Teenagers are better behaved and less hedonistic (2018) • Hacker News Board

Re: Teenagers are better behaved and less hedonistic (2018)

#341

Post by bitwize » Sun, Apr 26, 2020, 7:31 PM UTC

_5yps wrote: post #27

16-year-old here. My experience is probably markedly different from most teenagers in the US (I'm an immigrant who goes to a competitive school full of other immigrants) but I find that, for the most part, this article hits the nail on the head. High School is nothing like the usual media portrayal - I've never heard anyone even talk about a party, nobody's doing anything stronger than weed, nobody's fucking or even…

> The main thing I notice among my peers is an obsessive (borderline autistic) focus on "getting in" and having good credentials.

This was college for me. I went to a tech university, not MIT but a good one. It was all about simultaneously impressing your professors and scoring internships with big-name tech companies. And the most driven, type-A of the whole lot? Women (of which there were few) and minorities (of which there were a lot). Don't mess with a Jersey kid from the 'hood when they have their eye on a job at Microsoft or Intel. Their lack of privilege only makes them hungrier.

I got tired of it -- and poor -- and eventually dropped out. Went to state school. There, the professors taught. I seemed to do much better, both academically and spiritually.

Re: Teenagers are better behaved and less hedonistic (2018)

#342

Post by 7thaccount » Sun, Apr 26, 2020, 7:31 PM UTC

_5yps wrote: post #27

16-year-old here. My experience is probably markedly different from most teenagers in the US (I'm an immigrant who goes to a competitive school full of other immigrants) but I find that, for the most part, this article hits the nail on the head. High School is nothing like the usual media portrayal - I've never heard anyone even talk about a party, nobody's doing anything stronger than weed, nobody's fucking or even…

I graduated from High School in 2008 and in my small area, it was only just becoming possible to take college classes (dual enrollment) with the local community college. The next year, most of the AP and Honors kids were taking several classes to at least knock out all the non-relevant classes you have to take for any degree. This likely saved them time and money in college since if they went into something like physics, they already had credit for psychology, history, English, calculus, chemistry...etc.

Louisiana has this amazing program called TOPS that pays 100% tuition for any in-state college, so most people take advantage of that and go to LA Tech, ULL, or LSU. Because of that, I had no admissions problems because even though those schools have incredibly good engineering programs (stupid hard course load and small classes with a high student to teacher ratio and very good chance of jobs and internships), the barrier to entry is pretty low and you just need a pretty average ACT score. The hardest barrier for most students (like most colleges) is room and board.

Like you mentioned, I think maybe 8% of my class was dating, only 2% probably smoked weed, a lot of people were into sports, music, and academics. However, STEM programs only showed up in my area a few years later (FIRST, Arduino stuff... etc). The schools which already had STEM programs had students which made great grades freshman year as they already had learned basic programming, electric circuits, and other engineering basics without having to learn everything from scratch like the rest of us.

I'm sure it's even more competitive now. Being a teenager in 2020 must be rough. I mean, in some ways it's a lot better (no WW2 or Vietnam clouding over you), but there are also no easy jobs leading to a house and car with 1 income.

Re: Teenagers are better behaved and less hedonistic (2018)

#343

Post by heymijo » Sun, Apr 26, 2020, 7:33 PM UTC

alexhutcheson wrote: post #242

vegetablepotpie wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wish adults understood the realities of being young in 2020. Even when I graduated HS in 2007 I could tell my experience and the academic expectations I needed to live up to were much higher than it was for my mom. After I graduated I saw younger friends take more AP classes than I did and do more leadership activities than I did. Expectations are always ramping up. It is no party. Our laws and bureaucracies haven’…

FWIW, this isn't so much a story of "being young in 2020" as it is "being young in 2020 in the hyper-competitive culture of major coastal metro areas of the US". This phenomenon is actually pretty unique to a handful of metro areas, which happen to be over-represented on HN. In most of the country, bright high school students are focused on getting into their state's flagship public university, and exceptionally succ…

> being young in 2020 in the hyper-competitive culture of major coastal metro areas of the US

I think you'd be surprised how many 8th graders across the country are already stressing about SAT/ACT scores in places like southeast Ohio or Branson, MO.

