Well, I got a niece who quit high school and went to Bethel College in TN for a year then transferred to Bryn Mawr and graduated a couple of years ago. I also got a nephew who quit high school and enrolled in and graduated from St. John’s our in New Mexico.
Listening to you (some of) guys is begining to make me side with the kid.
There’s a huge difference between skipping a grade and just skipping the work, county.
Are you serious? That’s one sad world you live in. I just wish you wouldn’t try to force everyone else to live there too.
By the way, all these strawman caricatures of this student are pretty amusing. He obviously did work in high school - for the first three years. The fourth year of high school, for him and many, many others, including myself, is pointless. I had already done as much as high school could provide. I skipped more days than this guy, and only didn’t fail because my teachers didn’t grade on attendance, and I forged a lot of notes.
At least try to be accurate, people. He worked very well for three years, he was a very bright kid, and because his senior year was pointless, and he stayed home to work on software instead of sleeping through classes (yes, even when I went to school I would just sleep) you are demonizing him. Nice. Apparently you have an axe to grind, so go ahead. Just know that you are being very unfair, and pretty mean.
Oh yeah Monty, what’s that? They were (niece and nephew) bored. Sounds like this kid was too.
Your niece and nephew, apparently according to the synopsis you provided, immediately went onto college. This guy didn’t.
monstro –
:rolleyes:
No argument here. It doesn’t mean, however, that the unversity should have done what it did.
Hard to say. If they were in engineering, they were competing with engineering nerds, and not everybody can get on the dean’s list. Maybe they picked the wrong major. Maybe they weren’t good enough for their major.
On evidence of what we’ve seen in the articles cited, it wasn’t quite this way
It doesn’t matter if you’re lazy or bored. One isn’t more virtuous than the other. What matters is whether you can or can’t do each individual question on the calculus hw in 5 minutes. If you can - there’s no point doing them. If you’re punished just because you don’t want to do them even though you can - and it happens a lot in school - this is just silly.
“Mr. Smarty-pants”? Nerds obviously don’t do anything for the community(I suppose you think it’s boring?) ? They think everybody else is dumb?
WTF? I lurked around quite a bit lately, and on this board, milder things have been called rather harsh names.
:dubious:
We have no evidence one way or the other that he is selfish.
FP –
We have no evidence one way or the other that he is selfish.
If he’s interested in the subject matter, he’ll come. If not, it doesn’t make a difference.
Monty –
Like I said on page 2 in reference to calculus, if he isn’t prepared to take the classes he needs at the university, there’s absolutely no reason for him to be there. My impression, though, is that calc might not be the reason the admission was withdrawn after the interview, and is surely not the reason most posters here cite.
Fionn –
I don’t think the potential willingness to perform these tasks should be considered at admission, since it has little to do with the student’s potential to learn.
genie –
Right. The fact that it is so doesn’t make it right to make someone else’s life less effortless than it could be.
Given that he didn’t get any good efortless grades, this conclusion would be far-fetched.
Rysto –
Care to enlighten me?
(I can see two interpretations of the original statement. One is a meaningless tautology, another is false)
How about this? He asks him. Which UNC apparently did, perhaps it went something like this.
Mr. College Entrance Guy - “Well, Mr. Prospective College Student, I see you scored a perfect 1600 on your SAT so you’re either very bright or exceedingly lucky… mind explaining the drop off in your GPA your last semester?”
Mr. Prospective College Student- “Well, Mr. College Entrance Guy, my grades are what they are. After I received your letter stating that I had been approved to attend your fine University I found attending class and doing busywork rather boring and pointless as I had seemingly acheived my desired goal. So instead of wasting my time doing these nonconstructive tasks I applied myself in starting my own software company. To this end I created and marketed this software program, which I am happy to show you, on which I worked X number of months, weeks and days. I look forward to attending the more challenging atmosphere of your University and can assure you that I will put forth every effort to acheive my desired goal of a degree.”
Now, arrogant know-it-all slacker or aggressive go-getter? It seems that UNC came to one conclusion and I and others see another.
I would think that the College Entrance Guy would be wondering what parts of the college courses would this kid also consider “nonconstructive tasks.” I would think that the College Entrace Guy would be concerned that this student would start examining some the things expected of him in that college and he’d deem some “nonconstructive” as well.
Arrogant know-it-all slacker.
Definitely.
And God forbid that he should question authority and actually decide for himself what is constructive and what isn’t.
yosemitebabe, are you aware that a lot of what is going on in high school is actually nonconstructive?
He can decide, and he can have opinions, but if he wants that degree, he’d better go ahead and do the “nonconstructive” things anyway.
And I guess he should have done the “nonconstructive” things in high school too. But he didn’t. And now he’s been rejected by his college.
So obviously those “nonconstructive” things had some merit. If he’d done them, he’d be going to that college.
Oh, hell yeah. But then again, I know that there were times when I just thought they were nonconstructive, but years later, I realized that there was a point.
