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Competition is harder, kids are getting a head-start in every activity of life. What would have been an impressive final-year project when I was in university i

Competition is harder, kids are getting a head-start in every activity of life. What would have been an impressive final-year project when I was in university is something high schoolers are churning out as a bare minimum. How do we ready our kids (who are competitive) for this if not by ensuring that they don't miss out any opprtunities? Note that this is specifically for kids who do show promise.

A_D_E_P_T 2y ago
To quote from a post I made in a previous thread: I'm increasingly of the opinion that the winning move is not to play. The educational Red Queen Race that S.Korea and China have been famous for -- with childhoods utterly dominated by schooling and "extracurriculars" -- is now also an American thing. It's hard on kids, hard on parents, and the real educational benefit is less than zero. (In that kids would genuinely be better off without excess schooling and with more self-directed free time.) The Ivy League path is simultaneously ultra-high-stress and ultra-conventional. It's no longer a golden ticket to the good life. Unless you like grinding and competition, and want a career which features both, I feel it's usually just the opposite. So it makes sense to "say no," as those in OP do. Truly, kids aren't getting a "head-start" these days -- they're engaging in ever more complex and Byzantine make-work. And, emphatically, I do not believe it has any impact on their intellectual achievements later in life.
- elevatedastalt 2y ago
  It's a coordination problem (prisoners dilemma). It's a winning move only if no one plays (aka everyone hits cooperates). If you are the only one who defects you will be worse off.
  - A_D_E_P_T 2y ago
    Maybe. That is, if and only if you want a conventional life path or need a particular University-conferred credential for your choice of profession. Otherwise, there's no pain associated with defecting. If anything, there's far less pain associated with defecting than with the alternative, weighted down with drudgery as it is.
    - elevatedastalt 2y ago
      You are free to live in the woods isolated from society. So are my kids, if that is a decision they make of their own volition once they are old enough to make a meaningful decision. Until then it's my job to make sure they are equipped for life to the most of their capability.
      - A_D_E_P_T 2y ago
        > Until then it's my job to make sure they are equipped for life to the most of their capability. Have you ever looked at Ivy League university ads from 100 years ago? They're often about giving your son a well-rounded education in the liberal arts so that he's equipped to take over the family business. So there's an idea. Instead of forcing your kids to grind, you could leave them stakes in a business. Either yours, or one you build together with them. That's just one idea. There are many unconventional life paths that pay out better than the grind, and better equip your children. You just need to get a bit creative.
- liveoneggs 2y ago
  There is no real way to identify if your kid is extra smart + motivated + lucky enough to "make it" without advantages, of which an ivy education is a big one. The numbers say push them to the max because the best opportunities are given, in the highest numbers, to the kids with the most boxes checked. America is still where you can come from less than nothing and make it, but your parents don't determine that -- You do.
JumpCrisscross 2y ago
> What would have been an impressive final-year project when I was in university is something high schoolers are churning out as a bare minimum Isn’t this progress? The stress components, obviously not. But over time our teaching methods and tools progress, at least in respect of specific concepts.
- elevatedastalt 2y ago
  It is progress, but the progress doesn't come for free, as this article and associated discussion shows. The progress now means that this is now a default expectation at the high school level, which means more work for high-schoolers to just stay afloat.
  - JumpCrisscross 2y ago
    > which means more work for high-schoolers to just stay afloat I’m arguing this isn’t a given. It often is. But consider the pedagogical progress in just educational YouTube videos. Difficult concepts that took hours to understand can now be grasped in under an hour. (You still have to work at it.)
    - elevatedastalt 2y ago
      We are talking of different things. It's good that high-schoolers can make mobile apps. I am talking of the amount of extra work kids have to put in just to have an edge in their admissions profile. It's bad if the avg college admission officer expects every high-schooler to have an open source project.
ozim 2y ago
How can this be true while on the other spectrum I read that schools are lowering requirements and in general maths and physics are dumbed down - while there is a bloom of bs social science where required is showing up an that’s it.
- elevatedastalt 2y ago
  Both can be true. Entrance examinations are at least meritocratic in some sense. On the other hand, these open ended admissions means there's an arms race to the bottom to make your profile look stronger than someone else's, that's why the need to fill it with extra-curriculars and stuff.
- whimsicalism 2y ago
  American society is multimodal. I went to an urban high school that was frequently lowering requirements/making it easier to graduate, but among the people I considered my peer college competitors, the extracuricullar oneupmanship is frequent and seemed much more intense than in the prior generations.
listenallyall 2y ago
> What would have been an impressive final-year project when I was in university is something high schoolers are churning out as a bare minimum. Funny that people dont see the parallels between this, and housing. So much written about "boomers could easily afford a home on one salary, then they pulled up the ladder." No, not really, buying a house was always somewhat challenging, lots of families realized that two incomes would make affordability easier, that started to catch on, prices rose, soon two incomes became the bare minimum to afford a decent house. As competition rose for desirable cities/neighborhoods, not a surprise that now you need two well-above-median incomes to get into something decent.
DoingIsLearning 2y ago
> What would have been an impressive final-year project when I was in university is something high schoolers are churning out as a bare minimum. How do we ready our kids (who are competitive) for this if not by ensuring that they don't miss out any opprtunities? This sounds US-centric, looking from the outside it appears that you tried so hard to not use tests and marks to rate students that you made it all about projects/volunteering which mostly benefit kids with a lot money and time support from parents. It very much looks like performative kabuki for admissions officers where teenagers have lost interest in building something for the sake of it. Anywhere else in the world, bar the US and the rest of the Commonwealth, it is all about grades and having exams with normal distributions as the great equalizer. For all the pros and cons at least anything else you do in your spare time as a teen you do it without any external agenda. A 16 year old shouldn't be worried about how something will look like on their CV.
- elevatedastalt 2y ago
  Yeah, while things are much worse in India or South Korea due to the sheer number of students, the one benefit of entrance examinations is that they are meritocratic and allow everyone to focus on one common goal instead of this whackamole nonsense of activities where no matter how many you do there could be more.
- silverquiet 2y ago
  America is a big place and the Ivies are relatively few and very selective. There absolutely are tests and all serious applicants will have high 90th percentile scores as table stakes. That's why there are other, elaborate requirements.
  - DoingIsLearning 2y ago
    There are big places in a lot of places :) My point is if your tests were harder the distribution bell would not be as 'inflated' and you would not have as many people in the high 90th percentile. Allowing you to still use those scores alone without all the performative arms race. See for example the International Baccalaureate programme and their point system normal distribution with thousands of kids from around the globe.

