Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums General Discussion Adult Reversing Own Underachievement

Hello. I'm an adult who was identified as gifted (about three standard deviations above the mean) around fourth grade. I have had a long pattern of underachievement, which continued through high school even though I realized it was a problem in 6th and 7th grades. I am generally stubborn and took awhile to get myself to do unpleasant things in the short-term to achieve long-term goals.

Anyway, so while I advocated for grade skipping or curriculum compacting (the last one I didn't know had a name until a few years ago, but I knew it would be preferable to just skipping grades) since elementary school, school admin always rejected my proposals to grade skip or homeschool due to concerns about social skills. While they probably had a legitimate point there, it sounded ridiculous to a thirteen-year-old whose primary school-acquired "social skill" was learning to avoid using words more than five or six letters long to try to avoid assaults, which were my fault, of course. I am being sarcastic about that last part, but it isn't much hyperbole.

My parents didn't really do any sort of advocating, mainly because they were and are of low socioeconomic status and lack education beyond high school (my mother didn't graduate because she was pregnant). Also, they didn't really care about what grades we brought home, even though they stressed the importance of learning and the fact that you'll probably earn more with a college degree (but college isn't for everyone, they continue to remind me).

So the frustrating part, as I'm sure most of you know already, has been that I started doing college level work in English and math around the end of elementary school, but had almost no type of acceleration except for taking AP Euro in 10th grade (GATE didn't do acceleration/compacting, just pleasant but unnecessary enrichment). I slacked off a lot in high school, making my grades downhill, and I started the wheels in motion to drop out and take the CHSPE (I think that's the acronym - it's like the GED, only a little more difficult and I think also specific to CA). I didn't drop out, though, because I had made good friends the first day of high school, and we are still friends six years later.

So I took about 30 credits at community college in high school, then after realizing I wouldn't get into MIT as a high school junior while slacking off in classes, I applied to two colleges (including one very unselective) that either didn't use grades or just didn't show them to you unless you asked. After a trimester, I quit due to health problems which were/are ongoing since adolescence, but it took awhile to treat them adequately. Instead of taking to heart the lesson that I would have to take courses in subjects I already know, I dropped out of that college, then a few years later applied to a community college, where I would be even more behind than if I had just stuck with the first program and college. (D'oh!)

So I'm taking these two summer courses I already know (Calculus II and honors composition), very bored but sticking with it and doing the work and the exams, when a counselor I'm speaking with tells me she thinks I would fit better at the local private university, and that I could probably get in with my high school record and SATs even without taking more CC courses. The CC has an extensive relationship with this university, so I'm inclined to think she knows what she's talking about.

I'm excited by the idea, since even though it isn't my first choice college to transfer to, it is pretty close since they offer a lot of opportunities for both music and physics (I never played an instrument in school since renting an instrument would have been too expensive, but I'm really into theory and composition and have some keyboard experience). I'm setting up an appointment with them tomorrow, but I'm kind of flabbergasted at the sudden-ness of this - the application isn't very long, but I'd expected I'd need two years of remediation to prove I can stick with a college course load after my withdrawal.

At the university I could probably get the majority of "review" courses done in three semesters, about the same as the community college (so that's a financial concern), but they have a lot more options for courses that go into greater depth on the material, whereas the community college lacks theory/proof intensive math courses (which just plain require more thought and creativity than exclusively computationally focused courses, no matter what the prior experience in the subject), and also doesn't have a Putnam problem class.

It looks like you can't test out of math past calc II - which I'm currently taking - and I'm unsure about the physics department policies, but I think it would be difficult to test out of those because of the labs (I took AP Physics B in HS but bombed it for such a petty reason as disliking the teacher's presentation - she really should have stuck to teaching in her major, and the first semester of AP Chemistry and the first semester of AP Calculus AB, which the counselor dropped for me since I was failing US History). My parents were reluctant to pay for CollegeBoard exams, so I only took three AP tests in addition to the SAT, two of which I had a seizure that day and did very poorly on). Frankly, I'm glad MIT rejected me as a HS junior applicant - I'm sure I could've risen to the challenge academically, but I did not have the maturity then to live on my own in a strange place - I didn't reach that kind of maturity until I turned 20.

However, beyond intro courses (which sound like they'd go into more depth than CC/AP courses), does anyone know what options are available for advanced students who didn't start college classes in their major early on? Also, I am still concerned about the downward trend on the HS transcript and inconsistency in my transcript. That just screams "undisciplined, lazy" to me, and to others might shout, "couldn't handle the harder classes after freshman year". I had planned to do three or four semesters at CC to show I'm past that, and that's still an option if the university doesn't accept me, though, so I'm not as worried about whether I get in sooner or later.

However, time is my most precious commodity. Not because I want to run through things fast to get them done, but because I want to spend every moment doing something valuable (an unattainable goal, of course, but considering I spent the better part of K-12 staring at the ceiling or out the window, I've had this urgent desire to always be productive and stave off thoughts about the limitations of my own mortality - since learning is my primary objective, it's difficult to internalize the fact that going through the classes is productive toward the goal of getting to more interesting, challenging stuff - I can do it if I have to, but I always try to examine all the available options and create a new option if possible before settling for something).

That's why I'm planning, after college (and PhD and a couple of postdocs, hopefully) to set up a charter school primarily for gifted kids who lack wealth, whose parents didn't get much education, whose educational provisions are so out-of-step with their needs it presents large risk to their emotional health and academic achievement down the line, or who are in some other way disadvantaged, since it is hard enough for middle to upper-class kids to get appropriate education, but even more difficult for kids whose parents don't know about how or why to appeal school decisions, can't afford private schools, outside tutoring, etc.

