A good reminder that getting into the 1% is hardwork and often stressful. Too many articles seem to imply that it's all about "white privilege."
11
Fine article, thank you. Why suicide in Palo Alto? Is it meant to be immune to the fears and pains of youth and young manhood? If the stats are still true, the demographic least likely to commit suicide is African American females. Is struggle a protection?
Sweden once was wrongly criticized as the suicide capital of Europe--all that socialism, don't you know. Then it was Japan. More recently, for some of us, it's been Ireland. And there, another explanation was offered--sacerdotal pedophilia. No doubt it was a factor. I also remember Frau Prof. Shea's lesson about the Goethe story: The Sorrows of Young Werther. According to her, the publication of Werther was followed by a rash of suicides in Germany.
Suicide is a normal part of life. It's tragic like many other aspects of life. What to do with young ones? Love them. Treasure them. and make sure they know they are treasured--for themselves, not as ornaments or potential boasts.
As for "ushering children toward a bright future" what do we think a bright future might be?
Sweden once was wrongly criticized as the suicide capital of Europe--all that socialism, don't you know. Then it was Japan. More recently, for some of us, it's been Ireland. And there, another explanation was offered--sacerdotal pedophilia. No doubt it was a factor. I also remember Frau Prof. Shea's lesson about the Goethe story: The Sorrows of Young Werther. According to her, the publication of Werther was followed by a rash of suicides in Germany.
Suicide is a normal part of life. It's tragic like many other aspects of life. What to do with young ones? Love them. Treasure them. and make sure they know they are treasured--for themselves, not as ornaments or potential boasts.
As for "ushering children toward a bright future" what do we think a bright future might be?
5
I live in the Bay Area, and I can attest to what's been written here. On the one hand, American kids are over-scheduled, micromanaged, and infantilized. And yet they're also forced to cope with stress levels that even adults in their 30s & 40s would have trouble coping with: too much homework, too little sleep, too little time for being kids.
The problem runs deep. Last year, my daughter had appendicitis. Her hospital roommate was a kindergartner who was doing homework in her bed while hooked up to IV lines. There were paragraphs to be written and sums to be summed, and major surgery was no reason to stop. No, I am not making this up. For the skeptics out there, you don't think that kids suddenly get overwhelmed in 9th grade and decide to end it all, do you? These suicides are created slowly, over many years.
When my daughter was in 3rd grade, I asked other parents if they were concerned about all the homework our kids were getting. A couple were, but most weren't. Their message was that the kids needed to do the homework, even if it was 25 of the same kind of problem, every night.
Go to a library in a high-achieving school district around here in July, and you'll find study rooms packed with unhappy teens doing AP summer coursework. Those kids aren't there for the joy of learning. They're being compliant.
And then the "elite" colleges devise ways to increase applicants so as to craft single-digit acceptance rates.
Who decided that any of this was a good idea?
The problem runs deep. Last year, my daughter had appendicitis. Her hospital roommate was a kindergartner who was doing homework in her bed while hooked up to IV lines. There were paragraphs to be written and sums to be summed, and major surgery was no reason to stop. No, I am not making this up. For the skeptics out there, you don't think that kids suddenly get overwhelmed in 9th grade and decide to end it all, do you? These suicides are created slowly, over many years.
When my daughter was in 3rd grade, I asked other parents if they were concerned about all the homework our kids were getting. A couple were, but most weren't. Their message was that the kids needed to do the homework, even if it was 25 of the same kind of problem, every night.
Go to a library in a high-achieving school district around here in July, and you'll find study rooms packed with unhappy teens doing AP summer coursework. Those kids aren't there for the joy of learning. They're being compliant.
And then the "elite" colleges devise ways to increase applicants so as to craft single-digit acceptance rates.
Who decided that any of this was a good idea?
69
My Ivy-educated, high-earning husband (who never felt the college was worth it in some ways) challenges our (sometimes anxious, perfectionist) teen that what he really wants is to see her come home with a 73 - in some course that she thought would be worth taking despite the challenge - and NOT freak out, but just work at it, improve as possible, and keep doing interesting, challenging things that engage her and that she feels are worth something. I'm so grateful to him for that (of course I back it up, but Dads standards make a difference for nervy girls sometimes). I try to be pretty anti-tiger about sleep and overcomittment. Small school, state school - we really don't care, she'll be a good candidate and we are pretty confident she'll get a good decent education and training if she finds a path. The hype/stress/status stuff is so ridiculous. You'd think people would look around (or read Frank Bruni) and realize - but not so much. A small part of me hopes the pendulum is swinging back to reason or proportion in these things, but there are not a lot of indicators.
