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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]As the lore of the classes of 2021 and 2022 spread, it is going to be increasingly difficult for kids to be motivated in high school for some brass ring of T20 college as a reward. Seeing all these high stats, strong EC kids "settling" for "lessor" schools is very hard.[/quote]

Good.  Maybe a reset in how we think about college is in order. Maybe we, are parents, need to stop pushing our kids to take 14 APs, get a 34/1500+/ participate in so many ECs and believe that aT20 college is the only answer.  It’s a race to nowhere. My 2020 kid is now having to make decisions about summers and study await her an eye towards grad school. It never stops.

I had a 2020 kid at TJ and have a 2022 kid. And the pandemic has made me realize how batsh*t crazy academics and college admissions are in this area.  It was such a relief in spring of 2020 to be forced to stop. And then restart at a slower pace. It made me realize how crazy our pace of life was and how exhausted we were. I’ve also seen my friends in other parts of the country have kids get into the same range of colleges as my kids with 1/2 the APs, 100 points less on the SATs and many fewer ECs.

The system is broken. A more sane system, like Canada or Europe would be healthier. [/quote]

Parents need to stop looking around and thinking they have to keep up with neurotic strivers. I went to the Counselling Dept's PTSA lecture when my kid started high school. They said kids should take APs when they have exhausted high school classes in their track AND/OR to pursue courses in the field they want to enter (such as Calculus for an engineer or Psychology for a psychologist). When you do that, you don't take AP's until junior and senior year usually, and you only take a handful. This is what my DC did. She was so afraid that it would hurt her because the other smart kids around her were competing for how many AP's they could take and how little sleep they could get. It was very unhealthy. They were drinking coffee as young teens (and are probably taking adderall in college).

My kid went her own route and did fine. Colleges want to see that you are capable of college level coursework, and that you took some of the most rigorous courses offered at your school.

People have to be strong and make their own, healthy decisions.[/quote]

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