A_D_E_P_T 2y ago

To quote from a post I made in a previous thread: I'm increasingly of the opinion that the winning move is not to play. The educational Red Queen Race that S.Korea and China have been famous for -- with childhoods utterly dominated by schooling and "extracurriculars" -- is now also an American thing. It's hard on kids, hard on parents, and the real educational benefit is less than zero. (In that kids would genuinely be better off without excess schooling and with more self-directed free time.) The Ivy League path is simultaneously ultra-high-stress and ultra-conventional. It's no longer a golden ticket to the good life. Unless you like grinding and competition, and want a career which features both, I feel it's usually just the opposite. So it makes sense to "say no," as those in OP do. Truly, kids aren't getting a "head-start" these days -- they're engaging in ever more complex and Byzantine make-work. And, emphatically, I do not believe it has any impact on their intellectual achievements later in life.

elevatedastalt 2y ago
It's a coordination problem (prisoners dilemma). It's a winning move only if no one plays (aka everyone hits cooperates). If you are the only one who defects you will be worse off.
- A_D_E_P_T 2y ago
  Maybe. That is, if and only if you want a conventional life path or need a particular University-conferred credential for your choice of profession. Otherwise, there's no pain associated with defecting. If anything, there's far less pain associated with defecting than with the alternative, weighted down with drudgery as it is.
  - elevatedastalt 2y ago
    You are free to live in the woods isolated from society. So are my kids, if that is a decision they make of their own volition once they are old enough to make a meaningful decision. Until then it's my job to make sure they are equipped for life to the most of their capability.
    - A_D_E_P_T 2y ago
      > Until then it's my job to make sure they are equipped for life to the most of their capability. Have you ever looked at Ivy League university ads from 100 years ago? They're often about giving your son a well-rounded education in the liberal arts so that he's equipped to take over the family business. So there's an idea. Instead of forcing your kids to grind, you could leave them stakes in a business. Either yours, or one you build together with them. That's just one idea. There are many unconventional life paths that pay out better than the grind, and better equip your children. You just need to get a bit creative.
liveoneggs 2y ago
There is no real way to identify if your kid is extra smart + motivated + lucky enough to "make it" without advantages, of which an ivy education is a big one. The numbers say push them to the max because the best opportunities are given, in the highest numbers, to the kids with the most boxes checked. America is still where you can come from less than nothing and make it, but your parents don't determine that -- You do.

