I'm at the Texas Chess Championship Tournament and it's very lopsided. My kids are in elementary so they are competing in lower grade level (elementary) sections. It might be different in middle school and high school sections, but I doubt it. The difference is more profound at the higher levels. I have one kid competing in the "championship" section (no cap on their rating) and he is the only non Asian. These are the absolute best players in the state in their respective grades. My students competing in the "JV" section (lowest cap in rating) has the highest % of non Asian (maybe 30% at best).

Very anecdotal, but the hotel I'm staying at is also hosting some baseball teams for some sort of baseball tournament. Yep, you can guess what those kids look like.

I'm not saying Vivek is right, but I'm definitely not saying he's wrong either.

My kids go to a private Christian school. As you can imagine, it's predominantly white by a wide margin.

But we put her in an after-school piano class, and the proportion of Asians, which is generally low for the school overall, was probably half the class. And when you looked at the more advanced players that had obviously been doing it for a long time, they made up the majority of it.

Do I think that it presents an air of refinement? Yes. Do I think the piano makes them smarter? No.

Same for chess. Intelligent people may be better at chess, but mastering chess does not make you more intelligent.

In that regard, is it better to get good at a board game with little practical real world application? Or is it better to pump time into a sport that promotes teamwork and socialization?

Now do soccer..lol.

Or football

Just be happy kids still do extracurricular activities whatever their race is. There are a lot of kids that just sit on their butts all day.

A person is good at the sport they practice and have a talent for.

Asians simply stress intellectual achievement more than everybody else. If it became mainstream understanding that wearing a beanie on your head made you smart, then you could be damn sure that every Asian kid would be walking around with a beanie on their head. No matter how ridiculous everybody else thinks it looks. They don't give a crap about soccer, football, baseball, etc. because there is almost zero chance that will result in prosperity. If an Asian brings home a B, you can be almost certain, that that kid will get a stern talking to rather than a "well at least you are well rounded." It's biggest reason why they, along with Jewish people, outperform and out earn almost everybody else.

Everybody could learn from their example rather than cope with "at least my kid is more social."

My son did Academic Decathlon in high school. His team made the state tournament his junior and senior year,

When he was a senior, he finished 10th overall in the state - but was the only non-Asian in the Top 20.

The four things I try to teach my kids are Discipline, Manners, Failure and Success. Baseball/Softball is our main avenue for that. I strongly feel it is just as important as education. Certainly not more important and certainly not less.

Chess is an amazing game of strategy that can be extremely beneficial to learn. That said, if I had to choose someone to run my company, I'm picking the baseball player who knows how to play chess over a chess player who knows how to play baseball.

And you can substitute most team sports in my scenario but, in my opinion, there's few team sports more humbling than baseball.

Just to give some perspective, my kindergartner (the one competing in the championship section) has taught himself to play piano in ~5 months. He has not taken a single class with anyone. I just got him an app on the iPad. He is beating adult STEM career professionals in chess (engineers at NASA) and apparently picked up multiplication somewhere (probably watching/hearing his sister practice/learn). Did piano or chess take him from average to very intelligent? I don't think so. But to play at this level, you absolutely have to be at the highest levels of intelligence.

Little practical real world application? Pattern recognition, problem solving, critical thinking and training/working hard towards something to compete at the highest levels has many real world applications. It's like saying learning to hit a ball with a bat has little real world application. At the surface, sure. But there are clear benefits to team sports.

Speaking of which, chess is/can be a team sport. They are here with friends from school and their team is currently in first place by 1/2 a point. Two more rounds de today so that can change.

Interesting note, from the non Asians here, the overwhelming majority are from Christian/catholic schools. This makes me proud and happy.

Colossians 3:23-24

Culture matters

aTmAg said:

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Asians simply stress intellectual achievement more than everybody else. If it became mainstream understanding that wearing a beanie on your head made you smart, then you could be damn sure that every Asian kid would be walking around with a beanie on their head. No matter how ridiculous everybody else thinks it looks. They don't give a crap about soccer, football, baseball, etc. because there is almost zero chance that will result in prosperity. If an Asian brings home a B, you can be almost certain, that that kid will get a stern talking to rather than a "well at least you are well rounded." It's biggest reason why they, along with Jewish people, outperform and out earn almost everybody else.

