Reply to I want my kids to go to top schools. Sue me.

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]of course you. it's because you think going to a top school will make your child happy. and parents want happiness for their child.

but it doesn't necessarily bring happiness. it might. but it also might not. just like going to a school a few notches below might bring happiness or not.

my niece worked herself to death to get into an ivy (she got into multiple) and picked the one she thought would be least pressure cooker (brown) and ended up miserable. [b]she graduated but now has moved to a small town and is doing a menial job not related to her degree because her mental health got so bad from being on a treadmill that she wants to fully opt out of life's rat race.[/b]

It's been an eye-opening shock to our family. [/quote]

NP here. I am a therapist who specializes in "failure to launch" young adults, and a disproportionate number of my clients are recent grads of elite colleges. They are underemployed or unemployed in adulthood after graduating from Harvard/Stanford/Princeton/wherever, and the parents are furious about this.

Why is this the case? Well, it's usually because the child has a very weak sense of self because their entire high school experience was oriented around "winning" the college admissions process, and their entire college career was centered around "winning" an elite job in IB/Consulting/FAANG. So what happens when they get laid off from Mckinsey? Narcissistic collapse and intense depression -- these kids (yes, they might be 25 years old, but fundamentally, they are kids) don't know what's important to them or what they value most in life/career/relationships.

Let your kid have some autonomy. I know that this is antithetical to the whole tiger parenting schtick on DCUM, but it's way more important for their future success that they own their acceptance to JMU or Salisbury or wherever than let themselves get pushed into Princeton and then Morgan Stanley. [/quote]

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