33
Maybe I've become too jaded, but it seems to me that much of this kind of stress is self-induced and the competition, imagined. Part of the problem is lack of perspective -- With so relatively little life experience the young often imagine that their first romantic relationship must be the greatest and/or most tragic since Romeo and Juliette. And much the same can be said for the seemingly disproportionate emotional investment in their other goals and endeavors.
For these kinds of feelings I recommend what I've come to call the Meatloaf defense, as it derives from lyrics on the old "Bat Out of Hell" album and consists simply of reminding oneself that "Nothing really rocks, and nothing really rolls, and nothing's really worth the cost." (Or not worth your life, anyway...)
For these kinds of feelings I recommend what I've come to call the Meatloaf defense, as it derives from lyrics on the old "Bat Out of Hell" album and consists simply of reminding oneself that "Nothing really rocks, and nothing really rolls, and nothing's really worth the cost." (Or not worth your life, anyway...)
11
I've been teaching college students for 30 years, and I've noticed that over the last five or six years the percentage of my students with mental health issues has risen notably. Many times students report their conditions to me and in other cases it is more or less evident. And I am not now in an especially competitive academic environment.
My hunch is that there are multiple causes. Some are under pressure because they simply don't belong in college for academic reasons, and yet colleges must now teach them all. I'm for that, but there are real difficulties involved. Others are undergoing the normal destabilizing and sorting things out that comes with college.
Others, though, and this is hard to describe, are more radically destabilized by identity uncertainty. They have so many choices about so many things, and they are so aware of the many different ways people live and identify, and they have so little guidance--except from people with axes to grind, including professors and "student support" people who attempt to shape them to resemble themselves--that they are lost in more profound and more endlessly specific ways than college students were lost in the past.
I worry about them. Their world is far more complicated and more rich with choices than mine was at their age, and there is something potentially wonderful about this, but the balance between past and future is precarious in a time of rapid change. Many of them have not inherited much of a past to work from.
My hunch is that there are multiple causes. Some are under pressure because they simply don't belong in college for academic reasons, and yet colleges must now teach them all. I'm for that, but there are real difficulties involved. Others are undergoing the normal destabilizing and sorting things out that comes with college.
Others, though, and this is hard to describe, are more radically destabilized by identity uncertainty. They have so many choices about so many things, and they are so aware of the many different ways people live and identify, and they have so little guidance--except from people with axes to grind, including professors and "student support" people who attempt to shape them to resemble themselves--that they are lost in more profound and more endlessly specific ways than college students were lost in the past.
I worry about them. Their world is far more complicated and more rich with choices than mine was at their age, and there is something potentially wonderful about this, but the balance between past and future is precarious in a time of rapid change. Many of them have not inherited much of a past to work from.
47
fyi, a private school education in Silicon Valley costs about $40k for 6-12 grades.
3
Our kids - not our Ivy League degrees - are our precious legacies. If they are not compelled to follow in our footsteps, let them step to the music which they hear, however measured or far away. (With every nod to HDT.)
15
Would it be possible to have some statistics about this instead of anecdotes? For example, what is the relationship between teenage suicide rate and parental income?
23
IMHO, the "suicide epidemic" and the "autism epidemic" and the "ADHD epidemic" are all symptoms of one thing - the freedom to diagnose issues which previously were "family secrets" or seen as "mental health".
For example, people would hide suicide, people would hide that their kid was getting mental health help, people would hide if their child not only was not doing well in school, but couldn't get along with other kids, people would hide if their kid was so "hyper" and "energetic" that it destroyed their grades.
There were more than a few suicides when I was growing up, and there were also more than a few nervous breakdowns. Of three kids I knew with perfect SATs, back in the mid-80s, all three who went to a HYP, one is an unknown artist with several marriages under her belt, one is a college instructor at a very small college with no national reputation, and one is dead. The one who passed had a nervous breakdown and dropped out of the Ivy, and went to a state school. He never could find a steady job.
I don't think pressures are more nowadays, I do think media acts like everything is new and emerging. There is nothing new under the sun.
