Buck Turgidson said:
Why would you put your kid through that when there are such high odds it will cost them a spot at A&M due to the ill conceived 10% rule? Even if you are not targeting A&M, don't most good colleges look at class rank?
The real problem is that you end up like Oskar Schindler, wandering around at the end of the movie, thinking if you had just spent one more hour, taken one more class, stayed up a little later.. this is doing exactly the opposite of preparing kids for life. Guess what? Being a stud at multi-variable calculus doesn't make you special. By the time you're 21, there will be 50 people in your class who are good at it. Who cares that you stayed up all night learning it when you were 17? You made a 1550. So what? The engineer that designed our reactor never talks about his SAT score. I love smart kids too. I've got a quiver full of them. I went to A&M on a PES/NMS. But Lord, if only our best and brightest could solve problems and be kind to others. If my kids, in spite of me, can somehow be in the top 10% at those things, I will tapdance on the freeway.
94chem,
That, sir, was the greatest post in the history of TexAgs. I salute you. -- Dough