Getting Into Your First Choice College is NOT an Accomplishment.

2/6/2015

I received a comment from a Gunn Alumnus after posting When "Achievement" is Toxic: My Thoughts on the (most recent) Gunn Suicide, and Raising Resilient Children. In it, he writes (among other things, you can read the entire comment here),

I take great offense at your description of putting our future colleges on our graduation caps as a “pissing contest.” This opinion exemplifies your lack of understanding of our school. Our graduation caps represent our proud achievements, and I can assure you that they are worn with pride in whatever school we got into. As an example to demonstrate this pride to you, every one of these caps were handmade by the students themselves—we put effort into these because we are proud of what we’ve accomplished.

I wanted to take a moment to address this comment. So here goes.

Gunn Alumnus,

I stand by what I said about the graduation caps, though. Because getting into your first-choice school isn't an achievement. No matter how amazing and smart and "perfect" you are... there's only a 5% chance you'll get into an Ivy. When I was at Stanford, the admission rate was closer to 10% -- and even then, I knew that I was at least a little lucky to have been accepted. I've been called a lot of things, and "arrogant" is one of them. However, I have never been so foolish as to think my high school achievements were somehow "better" than those of the 9 students who didn't get my spot. We ALL had good grades. We ALL had good test scores. We ALL worked hard. We ALL experienced setbacks, failures... and major victories.

In other words, I truly believe that students who get into Stanford and Harvard aren't "better" than kids who only got into their second-choice (or safety) school. They're just luckier. So calling the college you got into an "accomplishment" is like calling finding $5 on the street during your run an "accomplishment."

On the one hand, you wouldn't have found that $5 if you hadn't braved the rain and cold weather. On the other, you're not a better runner than I am just because you found $5 on your run and I didn't.

Bring it on!

In fact, many parts of our run were probably really similar. We may have both stepped in that unexpectedly huge puddle as we turned onto Arastradero. We both felt our legs burn as we ran up the huge hill at mile two... and we both experienced the corresponding joy when soared over the peak and down the other side. We both caught that glimpse of the sun between the clouds -- and we both saw the rainbow at the end.

Many parts of our run were probably different, too. Maybe I chose a shorter but hillier route. Maybe you took the long way home. Maybe running is a lot harder for me than it is for you -- I was always more of a basketball player. But, at the end of the day, we both put on our shoes and did and saw all these amazing things. And now, instead of honoring and celebrating that... you want to celebrate the "accomplishment" of finding $5?

I totally agree that graduation should be a celebration of all your hard work, growth, experiences and accomplishments. Which is why it's so horrific and confusing to me that Gunn students choose to adorn their heads with... something they "achieved" kind of arbitrarily. Something that may trigger feelings of envy, regret, anxiety or shame.

Most people eventually come to terms with it, but so many kids spend a long time feeling like failures when they don't get in to their first choice school. One girl was so ashamed to tell her parents that she didn't get into Stanford... that she didn't tell them. She went to Stanford, anyway, and masqueraded as a student for several months before she got caught. She's an extreme example... but, then again, maybe so are you. When about three out of four Gunn alumni I know tell me that "Gunn is a terrible/unhealthy place," I'm inclined to think that there is probably something toxic about the culture there. What exactly that "something" is, or how to fix it, I may never fully understand.

But I am certain that ending this "tradition" (though one Gunn '05 alum told me that this was not a tradition when she graduated) would be a step in the right direction.

4 Comments

Tim Sun

2/6/2015 07:57:24 am

Hey Eva,

I somewhat disagree with this piece. I agree with you that there is a fair amount of luck when getting into top tier schools like Stanford. I also agree with you in that many many people are qualified individuals who could do just fine at Stanford. Having gone to Stanford, tons of people have high opinions of themselves having just gone to Stanford and show off it as an important accomplishment. (eg. Richard Sherman who I happen to have a very low opinion)

That being said, I think there is also some skill in getting into a school like Stanford. Distinguishing yourself above and beyond the crowd is important and getting the attention of the admissions officer is very difficult. So I disagree to saying its completely up to luck, but isn't life a combination of luck, skill and hard work?

My two sense.