I just pulled Branson out of a hat and here's their recommendations for ACT/SAT testingv[0]. I've seen a lot of schools across the U.S. This schedule matches up with offical recs, but it's half the story.

Goodhart's Law is in effect here. Those who are ahead will try to cement their leads. So official recs are ACT/SAT round 1 junior year. Those at the head of the pack find ways to test as early as middle school. These students know the game and feel the pressure, even when their families aren't pushing that hard.

This culture is institutionalized in places well beyond the coasts and major metros.

[0] https://www.branson.k12.mo.us/Page/3011

Re: Teenagers are better behaved and less hedonistic (2018)

#344

Post by jborichevskiy » Sun, Apr 26, 2020, 7:34 PM UTC

kirubakaran wrote: post #103

_5yps wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, I don't have a blog. There aren't many things I'd like to write about, and pretty much all of the things I would like to write about have been written about more eloquently by others. There's a lot of subpar and garbage information in this world, especially on the internet, and I'd rather not contribute to the pile if I can help it.

> pretty much all of the things I would like to write about have been written about more eloquently by others You may want to blog anyway https://sites.google.com/site/steveyegge2/you-should-write-b... And it is kind of funny that I'm linking to another blog to make my point since "it has been written about have been written about more eloquently by others"

That is a wonderful post. I would also add these points:

- effective async networking with entire internet

- you'll think deeper about the things you care about learning/studying/achieving

- you can express ideas more reliably

- you can open source your knowledge

https://twitter.com/jborichevskiy/status/1252652698614198272...

Re: Teenagers are better behaved and less hedonistic (2018)

#345

Post by heymijo » Sun, Apr 26, 2020, 7:37 PM UTC

alexhutcheson wrote: post #327

closeparen wrote: post #304

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is the segment of every part of the country that aspires to those costal metro areas. The driving motivation is "get me the hell out of this godforsaken place." The personal cost was immense, but I'm glad I did. I got to do fun and high-impact work at a fast-rising startup while my title and TC leapt up by $50-$100k each year. I got to meet friends from all over the world, travel, hike, run outdoors year-round,…

NYC, SF, Silicon Valley, Seattle, LA, etc. are all full of successful people who went to public universities that didn’t require crazy high school credentials to get into.

This is true!

However, it ignores a few things. There is always an advantage to being ahead, even at state schools.

Come in with more AP credits or college credit plus? - Get priority scheduling over your peers

Get priority scheduling - More likely to be able to graduate in 4 years

Come in with more credits, take less gen ed requirements and get into a major earlier - Build relationships with faculty in your major sooner, more opportunities come your way, internships, etc.

It's compounding, but instead of for interest in your bank account, it's your life.

Re: Teenagers are better behaved and less hedonistic (2018)

#346

Post by balnaphone » Sun, Apr 26, 2020, 7:38 PM UTC

enriquto wrote: post #154

qqssccfftt wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mandatory military service otherwise known as government mandated slavery

It depends if you think of your country as an accessory burden or as the ensemble of your fellows. Incidentally, this seems to be an argument towards smaller, culturally homogeneous countries, where it is much easier to feel connected to the whole set of your countrymen.

> Mandatory military service otherwise known as government mandated slavery

>> It depends if you think of your country as an accessory burden or as the ensemble of your fellows.

This "depends" clause doesn't logically follow, since the "slavery" label applies in either circumstance. If one's country is an "ensemble of your fellows", then volunteering for military service may logically follow from that; forcing others to do so, does not. In either case, whether one feels connected to one's country or not, being compelled by force to participate in the military can legitimately be seen as a form of slavery -- since the victim is unable to withdraw unilaterally from their compelled service.

If one cares deeply about their own countrymen, why would one want to enslave them, and remove their choice and freedom in the matter?

