The big news lately couldn't have been:"Hayeps Ma" and other top universities in the United States have been released!
As of yesterday, "Daddy Awesome" has been countedIvy League > Top 10 Early Applications269 top admissions, including 125 in China (today's MIT list, details move to two), the overall trend is more "cool" than last year, among which Brown, JHU, Cornell and other universities have shrunk seriously, 60-70 Cornell in previous years, only less than 50 this year, and New York University is seriously shrinking, from 246 ED1 last year to more than 130, almost halved!
Student resumes are also more volume, among the more than 140 students who provided detailed information88% of students submitted standardized gradesperformanceThere are ACT perfect scores, SAT 1580, and TOEFL 118, and one student submitted 15 AP perfect scores!
Looking at "other people's children", parents often leave messages asking us:
What is the underlying logic behind overseas university applications?
How can you raise such a wonderful child?
How should I plan for the long term from an early age?
What can parents do to become their children's "best partners" and support them not only to win offers from prestigious schools, but also to become a person who can adapt to future development and changes?
Not long ago, "Dad Awesome" invited several elite parents and senior sisters to do an offline sharing in Beijing. They are:
He graduated from Princeton University with full undergraduate scholarships, and is a member of the Board of Directors of Tabor Academy and the International Board of Trustees of Blair Academynini
DIY applied for the United States, and her daughter entered Brown, and her son entered Harvard, and deeply studied the financial practitioners of the top 30 overseas universities in the United States and G5 in the United KingdomWang Xiaoling
He graduated from Stanford with a Ph.D. and a bachelor's degree from Tsinghua University, and his two sons entered Cambridge and Chichi University respectively
At the meeting, they shared their children's long-term growth plans and application details in detail, and also interpreted the underlying logic of American college applications from the perspective of American college directors. (If you want to know more about their stories, you can read here).
In order to let more parents who have not participated in the offline sharing understand the essence of the content, we have specially compiled this article - revealing the three key words of planning and further education, hoping to give some inspiration to parents who are in the application season and want to take the international education route in the future.
Keyword 1: Understand the logic behind it
Behind choosing a school is the choice of values, mindset and lifestyle
Shared by: @普林斯顿学姐nini
Before planning and applying to prestigious schools, we can also understand the logic behind elite school admissions from the perspective of the school - why American schools are so good in addition to scoresPay attention to social responsibility and activitiesWait?
Once parents understand the top-level logic, they will be able to know more clearly how their child should prepare for the application.
The United States is a country that highlights individuals. For example, my alma mater, Tabor Academy, is named after its founder, Elizabeth Taber, Harvard, Princeton, etc., all based on a founder or founding family.
They hope to give back to the society with their educational philosophy of raising children, so they donate money and land to establish a school, and maintain it for a long time.
So what does this school carry?YesThis founder or familydnaand values
There is no good or bad in values. I often tell parents that when you choose an education, you choose a schoolValues, mindsets, and lifestyles
Parents can think about why they should send their children to Ivy League schools and top universitiesDo you want your child to have a face-saving education in the future?Or is it to find a good job?Do you identify with their values?Which values are more appropriate for your child?
This is the logic of choosing a university in the United States.
And why do American universities care about social responsibility?Let me start by asking you a few questions:
Do you think the U.S. middle and high school and colleges we applied to are for-profit or non-profit?
Click on the blank space to see the answer.
Most private schools in the United States are non-profit. Their purpose is not to give any shareholder a share.
Since the school is a non-profit organization, what are its management development goals?
Click on the blank space to see the answer.
The biggest goal is to serve students and families.
Every time a school admits a student, how much does it cost the school to its books?
Click on the blank space to see the answer.
$100,000!
We found that although the tuition fees of American universities have been rising, and some schools even cost $80,000 a year, they still can't cover the cost of college. So where does the funding for the school come from?
Yes, a large part comes from "donations".
The School Development Department expects current students and graduates to give back to the school. When I first graduated from Princeton, the school development teacher told me that 1 or 10 dollars is money, and you should get into the Xi of donating to the school.