Everybody could learn from their example rather than cope with "at least my kid is more social."

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If I had to choose between "prosperity" and happiness for my kids, I'd choose happiness every time. There are a million ways to make a living in this world, and very few of them are boosted by your skill at chess, piano, or spelling bee prowess.

All the Asians in my neighborhood hire a contractor to do basic home maintenance like installing a ceiling fan or changing a sprinkler head. They also ask for help if they find a snake in their yard. They could probably beat YT at chess but that's about it.

It's a cultural difference based on how and what they prioritize in raising their children.

Ozzy Osbourne said:

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All the Asians in my neighborhood hire a contractor to do basic home maintenance like installing a ceiling fan or changing a sprinkler head. They also ask for help if they find a snake in their yard. They could probably beat YT at chess but that's about it.

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What? Way to wake up in the morning to this poop.

AColunga07 said:

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Just to give some perspective, my kindergartner (the one competing in the championship section) has taught himself to play piano in ~5 months. He has not taken a single class with anyone. I just got him an app on the iPad. He is beating adult STEM career professionals in chess (engineers at NASA) and apparently picked up multiplication somewhere (probably watching/hearing his sister practice/learn). Did piano or chess take him from average to very intelligent? I don't think so. But to play at this level, you absolutely have to be at the highest levels of intelligence.

Little practical real world application? Pattern recognition, problem solving, critical thinking and training/working hard towards something to compete at the highest levels has many real world applications. It's like saying learning to hit a ball with a bat has little real world application. At the surface, sure. But there are clear benefits to team sports.

Speaking of which, chess is/can be a team sport. They are here with friends from school and their team is currently in first place by 1/2 a point. Two more rounds de today so that can change.

Interesting note, from the non Asians here, the overwhelming majority are from Christian/catholic schools. This makes me proud and happy.

Colossians 3:23-24

Culture matters

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Sounds like your kid is very smart. You should be proud of that, as I'm sure you are! And if they like chess and piano, it's worth promoting. Good for him!

I'm just saying that these activities don't represent a narrow path to success that should be modeled as the ideal. Yet that seems to be the case for a certain subset of the population.

I work at an affluent elementary school and I can tell you the Asian parents could not be more serious about their children's academic success. And not just what the school requires, but going way above and beyond in their academic and extracurricular careers. The Tiger Mom is a real thing in the Asian community. I see it almost to the extent in Indian Asians as well.
They've realized the key to success in the modern world is through education and high achievement. A lot of these kids to lack basic social skills however.

aTmAg said:

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Asians simply stress intellectual achievement more than everybody else. If it became mainstream understanding that wearing a beanie on your head made you smart, then you could be damn sure that every Asian kid would be walking around with a beanie on their head. No matter how ridiculous everybody else thinks it looks. They don't give a crap about soccer, football, baseball, etc. because there is almost zero chance that will result in prosperity. If an Asian brings home a B, you can be almost certain, that that kid will get a stern talking to rather than a "well at least you are well rounded." It's biggest reason why they, along with Jewish people, outperform and out earn almost everybody else.

Everybody could learn from their example rather than cope with "at least my kid is more social."

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This is exactly true. It's a cultural thing. Mostly it works for them as Asians and Asian Indians are the most successful ethnic groups in America.

AColunga07 said:

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Just to give some perspective, my kindergartner (the one competing in the championship section) has taught himself to play piano in ~5 months. He has not taken a single class with anyone. I just got him an app on the iPad. He is beating adult STEM career professionals in chess (engineers at NASA) and apparently picked up multiplication somewhere (probably watching/hearing his sister practice/learn). Did piano or chess take him from average to very intelligent? I don't think so. But to play at this level, you absolutely have to be at the highest levels of intelligence.

