Charity and admissions

[Anonymous]

It seems every month there’s a kid waking up and suddenly deciding to do a very public charity act. Some examples are:

opening up a community food pantry (in our town there is close to 0% food inseurity btw and a neighboring pantry often has to turn donations away due to excess, so I think that’s silly).

coordinating music concerts for black and brown up and coming musicians (all online of course, since out town and neighboring towns are 90%+ white).

Setting up a string of free libraries (which there is no need for and go unattended. Most are now just dumping grounds for our old folks to “replenish the library” with their old phone books and computer textbooks from the 90s).

There’s no need for most of these kinds of public charity acts and setting up foundations or nonprofits. Whenever I see this I assume it’s parent pushing or purely for college admissions. Sad but does anyone else feel this way?

[Anonymous]

No

[Anonymous]

Coordinating music concerts for black and brown musicians is the dumbest one. Black and brown musicians don’t need a white teen’s help. They dominate the music business and have enough talented producers to help them out.

If the teen was smart he could arrange with the local food pantry to deliver the overage to a needy community. And build it from there.

[Anonymous]

Yes it is performative

[Anonymous]

I run a nonprofit and regularly get teen “CEOs” reaching out to “partner” or launch a new program which adds no real value for anyone. it’s very clearly for admissions and I don’t understand how the admissions officers aren’t onto it yet

[Anonymous]

As a cynic looking at the energetic people who do this:

I think these kids, and the adults who help them, are all principally motivated by generosity and social engagement, not college admissions, but that they don't necessarily realize how empty their gestures can be.

They're part of a loose group of people who believe strongly that taking initiative, even in a crowded sphere of similar acts, ensures their message is kept in the news, and that this in itself is a worthy goal, because keeping the public thinking about that message means whichever cause they're promoting can have a better chance at being heard.

You see? Even I can see that they may have a point, even if their charity or their efforts ultimately don't last, since having your voice heard all the time takes stupendous effort.

Most families don't have the energy to do this, thankfully.

[Anonymous]

I am a high school guidance counselor. This is all about admissions, and I am hoping that the college admissions teams are starting to see through this. These projects are, at best, performances that have meaning in the moment only and, at worst, are disruptive to actual, longstanding service organizations. These admissions performances are called "passion projects," and the whole idea behind them is that they can be done efficiently without a lot of time or effort invested. Students who are busy holding an actual job, paid or volunteer, or working hard on a sports team, have less time for these performances. And the whole idea is not to contribute your time and effort into a strong program already in place in community but to be the leader, the CEO of sorts, of something that will fizzle out the moment the college applications are submitted.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I run a nonprofit and regularly get teen “CEOs” reaching out to “partner” or launch a new program which adds no real value for anyone. it’s very clearly for admissions and I don’t understand how the admissions officers aren’t onto it yet

I used to deal with this too. They never came to us first to ask if their idea would benefit us or if we even needed their idea. It's also work on someone's part in the organization to oversee what they do.

[Anonymous]

Another example of this sort of thing re: Eagle Scout projects...

https://www.tiktok.com/@geodendrochromosaur/video/7505219042496531742

[Anonymous]

I mean it’s just Eagle Scout Projects more widely adopted, and approximately as useful.

[Anonymous]

All of that stuff sounds performative. I volunteer with my city and the biggest need is for people to just pick up trash. Totally unsexy so it never gets done, but if people want to really help-grab a bag, gloves, and go walk a few blocks a couple times a week.