Reply to Why Affluent Parents Put So Much Pressure on Their Kids

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I feel like OP misread the article. Plus, it's Hanna Rosin, who is not high up on my list of most reliable narrators as an author. [/quote]

ooh, when truth hurts, definitely take a potshot at the writer.  your evidence for her unreliability would be???  i've read extensively about what's happening at those high schools in Silicon Valley and can find nothing wrong with her narrative. [/quote]

I grew up there. I didn't go to Gunn, but I went to a high school that's close to Gunn. I have several friends who went to Gunn. My mom still works at a different high school that's also not far from Gunn, has worked there for more than 20 years, and regularly interacts with their administration and staff. So, yes, I'm going to take my extensive personal experience over your "I've read some articles."

Haven't you ever read anything by Hanna Rosin? Why do accept what she writes as gospel truth? It should be obvious to anybody who reads more than a few things that she's written that she's great at putting together a narrative, just not an overly accurate one.

Why so defensive? Does this my post mess with a rigid narrative you want to tell yourself? [/quote]

I am no the PP but I have to wonder if you actually read the article? I also wonder if your bias is clouding your judgement.
It is not her narrative I give credence to, but the research she cites. And the feelings of the children she interviewed.

[/quote]

What I'm saying is that I don't trust her description of the research she cites, nor do I trust the accuracy of her interviews. Look, I am not sure why somebody saying "Hey. Hold up. Don't assume this is gospel truth" is so threatening. I'm not saying you should throw everything out. I am saying that you should think critically and not take this as unvarnished truth.

Also, her characterization of research and interviews aside, she missed a lot of information about Gunn. First, it's always been a pressure cooker. It was a pressure cooker when I was a kid, and I've heard from parents of my peers who grew up here that it was a pressure cooker back in the day. There has always been a significant focus on achievement at the school. I remember hearing about kids using drugs in high school so they could stay up later to study when I was a teenager. She doesn't even touch on this historical reality, I suspect in part because it weakens her narrative. Maybe there is something new about the pressure, I don't know, but she should have had some awareness of the history of the high school.

Secondly, she also missed something entirely that people who grew up in Palo Alto know: that Gunn is an unusually transient high school for a school with its demographics. The kids of temporary faculty who go to Stanford tend to live in Gunn's boundaries because that's where the faculty housing sits. That [i]is[/i] something that has changed since I was a kid; there's a lot more transience in academia then when I grew up. What that means is that there's a lot of kids who show up to Gunn who don't have deep roots. I have always thought that it made the population at Gunn vulnerable to risk-taking behaviors.

I don't pretend to know what's causing the suicides, but I think it's more complicated than what's put forth here. That's all I'm saying. [/quote]

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