Daily Beast: Ivy League freshman says rich classmates are frauds, faking first-gen and poverty

Anonymous
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:I’ve been teaching in top private schools in the US, UK, and Europe for almost 20 years. I give advice on letters of rec/application packages each year for many students, and yes, it has become increasingly common for students to lie. My privileged students have been trained to identify a financial or psychological obstacle, then embellish, embellish, embellish. Or just make something up.

It is very disheartening. Admin know and will not listen to or support teachers who try to bring this up.

At this point, I consider the letter of rec process to be a creative writing contest.


One of the ironic things about UPenn’s investigation and punishment of MF is that one of their own staff members told her that if it is uncertain, they generally advise students to use the designation that will get them the most financial aid. But Penn took no responsibility for their own staff. Pretty hypocritical of them.


Convenient hearsay. These rich ruthless frauds all put on the innocent babe in the woods routine, play dumb and claim someone told them to do it. Yeah, sure. It is totally normal for a rich kid to seek out first-generation, minority, and low-income student orgs as soon as they step on campus. It is totally not something a rich conniving sociopath would do to get the inside edge on internships, fellowships, and grad school.
Anonymous
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Reminds me of a young rising star politician who went to high school with my niece. In every profile she talks about growing up poor, minority (she's as "dark" as the Kardashians ) and being bullied. She was literally born and raised in a one million dollar home in the wealthiest suburb in their state, her dad was a very influential local figure, she got a brand new Jeep Wrangler for her 16th birthday, and she went to one of the most expensive private colleges in the U.S. It's nuts how rich kids get away with this.


But she's totally working class now, so it's all ok


Not AOC. https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2021/06/18/biden-republican-voters-oakland-county-michigan-suburbs-494983
Anonymous
Family friends living in CA come from generational wealth and have never worked much as adults. However, their property is all in the names of their parents, so their kids got full "need-based" rides to Stanford.
Anonymous
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:It’s no secret that a lot of over-achievers succeed by cheating and hurting others. Look at how many sociopathic people in politics have Ivy degrees. These competitive schools need to do a MUCH better job at weeding out selfish win-at-all-costs personalities. These kids don’t start lying on their college applications, they start earlier to get that perfect application. Like buying the team alcohol to be voted captain, inflating volunteer hours, and making up awards, for example.



You're assuming that the schools don't want these kinds of kids.


Perfect point. Birds of a feather. We all see who the connected people getting into these schools are. Regular smart kids from regular families are not prioritized at all.
Anonymous
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:There's no checking on ANYTHING. Students could put anything on the app; unless a counselor or teacher rec writes something that rats them out.

I'm not bitter, DS got in to some great schools and is happy with his final choice. But it is interesting that you could put most anything on the app.


+1. Clubs, awards, captain of ___, president of ___, founded ___... first-generation, bi-racial, grew up poor... none of that is verified.


I don't think it would be easy to get away with lying at many schools. At my kids' DC private, the college counselors go over the kids' Common App with them and they literally hit "submit" in the counselors office. If a kid claimed some obviously false status or achievements, the counselor would stop them in their tracks.
Anonymous
Not at STA.
Anonymous
Anonymous wrote:It is possible to be white, a first-generation college student, an immigrant and have upper-middle income parents all at the same time. [/quote]


Yes, that was me many years ago when "first generation" didn't mean anything. And parents were mid to low income but that, too, wasn't an issue back then.
Anonymous
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:There's no checking on ANYTHING. Students could put anything on the app; unless a counselor or teacher rec writes something that rats them out.

I'm not bitter, DS got in to some great schools and is happy with his final choice. But it is interesting that you could put most anything on the app.


+1. Clubs, awards, captain of ___, president of ___, founded ___... first-generation, bi-racial, grew up poor... none of that is verified.


I don't think it would be easy to get away with lying at many schools. At my kids' DC private, the college counselors go over the kids' Common App with them and they literally hit "submit" in the counselors office. If a kid claimed some obviously false status or achievements, the counselor would stop them in their tracks.


