Posted on 04/03/2013 8:09:12 AM PDT by TSgt
Like me, millions of high-school seniors with sour grapes are asking themselves this week how they failed to get into the colleges of their dreams. It's simple: For years, they—we—were lied to.
Colleges tell you, "Just be yourself." That is great advice, as long as yourself has nine extracurriculars, six leadership positions, three varsity sports, killer SAT scores and two moms. Then by all means, be yourself! If you work at a local pizza shop and are the slowest person on the cross-country team, consider taking your business elsewhere.
What could I have done differently over the past years?
For starters, had I known two years ago what I know now, I would have gladly worn a headdress to school. Show me to any closet, and I would've happily come out of it. "Diversity!" I offer about as much diversity as a saltine cracker. If it were up to me, I would've been any of the diversities: Navajo, Pacific Islander, anything. Sen. Elizabeth Warren, I salute you and your 1/32 Cherokee heritage.
I also probably should have started a fake charity. Providing veterinary services for homeless people's pets. Collecting donations for the underprivileged chimpanzees of the Congo. Raising awareness for Chapped-Lips-in-the-Winter Syndrome. Fun-runs, dance-a-thons, bake sales—as long as you're using someone else's misfortunes to try to propel yourself into the Ivy League, you're golden.
...
Then there was summer camp. I should've done what I knew was best—go to Africa, scoop up some suffering child, take a few pictures, and write my essays about how spending that afternoon with Kinto changed my life. Because everyone knows that if you don't have anything difficult going on in your own life, you should just hop on a plane so you're able to talk about what other people have to deal with.
(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...
Obviously SATs and grades are important, but I can't agree completely.
America's top educational institutions view themselves as having a product — a way of thinking about the world through education — that can influence society for good. They want to admit students with promise who can use that education for the best purposes possible.
Let's forget liberal arts or social science careers for a minute.
Let's say you are an admission officer making a decision on admitting students to a business degree program. You have two applicants:
1) a brainy kid from an upper-class family in an east coast state who loves video games and has high SAT scores but never did anything in his high school life to indicate any particular ambitions in life beyond going back to work for and eventually inherit his father's small business, or
2) a smart but non-genius kid with somewhat lower test scores who is from an inner-city background, worked in high school in his immigrant father's small restaurant, and has a goal in life of starting his own business and then serving as a model helping inner-city residents learn to start their own businesses.
Many conservatives, even those who would never support racial preferences, will say they'd work extra hard to get the second student to enroll in a good conservative college with a solid business program and a philosophy of free enterprise, and they'd be right to do so. The first student is probably going to do okay no matter what school he goes to. The second student might very well get sucked into a liberal college that would harm him, or at least not help him.
Liberal admissions officers at elite schools also work harder with some students than others, and that is entirely appropriate when dealing with the upper levels of education where not every good student who wants to get in can realistically be admitted.
“Princeton can use a guy like Joel.” LOL!
Of course. But my point was, kids with lower grades and test scores can still get admitted over kids who are native-born traditional Americans of European extraction and outstanding credentials and accomplishments. I responded to someone who implied that some kids just don't work hard enough. In my experience, hard work is a turn-off to today's liberal power elites.
The current message of college admissions personnel: “You may have a genius IQ and straight A’s, but if you’re White and not utterly PC, don’t bother to apply.”
They are also easier to move, being round you can roll them to a different location.
This was done as a group project for a college class and each chapter was written by a different person.
Amazon Credits Max Brooks (sone of Mel Brooks):
The New York Times bestselling author of The Zombie Survival Guide and World War Z, Max Brooks has been called "the Studs Terkel of zombie journalism." He lives in New York City but is ready to move to a more remote and defensible location at a moment's notice.
Max Brooks's The Zombie Survival Guide formed the core of the world's civilian survival manuals during the Zombie War.
Mr. Brooks subsequently spent years traveling to every part of the globe in order to conduct the face-to-face interviews that have been incorporated into World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War.
Fictitious author in a conjectured future?
Link to his authors page on amazon http://www.amazon.com/Max-Brooks/e/B001IGLRRU/ref=ntt_athr_dp_pel_1
Applicants to all service academies, except the United States Coast Guard Academy, are required to obtain a nomination to the schools. Nominations may be made by Congressional Representatives, Senators, the Vice President and the President. Applicants to the Coast Guard Academy compete in a direct nationwide competitive process that has no by-state quotas.
Friends or family of the above have a pretty good head start.
You are correct. It hasn’t changed since I attended USAFA.
I served 4 years in the U.S.A.F. that's where the similarities end.
Great subjects for comedic derision, though.
OK, I got a couple of my “zombie” projects mixed up.
“A History of the Great Zombie Wars” was a collaborative writing college project.
She has a 4.5 GPA, and decent SAT.
I saw her on TV this morning, and she rubbed me the wrong way..but she had the creds for IVY league.
Ahhh....that would be “person hole.” Jeez....//sarcasm
While I would agree with you on that assessment, many universities are working hard to marginalize the SAT as an admissions criterion.
I’m glad to hear that the USNA is not. Or at least, I inferred that from your post.
Acceptance into the Poison Ivy League is not an honor,but a vice
A-Team editorial writer.
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