<p>Compmom, I too find the Harvard hopefuls don’t come off too well. Last year my son was applying to a number of top colleges and there’s a level of angst and oneupmanship here that isn’t on the other forums. I comfort myself with the thought that most of the kids applying to Harvard and at Harvard are far too busy to spend much time hanging out here. I know my son never posted here. He was a pretty normal kid too. He got enough sleep, had a couple of school ECs and pursued his passion (computer programming) outside school because he’d been interested in it since he was very young, not with any thought at all of college placement.</p>