If I was a teen with suicidal thoughts, as I was in the mid-80s, at least now I would be more likely to reach out anonymously on the internet (for better hopefully) or reach out to my teachers. The stigma of mental health issues is still present, but it is not nearly as bad as it was in the past.
For example, people would hide suicide, people would hide that their kid was getting mental health help, people would hide if their child not only was not doing well in school, but couldn't get along with other kids, people would hide if their kid was so "hyper" and "energetic" that it destroyed their grades.
There were more than a few suicides when I was growing up, and there were also more than a few nervous breakdowns. Of three kids I knew with perfect SATs, back in the mid-80s, all three who went to a HYP, one is an unknown artist with several marriages under her belt, one is a college instructor at a very small college with no national reputation, and one is dead. The one who passed had a nervous breakdown and dropped out of the Ivy, and went to a state school. He never could find a steady job.
I don't think pressures are more nowadays, I do think media acts like everything is new and emerging. There is nothing new under the sun.
If I was a teen with suicidal thoughts, as I was in the mid-80s, at least now I would be more likely to reach out anonymously on the internet (for better hopefully) or reach out to my teachers. The stigma of mental health issues is still present, but it is not nearly as bad as it was in the past.
15
these are the extreme cases because they make the news. but what about the 100's of others who manifest other ways to cry out for releif? the cutters? the alcoholic teens? the drug users? the young sex addicts? etc. they are able to hide even deeper.
is it the parents' fault? maybe. it's definitely their problem. is it the schools' fault? to a great degree. is it the culture's? beyond doubt. for the latter, think of the Japanese culture. i believe their suicide rate of teens because of the rigorous education system is probably even higher.
solution? FIRST - do away with all of the frakking tests! there are too many and too many that are weighted. SECOND - focus on parenting. it begins in the home. we don't provide accurate support for helping parents. in most cases, having sex is the prerequisite for having children. THIRD - expand the idea of Social/Emotional Growth programs & curriculum. you can't just throw kids 'out there' with no coping skills. they interpret that they are 'broken' when they hit a snag. they're not 'broken' they are simply lacking instruction & skills.
is it the parents' fault? maybe. it's definitely their problem. is it the schools' fault? to a great degree. is it the culture's? beyond doubt. for the latter, think of the Japanese culture. i believe their suicide rate of teens because of the rigorous education system is probably even higher.
solution? FIRST - do away with all of the frakking tests! there are too many and too many that are weighted. SECOND - focus on parenting. it begins in the home. we don't provide accurate support for helping parents. in most cases, having sex is the prerequisite for having children. THIRD - expand the idea of Social/Emotional Growth programs & curriculum. you can't just throw kids 'out there' with no coping skills. they interpret that they are 'broken' when they hit a snag. they're not 'broken' they are simply lacking instruction & skills.
23
Good article but it's disingenuous to place to the blame squarely on the parents. The elite schools, certain employers and the media all have a hand in this elite college admissions mania.
First, our elite schools need to bare a big part of the responsibility. Their "holistic admission" used primarily to weed out undesired demographics, i.e. unhooked white and Asian applicants, is the prime reason why talented kids are killing themselves with a million a one AP courses, select sports, musical/dance competitions, club activities and volunteer hours. The real admission rate to HYPS for unhooked white and Asian kids, after preferences given to athletes, legacies, URMs and development cases, is more like 1% to 2%.
Next, employers in investment banking and management consulting also play a major role by only recruiting from a few elite schools. Those who aspire to go into these lucrative industries feel compelled to attend these schools.
Last and most importantly, the media esp. the NY Times needs to shoulder major blame. The NYT has written more about Harvard than all other colleges put together. The only times the NYT mention other colleges are about college football/basketball or frat misbehaviors, plus 1 or 2 articles on the plight of URMs in Community colleges, or "homeless to Harvard", as if homeless to Rutgers just isn't news worthy. To the NYT, it certainly is Harvard or bust. The public shapes its perception on elite schools based on what they read in the media.
First, our elite schools need to bare a big part of the responsibility. Their "holistic admission" used primarily to weed out undesired demographics, i.e. unhooked white and Asian applicants, is the prime reason why talented kids are killing themselves with a million a one AP courses, select sports, musical/dance competitions, club activities and volunteer hours. The real admission rate to HYPS for unhooked white and Asian kids, after preferences given to athletes, legacies, URMs and development cases, is more like 1% to 2%.
