I can't speak to the OP's school, and I think ChaosMitten brings up good points. But for example where we are, the quality of the music program does have to do with the school and not just with the parents. Sure kids get private lessons, are made to practice, play in local youth symphonies, and there is a booster club. But the daily instruction beginning in middle school by excellent orchestra directors has a direct impact on the awards the orchestra receives, and the joy my daughter derives from participating.
I did have to have this conversation with my daughter when I saw her eyes light up at the thought of valedictorian. Students are taking extra on-line AP classes to bring their GPA up--and there are usually around 70-80 kids with perfect GPAs (4.something something) taking all AP classes + stellar ECs. I know that many parents put enormous pressure on their kids. The first violin at one of the concerts burst into tears afterwards because she had made a small, unnoticeable mistake during a solo and was afraid to face her parents.
Excellent points.
As another silicon forest-dweller
, I'd also add that it is important to pay attention to local norms re: adolescent mental health indicators.
Many such places have very high teen suicide rates-- or high rates of mental health hospitalizations. That's the dark side that I referred to earlier.
This kind of environment is
not a good one for:
anyone who isn't HG/HG+,
those who intend to gain admission to elite-elite institutions.
The latter has already been explained rather well-- but let me further explain the former. There
is tremendous pressure placed on the kids in the top 5-10% in such settings.
Tremendous pressure.
On the other hand, most of the parents who post/read here have children who really
can (in general) perform up to those expectations without having to do anything particularly unhealthy to do so. Kids above MG also have the chance to find their tribe more readily when 15-25% of the local school population
is genuinely at least garden-variety gifted.
On the
other-other hand (this is why I need that third hand, huh?)
that kind of high-anxiety environment may be particularly enriched in disordered eating and other maladaptive coping-- particularly for girls. That kind of anxiety/perfectionism
can be "contagious." It also means that if your child has MG friends, s/he will astutely hide how easily s/he is meeting those standards so that their parents don't get wind of it and use it as leverage against their own kids. (I wish that I were kidding about that). The KIDS may be great... and the parents may be another story if they feel that your kid is not a "good influence" (er-- or more insidiously, a 'good foil' for his/her excellence). The competitiveness among
parents there can be pretty toxic.
PG kids are still like unicorns-- only a fair number of the villagers are tying paper mache horns to their horses and definitely don't want the real deal to be TOO obvious. KWIM?