Little practical real world application? Pattern recognition, problem solving, critical thinking and training/working hard towards something to compete at the highest levels has many real world applications. It's like saying learning to hit a ball with a bat has little real world application. At the surface, sure. But there are clear benefits to team sports.

Speaking of which, chess is/can be a team sport. They are here with friends from school and their team is currently in first place by 1/2 a point. Two more rounds de today so that can change.

Interesting note, from the non Asians here, the overwhelming majority are from Christian/catholic schools. This makes me proud and happy.

Colossians 3:23-24

Culture matters

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Culture is everything.
Out of curiosity what app did you use to learn the piano?

In the mid 90's I used to recruit A&M, UH, tu, SWT, Rice for IT talent.

We stayed away from the perfect score individuals with zero life skills.

You're in a tiny room and each applicant had 15 minutes.

It would totally flummox the perfect score kids when you asked them about hobbies, interests, anything outside of school that would lean towards having social skills. They couldn't answer.

I went to a one legged butt kicking contest and was amazed at the number of asian disabled people that were participating. I think there is something to this...

Jeeper79 said:

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aTmAg said:

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Asians simply stress intellectual achievement more than everybody else. If it became mainstream understanding that wearing a beanie on your head made you smart, then you could be damn sure that every Asian kid would be walking around with a beanie on their head. No matter how ridiculous everybody else thinks it looks. They don't give a crap about soccer, football, baseball, etc. because there is almost zero chance that will result in prosperity. If an Asian brings home a B, you can be almost certain, that that kid will get a stern talking to rather than a "well at least you are well rounded." It's biggest reason why they, along with Jewish people, outperform and out earn almost everybody else.

Everybody could learn from their example rather than cope with "at least my kid is more social."

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If I had to choose between "prosperity" and happiness for my kids, I'd choose happiness every time. There are a million ways to make a living in this world, and very few of them are boosted by your skill at chess, piano, or spelling bee prowess.

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Keep telling yourself that.

It's not the chess, piano, or spelling bees themselves... it's the fact that their kids are driven to be the best in chess, piano, and spelling bees that makes them achieve more in other aspects of life.

And nobody is happy when they are failures.

Cyprian said:

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It's a cultural difference based on how and what they prioritize in raising their children.

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This. Its not genetic. I suggest to anyone who is unhappy with this: Simply bring up your children to compete wherever you want them to excel.

People's achievements reflect what they prioritize with their time, their treasure and thoughts.

You can observe it with Asians and education/intellectual endeavors. You can even see it in racial disparities in different spots. You could also observe it in the social hierarchy present in most highschools (popularity).

For what it's worth - history has shown that a balance across intellectual, physical and social skill produces by far the most success for a society. And on individual level the same principle applies. It's typically the kids who can master all domains that perform the best with rare exception.

Diversity is our strength, I thought?

doubledog said:

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A person is good at the sport they practice and have a talent for.

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And no matter what you are good at, there is an Asian kid somewhere who is better. They pick something and autistically focus on it. It's just what they do.

Balance should be stressed in a high achievement household.

You look at Japan now and they're embracing lying flat. Their birthrate is at all time lows.

China's is at an all time low as well.

The exam in Singapore they all stress about to get into the best, most prestigious school there is creates quite a stir.

There needs to be balance.

Started with flowkey and ended up with simply piano. The family plan worked well for us (family of 5).

This next bit is not addressed to ts5641, but some of the other comments:

I am not saying that we need to all raise our kids the way Asians do it but I do think most families could learn a thing or two from them.

We, as a country have grown soft. Our kids are entitled and soft. My wife and I are first generation immigrants who couldn't speak English when we first came. We are both master degreed STEM professionals. AND we are very active in our church, neighborhood and school. This is an area where maybe most Asian cultures lack (a sense of civic responsibility and to some extent, sociability).

Quote:

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The exam in Singapore they all stress about to get into the best, most prestigious school there is creates quite a stir.

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That's because of how Asian countries determine acceptance into their universities; merit based on entrance exams. It has been that way ever since my aunts and uncles were trying to get into universities. They are in their 70's now. It probably dates back to the ancient China civil exams.