Tim

Eva Glasrud link

2/7/2015 11:22:16 am

I actually completely agree. In order to get in to your top choice school, you have to be excellent at a lot of things -- or at least world-class at one thing. That takes a lot of talent and hard work. Making yourself stand out among so many other applicants also requires that you're very special. I didn't mean to imply that getting into your first choice school is purely luck -- just that, at a certain point, it becomes impossible to predict who will get in and who won't, and that lots of incredibly qualified, amazing applicants are irrationally excluded. That's why I think it's weird to celebrate your high school graduation by focusing on where you'll be going this fall -- it should be about where you are and who you're with now.

Thanks for the comment!

Another Gunn Alumnus

2/8/2015 12:23:53 pm

Dear Eva,

Even after reading this new piece to clarify your original piece, I strongly disagree. For one, many people don’t go to their first choice school, so automatically assuming our graduation caps are our way of bragging that we got into our dream school is faulty. (As a side note, if where you go doesn’t matter, then the fact that you went to Stanford should not even be mentioned in the first place) Perhaps the college we end up at isn’t the achievement, but is putting the college logo on our cap to symbolize our next stage in life really that offensive to call it a “pissing contest"? The issue is that if designing our caps is bad, then wouldn’t wearing our college sweater, which everybody can see, while on campus be just as bad? If so, there are so many simple harmless things that we could do that would unintentionally trigger anxiety. School does have a responsibility to promote a safe environment for students to grow, but it cannot keep track of every single stimulus that can trigger someone’s emotions.

Furthermore, I know plenty of students at other schools(Los Altos High, St. Francis, Mountain View) that design their caps, yet their school environment isn’t known to be toxic. In fact, I know Los Altos allows their students to load up on APs starting sophomore year, unlike Gunn. If academics and cap designs are reasons for making Gunn such a terrible place, wouldn’t Los Altos be even worse? Los Altos does not seem to be as “toxic"(according to my friends, if we are simply going by word of mouth as you are) as Gunn is.

In addition, I can assure you that the 3 of 4 students who talked you into believing that Gunn is a toxic environment is definitely too small a sample size. The student body takes surveys to anonymous evaluate their life at Gunn. I am absolutely positive that the survey results would report less than 75%(probably way less than 50%) would actually believe that Gunn is as “toxic” and miserable as you make it seem.

Also, I take offense that you use the suicide as an opportunity to call upon fixing Gunn’s academic environment, implying you do believe there is a strong correlation between the two. Why don’t you give actual suggestions to high schoolers to change their mindset? Your original article definitely states that work only needs to be done on the school and parents, but there is nothing said directly to students to change their own mindset.

I completely stand by what the original Gunn alumunus wrote. For those students who are willing to take up an academically rigorous course load, they do. Maybe we do want to get straight A’s. Sure it may look good for college applications, but we pursue that A because we know we can work our way to it.

While I admit my years at Gunn were academically rigorous, they have definitely helped me transitioning into college. I don’t think what is considered here a toxic environment would have made be prepared for college. While I might not have gotten the end result I wanted, I’m still very satisfied with where I ended up at.

In the end, we all agree something has to be done. That I graduated Gunn and I still don’t completely understand the problem says that people outside of Gunn should not be able to come up and easily identify how to fix the problem. Immediately pointing to certain factors as bad is not the right way to go to help Gunn out.

Kevin Bates

4/27/2017 04:46:01 am

the problem is the belief/brain-washing that college is the be-all & end-all ultimate achievement in life. it has been so strongly inculcated in the society that people without college degrees are sneered at and looked down upon as brainless disposable trash..but who is going to fix your plumbing problems?

not likely some Ivy Leaguer

many of "the troops" and police officers & firefighters & other emergency workers whom people "supposedly" respect..*GASP* may not actually have college degrees!

(brainless, uneducated morons!) hardly a step above a baboon..

the horror! guess they are UNFIT to put their lives on the line for you!

next time INSIST on a proper Ivy League degree when you call the police or fire department!!!

if the responders are not properly educated, make sure that you let them know how INFERIOR they are to you!

and forget about showing respect for loser , bottom-of-the-barrel, lowly uneducated soldiers, sailors, marines & airmen

Getting Into Your First Choice College is NOT an Accomplishment.

Leave a Reply.

Want more?

Categories