<p>Can anyone post today's Wall Street Journal article about student's polishing their resumes in the summer to get into America's elite colleges? Thanks!</p>
<p>Not sure if it is legal. Anyway, here are excerpts:</p>
<p>"
Cram Sessions
For High Schoolers,
Summer Is Time
To Polish R</p>
<p>Oops, our posts crossed in the wire I guess....</p>
<p>Thank you both! I heard about the article, but I actually ended up knowing one of the kids quoted! What happened to good old kick ball in the streets and working at the ice cream parlor?</p>
<p>HELP!!! PLEASE RESCUE OUR KIDS FROM COLLEGE PREP BOOT CAMP!!!</p>
<p>
[quote]
teens -- many just finishing their sophomore year -- will spend two weeks polishing their college-application essays, undergoing mock admissions interviews and prepping for SAT exams.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Katherine Cohen -- whose company IvyWise LLC charges $23,995 for two years of college-admissions advice and assistance -- recommends an internship after the freshman year, a minimum 100 hours a year of volunteering, and a "real job" after the senior year at, say, a major investment bank or an internationally prominent museum, places she says she placed students last summer. If that's not enough, "I might put you in an art program in Mexico for 10 weeks in a little town where you can do pottery and learn Spanish," she says, or suggest a trip to Asia "where you study with Tibetan monks."</p>
<p>I may have found MY perfect summer job: I'll do subcontracting for Mrs. Cohen. I know plenty of villages where one can learn pottery and Spanish. I'll even throw in a bit of SAT training. If I can keep all the potteries, I'll charge her a paltry $1,995 a week per kid, including all the corn tortillas they want to eat. </p>
<p>Where is Lady Catherine's phone number .....</p>
<p>And the funny thing is, thousands of kids are going to fabulous schools without having done any of these things!</p>
<p>It does sound like a self-perpetuating industry.</p>
<p>Even though I sort of knew about all this, I was really horrified. Especially since my S goes to boarding school, I like to have him around in the summer (sort of....) and he hasn't even had a job because we like to take a couple of trips. He would definitely not qualify as having "college admission oriented summers". I know how absurd it is, but if that is what it takes to get into some of these schools, Indiana and UT are looking really good.</p>
<p>I feel sorry for those kids. They don't even get a chance to be kids. They must take a million AP classes, do volunteer work, be a leader in organizations, play a sport or instrument, etc. during the school year, and then fill the summer up with resume-building activities? I wonder if these are the kids my son met at Stanford who were flunking out of their classes? They must be totally burnt out by the time they reach college!</p>
<p>My younger son has always been the type to take on more than he should--not to look good for college, but because they are things he really wants to do (mainly music activities). He had an extremely hectic junior year, so we totally agreed with him that he should just work part-time during the summer (at the pet boarding kennel down the street) and take time to play music and relax with his friends. He had a great summer! And you know what--he may not be going to an Ivy League school next fall, but he has some wonderful choices where he will get a great education.</p>
<p>I worked with one family whose son had outstanding stats but not such great ECs. I was tutoring him for the SAT2 Writing and he had a top drawer college counselor who was putting together the most fascinating summer packages to highlight the ECs, clustering and organizing them so the presentation was better. My only suggestion was for him to find a real job over the summer, by real, meaning one that fit his age and abilitites that paid real money since I was a bit concerned that his entire resume looked "bought" to me. Heck, even the test scores had TUTORS written all over them, myself being one of them. Something fell through in the way of a juicy job, so he did end up working at a concession stand, and doing cleanup of the field where it stood as part of his job duties. </p>
<p>He was not accepting to his top choice school where he was a legacy. His father did get to speak to the adcoms about his app. THe word was that the two best things about his app were the SAT1s (very high after 3rd try), decent transcript, but they were impressed with the 6 weeks he worked at what was basically a hot dog stand. This very selective school read right through his bought activities.</p>
<p>Not to say some of these activities do are not a wonderful way to spend the summer. Why not find something fascinating to do for the summer that will make your resume look good as well? If you have the money, and the interest, go for it. But don't automatically assume that it is going to necessarily make the adcom's head turn in great interest. Many are well aware of these programs. You can just look them up and find out what they cost. I think the better ones are nominal in cost or are free. I have trouble when kids spend thousands to do volunteer work as there are so many venues available locally. Again if you are a studio art major who is doing much work in pottery and Spanish is your language, a possible minor, the art program in Mexico might well be a worthwhile investment. But I know I hear bells go off when I see a kid get an important investment banking or museum internship and a peek at where Dad or mom works shows a might powerful connection. I have mentioned several times that many adcoms barely make as much as the COA for their college, and there is a resentment about silver spoon kids. I don't think it hurts the very top candidates but it can for kids on the verge of the accept line when they seem so contrived and bought.</p>
<p>
[quote]
