Nurturing isn't necessarily a synonym for primping, 'helping' with every accomplishment, and grooming (for lack of a better term).
Many parents think other parents are pushing their children, but few put themselves in that category. There is no clear dividing line.
There is a big difference between a child who is highly capable on his/her own-- and one that only SEEMS that way because of focused, high-dollar, parental over-involvement.
The Williams sisters had a very focused, involved father -- but
they are the ones hitting the tennis balls. My eldest son is gifted at math, and we are investing time and money in EPGY, Math Olympiad, math books etc. But he is the one participating in the math contest and scoring well on the SAT at a young age.
If we pay to send him to math camps when he is older, drive him to math classes and competitions, and otherwise support him, and as a result he wins math competitions, how will your eagle eye detect if he is "highly capable" or just "seems that way" because of his parents? We are just supportive parents. The parents who spend two weeks with their children at Epsilon math camp are overdoing it
.
Honestly those are the parent that give parents like US a bad name. I will apologize in advance if I am inadvertently touching a nerve here, but I think that I am likewise only stating what is fairly obvious. This phenomenon has gotten so out of hand that people see one of those kids now, and the first thought isn't "Wow, what an extraordinary child," it's "Wow, what a pair of enmeshed parents...that poor child."
The more gifted a child is, the more "enmeshed" the parents may need to be, because the public schools won't be educating them.
Anyone that needs mom and dad to primp them for a decade, and needs four shots at the SAT probably isn't as good as they look on paper. That's all.
Which kid deserves an Ivy slot more? The one that gets a top-notch SAT score on the only attempt-- and with no prep course? Or the one that has a heavily padded resume and that same top-notch SAT score (the result of weekly coaching for three years and four separate attempts at the SAT)?
Railing against SAT preparation on moral grounds is pointless. If people think it's effective, they will do it. Studies have found that such preparation does not raise scores much on average
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/05/19/AR2009051903058.htmlStudy Finds Relatively Small Gains From Test Coaching
By Valerie Strauss
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, May 20, 2009
I just don't think it's a good trend, overall. For kids that have exceptional talents outside of traditional academic ones, it makes sense, of course. But Julliard isn't Yale; there should not be a need to 'showcase' a student via a portfolio at the latter, since the academic abilities of the student should be readily observable via SAT/ACT scores and transcripts, maybe coupled with an essay.
Yale has a student orchestra that tours the world
http://yso.research.yale.edu/history/index.php . Given two students with similar grades and test scores, why not admit the
superb musician? You said that a student who scores well on the SAT "cold" is more impressive than a student getting the same scores after much preparation. By the same logic, a student who can get good grades and test scores AND be a good musician AND be a good athlete AND win a science competition is more impressive than a student who only has good grades and test scores, because the former student was likely able to get the same academic results in less time and therefore had more time for extracurriculars.