Next, employers in investment banking and management consulting also play a major role by only recruiting from a few elite schools. Those who aspire to go into these lucrative industries feel compelled to attend these schools.
Last and most importantly, the media esp. the NY Times needs to shoulder major blame. The NYT has written more about Harvard than all other colleges put together. The only times the NYT mention other colleges are about college football/basketball or frat misbehaviors, plus 1 or 2 articles on the plight of URMs in Community colleges, or "homeless to Harvard", as if homeless to Rutgers just isn't news worthy. To the NYT, it certainly is Harvard or bust. The public shapes its perception on elite schools based on what they read in the media.
72
Rashes of suicides in affluent communities are nothing new. I remember one such suicide cluster from the 1980s, and at the time, a Czech immigrant who had spent years as a slave laborer for the Nazis during World War II, told of being taken from her family as a young teenager and forced to work long hours under terrible conditions, and although many of her friends died from the harsh conditions, no one had committed suicide. She wondered about the difference between the Czech teens and the affluent suicides.
I thought about this, and I came to the conclusion that the Czech teenagers had a firm identity. They knew who they were: members of a specific ethnic group, a specific culture, and a specific religion, part of strong extended families in stable communities, raised with solid values other than materialism and achievement. Furthermore, they knew exactly who was at fault for their misery, and this shared knowledge undoubtedly gave them a sense of solidarity.
What I saw from many affluent students was a lack of identity beyond getting good grades and keeping up with current trends in a pop culture that is designed to make people feel insecure as it changes, making today's fad yesterday's laughingstock.
I would suggest that parents worry less about achievement and more about giving their children a solid emotional, spiritual, and cultural background. The children and the future of our country will be better for it.
I thought about this, and I came to the conclusion that the Czech teenagers had a firm identity. They knew who they were: members of a specific ethnic group, a specific culture, and a specific religion, part of strong extended families in stable communities, raised with solid values other than materialism and achievement. Furthermore, they knew exactly who was at fault for their misery, and this shared knowledge undoubtedly gave them a sense of solidarity.
What I saw from many affluent students was a lack of identity beyond getting good grades and keeping up with current trends in a pop culture that is designed to make people feel insecure as it changes, making today's fad yesterday's laughingstock.
I would suggest that parents worry less about achievement and more about giving their children a solid emotional, spiritual, and cultural background. The children and the future of our country will be better for it.
30
We teach our children to seek that which we were never made to seek. Who told us that wealth would lead to satisfaction? Who are we trying to impress? We are literally awash in wealth and we are more unhappy than ever. What does that tell us?
Our forefathers warned us, didn't they? The chief end of man (and woman) is to know God and to enjoy Him fully. God set eternity our hearts because we are only passing through. We act like we own the place and will never leave.
Our forefathers warned us, didn't they? The chief end of man (and woman) is to know God and to enjoy Him fully. God set eternity our hearts because we are only passing through. We act like we own the place and will never leave.
20
I am a current high school senior now on the other side of the college process and I can say with all sincerity that while the year-long college process itself was indeed profoundly compromising and cruel, it is in fact the entire high school experience for myself and so many others that has been warped so deeply to cater to this process. My junior year was one of the most depressing years of my life, especially because each day I was telling myself, "I'll never be 17 again, and I spend every day, every night and every weekend doing a mind-numbing amount of endless work." It tore me apart. I know that I am SO PRIVILEGED to be getting this education, and this awareness made me even more ashamed of the sadness. Still, one of the things that school has taught me is to question things, and I cannot help but question the worth of the anxiety, the depression and the self-hatred that the system wrought upon us. It frustrated me beyond belief that the things that I was genuinely curious about and wanted desperately to explore were pushed aside and deemed unnecessary and futile. We were taught constantly that in this life you WORK HARD for what you want and you don't make excuses for yourself, but when I see some of the most hardworking, honest, creative and, yes, brilliant people in my life be driven to this place I have trouble accepting the merit of this system. I am grateful for an amazing, transformative high school experience but know that something has to give.
232
If you have two exceptionally bright parents the chances are that the child will be a little more normal, ie revert to mean.
But the parents keep the pressure on. The kids want to match the parents.
Plus with two power parent families the kids have usually been raised without a whole lot of face time with the parents.
On top of that is the obsession which technology. The closer people are to technology the less they use it in the valley but the average kids are the most susceptible to social media addiction which again makes them feel inadequate.