"I might put you in an art program in Mexico for 10 weeks in a little town where you can do pottery and learn Spanish,"
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Has anyone thought about taking some of Katherine Cohen's $24k fee, gathering a couple of friends, start up and funding a summer art program. You can have your own little gallery showing at the end of the program. You can teach inner city kids about art and maybe throw in some literacy, math or spanish skills to boot? You really don't have to travel around the world to serve when there are so many in need around the corner.</p>
<p>Some of these "made for the college resume" programs are actually quite interesting, and for those who have the money and find one that fits their niche, I don't see any problem in taking the opportunity. Where I get bothered is when I see families who are practicing such austerity, dip into the coffers and spend hard earned much needed cash on these things, really thinking they will make a big difference in the selective college admissions game. I know a single mom who spent a fortune sending his son on some Washington DC, sort of a internship, and she really thought this would be a valuable thing on the resume. The literature for the program was hyped with that in mind as well.</p>
<p>No wonder S did not get in to Stanford !!!</p>
<p>I guess D is going to stand out after all. She'll be the only applicant without this crap. Nuh-uh. Not going to do it.</p>
<p>At this rate, in a few years no one will get into college without a stint as the CEO of a Fortune 500 company.</p>
<p>After reading that article, I think I'll be encouraging my daughter to find the cure for AIDS this summer. After all, she'll have more than two months off and I'd like her to get into an elite college. Do you think that will help?</p>
<p>Some great comments, but I have to admit that there are hints of some of what this article speaks to in this thread: <a href="http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showthread.php?t=26515&page=1&pp=20%5B/url%5D">http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showthread.php?t=26515&page=1&pp=20</a>. Hold the tomatoes! ;) I didn't say all the parental suggestions for summer programs were over the top - and I know that many have opted for the non program summers, too.</p>
<p>Audiophile:<br>
Well, it will help... but see if she can solve the problem of sustained cold fusion as well. <em>That</em> should put her over the top :) .</p>
<p>audiophile</p>
<p><i think="" i'll="" be="" encouraging="" my="" daughter="" to="" find="" the="" cure="" for="" aids="" this="" summer.="" after="" all,="" she'll="" have="" more="" than="" two="" months="" off="" and="" i'd="" like="" her="" get="" into="" an="" elite="" college.=""></i></p><i think="" i'll="" be="" encouraging="" my="" daughter="" to="" find="" the="" cure="" for="" aids="" this="" summer.="" after="" all,="" she'll="" have="" more="" than="" two="" months="" off="" and="" i'd="" like="" her="" get="" into="" an="" elite="" college.="">
<p>But can she do it while rollerblading and twirling a baton?</p>
</i>
<p>I'll bet the author of this essay was a graduate of one of these summer programs. Note - it's a Harvard Lampoon parody, but what makes it funny is that you could almost imagine someone writing it seriously:</p>
<p>The summer before my junior year, I went on the Amigos del Mundo Youth-Interchange Study-Work Experience Program in Belize, South America. I went there intending to do community service, but I ended up doing much more: I learned about myself and discovered that I was more than just an intelligent and outgoing college-bound woman.</p>
<p>"Community service" doesn't accurately describe what I was doing: I was helping people in the community who needed my help. They, in turn, taught me how to wash my clothes in the river. Before I could help others, though, I had to face my fear of failure. But just as I was afraid when I first became treasurer of the International Club, I conquered that fear, and we raised $230 dollars in my junior year and took a field trip to a Mexican restaurant.</p>
<p>The animals in the Belize jungle are like the different groups in my school. The jocks are the fierce lions; the preppies are the proud snakes; the druggies are the drugged-out hummingbirds; and the deaf kids are fish. With its sun-dappled sparrows swimming against gentle breezes, and its rosy-cheeked monkeys swooping among dense vegetation and inviting zephyrs, my high school is a lot like the animal kingdom.</p>
<p>In the rainforest, you never know what's lurking around the corner. Similarly, as co-captain of the cross-country team I had to sacrifice a lot of my time in order to make the team the best it could be. After being attacked by a tiger in the jungle, I realized that the only limits in my life are those that I choose to place on myself. And I don't believe in limits, as my organization of school pep rallies demonstrates.</p>
<p>I remember something that a tribal elder in Belize told me, a medicine woman who reminded me of my mother (Wellesley '70). She said, "When I was your age, I was involved in a painful coming-of-age ritual." That's when I understood that I enjoyed voting in school elections as much as I did attending school plays. And that's why I think I could contribute something valuable to the Wellesley College community.</p>
<p>My fondest memory of Belize is not teaching the young girls lacrosse, or even building the computer center for the elders. It is of the time freshman year when I won honorable mention in a school contest for my essay, "Why We Need Trees." Trees make up a large part of the Belize population, and many Belizians told me that if they didn't have trees they would have to stop eating bark. "Beestes and briddes couden speke and singe, and so bifel that in a daweninge," said Chaucer over 600 years ago. I couldn't agree more. Whenever I sell tickets for school dances, I always think of Belize.</p>