The Overachievers Analysis

Alfie Kohn’s Article “How Not to get into College” analyses many key factors of how the current school system does not work and how we as members of society need to work together extensively to remodel the system to ensure the success of future students by valuing education over grades. By looking at how students only join clubs and and worship numerical grades only to impress colleges; students facing pressure from parents, teachers, and society to get good grades and succeed in life; and how students live through many mental health implications due to a multitude of factors surrounding their educational life, we can determine that systemic factors of this society have turned students of this generation into grade grubbers.

Throughout high school, students are prepped for college. Almost the entire curriculum revolves around getting into or being prepared for college. Many of these students are independent and intelligent individuals. College may be the perfect place for them. Linda Lee contemplates the fact that even though statistics show that college graduates make the most money, the statistics also point out that these students were “the brightest and hardest-working” students. There are also students that fall between the cracks of these statistics. Some students may be skilled in certain areas, but do not make the test scores to apply for a university. Others may be on the

In “College Pressures” by William Zinsser, the author displays different types of pressures that college students experience. He explains four different type of pressures including economic pressure, peer pressure, parental pressure, and self-induced pressure. These type of pressures are described as having negative effects on college students. Students are doing the things that they believe will pave the way to a successful life ahead, but Zinsser explains how there is no right way to get ahead and become successful because everyone is different. In “College Is A Waste Of Time And Money” by Caroline Bird, the author explains how college is unnecessary and a waste of time and money. She argues that there are different ways other than going to college to become successful and prepared for the “real world”. Bird believes that many college students are unhappy and wasting their time. Both essays were written in the 1970’s meaning some of the facts and information are obsolete and invalid. In comparing “College Pressures” and “College Is A Waste Of Time And Money”, we can clearly see that they both focus on the downsides of college, but more specifically both of the essays share a common pattern and audience. The two essays are different in the sense that they each have a different purpose.

As both the standards of school work and stress levels of student’s rise, the American school system remains unaltered, unchanged, and unaffected for over a hundred years. School is an institution that can serve as a massive gate in life granting you access to a job, stability, and a future or it can become a giant pillar in the way of everything you wish to achieve. While we recognize that a student’s own motivation, study habits, and will to learn, are cardinal in any schooling system, we must also understand the issues with an institution that is fundamentally unsound from the ground up. In today’s world, students are shoved with the hands of docility, and amenability as they render themselves in a system that has inadvertently failed them, by neglecting to celebrate their differences, and varying learning patterns. Conformity in the education system has shown to damage the personalization and

There was a time when America’s education system was top-notch according to the culture and society. With time, a myriad of things has changed, but unfortunately what has not evolved is the American education system. The country is still following a system which was not designed for the current global economic climate. Equality, as positive as it sounds is not as sufficient when it comes to education. The system treats students equally yet expect a similar culmination and outcome. Every child has his individuality and distinct abilities; one cannot judge a fish by its ability to climb a tree. Conversely, a few of the prominent reasons why the education system is failing are overcrowded schools, the rise of technology, and following the same old school hours.

    In discussions of Charles Murray, he expresses his opinion on the thoughts and feelings that are being transferred to students before college, claiming them to be misleading. Murray brings to light the problem that exists in the constant pushing of guidance counselors, teachers, and even politicians to aspire for a college degree no matter what, “treating every failure to go to college as an injustice” (Murray 48). Yet, by doing so, parents and students are often blindsided by the overwhelming cost of college that many cannot afford, or the sheer amount of education students would put themselves through for no reason at all. Murray observes that “one aspect of this phenomenon has been labeled misaligned ambitions, meaning that adolescents have career ambitions that are inconsistent with their educational plans” (Murray 48). Convincing students that college is the only guiding light to a better life forces students to see college as such, an intellectual heaven where they can become anything, such as a doctor or an attorney “without understanding the educational hurdles they must surmount to achieve their goal” (Murray 48-49). They then attend a four-year university with the depiction of college as a “place where B.A.s are handed out” fresh in their minds, thoughtless as to if that particular college they are attending even has the educational requirements needed to complete their career goals (Murray 49). Unfortunately, as Murray reminds us, this is the system that  is in place. For “a brutal fact

