Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums General Discussion college acceptance rates

I think these are stereotypes. LOG does not determine desire to please, nor is it required to be PG to make it through a demanding undergrad program successfully.

I have no doubt that the characterization above represents (often untrue) stereotypes which have more to do with personality than LOG.

However, the point IS well-made that statistics alone dictate that there are many, many more MG people applying to colleges than PG ones. Period.

Naturally, the elite institutions should (hypothetically) be much more interested in PG applicants (who have extraordinary potential) rather than MG ones (who have "merely" great potential-- poor choice of words, perhaps, but you all know what I mean there, I hope).

Since there is a perception of scarcity (slots available at top institutions) and value (that a seat at HYPS is very much better than one at Sacramento State), what's a MG student to do?

That's right-- work hard enough to at least appear plausibly HG+ on paper, and therefore... more RARE... and desirable.

Truly EG/PG students, I think, are not really the ones suffering for this development. I think it is MG students, for whom the bar of "acceptable" has been moved into HG performance territory, causing them and their parents anxiety and terror.

As someone else noted above-- it's not the students in the top whatever-it-is percent (locally, I'd estimate top 2%) who are panicking and running like caffeinated hamsters for all of high school-- it's the top 8-10% who are.

Of course, as I've stated before, the only (selfish) objection that I have to that is probably blatantly elitist on the face of it-- I don't think that the kids in the top 10%ile belong in some of the coursework that my kid (top percentile) belongs in and NEEDS-- and putting them there just means that my kid gets LESS of what she needs, because what she needs is incompatible with what the top tenth is capable of doing.

I think the "bored PG student" problem is a real problem in some school settings, but much less so in high achieving school systems. Our school system is fairly easy through 8th grade, and becomes much harder in high school. I don't think my daughter is PG, but some of her friends clearly are. But everyone is challenged in high school.

Off topic, but Google's power can be a bit unnerving at times. I looked up "David and Goliath Princeton breakdown" on Google, and the sixth entry was Wren's post, and this was just 20 minutes after he posted it.

What about the mad scramble within the top <0.5% for the elusive label of valedictorian?

I've made it clear to my daughter that we don't care, even though she is likely in that group. Put in the effort, and let the results happen as they may.

This assumes ability maps more or less directly to potential. Potential is arguably a cocktail of personality traits, chance, connections, ability, and other factors.

Perhaps a better question is: potential for what? If the goal is an Earth-shattering new physics theorem, then E[PG]-E[MG] is probably > 0, with sigma[PG] > sigma[MG] to reflect the potentially deleterious impact of OEs, PG polymath indecision, etc. The university's admissions motive will reflect its risk tolerance wrt sigma.

However, let's not forget that the primary MO of universities is self-preservation, not novel scholarship. Novel scholarship is certainly an input into institutional longevity, but it is a bought resource and is probably only reputationally important below a critical level. If MG candidates are, on average, more financially successful in industry, then favoring MG over PG candidates is rational from an endowment management perspective.

And the PGs with the optimal combination of soft skills and temperament/character traits to produce institutionally-beneficial outcomes are also probably the most likely to make it through undergrad without TLC. Then you can purchase them at the post-graduate/post-doctorate/post-professional level, when they are already beginning to be proven commodities.

Bingo.

The results you get depend on your viewing habits.

Way to diminish opportunity costs, by the way. Elegant solution.