Re: Teenagers are better behaved and less hedonistic (2018)

#347

Post by [deleted] » Sun, Apr 26, 2020, 7:42 PM UTC

vmception wrote: post #306

vegetablepotpie wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wish adults understood the realities of being young in 2020. Even when I graduated HS in 2007 I could tell my experience and the academic expectations I needed to live up to were much higher than it was for my mom. After I graduated I saw younger friends take more AP classes than I did and do more leadership activities than I did. Expectations are always ramping up. It is no party. Our laws and bureaucracies haven’…

There was a time when I looked "down" on tiers of schools, differently. It was like what I was qualified for was better, Ivy League was a pipe dream and unnecessary, and everything else was a joke. Around my sophomore year, I was interning in a Federal Work Study program, pushing pencils right next to someone studying a Princeton. When I realized this fate was still intertwined, I immediately transferred to a cheaper…

[deleted]

Re: Teenagers are better behaved and less hedonistic (2018)

#348

Post by WalterBright » Sun, Apr 26, 2020, 7:43 PM UTC

7thaccount wrote: post #342

_5yps wrote: post #27

16-year-old here. My experience is probably markedly different from most teenagers in the US (I'm an immigrant who goes to a competitive school full of other immigrants) but I find that, for the most part, this article hits the nail on the head. High School is nothing like the usual media portrayal - I've never heard anyone even talk about a party, nobody's doing anything stronger than weed, nobody's fucking or even…

I graduated from High School in 2008 and in my small area, it was only just becoming possible to take college classes (dual enrollment) with the local community college. The next year, most of the AP and Honors kids were taking several classes to at least knock out all the non-relevant classes you have to take for any degree. This likely saved them time and money in college since if they went into something like phys…

> if they went into something like physics, they already had credit for psychology, history, English, calculus, chemistry...etc.

Calculus and chemistry are very relevant to physics!

Re: Teenagers are better behaved and less hedonistic (2018)

#349

Post by throwawayfang1 » Sun, Apr 26, 2020, 7:45 PM UTC

vmception wrote: post #306

vegetablepotpie wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wish adults understood the realities of being young in 2020. Even when I graduated HS in 2007 I could tell my experience and the academic expectations I needed to live up to were much higher than it was for my mom. After I graduated I saw younger friends take more AP classes than I did and do more leadership activities than I did. Expectations are always ramping up. It is no party. Our laws and bureaucracies haven’…

There was a time when I looked "down" on tiers of schools, differently. It was like what I was qualified for was better, Ivy League was a pipe dream and unnecessary, and everything else was a joke. Around my sophomore year, I was interning in a Federal Work Study program, pushing pencils right next to someone studying a Princeton. When I realized this fate was still intertwined, I immediately transferred to a cheaper…

Right. People who go to the world's top universities are in the position where they don't HAVE to work for a big company. I went to one of the listed "second-tier universities" and work at FANG (and to be clear, not Amazon), and I don't think I have a single coworker from Harvard or Stanford. I have one coworker from Oxford who considers himself the "failure" of his graduating class because he only works at a big tech company.

Big tech companies are sweat shops, offering just enough pay to have the TOP end of an upper-middle class lifestyle (after sufficient robbery by the tax man, since you're not quite rich enough for any of the Trump-esque tax loopholes to apply), in exchange for the expected 60-80 hour weeks. You still have to work for a living, and you're competing in Stack Ranking with the majority of employees who are visa workers (hiring visa workers is a PLUS for these companies) that will happily sacrifice their family life and weekends to avoid deportation by being slotted into the "bottom 10%" during the bi-annual performance review (which means you get fired). Sure, it's a local optimum for a lot of people (work insanely hard and sacrifice your health to drive a Porsche/Tesla and own a house/luxury condo in a top-tier city), but make no mistake, it is a second-tier lifestyle.

On the other hand, people from Harvard and Yale are UPPER class -- not upper-MIDDLE class. This means they have last names like Bush or Clinton, get ushered into upper management or C-level at their father's companies, go "work" for cushy jobs at rentseekers like PE/VC/real estate with corporate credit cards, run for office, repeatedly start failed companies, or go indefinitely "exploring" or "finding the next thing to do" (courtesy of their trust fund).

Meanwhile, the vast majority of my graduating class is slaving away as entry-level rat racers at FANG, investment banks, legal, Big 4, medical residencies, etc.

Re: Teenagers are better behaved and less hedonistic (2018)

#350

Post by aaomidi » Sun, Apr 26, 2020, 7:45 PM UTC

I was raised as a nudist (I'm in my 20s now) and that really helped during my teen years to keep me "focused".

This doesn't mean I was focused on my studies or anything. But it did mean I generally gave far less shits about peer pressure than my friends at the time.

It's something I highly recommend if you have a close relationship with your immediate family. Let the inhibitions fall and allow the kids to realize they don't have to keep up with everyone.