At that time, the two founders of Google were both from Stanford, and they completed a lot of preliminary research at the school, and when Google went public in 2005, Stanford received nearly 400 million US dollars.
School is like oneAngel investorsIts business model is based on the inheritance and donation of generations of students and families.
Therefore, when it evaluates students, it will definitely look at the value he can bring to the school in the future, of course, this is not only the funding, but also the reputation, influence, resources and knowledge in the professional field can bring positive progress to the development of the school.
If a student demonstrates the potential of these values and an attitude of giving back and gratitude at the time of application, then it may be what the school likes.
Thinking about this logic is understandable to parents:
Why do schools value academics?Because it is possible for a capable child to create a second Google in the future;
Why do you value service and social responsibility?Because it means that students have the potential to give back to their alma mater in the future;
Why do you value multi-dimensional development?Because you can use all the resources of the school, you will be more connected to your alma mater
Why do you value the right fit between students and schools?Because if you don't match, you may not be comfortable in this school, so your chances of success will not be great, and then the chances of contributing to the school in the future will not be great.
Doesn't this way make you more enlightened about the logic of applying to American universities?
In addition, parents should consider the overall environment in the United States.
The United States nowVery concerned about deibj(diversity,equity,inclusion,belonging,justice);
Will care about someMinoritiesRegardless of the ethnic, religious, or economic power of minorities;
A lot of colleges to startDe-elitismFor example, more and more schools are saying that they no longer look at legacy when admitting students - if there were older siblings in the family in the school, then the younger siblings will definitely have an advantage when applying.
Based on this environment, parents and students should pay attention to preparing according to the new logic.
Here's another tip: when everyone starts to be homogeneous, such as applying for programs such as CTY and YYGS, the uniqueness that these programs can give to students may be reduced.
It is still necessary to plan based on what your child is suitable for and likes, rather than following the crowd and doing whatever everyone does.
Keyword 2: Be brave and be yourself
Don't take the application utilitarianly and see it as an opportunity to grow
Shared by: @哈佛, Brown's mother Wang Xiaoling
There is a very consistent understanding in my family-
The halo of a prestigious school is only an added value in the process of learning Xi, not the whole of education, let alone the ultimate goal of life. "Rather than using school rankings to determine the winner, we want our children to be oneDare to explore, love Xi to learn, dare to challenge, warm and interestingpeople, one to the community hasAccountabilityof people.
After we went through the college applications of our two children and deeply understood the underlying logic of admission to prestigious schools, we found that "the courage to explore, long-term persistence, unique and interesting, and altruistic" are not exactly the characteristics that college admissions officers want students to haveTherefore, the core of education is not only the pursuit of excellence, but also the emphasis and emphasis on "people-oriented".
Especially in the college application stage, if children want to show a true and unique self, it is impractical and even counterproductive to rely on "short-term investment" or "beautification and improvement", so what should "people-oriented long-term planning" include?
"Love makes the eyes shine".
Support your child to find and explore what they are truly passionate aboutEach individual naturally has different endowments and interests, and as a parent, it is important to help the child discover and develop the direction he is passionate about
If there is no clear point of interest, then try widely and gradually subtract to help the child find and dig
If your child shows an interest in something early on, try to create as many opportunities for him as he or she can explore, even if it doesn't seem like the mainstream direction of Xi.
My feeling is, a lot"Niche but brilliant".Although the activity seems to have nothing to do with schoolwork on the surface, because it is the child's real love, it can show the child's personal characteristics in three dimensions and vividly, making him stand out from the thousands of applicants.
So, don't boil everything down to whether it's good for college or not, you can't blindly follow the trend to do activities in order to apply to college, and you can't do things that many children are not interested in in order to fill up the list of activitiesStick to doing something that your child is really interested in and passionate about, even if it "seems" to have nothing to do with applying to college.
"Be true to yourself and find the direction you love".It is the homework of growth, and if you can do it at every stage, your college application will come naturally.
"My application is my decision".
Understand and respect your child's wishes, remembering that this is their own lifeParents can provide perspectives and advice, but never make decisions for their children.