The parents here are unbelievable in their pressure and expectations. The ONLY thing that seems to matter in their lives and social status in the community is whether their kids get to Stanford, Harvard, Yale, Caltech, MIT or Berkeley. Nothing else seems to matter.
Go to UC Davis...a failure.
And you can have a perfect SAT, perfect grades, play violin at Carnegie Hall, and join the peace corp in sub-saharan africa and STILL, due to the numbers game, not get into anywhere great.
We all have to back up. Realize that due to the numbers there is an ever greater number of truly gifted kids who dont get in. Once that is done and these kids can be respected despite attending Sonoma then the pressure will be off.
But the parents keep the pressure on. The kids want to match the parents.
Plus with two power parent families the kids have usually been raised without a whole lot of face time with the parents.
On top of that is the obsession which technology. The closer people are to technology the less they use it in the valley but the average kids are the most susceptible to social media addiction which again makes them feel inadequate.
The parents here are unbelievable in their pressure and expectations. The ONLY thing that seems to matter in their lives and social status in the community is whether their kids get to Stanford, Harvard, Yale, Caltech, MIT or Berkeley. Nothing else seems to matter.
Go to UC Davis...a failure.
And you can have a perfect SAT, perfect grades, play violin at Carnegie Hall, and join the peace corp in sub-saharan africa and STILL, due to the numbers game, not get into anywhere great.
We all have to back up. Realize that due to the numbers there is an ever greater number of truly gifted kids who dont get in. Once that is done and these kids can be respected despite attending Sonoma then the pressure will be off.
21
So glad I am "old"! I spent the afternoon with a client who has two pre-teens, and as we worked on her new home, the vibrating texts from school announced her children's test scores for that day, along with other school trivia over the four hours we huddled at the dining table. It's an affluent suburb, and it seems a parent no longer even has to ask what happened at school when a child descends the bus. I was dumbfounded! And also not certain for whom I felt worse.... the mother, the children or the teachers! Has every pop quiz moment become this critical? Apparently a child is no longer given the opportunity to sweat bullets on the bus ride home before sharing bad news grades or behavior issues, and mommy or daddy are slugs if they do not care to receive moment to moment updates from middle school ala "Sally received an 87 on her vocabulary test.. Johnny was just sent to detention in study hall for ....."
16
The NYT's own Tom Friedman has been adding fuel to the hyper-competitiveness fire with all his "World is Flat" reasoning. The pendulum has swung far from the ethos of "Fast Times at Ridgemont High", "Dazed and Confused", and "Take it Easy." There are countless great teachers at many, many colleges (you think it's easy getting a job as a professor?), and when the "name" schools have 5-10% admit rates, there are also amazing kids going all over the place and thriving in their obscure ponds. I am sure that the faculty at Palo Alto HS is preaching a healthy message, but probably the overpaid parents consider the teachers to be losers.
20
I see no mention of the schools' role in all of this. I have two kids in public high school in a fairly, but far from the most, competitive suburb. Freshman world history assignments come from the AP European History curriculum, the biology teacher assigns typical lab and reading and homework plus one to four independent projects per unit, the algebra teacher complains that you are holding him back if you ask a question. Dispair is an unreasonable response. Parents who push back don't get answers, any answer, agreeable or not. When my daughter had a nervous breakdown, she asked the assistant principal, "Everybody says our health is so important. Then why isn't the school giving us a workload that is healthy?". He says, "I'll have to get back to you on that.". She's still waiting.
I'm all for academic rigor and support the goals of the common core, but I don't see how crushing our kids energy and making eager learners hate school is going to make them critical thinkers or globally competitive.
I'm all for academic rigor and support the goals of the common core, but I don't see how crushing our kids energy and making eager learners hate school is going to make them critical thinkers or globally competitive.
21
How many future "rich and well schooled" Richard Corys are high pressure parents in high pressure times making?
Richard Cory
BY EDWIN ARLINGTON ROBINSON
Whenever Richard Cory went down town,
We people on the pavement looked at him:
He was a gentleman from sole to crown,
Clean favored, and imperially slim.
And he was always quietly arrayed,
And he was always human when he talked;
But still he fluttered pulses when he said,
"Good-morning," and he glittered when he walked.
And he was rich—yes, richer than a king—
And admirably schooled in every grace:
In fine, we thought that he was everything
To make us wish that we were in his place.
