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I Ghostwrite Chinese Students' Ivy League Admissions Essays

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Re: I Ghostwrite Chinese Students' Ivy League Admissions Essays

#221

Post by erikpukinskis »

aaronbrethorst wrote: post #62

I appreciate the typo in the second paragraph. Gave me a good chuckle: factory tycoon’s daughters as opposed to the plural possessive "tycoons' daughters"

I actually think it's fine as it is. Each variation has slightly different meaning:

tycoon's daughters - the group of daughters, each of whom belongs to a tycoon

tycoons' daughters - the group of daughters, who are something that belongs to the whole class of tycoons

The choice really changes the extent to which it's the daughters or the tycoons being described.

You could certainly argue it's incorrect, but that's a philosophy of grammar that I think makes writing less interesting.

Re: I Ghostwrite Chinese Students' Ivy League Admissions Essays

#222

Post by walshemj »

mathetic wrote: post #213
walshemj wrote: post #196

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And there is a cottage industry in helping students perform well in those interviews its why public schools who know how the game is played do so well in getting their students into Oxbridge. I know that even back in the 70's our head of 6th form at a comprehensive helped the brighter students cram for Oxbridge - that was when you had to have a Latin O level to get in.

That's cool. I wish I had a headmaster who can prepare me for an interview in which I ended up discussing project euler questions, prolog, how jpeg works and how the way humans sort relate to how computers sort. In maths interview, they give you an open question of some sort and want you to have a go at it. It's generally trivial and obscure so you cannot know the answer. How do you prepare for that? It might work in…

Err its more the soft aspects and confidence and knowing the unwritten rules they are coaching - you no longer need basic Latin to go to Oxford or Cambridge.

Re: I Ghostwrite Chinese Students' Ivy League Admissions Essays

#223

Post by abustamam »

lutusp wrote: post #130
abustamam wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What I want to know is what the difference between ghostwriting for school purposes, and ghostwriting for literary purposes, is. Hillary Clinton and Ronald Reagan (and many others) had their autobiographies ghostwritten [1] and no one seems to really care. The definition of "autobiography" means a biography of yourself, written by you. So why do we hold different standards to academia as opposed to non-academia? When…

> What I want to know is what the difference between ghostwriting for school purposes, and ghostwriting for literary purposes, is. Easily explained. Ghostwriting in academia is a violation of academic ethics, a basis for expulsion or withdrawal of a granted degree. Ghostwriting in the everyday world is accepted, indeed it's not uncommon to see a ghostwriter's name alongside the putative author's name on the book's co…

> Ghostwriting in academia is a violation of academic ethics, a basis for expulsion or withdrawal of a granted degree

I addressed the academic ethics part in my post. But ghostwriting for a personal statement? Some employers will definitely look at some projects/essays you did for the completion of the degree if they are relevant to the job (making cheating in that sense impractical), but I've never heard of any employers asking for the personal statement that got them accepted into a college.

> ghostwriting doesn't expose the student to the material to be learned, but test prep does

Personal statements don't have any material to be learned to begin with. I don't have anything to back up this statement, as this is all anecdotal, but those who spend more time preparing for a test are more likely to do better, as much of test prep is simply rote memorization/practice. A bad writer writing a personal statement can spend weeks writing his personal statement and it can still be crap, but a good writer writing a personal statement can produce a pretty good first draft.

Some will say that a bad writer should send the personal statement to a proofreader or editor, but then comes the question--where do we draw the line between proofreader/editor and ghostwriter? The experiences in the final product are likely to be the submitter's own experiences (unless the ghostwriter adds his/her own experiences as in this article), but much of the content will certainly not be from the submitter's first draft.

What's the difference between sending a first draft to an editor and having them add eloquent language and coherent stories, and sending a few basic facts/experiences to a ghostwriter? Is it the percentage of original content?