Asians has adapted and adopted the US culture in terms of well rounded kids. While physically, most asians aren't able to perform and dominate at some of the most popular team sports like football and basketball. However in individual sports, they are able to compete at the highest levels.

As an asian dad, both my kids played a varsity sport and also did band in addition to one more activity of their choice in high school. When we lived in the Bay Area, just about every asian kid played a sport and did orchestra or some other performing arts activity in addition to achieving high academics. The stereotypical joke is if it was a boy, they either did violin or played the piano in addition to playing tennis, golf or swam in high school. For the girls, it was either dance, violin, piano and swimming, tennis or golf.

The Fall Guy said:

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Now do soccer..lol.

Or football

Just be happy kids still do extracurricular activities whatever their race is. There are a lot of kids that just sit on their butts all day.

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Needs another star.

My dad looked like Mr. Miyagi. But, he was a hell of a lot more mean. Bring home a "b" - your ass was getting kicked. I was in math club, academic decathlon, etc. - as those were the only things I could be in. Only academic related. It was kind of funny going to math competitions and being the only not completely Asian looking participant winning anything. My secret was that I was half Asian.

It's just a different culture. My dad prioritized respect, doing well in school, and respect again above all else.

AColunga07 said:

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I'm at the Texas Chess Championship Tournament and it's very lopsided. My kids are in elementary so they are competing in lower grade level (elementary) sections. It might be different in middle school and high school sections, but I doubt it. The difference is more profound at the higher levels. I have one kid competing in the "championship" section (no cap on their rating) and he is the only non Asian. These are the absolute best players in the state in their respective grades. My students competing in the "JV" section (lowest cap in rating) has the highest % of non Asian (maybe 30% at best).

Very anecdotal, but the hotel I'm staying at is also hosting some baseball teams for some sort of baseball tournament. Yep, you can guess what those kids look like.

I'm not saying Vivek is right, but I'm definitely not saying he's wrong either.

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The reality is this country will look significantly darker in the future thanks to all the POC coming in, even just legally. What's helping make that happen faster is the need for health care individuals. From the most specialized doctors to the lowliest nurses, our medical field is always in dire need. I can see that being the issue in many sectors, not just the ones Vivek and Elon mentioned a couple of months ago.

There's a reason this is a meme

chess is a great game / activity to learn

it teaches you to look ahead...3, 4, 5 moves

and teaches you to visualize what the board will look like in 3, 4, 5 moves

very important skills in engineering

I don't know if chess is all that strategic at most levels of ability compared to tactical. What I mean is that because there are a set number of permutations of piece positions, a lot of skill involves memorization of responses. In that regards, it's not much different than the spelling bee.

There is value in that kind of activity. It teaches memorization, retention, and application. Critical skills for STEM fields. And like any skill it can be improved with practice. But chess doesn't teach (as well) creativity, teamwork, and psychology. Skills better suited for business and the arts. I think sports does that much better.

I think the important things is to teach dedication and excellence to the best of ones ability.

AColunga07 said:

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I'm at the Texas Chess Championship Tournament and it's very lopsided. My kids are in elementary so they are competing in lower grade level (elementary) sections. It might be different in middle school and high school sections, but I doubt it. The difference is more profound at the higher levels. I have one kid competing in the "championship" section (no cap on their rating) and he is the only non Asian. These are the absolute best players in the state in their respective grades. My students competing in the "JV" section (lowest cap in rating) has the highest % of non Asian (maybe 30% at best).

Very anecdotal, but the hotel I'm staying at is also hosting some baseball teams for some sort of baseball tournament. Yep, you can guess what those kids look like.

I'm not saying Vivek is right, but I'm definitely not saying he's wrong either.

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My 9 year old and 5 year old both play chess. Both white. My 9 year old got first in the UIL competition (sadly they only do puzzles).

I have a friend whose kids play competitively. They are white. So there are some of us out there.

I will tell you though, those baseball kids are no slouches academically. I coach a lot of really sharp and good kids in baseball.

a ucla running back from texas once tweeted this when he got on campus....ucla is like 35% asian.