Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Looking back, one of my biggest regrets/missteps as a parent was putting way too much pressure on my kids to excel in school with the goal of getting into top colleges. The pressure worked, and they did do well and go "name brand," but fast forward a few years and it really didn't make much of a difference. They're all happy and successful, but so are their friends who didn't do as well as they did and didn't end up at top schools. Time is proving to be the great equalizer.
Just something for parents to keep in mind when they're still in the midst of things. I realize I'm probably preaching to the wrong crowd.
I think the real problem here is that a lot of people on DCUM see earning a high income as the only reason to go to college.
For people who're going to college solely to increase their income, maybe name recognition is a big deal. Maybe, for them, going to Penn State is a lot better than going to, say, Brown, because a lot more people have heard of Penn State.
For kids who are born to have high stats and are tired of rarely meeting anyone who shares their interests: focusing on "prestige" schools is a quick way to identify schools that might have a lot of other kids who grew up reading the unabridged dictionary for fun. No one is pushing those kids to get high stats. For them, having a naturally a high stats brain is, in effect, a crippling, isolating disorder that can sometimes lead to career success.
For regular, functional bright kids who enjoy learning, looking for "prestige schools," "Colleges That Change Lives" schools, etc. is a way to try to identify schools where a lot of the students truly enjoy learning and may for example, want to discuss reading assignments for fun. Prestige may not always correlate with the students having a sincere interest in learning, but sometimes it might.
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