At my kids public, I doubt the counselors have even a vague recollection of who most kids are.
Anonymous
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:It is possible to be white, a first-generation college student, an immigrant and have upper-middle income parents all at the same time. [/quote]


Yes, that was me many years ago when "first generation" didn't mean anything. And parents were mid to low income but that, too, wasn't an issue back then.


Times change, thankfully.
Anonymous
Anonymous wrote:Family friends living in CA come from generational wealth and have never worked much as adults. However, their property is all in the names of their parents, so their kids got full "need-based" rides to Stanford.


I went to private school and my middle class parents struggled to pay for everything. My richer classmates and friends received more financial aid than I did because their parents did quite a bit of creative accounting in their businesses and were "broke" on paper, but had boats, fancy cars, lived in houses (as cited) officially owned by their older parents.
Anonymous
Keep in mind that the average poor, first-generation kid can only dream of going to an elite university. Most are going to the local community college on loans.
Anonymous
Anonymous wrote:…and then we wonder why there are so many crooks running companies, Wall St firms and in top Gov offices.


+1
Anonymous
Anonymous wrote:I know a very wealthy kid who went to a top private k-12 and then to a top ivy who gets significant financial aid. Parents live on a huge trust fund and don’t work. Because of zero income they got financial aid. Most assets are still in grandparents name but parents live a luxurious lifestyle. The rich have all sorts of tricks that are not available to average folk.


This makes me want to do violence. These people are sociopathic scum. As are most rich people.
Anonymous
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:…and then we wonder why there are so many crooks running companies, Wall St firms and in top Gov offices.


+1


The deep State?
Anonymous
Anonymous wrote:Keep in mind that the average poor, first-generation kid can only dream of going to an elite university. Most are going to the local community college on loans.


This. My dad was a blue-collar factory worker And for most of my childhood my mother was too disabled by depression to work. Despite frequent admissions to inpatient hospitals for suicidal ideation, she never qualified for actual disability. Which, of course, I now know it’s partly because we didn’t have any money to hire lawyers to advocate for us. While people who are not actually disabled can scam the system if they can hire advocates who can get them qualified.

When I was in high school, I was on no one’s radar as someone who could attend an elite university. I couldn’t do athletics, both for financial reasons and because I always had after school and weekend jobs. My parents had no idea what parents were doing in our community to prepare their teenagers for college. I thought I was ahead of the game by buying myself an SAT prep book. I knew nothing about college counselors I never even heard from my own high school guidance counselor other than when I would make my schedule each year. It wasn’t until senior year when I scored the highest score on the SATs in my graduating class of 400 that my guidance counselor seem to wake up and wonder what colleges I was applying to. We have never discussed it before. And I assumed that I would go to the local branch of our state university, because we couldn’t afford anything else. And, out of nowhere, and fall of my senior year here is someone telling me that I should be applying to Ivy League schools. And when he suggested that I should apply to several, he was a palled that my number one reason for not applying was that there was no way I could afford all of those application fees. I did end up getting accepted to the one IVy I had applied to but ended up going to a lesser-tier large private university that offered me more merit aid. I had absolutely no clue that the parents of my classmates were hiring private college counselors, hiring people to write essays for them, hiring private tutors to keep up with AP level work. And when I got to college, one of the girls who lived on my floor was getting more financial aid than me, But from her dorm decorations and clothing and photos of her family’s house and the vehicle she had at home, it was clear that they were insanely rich. Her father was a patent lawyer and her mother was a stay at home mom. But her parents never married and literally never put her father on the birth certificate precisely so she would appear to be a student from a destitute home. I couldn’t believe that a family that was already Rich was going to go through a 21 year scam in order to save themselves money that they certainly could have afforded. I truly have never gotten over how much I hated her family. I had to take out loans each year, while she got nearly a free ride. The only money she had to pay was the equivalent of what would have been work-study earnings because her parents did not want her to be distracted by a work-study job. So she had to make up that part of her financial package herself. People like this are soulless.
post reply Forum Index » College and University Discussion
Message Quick Reply
Go to: