>In this scenario, would we all be expected to see the message that you can “overcome the odds of a system that rejects about 90% at its most selective point”?</p>
<p>or has her heart set only on HYP but ends up at Brown
or the Ivy League and ends up at U Chicago
or at a USNWR Top 20 and ends up at the Honors College at a non top 20 State University</p>
<p>and so on…</p>