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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I was reading about Olympian Kristen Faulkner, who went to Philips Exeter, than Harvard for CS major and competing in crew etc. then of course the Olympics, and all that entails.

I was curious about how she achieved so much, and if you read up on her family history, they ALL went to Philips and Harvard, going back to 1842. Her N-grandfather started a mill, and his sons went to Harvard and ran banks, and real estate development. It goes on for generation to generation.

https://keenenh.gov/sites/default/files/bioAH.pdf

I have hopes for my kids to do well in life, but we are barely middle class and my grandfather couldn’t read, and this is their competition. Oh and AI. [/quote]

Don't worry.  My family is a downwardly mobile version of that Faulkner family because we all love intellectual pursuits more than money, and the MA woolen mill closed due to the rise of cotton in the South, and being carpetbaggers didn't work, and the second wife got all the remaining money, and N father went into the ministry, and the next one married FGLI for love, etc. etc. Throw Williams, an Ivy x 6, and a fancy prep school in for good measure.

We're all educated and happy and medically better off than royals from any time in history up to the 1950s.  We have good, meaningful lives but aren't rich.  It's honestly o.k.

So my kid might see your kid at a state flagship!  They'll make great friends.  And on that note, I think two things that are really important to success are:

1) Simple knowledge of opportunities and how to get them.  As well as who might fund them for you if you can't pay.  The Internet is the inside contact your ancestors never had!

2) Good EQ.  My family is thinky, blunt, and not extroverted enough to be successful in today's economy.  It must have been a tremendous advantage to be college educated in the 1800s.  Today, not much at all.  So cultivate people skills as well as academic skills.[/quote]

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