So on we worked, and waited for the light,
And went without the meat, and cursed the bread;
And Richard Cory, one calm summer night,
Went home and put a bullet through his head.
Richard Cory
BY EDWIN ARLINGTON ROBINSON
Whenever Richard Cory went down town,
We people on the pavement looked at him:
He was a gentleman from sole to crown,
Clean favored, and imperially slim.
And he was always quietly arrayed,
And he was always human when he talked;
But still he fluttered pulses when he said,
"Good-morning," and he glittered when he walked.
And he was rich—yes, richer than a king—
And admirably schooled in every grace:
In fine, we thought that he was everything
To make us wish that we were in his place.
So on we worked, and waited for the light,
And went without the meat, and cursed the bread;
And Richard Cory, one calm summer night,
Went home and put a bullet through his head.
7
If there is evidence that the incidence of suicide and mental illness in the "overachieving" geographies is HIGHER than in kids overall ,Bruni does not provide it.It may well be the other pressures,such as cyber-bullying,are more powerful variables in the equation.Additionally,it behooves us to compare rates with other societies or cultures where such parenting is more of the norm to help us distinguish association from causality.Finally,for every US family like the ones Bruni describes there are ten where boundaries,discipline and prioritization of activities are totally or virtually absent.Yet another reason for evolution of the class system and associated economic gulf in our Society.
9
The irony is, most of the parents of these high achieving Silicon Valley teens probably went to state schools themselves. Most people who go into IT are CS majors from state universities. The biggest source of employment for Microsoft and Amazon are University of Washington grads, the biggest source for Apple is Univ. of California at Berkeley, UCLA and Cal Poly. Google hires a lot from Stanford but it hires even more from Berkeley, UCLA and Univ. of Washington.
IT is the most egalitarian field there is. If you can code, you are king, period, doesn't matter where you went to school, if at all. 14% of Google employees never went to college, and Google goes out of its way to look for these talents. In fact, except for Cornell, most Ivies and elite Lib Art Colleges are quite weak in Computer Science.
I look forward to the day when MOOCs take off by granting diplomas that are widely accepted by employers, with proctored exam results used as benchmark for hire like the CPA, BAR, ARE exams. Then all this elite college admissions mania will finally go away.
The NYT needs to accept its responsibility in this fiasco and help us change as a society. It needs to stop focusing so much on elite schools and start focusing on state schools, on what they offer academically and profile successful graduates of state schools, which are a dime a dozen in every field.
IT is the most egalitarian field there is. If you can code, you are king, period, doesn't matter where you went to school, if at all. 14% of Google employees never went to college, and Google goes out of its way to look for these talents. In fact, except for Cornell, most Ivies and elite Lib Art Colleges are quite weak in Computer Science.
I look forward to the day when MOOCs take off by granting diplomas that are widely accepted by employers, with proctored exam results used as benchmark for hire like the CPA, BAR, ARE exams. Then all this elite college admissions mania will finally go away.
The NYT needs to accept its responsibility in this fiasco and help us change as a society. It needs to stop focusing so much on elite schools and start focusing on state schools, on what they offer academically and profile successful graduates of state schools, which are a dime a dozen in every field.
24
This may be the best (if thats the word) thing I have ever read in the Times. I just had no idea, no clue whatsoever this was going on. I mean, what do you do?
4
The issue with success in the US has so many heads that the beast can barely move along from the weight of its many heads. Success in academics and sports, etc, for children is of course long standing. But now there is this thing, this beast called social media, and there is an underlying notion of being successful at mastering that bucking bronco as well. Imagine the child who cant accumulate enough "followers" - cant friend request, and be friend requested by enough so-called 'friends"...? A score that everyone else can see! The kids can grade each others success at accumulating "followers"! (Which is a term that needs addressing by everyone - followers!? Do we really want followers? Are we each a cult unto ourselves?)
Remember old folks, when the telephone answering machine was king...and coming home to it NOT blinking! That no one wanted you to "come out and play" with them. Or it was blinking and it was just telemarketers, a bill collector, or a wrong number - or mom again. But not the call back from the woman/man you met last week. The job you wanted.
Now imagine if you cant get friend requested, cant catch up to your peers on their Twitter followers, etc, etc. All due to the arcane grading system of who is cool and not.
The pressures we put on children these days is not just school and such - but about how BIG an imprint they can make on the World before they even gain enough knowledge (and confidence) about even their own world, and how that even operates.
