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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

#131

Post by Bahamut »

foobarqux wrote: post #127
Bahamut wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My writing was just not that great at times before attending college - ironically, when I took a philosophy summer class the summer before the semester started, everything just clicked and I suddenly started to be able to write pretty well.

So it wasn't the content per se?

Part of it was that I often struggled on open-ended essays like college essays back then - I always felt that the questions/topics were contrived and made it harder for me to find something to write about.

Re: I Ghostwrite Chinese Students' Ivy League Admissions Essays

#132

Post by argonaut »

lutusp wrote: post #107
Yardlink wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It opens doors for some people who wouldn't have been able to otherwise. But more importantly, I hope this type of cheating leads universities to change their selection processes so applicants don't have to play this second-guessing game. I feel like the university staff are fools being deceived by this nonsense. That they actually give weigh to the application essay shows they're not making a fair decisions.

> But more importantly, I hope this type of cheating leads universities to change their selection processes so applicants don't have to play this second-guessing game. Well-heeled parents who dote on their children, and who regard a college education as an absolute must, represent a formidable natural force to be reckoned with. They will always think of a way to see their children treated with favor. "I'm donating ¥1…

Everyone makes typos. Give it a rest.

Re: I Ghostwrite Chinese Students' Ivy League Admissions Essays

#133

Post by cgio »

WoodenChair wrote: post #39
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…

I really appreciate your honesty and the knowledge you shared here, but I fear your rationalizations about why what you did is not unethical are just that - rationalizations. It's wrong to do others work for them and let them represent it as their own, no matter how mundane the subject matter. It lets them receive qualifications that they didn't earn and others who want those qualifications in competition with them,…

"It's wrong to do others work for them and let them represent it as their own"

which is what I do in my everyday job. And I am not shadow-writing, I am a consultant...Writing ideas that superiors represent as their own, or clients do. I guess this is capitalism, life or something. And someone not worth it has to be promoted before I do, as in the author's case someone has to be admitted for her to live.

Re: I Ghostwrite Chinese Students' Ivy League Admissions Essays

#134

Post by sk5t »

cgio wrote: post #133
WoodenChair wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I really appreciate your honesty and the knowledge you shared here, but I fear your rationalizations about why what you did is not unethical are just that - rationalizations. It's wrong to do others work for them and let them represent it as their own, no matter how mundane the subject matter. It lets them receive qualifications that they didn't earn and others who want those qualifications in competition with them,…

"It's wrong to do others work for them and let them represent it as their own" which is what I do in my everyday job. And I am not shadow-writing, I am a consultant...Writing ideas that superiors represent as their own, or clients do. I guess this is capitalism, life or something. And someone not worth it has to be promoted before I do, as in the author's case someone has to be admitted for her to live.

Your ideas and work product are the ideas and work product of the organization, which your superiors represent... different kettle of fish.

Re: I Ghostwrite Chinese Students' Ivy League Admissions Essays

#135

Post by thaumasiotes »

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…

> The most surprising discovery for me was that it seemed like after foreign language students the heaviest users of the service were education majors. No joke. I never figured out if the noticeably heavy use by education majors was a selection bias caused by the way the service was advertising itself, a sign of especially low ethics among education majors, or an indication that there might be a higher incidence of lifestyle factors (e.g. going to school while working full time) that made it difficult for them to crank out all the BS assignments required of them.

Not a huge mystery here; check the average GRE scores by major here (2001-2004, but the general effect is well documented): http://www.ncsu.edu/chass/philo/GRE%20Scores%20by%20Intended... . Data provided is average GRE score in Verbal, Quantitative, and writing sample, for 50 majors. Here are #s 41-50 in verbal, along with some reference points:

     1. Philosophy (589)
    25. Business - Bank. and Fin. (476)
    41. Engineering - Industrial  (440)
    42. Business - Administration
    43. Education - other (437)
    44.  Home Economics [?!]
    45. Education - Special (432)
    46. Education - Counseling (428)
    47. Social Work
    48. Education - Administration (427)
    49. Education - Early Childhood (418)
    50. Business - Accounting (415)
Here are the same in Quantitative:

     1. Physics/Astronomy (738)
    25. Education - Secondary (577)
    41. Education - other (531)
    42. Social Sciences - other
    43. Education - Elementary (527)
    44. Education - Administration (523)
    45. Public Administration
    46. Education - Special (502)
    47. Education - Counseling (500)
    48. Home Economics
    49. Education - Early Childhood (495)
    50. Social Work (468)
There are four education majors which don't make the bottom 20% cutoff: Education - Secondary, Education - Higher, "Education - Curr. & Instr.", and "Education - Eval. & Res.". They hold ranks 21, 30, 32, 37 (V) and 25, 34, 35, 39 (Q). So to sum up -- it's a "lifestyle" factor; it's harder for education majors to crank out their assignments because, compared to other students, they're not very smart. What you're seeing is not lesser ethics but greater need.

Re: I Ghostwrite Chinese Students' Ivy League Admissions Essays

#137

Post by rxin »

nicolax wrote: post #90

As a Chinese student who applied to US grad schools 2 years ago, this story is interesting and somewhat sad to me, even though I always know such ghostwriting exists in China. Unlike the wealthy Chinese students described in this story, my family is poor--even paying the application fees is no easy. Besides, I really don't like being unauthentic and cheating. I wrote all the essays myself, without buying any guides o…

It is an oversimplification to link "Chinese students are usually very weak on independent thinking" to "many Chinese students fail to make the best use of their time here".

Many American students also fail to make the best use of their time in America. As a matter of fact, if I had to guess based on the people I know, the average (international) Chinese student in American is probably harder working than the average American student.

Re: I Ghostwrite Chinese Students' Ivy League Admissions Essays

#138

Post by gaoshan »

She wrote an essay for a Chinese student about her mother washing clothes in a laundromat, leaving them to run errands and returning to find the clothes stolen. While leaving one's belongings unattended in a public place in China would indeed likely result in them being taken (and no one in China would do such a thing expecting anything different), China doesn't have laundromats. Never has. Not that anyone involved seems to care.

It would be like a Chinese ghost writer crafting a touching tale of an American kid's mom having to work double shifts in a KTV bar only to return home one night and find that her husband's chou tofu stand had been confiscated by the Chengguan.

Re: I Ghostwrite Chinese Students' Ivy League Admissions Essays

#139

Post by [deleted] »

nicolax wrote: post #90

As a Chinese student who applied to US grad schools 2 years ago, this story is interesting and somewhat sad to me, even though I always know such ghostwriting exists in China. Unlike the wealthy Chinese students described in this story, my family is poor--even paying the application fees is no easy. Besides, I really don't like being unauthentic and cheating. I wrote all the essays myself, without buying any guides o…

[deleted]

Re: I Ghostwrite Chinese Students' Ivy League Admissions Essays

#140

Post by canadev »

It's definitely an interesting read, but I don't know how true it rings to me.

> In one admissions cycle, I wrote over a hundred essays and earned enough money to pay my bills for the rest of the year, pay off my car loan, and—as a treat for my hardworking hands—receive $150 Japanese manicures on a biweekly basis.

[...]

> At the end of every writing season, I always swear I will quit, but I’m still broke with no idea about the shape of my future.

Either she's a great writer, and horrible at managing her finances, or she is lying. No?

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