Children in middle and high school are becoming more and more independent thinking and self-awareness, and they are eager to judge and solve problems in their own way, and take responsibility for their own decisions Xi.
Independent thinking, independent judgment, and the courage to take responsibility, these skills require long-term accumulation, learning and Xi trial and error, and the wrong choice of a moment will not affect too much, but whether you can have these qualities is related to the whole life.
Therefore, it is necessary to give children the opportunity to try and make mistakes, in fact, most of the time, the choices made by children themselves are the most correct decisions.
In the preparation stage of the siblings' college application, we also faced many difficult and tangled moments, such as the decision of application strategy, which activities to give up and stick to, and whether to give up the most difficult courses for ......a higher GPAThese things are like "lottery picks" and there is no chance to do it all over again.
To tell you a story, my two children have aggressive college application strategies, such as my younger brother, who gave up the opportunity to ED Ivy League with a "higher acceptance rate, but with a binding nature" and chose itREA+RD application method, which is very risky for applying to universities that aim to be in the top 10.
Because entering the RD stage, the acceptance rate is 2-3 times lower than ED, and the competition in the United States is already fierce, and the acceptance rate is even lower for a Chinese student, even if you have a top 20 level, you will fall to a very low ranking school because of the disadvantage of competition.
So I tried to convince my brother to choose the more secure way of ed, and he replied to me:
I'm going to take a risk, and even if I don't get accepted into any of my target schools, I'll accept the results of my choiceBut if I don't have a challenge, I will regret it for the rest of my life. "Then we chose to respect the child's wishes, and the end result proved that his decision was the right one.
Note: ED-Early Decision, once an applicant is admitted, must accept admission to that school and cannot be considered for other schoolsREA-regular early admission, RD-regular decision, applicants can still choose other schools after being admitted, according to the data released in the United States over the years, the ED acceptance rate is higher than that of REA and RD).
"Have a mission and feelings".
Get in touch with the society and become a "wind vane" characterWhen applying to university, "community service and social responsibility" is an important indicator for students to do to show that they care about and give back to society by doing many activities.
In fact, even if there are no mandatory requirements, parents hope that their children can become the backbone of caring for and promoting social development in the future, which is in line with the original intention of education mentioned above.
In the process of persisting in social practice and volunteer activities for a long time, children have the feelings and ability to promote and improve society, and gradually change from participants to leaders and promoters.
During the Spring Festival of 2020, my sister had already applied to college and was waiting for the release of the lists, when the new crown epidemic broke out.
After seeing the news, my daughter and several classmates spontaneously set up the "Guardian White Volunteer Group" in a very short period of time, and they are the first middle school volunteer group in Beijing and even the whole country to start taking action. They immediately divided labor, applied for fundraising qualifications, promoted fundraising information, established publicity and resource procurement docking, and contacted donation objects, and a series of complex arrangements were launched in an orderly manner at the same time, and I was deeply impressed by the high efficiency and orderly organization.
My daughter competes in the Ivy League.
The children were busy from the afternoon to the early morning of Chinese New Year's Eve, setting a record of receiving more than 200,000 donations in 24 hours, providing more than 40,000 supplies to 13 hospitals, and solving the urgent needs of some hospitals.
We are very proud of my sister's actions, and even if this activity does not help the university admissions results, we are deeply pleased with her self-developed sense of social responsibility and mission, as well as her complete organizational and leadership skills. Everyone has a calling and mission in their hearts, and it is the responsibility of young people to "be poor and be good to themselves, and to help the world if they are good".
This year's application season has begun to release the results, and there is a word I would like to give to students who are working hard to apply and waiting for results:
A prestigious school is just a small node and goal in life, and it is regarded as an opportunity for growth. Applying to your dream school is the ideal start, and not applying to your target school will never stop you from becoming a better person.
Keyword three: long-termism
Every parent needs a "growth tree".
Shared by: @斯坦福学霸妈妈诸葛越
The ultimate goal of our family education is that when our child leaves home at the age of 18, we can rest assured that he can go to a distant place to study, enter the society, and become a person who can live a good and excellent life.
