Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums General Discussion Looking for ideas for my high schooler

I'd recommend checking out Cal Newport's So Good They Can't Ignore You. It's an alternative viewpoint to the pervasive idea of finding your passion. If nothing else, it might give you and DD different ideas for how to tackle the problem.

Brown and RISD have a dual degree that may interest her or give her some ideas see link. Dual degree grads fuse art + science

Thanks for the book recommendation! I'll check it out. I'm a little resistant to the "find your passion" concept myself. "very few people at a young age know enough about life to choose something to be really passionate about, and even if they do, they are bound to be wrong"--Yes, I do see this point indeed, and yet, I sure see a lot of kids who think they know...and I feel like there's this THING where schools want you to have a THING.

Meanwhile, like her dad, DD is strong in a lot of areas and probably would do fine in many jobs.

That book sounds great! It sounds like it jives with what I was trying clumsily to say, too- find things she’s good at and interested in and ideally she will find a career where those skills are valuable. It seems like jobs and even college majors nowadays are much more interdisciplinary and flexible, and at least my view is that choosing a specific field is not as important as it once was.

You know, it's not so much that I'm worried about her finding a field except for two things:

1. She has to decide which way to "go" in high school (humanities or science/math track)

2. It seems like colleges want you to have a focus/passion. Do you all think I'm wrong there? I'd be happy to be wrong!

Um, certainly views vary on these points, but I can say from our recent experience applying to and beginning college, that

1. It probably depends a lot on what type of school, but my DD is still interested in both “tracks” as you put it. I guess I was trying to point out that I don’t think there is a division any more, unless one is persuing a very technical field. To that end, we knew that a liberal arts college would serve DD well, (math and sciences are part of the liberal arts definition) and she wanted to be surrounded by kids with diverse interests. So far, so good- there are engineers taking philosophy, math kids trying Arabic, there are two kids on her floor taking beginning Japanese, but also the advanced compacted math class DD is in. And her interests are still developing, and will surely change as she gains exposure and new opportunities arise. We’re more than ok with that.

2. I can only speak to my DDs experience, but colleges welcomed the breadth of her interests and experiences. That said, I would say she showed passion in many things, both in her essays and letters of rec, but also in the intensity of her participation- she had a few areas/activities that she pursued for many years, held leadership roles in these and participated at national levels. But she could not be pigeonholed as either math/ science or humanities- she found areas in both that excited her and in which she excelled. And she intends to continue this trajectory- to the point that we are slightly concerned she won’t be able to keep up with all of it, but that’s a different problem... So far, her experience has been phenomenal and the college community has been totally welcoming; she feels like she has found her people.

Almost every college that we visited said that most kids who declare a major change that major when they get to college. They also say that there is nothing wrong with being undecided. Hard to know if declaring a major makes a difference.

For my college Freshman, she had two areas of interest (math and music) but went in as undecided. I wish she had declared at least one as an intended major - mainly because she might have gotten an adviser with a bit more knowledge of her interest areas.

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I am following this post for sure. We have 2 9th grade girls. DD14 is challenged and doing fairly well socially. DD13 has declared, "What does it matter?" when we talk about school. We are in an incredibly academic school, but not a school that caters to DYS types. DD13, like ultramarina's daughter, isn't engaged. She received A's this semester without trying, but I am worried that the attitude will eventually cause the grades to slip. The only thing DD13 seems to care about is her art, and because of block scheduling, there isn't room for art right now (gym class is taking up the elective spot). She spends all her free time drawing at home and creating new languages and fonts. School is absolutely boring for her.

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