But even though I didn’t think they were constructive, I didn’t ditch classes and then whine later when I had to face the obvious consequences.
mic84: I was using Calc as just one example to introduce the rest of the question and it was quite obvious from the rest of that posting that the question was not limited to that particular school subject. You are tossing up essentially invalid argument after invalid argument in support of this guy getting into a school solely because he wants to although he did not meet the conditions of enrollment.
I don’t think the college thinks that the work they require can be deemed nonconstructive.
That’s circular reasoning: Busywork is constructive because the college requires it, and the college requires it because(presumably) it is constructive.
Now, I’m not saying he shouldn’t have done the busywork anyway, I’m saying that the college shouldn’t require it(or at least not punish him if all his fault is not appreciating the value of the busywork)
Surely you don’t think that everybody should do everything they are told because years later, they might realize that there was a point?
I doubt he thought the consequences were obvious. He doesn’t whine, he tries to get into college. By frivoulous means, granted, but he has very little to lose, so why not?
I’ll repeat: if he’s not prepared to take the classes that he is expected to take in college, knowledge-wise, he shouldn’t be in college.
I don’t recall tossing any invalid arguments. I do happen to think that people should have access to education solely because they want to, but I didn’t argue this in this particular thread; I do think the school should’ve let him in, but I don’t think that it is obligated to let him in.
I hope this clears things up.
You completely missed my point.
Of course the college doesn’t think the tasks they require are “nonconstructive.”
Neither did this boy’s high school.
But this boy deemed the high school’s expectations as “nonconstructive” and didn’t do them.
So why should the college believe that the boy won’t do the same thing with them? Why should they not be concerned that he’ll disagree with their standards of “constructive” and proceed to cherry-pick which tasks he will or will not do?
So what if it’s circular thinking?
Because he didn’t do it, he’s not in college. End of story. No sympathy for him.
Why should they take a chance on him? Why shouldn’t they expect their students to have a history of doing what was expected of them, rather then cherry-picking tasks?
This is not “everything they are told,” this is school, and he wanted to get into a college that expected him to do what the school had laid out for him to do.
He doesn’t have to do what the school expected of him, and the college didn’t have to admit him.
And they didn’t.
The college is under no obligation to cut him a break, and they didn’t. They figured he knew the score, didn’t abide by it, so they assumed he didn’t care enough.
Boo hoo. Too bad. No sympathy.
Well, then he’s pretty stupid and he’s obviously too thick-headed to fit in at that college anyway.
He’s now an object of derision and contempt. So much for “nothing to lose.”
And yes, by definition, filing a frivolous lawsuit against the college that had every right to reject you (and did) is pretty much akin to whining.
yosemitebabe: Thank you for addressing mic84’s last posting.
Now there is a reason to refuse admittance - timeliness. What’s the difference? Now or later, the more I listen to you guys the more you convince me that the kid got fucked.
mic, everyone is entitled to an education who wants one. That’s why we have libraries and open-admission colleges. UNC’s decision does not keep kiddo from advancing his studies. He may have to wait a year, but he still has a lot of options.
You seem to think this guy was in the wrong (at least a little bit) for ditching school. Yet you don’t think he deserves to face any consequences. Why? Does his perfect SAT score absolve his responsibility? If we were talking about someone with average marks and scores, would we be having this conversation? For some reason, folks think he deserve leniency because he’s smart. But like I said before, colleges and university don’t just want kids who know a lot of stuff. They want students who have good character traits as well.
By definition, a nerd is a person who is socially retarded with esoteric interests. Nothing wrong with nerds per se, but if I had my choice between a nerd and someone who was smart and yet more balanced and well-rounded, I would choose the latter. Even if the nerd had a 1600 SAT and the other candidate had a score much less perfect.
I’m not saying the kid is a nerd. My point is that schools care more about grades and scores.
county, the kid got fucked because he fucked himself. He could have lasted through the tedium for another year if it was that important to him to go to college, but he didn’t.
Further, he has fucked himself by not being repetentant. He could have fixed the situation by simply humbling himself. But no. Not only does he thinks he’s above school, he thinks he’s above policy. Just because he’s “smart”.
He did what he wanted to do. He is as eligible as he was when admission was granted.
What the fuck is this, college admissions or 101 Humility. What does UNC lose the first year, 30%, 40%. Well I doubt this kid will be in that loss percentage.
You want to see this kid punished because you don’t think he lives up to your standards.
And UNC did what it wanted to do.
No he isn’t. Before he had a GPA of 3.8. Now he has a GPA of 3.5. The difference seems pretty minor but in the dog-eat-dog world of college admissions it could be the difference between rejection and acceptance.
It’s a university following its policy. You know, doing what it wants to do.
Why? I knew a lot of supposedly bright kids who dropped out after their first year. I knew a “bright” kid who had a whopping 1.4 GPA at the end of his first year. How does the school know that the bad behavior during his senior year isn’t the beginning of a trend that will continue through college? Should they just take his word for it?
[quuote]You want to see this kid punished because you don’t think he lives up to your standards.
[/quote]
Punishment is a harsh word. I don’t want to see him punished. I just happen to agree with UNC’s decision. They have the right to decide who they want in their school. They have the right to look at students’ behavior. I don’t think whiny brats should be able to dictate what a school can and cannot do.