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The Disadvantages of an Elite Education (2008)

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Re: The Disadvantages of an Elite Education (2008)

#171

Post by a3camero »

aarohmankad wrote: post #70
akiselev wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, to gain access to these institutions you are basically required to have half a dozen extracurriculars on your resume. They receive applications from so many white straight-A/4.0 students that extracurriculars are the only differentiating factor. Few high schools (in California, at least) would even let you graduate without 50-100 hours of community service. Whether these extracurriculars would expose you to diffe…

"Few high schools (in California, at least) would even let you graduate without 50-100 hours of community service." I have never heard of community service as a requirement to graduate high school. (No school in my district had this requirement.) Granted, I understand your overall point. It is becoming increasingly difficult to be accepted by "elite" colleges. In fact, I had applied to nearly 12 colleges that were hi…

To get a high school diploma in Ontario, Canada you need to do 40 hours of community service: http://www.edu.gov.on.ca/extra/eng/ppm/124a.html.

Re: The Disadvantages of an Elite Education (2008)

#172

Post by aswanson »

argonaut wrote: post #144
jondubois wrote: post #140

I graduated from one of the top universities in my country (top 50 in the world) and we learned pretty much exactly the same material as they did at MIT. In reality I don't think there is any significant difference in terms of education quality between the top #1 university and #100 for any given field. But the difference in terms of opportunities after finishing MIT vs finishing some other good university is massive…

I went to Berkeley for CS and knew people that went to MIT and Stanford, and I don't agree. You're right the curriculum is the same. Everything else is different. Just one example: lots of undergrads do research. They get to work (albeit basically as trainees) in some of the top CS labs in the world.

I think you learn more from your peer group than classes in college, so it's a good idea got try to get surrounded with the most talented cohort possible.

Re: The Disadvantages of an Elite Education (2008)

#174

Post by lmm »

csallen wrote: post #165
nimchimpsky wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"the ability "to not be rich" is, in fact, a choice" Yeah but thats a choice, whereas being poor is enforced. Thats why an elite education is an advantage. The article is horrible self indulgent drivel ... "you incapable of talking to people who aren’t like you". They think going to a shitty school teaches you how to talk to everyone?

> Thats why an elite education is an advantage. The author isn't saying that an elite education offers no advantage. He's saying that it has downsides as well. It's not 100% advantageous, and yet we tend to think of it as so. > They think going to a shitty school teaches you how to talk to everyone? It certainly does a better job than isolating yourself within a very narrow band of culture. In my experience, that's j…

Any school will have a culture. Those that pride themselves on diversity tend to have one narrow kind of variety, and extreme monoculture on other axes - or else have a bunch of subcultural groups that don't really talk to each other. There's a kind of fundamental conservation: for people to be able to communicate and work together requires a certain level of cultural commonality.

So whichever school you went to, you end up finding it easy to talk with some number of people and hard to talk with some number of people. It all averages out. The questions that matter are a) how good or bad that culture is and b) how good or bad the non-cultural aspects of your education are.

Re: The Disadvantages of an Elite Education (2008)

#175

Post by snarf21 »

dibstern wrote: post #14

These aren't the disadvantages of an elite education, it's the disadvantages of not having sufficient breadth of experiences with people from a sufficient breadth of social-economic backgrounds. Get your kids to do extracurriculars where they'll meet kids from lower-income households. It'll make them able to relate to them and understand them better.

I agree. These aren't disadvantages and shouldn't be characterized that way. This is in no way to imply that rich/elite people don't have problems. Instead of not having access to quality education or food or etc., kids of the rich/elite have massive expectations thrust on them.

But everything in life is a choice and if the author is so self aware of this "disadvantage", they have simple paths to fix it. Instead of people making more home food delivery start-ups, create one to help underprivileged get access to education or healthcare, etc.

The key take away for me is that if you decide to live your life based on someone else's terms, you'll never be truly happy. Create your own path on your journey.

Re: The Disadvantages of an Elite Education (2008)

#177

Post by dahart »

pyre wrote: post #147
douche wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The ability to not be rich strikes me as the position of someone who is very privileged to start with. Po' folk don't have to opportunity to choose to not be rich, they just have to do the best they can with the hand they are dealt.

That's exactly what she said though: > I will say that the ability "to not be rich" is, in fact, a choice not psychologically available to many upper class people (emphasis mine)

That is not the same thing at all. There's a vast chasm between not possible because you don't have the money and not phychologically available because you can't imagine lowering your standards. For one, the argument that rich people can't bring themselves to do it might be true, but is a broad generalization that is speculating about the mental state of other people. The argument that when you don't have the money, you don't get to choose to not have the money, that is a tautology, it's 100% guaranteed.

Re: The Disadvantages of an Elite Education (2008)

#178

Post by smelterdemon »

gnicholas wrote: post #75
Mz wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As far as I know, my scholarship was not portable. It was specifically for one university and when I failed to attend, no, I did not get to keep my scholarship. No one gave me an extra kicker. I turned my scholarship down for personal reasons, not because I was bought out by some competing school.

At the time when I was in the NMS pipeline, if you listed a school that you wanted to attend when you took the PSAT/NMSQT, that school would give you the scholarship if you became a finalist. The best idea was to say "undecided" and to maintain the ability to designate any school once committed. My older brother learned this the hard way—he listed a school (October of junior year) that he decided (April of senior yea…

IIRC (circa 2009/2010) only certain schools are sponsors, where you are guaranteed the award. Some portion of finalists are awarded the scholarship from the National Merit program itself that can be used anywhere.

Re: The Disadvantages of an Elite Education (2008)

#179

Post by akhilcacharya »

BigJeffeRonaldo wrote: post #157

And this is why Trump's win was so confusing for many citizens if the US--too stuck in their bubble to understand the rest of the world and its happenings. See also Nassim Taleb's essay on the Intellectual Yet Idiot class: https://medium.com/@nntaleb/the-intellectual-yet-idiot-13211...

I go to a school elites think is crappy, and the most confusing part of this cycle was the endless string of articles about whatYoung Republicans and Young Democrats at Ivies and top schools thought about Hillary, Bernie, Trump etc - nothing about the type of school I go to. Does the MSM not think we matter?

With that said, my schools county still went for Hillary by about 20 points, so that's good.

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