DS spent 5 years building a passion project. Perfect profile for CS at Stanford, Cornell, MIT. Or AI a threat?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My son has worked sooo hard and has the most incredible drive. He wanted to get into Stanford for CS so he thought of a practical passion project around coding. He created his own program to teach middle school kids and seniors to code for free, employed classmates to help teach the classes for him and scale the business model internationally and to other schools. He built his own website, launched global company as founder in multiple countries. His global impact in terms of students taught is high.

On top of that passion project, he took maximum load of APs in all subjects at private school. Top grades esp in STEM and music. Studied and took SAT five times over two years and now over 1550 super score. Played varsity sports, and instrument, no video games or hanging out with friends. He reads every STEM and business magazine he can find and spends all his free time outside of school and ECs scaling and managing the business he founded and his website. He wants to be Zuckerberg.

I am worried despite all his achievements, what if AI can replicate some of the achievements his company is teaching and scale it far beyond what he is doing? He's worried about his impact and legacy. I'm worried that he is so driven to get into a great college that he's missing a lot of social development. It's all he think about.

The college arms race has gotten out of control. I really don't know what else to say.

Oh, yes, the great humanitarian Zuckerberg.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My son has worked sooo hard and has the most incredible drive. He wanted to get into Stanford for CS so he thought of a practical passion project around coding. He created his own program to teach middle school kids and seniors to code for free, employed classmates to help teach the classes for him and scale the business model internationally and to other schools. He built his own website, launched global company as founder in multiple countries. His global impact in terms of students taught is high.

On top of that passion project, he took maximum load of APs in all subjects at private school. Top grades esp in STEM and music. Studied and took SAT five times over two years and now over 1550 super score. Played varsity sports, and instrument, no video games or hanging out with friends. He reads every STEM and business magazine he can find and spends all his free time outside of school and ECs scaling and managing the business he founded and his website. He wants to be Zuckerberg.

I am worried despite all his achievements, what if AI can replicate some of the achievements his company is teaching and scale it far beyond what he is doing? He's worried about his impact and legacy. I'm worried that he is so driven to get into a great college that he's missing a lot of social development. It's all he think about.

AI has nothing to do with the concerns his application will bring elite AOs:
1. implies he has less than top grades in other areas, not good for Ivy/stanford/MIT range
2. over 1550 superscore after FIVE times is not a true top 1% kid. He will be competing against all of those and will likely struggle to be top half if he were to get in. Most likely the AOs will figure out he is not a true top kid somewhere else in his apps (the less than top grades across the board, his AP scores are likely not straight 5s from your descripion
3. while his coding program and business sound as though they could be great, something about your description makes it seem as though he would not want to interact with classmates, be open to new ideas, find college meaningful enough to stay.

In sum our DC went to high school with a couple similar students, one was close to VAL one was not even top10%, Both had top rigor in stem. Both had some mildly lackluster grade/score/class choice outside of stem that indicated a minor issue in non-stem compared to top peers. Both had very similar unidimensional EC related to writing code and obsession with it. Lower ranked one did not get in to any T25 and the other one got into Umich and GT OOS but flat rejected every ivy and stanford, though they did not ED and Cornell ED may have worked for them. This is a private that sends 3-4 kids to IVY/MIT/stanford unhooked every year (and a few more hooked). The top schools picked the students who had the straight 5s, super high raw intelligence, easily above 1530 one sitting first try, and were driven and had impactful ECs but were not unidimensional.

Take this with a grain of salt maybe he is in a feeder school that sends 10-15% to ivy + your student will make the cut. high school matters a lot. Ask his college counseling dean.

how would a college know how many times you took the SAT?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I would worry more about not spending time with friends. That is very upsetting.

Stanford will take him or not. You need to prepare him for the unpredictability.

I am the OP. I don't know how to do this. I feel he will take a rejection very badly.

I keep asking him to spend more time with friends as I did at his age. But he says if you dream big there's no time for that. I do worry.

I'm pp. Your child sounds driven and brilliant and wonderful. There are lots of driven and brilliant and wonderful people with incredible accomplishments who will not gain acceptance to the school of their choice. I genuinely think therapy now, before all of the decisions come out, is critical. What may be the worst case scenario is that he does go to Stanford and realizes that he worked so hard for something that isn't a magic key to happiness. He needs to engage in something other than a goal that is not in his realm of control.

A kid who needs to take the SAT five times to superscore is not brilliant. He is surely motivated but not brilliant.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You know what bothers me about this? He did all of this not because he wanted to, but because he thought it would look good for Stanford.

Colleges often see through that.

+1

And what kind of teen “worrie[s] about his impact and legacy?”

This all sounds nuts.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I would worry more about not spending time with friends. That is very upsetting.

Stanford will take him or not. You need to prepare him for the unpredictability.

I am the OP. I don't know how to do this. I feel he will take a rejection very badly.

I keep asking him to spend more time with friends as I did at his age. But he says if you dream big there's no time for that. I do worry.