Remember old folks, when the telephone answering machine was king...and coming home to it NOT blinking! That no one wanted you to "come out and play" with them. Or it was blinking and it was just telemarketers, a bill collector, or a wrong number - or mom again. But not the call back from the woman/man you met last week. The job you wanted.
Now imagine if you cant get friend requested, cant catch up to your peers on their Twitter followers, etc, etc. All due to the arcane grading system of who is cool and not.
The pressures we put on children these days is not just school and such - but about how BIG an imprint they can make on the World before they even gain enough knowledge (and confidence) about even their own world, and how that even operates.
9
This helps explain the somewhat sociopathic attraction of the financial services industry of our best and brightest. Instead of focusing on finding a cure for cancer, figuring out how to feed or clothe the world more efficiently or solve our numerous social political challenges....they are just seeking the greediest and fastest ways to feather their nests just like the parents who they were spawned from. This does not bode well for the future of this country, does it?
25
Everyone, especially teens, need to believe they have intrinsic value. Society and social media has created a world of intense competition void of God. Kids need to believe they have a mission and that in the great scheme of things they are not a cog in the wheel but a person who matters.
God knows me and calls me by my name.…
God has created me to do Him some definite service;
He has committed some work to me
which He has not committed to another.
I have my mission John Henry Cardinal Newman
God knows me and calls me by my name.…
God has created me to do Him some definite service;
He has committed some work to me
which He has not committed to another.
I have my mission John Henry Cardinal Newman
7
I've taught my daughters that their job is to be the best version of themselves and not to worry about what others are doing.
“Want the best for your child, not for your child to be the best.” = DUH.
“Want the best for your child, not for your child to be the best.” = DUH.
8
I think Frank is talking about a major serious problem. I think it would interesting for him to also look at the types of people he celebrates in his column. Power, fame, celebrity and wealth. Those would seem to be the criteria he uses to think a person interesting enough to write about.
10
Mr. Bruni says, "There's no direct line connecting the pressures of Palo Alto and the deaths." Perhaps not, but there is a solid meandering line that runs right through Madison Avenue. Bombard people with enough messages that what's desirable in life comes from having a high income, and this is what you get, and sadly the New York Times is part of the problem. For me, juxtaposed to this very piece is an ad for a $52,000+ Mercedes Benz. What you might see depends on your browsing history.
Alas we've become fodder of the capitalist machine we have created. Look around you. It doesn't care who it consumes, why or how, and even now the Supreme Court is giving it the same rights as a human being.
Alas we've become fodder of the capitalist machine we have created. Look around you. It doesn't care who it consumes, why or how, and even now the Supreme Court is giving it the same rights as a human being.
9
what is the point of being interviewed on bloomberg west or worshiped on the cover of wired magazine or even pretending to be some diva with a boom mic at a startup conference if you cannot even keep your kids alive? I find most of these people in tech couldn't even disrupt a small mound of talcum powder if they sneezed on it, yet they seek fame and fortune and trivial social status blindly at the expense of their children's lives. I really feel sorry for the little babies whose parents pay $2M for a tear down in palo alto because they will supposedly be attending Stanford in 18 years. If you want to know what real disruption is, trying getting a call from the police saying that your kid just offed himself on the train tracks.
13
Being a Koala Dad is fine if they aren't any Tiger Moms out there. Or else your children will be eaten alive in the real world when competing against the Tiger Mom's offspring.
5
Holy cow, what would I have given to have had parents who were pushing me as an adolescent. Children of privilege being cared about and nurtured. Poor them and boo hoo.
7
This is a very timely column especially in this day and age of helicopter and lawn mower parenting. I was impressed and intrigued by Julie Lythcott-Haims' observations that many parents are "not only overprotective but overbearing, micromanaging the lives of children." She also goes on to note that "pointing them (kids) toward specific mile markers of achievement and denying them any time to flail or room to fail' is not helpful in raising children.
However when she stepped down from her position she reports saying to herself "Folks, you're not in Cambridge, you're not in New Haven, you're not in Princeton, you're in Palo Alto, and we do things differently here."