JumpCrisscross 2y ago

> What would have been an impressive final-year project when I was in university is something high schoolers are churning out as a bare minimum Isn’t this progress? The stress components, obviously not. But over time our teaching methods and tools progress, at least in respect of specific concepts.

elevatedastalt 2y ago
It is progress, but the progress doesn't come for free, as this article and associated discussion shows. The progress now means that this is now a default expectation at the high school level, which means more work for high-schoolers to just stay afloat.
- JumpCrisscross 2y ago
  > which means more work for high-schoolers to just stay afloat I’m arguing this isn’t a given. It often is. But consider the pedagogical progress in just educational YouTube videos. Difficult concepts that took hours to understand can now be grasped in under an hour. (You still have to work at it.)
  - elevatedastalt 2y ago
    We are talking of different things. It's good that high-schoolers can make mobile apps. I am talking of the amount of extra work kids have to put in just to have an edge in their admissions profile. It's bad if the avg college admission officer expects every high-schooler to have an open source project.

ozim 2y ago

How can this be true while on the other spectrum I read that schools are lowering requirements and in general maths and physics are dumbed down - while there is a bloom of bs social science where required is showing up an that’s it.

elevatedastalt 2y ago
Both can be true. Entrance examinations are at least meritocratic in some sense. On the other hand, these open ended admissions means there's an arms race to the bottom to make your profile look stronger than someone else's, that's why the need to fill it with extra-curriculars and stuff.
whimsicalism 2y ago
American society is multimodal. I went to an urban high school that was frequently lowering requirements/making it easier to graduate, but among the people I considered my peer college competitors, the extracuricullar oneupmanship is frequent and seemed much more intense than in the prior generations.

listenallyall 2y ago

> What would have been an impressive final-year project when I was in university is something high schoolers are churning out as a bare minimum. Funny that people dont see the parallels between this, and housing. So much written about "boomers could easily afford a home on one salary, then they pulled up the ladder." No, not really, buying a house was always somewhat challenging, lots of families realized that two incomes would make affordability easier, that started to catch on, prices rose, soon two incomes became the bare minimum to afford a decent house. As competition rose for desirable cities/neighborhoods, not a surprise that now you need two well-above-median incomes to get into something decent.

DoingIsLearning 2y ago

> What would have been an impressive final-year project when I was in university is something high schoolers are churning out as a bare minimum. How do we ready our kids (who are competitive) for this if not by ensuring that they don't miss out any opprtunities? This sounds US-centric, looking from the outside it appears that you tried so hard to not use tests and marks to rate students that you made it all about projects/volunteering which mostly benefit kids with a lot money and time support from parents. It very much looks like performative kabuki for admissions officers where teenagers have lost interest in building something for the sake of it. Anywhere else in the world, bar the US and the rest of the Commonwealth, it is all about grades and having exams with normal distributions as the great equalizer. For all the pros and cons at least anything else you do in your spare time as a teen you do it without any external agenda. A 16 year old shouldn't be worried about how something will look like on their CV.

elevatedastalt 2y ago
Yeah, while things are much worse in India or South Korea due to the sheer number of students, the one benefit of entrance examinations is that they are meritocratic and allow everyone to focus on one common goal instead of this whackamole nonsense of activities where no matter how many you do there could be more.
silverquiet 2y ago
America is a big place and the Ivies are relatively few and very selective. There absolutely are tests and all serious applicants will have high 90th percentile scores as table stakes. That's why there are other, elaborate requirements.
- DoingIsLearning 2y ago
  There are big places in a lot of places :) My point is if your tests were harder the distribution bell would not be as 'inflated' and you would not have as many people in the high 90th percentile. Allowing you to still use those scores alone without all the performative arms race. See for example the International Baccalaureate programme and their point system normal distribution with thousands of kids from around the globe.