I'm pp. Your child sounds driven and brilliant and wonderful. There are lots of driven and brilliant and wonderful people with incredible accomplishments who will not gain acceptance to the school of their choice. I genuinely think therapy now, before all of the decisions come out, is critical. What may be the worst case scenario is that he does go to Stanford and realizes that he worked so hard for something that isn't a magic key to happiness. He needs to engage in something other than a goal that is not in his realm of control.

A kid who needs to take the SAT five times to superscore is not brilliant. He is surely motivated but not brilliant.

X10000 he wont fit even if he happens to get in to an ivy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My son has worked sooo hard and has the most incredible drive. He wanted to get into Stanford for CS so he thought of a practical passion project around coding. He created his own program to teach middle school kids and seniors to code for free, employed classmates to help teach the classes for him and scale the business model internationally and to other schools. He built his own website, launched global company as founder in multiple countries. His global impact in terms of students taught is high.

On top of that passion project, he took maximum load of APs in all subjects at private school. Top grades esp in STEM and music. Studied and took SAT five times over two years and now over 1550 super score. Played varsity sports, and instrument, no video games or hanging out with friends. He reads every STEM and business magazine he can find and spends all his free time outside of school and ECs scaling and managing the business he founded and his website. He wants to be Zuckerberg.

I am worried despite all his achievements, what if AI can replicate some of the achievements his company is teaching and scale it far beyond what he is doing? He's worried about his impact and legacy. I'm worried that he is so driven to get into a great college that he's missing a lot of social development. It's all he think about.

The college arms race has gotten out of control. I really don't know what else to say.

Oh, yes, the great humanitarian Zuckerberg.

Op and son should read "careless people" and then son should craft an admissions essay about how he used to want to be Zuckerberg but them realized the fallacy.

[Anonymous]

Instead of looking just at the number of users as a sign of success, he needs to dig in on the pedagogy and how people learn to make his project more academic. He should think about how to measure its effectiveness in teaching more deeply and then use pedagogy to tweak it to be even more successful.

They want to see scholarship, analysis and intellectual contribution, not necessarily entrepreneurship.

[Anonymous]

OP your kid comes across as a clueless grinder. Probably on the spectrum. 1000 users, gimme a break.
Make it freeware, give it up, get a life. Kid sounds creepy and punching above his weight.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:that's not a passion project. it's just a project.

A project pursued with passion.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP your kid comes across as a clueless grinder. Probably on the spectrum. 1000 users, gimme a break.
Make it freeware, give it up, get a life. Kid sounds creepy and punching above his weight.

+1. What has your son done for his community? No hanging out with friends? Sounds like he has no social skills.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I would worry more about not spending time with friends. That is very upsetting.

Stanford will take him or not. You need to prepare him for the unpredictability.

I am the OP. I don't know how to do this. I feel he will take a rejection very badly.

I keep asking him to spend more time with friends as I did at his age. But he says if you dream big there's no time for that. I do worry.

I'm pp. Your child sounds driven and brilliant and wonderful. There are lots of driven and brilliant and wonderful people with incredible accomplishments who will not gain acceptance to the school of their choice. I genuinely think therapy now, before all of the decisions come out, is critical. What may be the worst case scenario is that he does go to Stanford and realizes that he worked so hard for something that isn't a magic key to happiness. He needs to engage in something other than a goal that is not in his realm of control.

A kid who needs to take the SAT five times to superscore is not brilliant. He is surely motivated but not brilliant.

OP needs to know someone sees her child how she sees him before taking in advice. I don’t care if he meets your qualifications for brilliant. I posted solely so she gets him some help and he doesn’t become a suicide statistic when he doesn’t get what he wants.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My son has worked sooo hard and has the most incredible drive. He wanted to get into Stanford for CS so he thought of a practical passion project around coding. He created his own program to teach middle school kids and seniors to code for free, employed classmates to help teach the classes for him and scale the business model internationally and to other schools. He built his own website, launched global company as founder in multiple countries. His global impact in terms of students taught is high.

On top of that passion project, he took maximum load of APs in all subjects at private school. Top grades esp in STEM and music. Studied and took SAT five times over two years and now over 1550 super score. Played varsity sports, and instrument, no video games or hanging out with friends. He reads every STEM and business magazine he can find and spends all his free time outside of school and ECs scaling and managing the business he founded and his website. He wants to be Zuckerberg.

I am worried despite all his achievements, what if AI can replicate some of the achievements his company is teaching and scale it far beyond what he is doing? He's worried about his impact and legacy. I'm worried that he is so driven to get into a great college that he's missing a lot of social development. It's all he think about.

How do you employ classmates when your program teaches students "to code for free." Not much of a business if there is no revenue stream.

[Anonymous]

OP -- to get into the top 20 ranked schools on USNWR, your child must first have top grades and scores. Once that hurdle is passed, they must be top tier in whatever passion area they're conveying. That means, as an earlier poster referenced on page 2 here, being judged by a proven competition, contest, national body or the likes. If none of those applies ..articles in newspapers or magazines about the accomplishments. There not going to take the applicant's word for it. From what you've described, your child will more likely end up at a state flagship school like UMD or a state tech university like VA Tech.

[Anonymous]

I suspect this is a troll.

[Anonymous]

Most definitely.