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U of Michigan drops first-semester grades to ‘curb mental health crisis’

wsj.com

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Re: U of Michigan drops first-semester grades to ‘curb mental health crisis’

#131

Post by [deleted] »

estearum wrote: post #59
joezydeco wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let me tell you about the scam of 'honors' classes in today's high schools. They not doing anything more introspective or challenging. It's the same classwork thrown at them faster and without as much teaching support. Just more to grind out. But when you don't understand something? You're smart, you'll figure it out . In return you get inflated GPAs that get you into better colleges. But if you can't figure it out o…

Yeah definitely. But "can you grind" is legitimate selection criterion for making it into the upper echelons. Not an ideal one, but it's not illegitimate.

[deleted]

Re: U of Michigan drops first-semester grades to ‘curb mental health crisis’

#132

Post by TimDotC »

ackbar03 wrote: post #123
joezydeco wrote: post #15

When you force high school kids to work days that are significantly longer than a normal adult to achieve a good GPA and get into a good college, you can expect that they are going to throttle back once they're away from home with way more free time than is normal. From my kid's experience: she was up at 6:30am, in AP classes by 7:30am (three more to go during the day). Classes were done by 3:00, then sports practice…

Sorry if this seems naive but do students in America actually work that hard these days? Modern television and social media seem to suggest they are all on drugs and doing God knows what

This is fairly representative experience for high achieving students. When I was in high school, I was typically up at 6:30 AM to get to my 7:00 AM AP class. Classes can end anywhere from 3-4 pm, depending on your course work. After school clubs and activities ranged from commitment. But we were under the assumption that it mattered a lot for college admissions, so many of us participated in 2-3. Once you got home, you had a considerably amount of homework from each class. If you were prepping for standardized exams, you probably dedicated some time to study that as well. Overall, I felt the amount of time spent working in high school was taxing. But also it worked out for me - went to a good college and got a good job and life.

Re: U of Michigan drops first-semester grades to ‘curb mental health crisis’

#134

Post by elmer2 »

joezydeco wrote: post #15

When you force high school kids to work days that are significantly longer than a normal adult to achieve a good GPA and get into a good college, you can expect that they are going to throttle back once they're away from home with way more free time than is normal. From my kid's experience: she was up at 6:30am, in AP classes by 7:30am (three more to go during the day). Classes were done by 3:00, then sports practice…

[flagged]

Re: U of Michigan drops first-semester grades to ‘curb mental health crisis’

#135

Post by armchairhacker »

ackbar03 wrote: post #123
joezydeco wrote: post #15

When you force high school kids to work days that are significantly longer than a normal adult to achieve a good GPA and get into a good college, you can expect that they are going to throttle back once they're away from home with way more free time than is normal. From my kid's experience: she was up at 6:30am, in AP classes by 7:30am (three more to go during the day). Classes were done by 3:00, then sports practice…

Sorry if this seems naive but do students in America actually work that hard these days? Modern television and social media seem to suggest they are all on drugs and doing God knows what

I remember waking around 7am and leaving school around 3pm, then no more than on average ~2 hours of extracurriculars and ~2 hours of homework.

I think the quantity was reasonable, except too much busywork, I wish I could replace it with subjects I was passionate about (i.e. tech).

I also had the entire summer between senior year and college to decompress.

Nowadays I hear that most public schools are giving less work. With all due respect, I believe GP is an anomaly and/or it wasn't the school, but their own pressure.

Re: U of Michigan drops first-semester grades to ‘curb mental health crisis’

#136

Post by kalcode »

joezydeco wrote: post #15

When you force high school kids to work days that are significantly longer than a normal adult to achieve a good GPA and get into a good college, you can expect that they are going to throttle back once they're away from home with way more free time than is normal. From my kid's experience: she was up at 6:30am, in AP classes by 7:30am (three more to go during the day). Classes were done by 3:00, then sports practice…

A lot of this is just inflicted by parent culture and anxiety. Unless your kid applying to an elite school, most college/university accept between 60-80% of their applicants. If they have decent GPA.

We are making the kids endure that out of fear of their college, but stats don't back up the grind they make the kids do.

Re: U of Michigan drops first-semester grades to ‘curb mental health crisis’

#138

Post by watwut »

bradfa wrote: post #47
joezydeco wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And we shouldn't expect adult/parent level of work out a 16/17 year-old. There's no time left any more to be a kid.

Your comment specifically compared it to the normal adult, my point is the normal adult who is a parent is very likely doing even more than your example of your kid. Even for adults who aren't in the elite high earner category, heck people who make less money are likely working even more hours per day just to make ends meet.

As adult with job and kids, I honestly don't work as much as a kid described in that comment. It is in fact way less competitive. I get a good pay, my job is reasonably interesting (ai can make it sux and probably will, but we are not there yet). There are parts that sux or where I am under pressure, but overall, it is better to be an adult then to be teenager trying to get to competitive school.

And for the record, I had to work less to get to good school back then.

Re: U of Michigan drops first-semester grades to ‘curb mental health crisis’

#139

Post by kakacik »

alephnerd wrote: post #45
bradfa wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are normal adults not "working" in a similar way to your kid for 15+ hours per weekday? Comparable adult parent things would be up at 6am, prep kids for school day, in the office by 8am, 8 hours of work plus a lunch, departing the office around 5pm, transporting kids to/from some activities, dinner, helping kids with homework, somehow fit in regular shopping needs (food, essentials, etc), maybe some volunteering or h…

Naw. Adult life is so much easier with regards to competitive pressure compared to getting into a good college. The real world is Pass/Fail, much to the chagrin of plenty of HNers.

Only if you make it so. Good college/university means little in many jobs. The best devs for example (and most paid correspondingly since they knew their value very well) I've ever met were either coming out of subpar schools or skipped university altogether.

I myself went through mediocre noname university in eastern Europe with OK grades and it didn't matter at all, now I get perm salary thats better than 99% of devs in whole Europe while doing just that and nothing more, while sporting 10 weeks of paid vacation yearly. Quality of life further down the line, success and happiness are extremely non-correlated with all this academic stuff.

Its just control freak helicopter parents, which, albeit with good underlying intentions, fuck up everything they touch, including mental health of their kids. So kids compete just to endlessly compete while winning less than nothing. This is how deep regrets later in life are made.

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