Boasting in Admissions

If you have passion, it’s implied you have achieved. If p, then q.

Passion > Achievement.

Beware of boasting in highly selective college admissions. Don’t think you do it? You might want to think again and reflect on it. Often times, our free consults begin with a parent saying something like, “My son has won a lot of science awards. He was featured in several high-profile newspapers. He is very accomplished in science research…” You get the idea. Don’t mind us if we busy ourselves with baking an apple pie while you boast about your son. We’ve got things to do, people.

Just as love trumps hate, passion trumps achievement.

But just as boasting doesn’t draw us in and only makes us less inclined to wish to work with a parent and student, it certainly doesn’t draw in admissions officers at highly selective colleges. It’s about passion, not achievement, as articulated in a piece up on “Quartz” by Amy X. Wang. Is achievement nice? Of course. Several Olympic gold medals sure didn’t hurt Katie Ledecky’s case for admission to Stanford (yes, this one was a no brainer — who wouldn’t want Katie Ledecky?). But as Amy accurately writes in her piece for “Quartz,” “Research shows the former tend to imply the latter, anyway.” Meaning that passion implies achievement. Well said, Amy!

So parents and students everywhere, no need to boast of your achievements. You’re rendering yourselves unlikeable. You’re pushing people away when you want to be drawing them towards you. Nobody cares that your son was in some newspaper. That alone isn’t going to get him into a highly selective college and if he writes about being featured in this paper, our bet is he’s going to have a tough time in the highly selective college admissions process. But sometimes people have to learn the hard way. Sometimes they have to get rejected or deferred by their Early school to understand that they’re not approaching the process the correct way. Sometimes they have to learn that life lesson.

Let’s reiterate this once more. Passion trumps Achievement. Have we nailed it in your heads yet? With passion, comes achievement. With achievement, does not necessarily come passion. If passion, then achievement. It’s ninth grade logic. If p, then q.