Re: I Ghostwrite Chinese Students' Ivy League Admissions Essays

#224

Post by [deleted] »

jurassic wrote: post #34

Really interesting piece. In my post-college lull, I was once in a major financial bind and ended up doing a brief stint as an academic ghostwriter. I wrote term papers, not admission essays, for a ghostwriting service over a period of about 2 months. The work was easy and the money was good. I felt pretty guilty doing the work at first, but I quickly realized that most of the assignments were so banal that I don't t…

[deleted]

Re: I Ghostwrite Chinese Students' Ivy League Admissions Essays

#225

Post by disjointrevelry »

Ironically, by getting used to dole out work to others (subordinates) by paying them and expecting success is their basic managerial ethos, and one that even predominates modern Western management. This does properly prepare them in a way for management and 'modern' capitalist idealism. They have no feelings of condition to reciprocate any sacrifices of their 'employees' (in this case ghost writers) other than payment. Expecting any kind of reciprocation other than materialism and monetary in a purely capital transaction is a mistake that is common to those not accustomed to the exploitative condition of capital, economics, and enterprise.

It was interesting the author indicated the ethnicity of their background in the US. These Chinese masters of OP, who mentioned they were Korean-American where Koreans are looked down upon heavily by China and their adopted country the US, are already well aware that money alone is the primary and only necessary motivator in a capitalist economy and country.

The US' only interest in the Korean peninsula is to use it as a point of interaction with the Chinese. These Koreans are not only bootstrapped into being intermediary, but a 'bridge', which both the Chinese and Americans liberally walk all over. It is a bit of a shame the US allowed the victimization the Koreans suffered to be exploited shamelessly by both Americans and the Chinese. The hint of not finding respite, but only exploitation in their adopted land the US, is very telling of the Korean condition.

Re: I Ghostwrite Chinese Students' Ivy League Admissions Essays

#226

Post by lmm »

vorg wrote: post #197
lmm wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I went to a laundromat in Shanghai once. Maybe they only exist around the trendy western-style apartment neighbourhoods, but they do exist.

They exist inside and around every university and college throughout the Mainland, though not on the street front. You go up the stairs to the 3rd floor, give your bag of washing and 10 rmb to the attendant who tears a playing card in half, gives you one half and staples the other onto your bag. Go back 2 days later for your washed, dried, and folded clothing.

Right, but you wouldn't have your clothes stolen from that kind. The point is it's automatic and (at least mostly) unattended.

Re: I Ghostwrite Chinese Students' Ivy League Admissions Essays

#227

Post by WildUtah »

lmm wrote: post #175
WildUtah wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oxford and Cambridge professors are conducting multiple technical interviews with each candidate for centuries for both domestic and international students. And today C and O admit based on comprehensive objective tests just like almost all of the world's elite universities outside the USA. US universities could avail themselves of that system, if their priority were academic quality or equality and fairness.

> And today C and O admit based on comprehensive objective tests just like almost all of the world's elite universities outside the USA. Huh? Qualified students are invited for a subjective interview, and then based on the results of this about half of them are given offers.

The subjective interview is academic, not a tally of your social contacts and social class. Then the "offer" is conditional on your performance on comprehensive objective subject examinations. It would be vanishingly rare not to get an offer for A * A * A * A if one were capable of scoring that well and few offers that I've heard of are for less than AAA.

The US elite university admission system is mostly based on sports performance, personal relationships ('recommendations'), racial balance, obsequious classroom obedience ('grades'), pedigree (more of your school district than of your family, but both count), popularity in desirable cliques ('leadership'), and avoiding working class activities (farming and trade oriented clubs are very bad for your chances). Uniform national tests barely count at all at any stage.

Re: I Ghostwrite Chinese Students' Ivy League Admissions Essays

#228

Post by lmm »

WildUtah wrote: post #227
lmm wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And today C and O admit based on comprehensive objective tests just like almost all of the world's elite universities outside the USA. Huh? Qualified students are invited for a subjective interview, and then based on the results of this about half of them are given offers.

The subjective interview is academic, not a tally of your social contacts and social class. Then the "offer" is conditional on your performance on comprehensive objective subject examinations. It would be vanishingly rare not to get an offer for A * A * A * A if one were capable of scoring that well and few offers that I've heard of are for less than AAA. The US elite university admission system is mostly based on sp…

> The subjective interview is academic, not a tally of your social contacts and social class.

Maybe, but I'm not sure how you can be so sure. It's an in-person conversation; class is very much apparent.

> It would be vanishingly rare not to get an offer for A * A * A * A if one were capable of scoring that well and few offers that I've heard of are for less than AAA.

When I went it was before A* was introduced, and the standard offer was AAB. But only about half of applicants got the offer; it was not "vanishingly rare" but quite common for someone to be rejected by Cambridge but go on to achieve AAA in the exams.

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