With this goal in mind, we start by looking at what kind of skills and mindset should children develop before the age of 18
Based on my own experience and the essence of decades of research in the field of education and Xi, I summarized them into a "growth tree model", condensing all the abilities that children need into 4 levels and 16 specific skill modules. The 4 levels are:
Basic skills. Comprehensive skills.
Growth mindset. Be physically and mentally healthy.
Basic skills.
Mathematics and Physics, Literature and History, Reading, WritingThese are the basic abilities and knowledge that a person needs to have. School is a great place to learn Xi basic skills.
For example, mathematical and physical skills, including mathematics, physics, chemistry, computer and other disciplines, as well as logical thinking, abstract thinking, etc. Children are often labeled: this child is science-minded, that child is not mathematically talented.
In fact, mathematical skills can be developed and cultivated. Each stage has a different focus, from the establishment of numerical concepts (enlightenment), to the training of logical thinking and understanding of mathematical concepts (adolescence), and then to the development of abstract thinking and knowledge frameworks (adolescence).
Another example is reading, which is the most basic learning ability Xi. If parents can only teach one thing about the epidemic that will benefit their children for life, they must develop the habit of reading Xi all Xi subjects are based on reading.
Reading Xi needs to be cultivated from an early age, from doing a good job in parent-child reading (enlightenment period), to cultivating children's independent reading (adolescence), to cultivating children's extensive reading and lifelong reading (adolescence), parents should pay attention to it at every stage.
For example, my eldest likes science fiction and has read hundreds of science fiction books, which helped him a lot in the formation of his thoughts in high school.
Growth path map for children aged 4-18.
Comprehensive skills.
Communicate, collaborate, plan, createSchools generally do not directly nurture these abilities in children, but these abilities ultimately affect a child's future achievement.
When I was a manager, I did a lot of training for employees, and I asked them, you are all Qingbei graduates, Olympiad champions, why can't you do one thing well?Later, I discovered that the ability of people to do great things is actually theComprehensive skills. , including communication and cooperation between people, as well as planning and creation from scratch.
These comprehensive abilities do not mean that children do not need to learn in school, and they can suddenly learn when they grow up and enter the company. Instead, it should be developed from kindergarten to elementary and middle school, along with basic skills.
Growth mindset.
Sense of purpose, self-drive, curiosity, critical thinkingI once did a survey in the Stanford alumni group: "What kind of skills will children need in the future in the AI era of GPT?"."Alumni almost always answer questions about growth-related qualities and skills, such as curiosity and critical thinking.
Only children with a growth mindset can adapt to an uncertain future: a sense of purpose gives children a heartfelt desire and purpose;Self-motivation allows children to keep moving forward in the face of difficultiesCuriosity allows children to enjoy the process of exploration;Critical thinking allows children to adapt and improve.
Zhuge Yue with his two sons in Sydney.
Be physically and mentally healthy.
Athletic, confident, resilient, empatheticIt is located at the top of the "growth tree".
According to a well-known Harvard study, the happiest people are not the smartest or richest, but the ones who feel worthy, those who have many good friends, and the ones with whom they have the closest relationships. We want our children to be healthy, confident, and optimistic, and we want them to be resilient in the face of inevitable setbacks.
Not all of these 16 modules can be done by all parents, and neither can I myself. There are also three underlying principles of homeschooling behind it that can be followed:
The principle of love: I love my children unconditionally and I love the process of being a parent. For example, give children sincere and focused companionship, and play games with children;Get to know your child, let him learn according to his ability Xi and stay interested;Calm down when there is a conflict, and don't turn your lack of self-confidence into pressure on your child
Team principle: My child and I are a team, the child leads, and I support. When I was a child, parents did more and children did less;As the child grows up, he moves forward, and the parent can move backwards;
Growth principle: Children are growing children, and parents are growing parents. In the process of accompanying children to grow up, we also grow into better people.
If you want to know more about Zhuge Yue's concept of "Growing Tree", you can read her new book "Growing Tree Family Education Method".
Words written on the back
The sharing of parents and seniors from prestigious schools will surely inspire you and your children's planning and the path to higher education. This year's release is still in progress, and we will continue to pay attention.