In “Let Teenagers Try Adulthood,” Leon Botstein argues that the “American high school is obsolete and should be abolished.”(Botstein 254) He explains that this obsolescence is because high school does not represent the way real life works, that real life is not based on popularity and athletic abilities. Botstein suggests that our society isolates students in high school because adults “do not like adolescents.” Botstein wants more options for teenagers and suggests that they graduate at 16 and have the ability to choose what they want to do from there; such as joining the workforce, attending specialized schools for professional training, or going to college. Botstein also states that high school teachers are employed because they are popular, whereas college professors are employed because they are experts in their fields. I agree with Botstein’s statement that the American high school system should be changed, but I do not agree with his belief about the “poor quality of recruitment and training for high school teachers.”(Botstein 254)

The American Education System is not meeting the needs of current students. If anything, the system is not building a sturdy foundation for the future working class. Schools have existed for many years and every period they have worked differently. However, every school’s main purpose was to educate students to be efficacious later in life. Modern day schools are corrupting students with added pressure, standardized tests, making less accommodations for special education students, not following laws, and take away individualism from the students’. The students of modern times are the people of our future and the future does not look too bright with the current American Education System.

Journalist Alexandra Robbins ventures back to her old high school to examine the competitive efforts students are having to take to compete on the battlefield that is the education system in her book, The Overachievers: The Secret Lives of Driven Kids. Robbins explores the lives of multiple students who are stressed and pressured to maintain good grades and get into an Ivy League college. This text allows for intriguing insight on how the educational system has “spiraled out of control” and displays the different measures students must now take to be the best. Robbins’ The Overachievers is an eye-opening bestseller which exposes the social pressures and anxieties students must overcome in their high school lives as they attempt to impress and prove to colleges they are worthy of acceptance.

Psst... What's the answer to number four?” High school students hear things such as this all too much.“We live in the Age of Comparison. Too often, we deem our own achievements worthless if they fall short of others' standards. Our best isn't good enough if it's not as good as someone else's best” Alexandra Robbins, The Overachievers: The Secret Lives of Driven Kids. It is this type of elitist thinking that compels so many young students to copy work from pers or “cheat”. It is my belief that all work requires original thoughts to complete it.

In the novel, Overachievers: The Secret Lives of Driven Kids, author, Alexandra Robbins conveys the message that today’s society, including school systems, parents, friends, and students themselves, puts so much pressure on students to succeed (which means doing well well on standardized tests having high GPAs/class ranks, and being accepted into prestigious schools and universities.) This extreme amount of pressure can result in students not learning as much while at school, as well as unhappiness and other issues. Robbins conveys this message throughout the novel by following multiple students around school at Walt Whitman High to discover what the “perfect” overachiever secretly goes through in order to be successful.

Overachievers, by Alexandra Robbins, is an exposé about the lives of driven high school students at Walt Whitman High School in Maryland. Throughout the book Robbins argues the point that college admission expectations have made high school a very cut-throat environment, leading students who try to meet these expectations to have deteriorating mental and physical health.

Overachievers, by Alexandra Robbins, is an exposé about the lives of driven high school students at Walt Whitman High School in Maryland. Throughout the book Robbins central argument is that college admission expectations have made high school a very cut-throat environment, leading students who try to meet these expectations to have deteriorating mental and physical health.

William Deresiewicz does an on key job at analyzing and capturing the typical experience of today's over achieving student population. We are scared. The analogy of the calm on the surface “Stanford duck” reaches far past the campus limits of Stanford and into college campuses all around America. An example of this was a young Nicholas Barne of The University of Chicago. Alone in his dorm room Nicholas was paddling away, day in and day out, to reach his constantly shifting goals. Too afraid to derail from the status quo set at an early age by his parents and peers, and too afraid to decisively follow any inkling of passion that would put an end to the versatility of his “stem cell” ambitious college student state, Nicholas just kept paddling into the center of a dark lake, ever expanding around him in all directions. The only thing to stopp Nicholas’ paddling would be his untimely death on UChicago's

“Contemporary American society pulls teenagers away from school toward social and recreational pursuits. There is widespread peer pressure not to succeed academically. One of five students say that their friends make fun of people who try to do well in school. More than one-half of all students say they never discuss their schoolwork with friends.”