Kids who are encouraged to go into the workforce early, who are often underestimated by school faculty who interpret their underachievement as a sign they aren't capable, and to not only educate the academic areas that need acceleration, but also to teach study skills, managing perfectionism, work ethic, and similar skills gifted kids often don't fully develop after years in inappropriate education settings where they coast, and lessen the shock that happens if/when they enroll in a challenging college program.

So I guess I'm looking for other people's experience with the four-year-college, from the perspective of a gifted person in college or as the parent of one, or both - like ideas for taking full advantage of the resources available, any unique (or not so unique) challenges I could expect (I would live off-campus and commute by bus), or whether it's truly a good idea to take on the additional debt of enrolling in a private 4-year school earlier when the additional depth/challenge of the intro courses is likely to not be staggering.

For reference of roughly where I'm at, I've self-taught using the intro mechanics book by Kleppner/Kolenkow and the calculus books by Apostol, as well as studying linear algebra and ordinary differential equations, some basic number theory proof-writing, some basic chaos theory and a bit of abstract algebra including the basics of groups and rings, Fourier series/transforms, some basic Python and C++ programming, and E&M theory with a bit of quantum mechanics (the last two at a level just above a freshman physics major course).

One thing I would love is the greater opportunity to do research - while I can talk to CC physics professors about topics in current research and their main area of interest or expertise in the field, I would probably have more access to doing research, even though it's extremely unlikely I would be capable of doing research in the areas I'm most interested - theoretical particle physics, maybe theoretical plasma physics or nuclear physics - but it is good to have hands-on experience in a different sub-field, which could be especially useful if I decide to switch my area of concentration later on, or choose early on to focus on something else that is more exciting than I had anticipated, kind of like how medical students do rotations in different specialties before deciding which area to focus on for residency.

Okay, I guess that's about it for my introduction. I'm really interested in education reform, particularly special education (both ends of the spectrum) - there are a few things I have known I want to study or do since before starting school: math, physics, music, creative writing, animation, and education. I love other subjects like chemistry, psychology, biology, literature, etc. but I could leave those alone for awhile and be content - with the others, it's a very strong drive (though animation and music are more hobbies than anything else).

That's a lot to process. Remember to inhale--oxygen is important.

1) Don't overthink the admissions process or try to second guess the committee decision. Having been on an admissions committee, I can tell you there's no way to predict what they'll decide. The committee is made up individuals, and individuals think for themselves.

2) I also come from a working class background. If I brought a D home on a report card, my parents' reaction was not significantly different than if I brought an A home. I too, was seriously bored and an underachiever in middle school and high school.

I went to a small, private college and absolutely loved it. It was better than I could have imagined, and I was more excited to arrive on campus my senior year than I was in any of the years before! I did a bunch of my emotional and social growing up at college, which was a pretty intense social and emotional experience for everybody, some more than others. It's been more than 20 years [cough] since I graduated, but even today, I've had discussions on FB with my college friends about interesting articles or funny photos we've posted.

I still struggle with motivation for things like cleaning up my living room today, right now. But I'm a tenured teacher, and this much I can tell you: you are not likely to ever have more power to actually change things in education than you will between the four walls of your own public school classroom. It is not easy, by any means, and I find this a very annoying truth, personally; but there is not much anybody in an office can do to impact learning without the full cooperation of the classroom teacher.

Yeah, that's pretty much what I figure (since a lot of education "reform" that goes on is fads getting rehashed, or people searching for Band-aid solutions). It's why I plan to be one of the teachers (I'm thinking at the middle school / high school level). I also plan to be very selective in the interview process. Things will never be perfect, but since I can't effect a large change by myself, I'd at least like to improve the opportunities for others. There are a lot of questions I still have about how to go about this, and I expect that even after years of contemplating it, I'll still get it wrong. But maybe I'll get it a little less wrong. That's kind of my approach to why I want to learn to be an independent researcher in science: it's for the search and the possibility of contributing something worthwhile, not because I want to secure a Nobel Prize.

Yeah, you never know what they'll think - but I figure it's worth it to give it a shot, kind of like I applied to MIT in my junior year even though realistically I had almost no chance of getting in. But I knew I would regret it if I'd never tried.

That's one reason I'm interested in attending - I look forward more to doing research and having discussions with professors than I do to the possibility of skipping some intro courses. I just have to think long-term, which is what I have to do at community college anyway. I'm not a terribly social person (I generally take a "strictly-for-business" kind of attitude for college classes, but would love to find people who want to discuss interesting things from politics to poetry to physics), but if I develop friendships anything like I did in high school, that would be a very positive bonus.

Ugh, I don't know how gifted people manage to get PhDs. I want to have one by the time I'm 60, but I don't really have a good reason for wanting one. I'd probably teach part time and do some research.

My transcript makes me look bi-polar or something. I have a semester of straight As, followed by Cs and Ds (even Fs), followed by straight As, followed by Cs and Ds, etc. I have 80 college credits and I decided to just drop out for now and concentrate on being a SAHM and my business.

Are you definitely sure you want to do all this schooling? My reaction to my experiences has been to decide to homeschool my own children. I have no interest in trying to work within the current system.

I also recognize how bored I get in school and in jobs and I deal with a lack of self-discipline as well. A lack of self-discipline is the result of coasting through childhood without getting challenged and having to work hard for anything, I think.

The only thing I work really hard at, consistently, is my own business and at being a good mother. Instead of fighting who I am right now, I've decided to accept that and pay off the loans I have before going back again.

I'll let the people with more and varied college experiences go after all of that discussion. What comes to me after reading your whole story is that you might want to try and contact Salman Khan, of the Khan Academy website. For some reason I get the impression that you and he might get along famously, and he's a guy with education ideas!