There is clearly a bit of elitism in that statement, and while that may be justified in the context of these elite universities, isn't there a hint of pressure being applied on the entering class? The very kind of pressure that she recommends we avoid?
http://news.stanford.edu/news/2012/march/lythcott-haims-leaving-032812.html
which, in her view, can be ,
However when she stepped down from her position she reports saying to herself "Folks, you're not in Cambridge, you're not in New Haven, you're not in Princeton, you're in Palo Alto, and we do things differently here."
There is clearly a bit of elitism in that statement, and while that may be justified in the context of these elite universities, isn't there a hint of pressure being applied on the entering class? The very kind of pressure that she recommends we avoid?
http://news.stanford.edu/news/2012/march/lythcott-haims-leaving-032812.html
which, in her view, can be ,
1
How about an unscientific generalization from one of the professors at a highly selective college who will be teaching some of the 4.0 kids with perfect SATs whose academic success has been extracted as if by illegal coercive interrogation.
Their first office visit: “Prof. Smith, if I only earned 28.5% on the third essay, why would an A- be the result when the second essay was graded at 54%, or half the value of ………. blah,blah, blah.”
It could not be more sad to see them explain why an A- is a crime against humanity per the Geneva convention. They see their worth as a human being at stake in every epic struggle between “A” and “A-“.
They rarely laugh at inconsistency and silliness and irony. They don't grapple with ideas. They don't see irony and nuttiness.
And then they watch as some kid with an SAT in the 70th percentile shows up, fearlessly answers a question in an unconventional way, grades be damned, and shows --yup -a flash of genius.
And the kid parented by coerced confession? Any spark of wonderful weirdness – the quality great grad programs really value -- was extinguished during some rote and costly Princeton Review course.
Bring me your self-aware, silly, irreverent children, yearning to breathe free and fail frequently. They don't lose sleep over the difference between an “A” and “A-“ but why there isn’t a vaccine for HIV or a solution for child hunger.
And they'll need all the accounting and legal advice your 4.0 student will be able to provide.
Their first office visit: “Prof. Smith, if I only earned 28.5% on the third essay, why would an A- be the result when the second essay was graded at 54%, or half the value of ………. blah,blah, blah.”
It could not be more sad to see them explain why an A- is a crime against humanity per the Geneva convention. They see their worth as a human being at stake in every epic struggle between “A” and “A-“.
They rarely laugh at inconsistency and silliness and irony. They don't grapple with ideas. They don't see irony and nuttiness.
And then they watch as some kid with an SAT in the 70th percentile shows up, fearlessly answers a question in an unconventional way, grades be damned, and shows --yup -a flash of genius.
And the kid parented by coerced confession? Any spark of wonderful weirdness – the quality great grad programs really value -- was extinguished during some rote and costly Princeton Review course.
Bring me your self-aware, silly, irreverent children, yearning to breathe free and fail frequently. They don't lose sleep over the difference between an “A” and “A-“ but why there isn’t a vaccine for HIV or a solution for child hunger.
And they'll need all the accounting and legal advice your 4.0 student will be able to provide.
20
Here is what Carolyn Walworth, a junior at Palo Alto High School, recently wrote: “We are lifeless bodies in a system that breeds competition, hatred, and discourages teamwork and genuine learning.”
Brilliant girl! She understands America, and will go far!
Brilliant girl! She understands America, and will go far!
15
Here's a crazy thought: All you affluent, financially secure parents, why not view your affluence as making it possible to give your children the enormous gift of getting to figure out for themselves what they love and pursue it for its own sake, without worrying about whether it will make them rich? And if it means they move back in with you for a while after college, count your blessings that you get to enjoy them a little longer-- it's not like you're overcrowded in your 3500 square foot house, right? Heck, they could probably raise a whole family in their corner of it and still have more space and privacy per person than you had growing up.
14
By what criteria are these children "the best and brightest"? The Times' headline writers fell straight into the trap the article ostensibly excoriates - equating wealth and success with being 'best and brightest'. And not even these children's own wealth - just that of their parents. Ironic indeed.
22
I told my kids that success in a career is getting somebody to pay you money to do things you think are fun. It seems to have worked. They both got a PhD degree in areas that fascinate them and engage their interests daily, even though neither took an obvious pathway to wealth and probably will never be rich.
17
My son was a great student until middle school when he stopped doing homework, failed classes and took his report card out of the mail before we saw it. My brother told me to lighten up. I had always refused the boy's request for an Xbox. I bought him an Xbox for his birthday. I got him into the Boy Scouts which he loved. Gradually, he started doing his school work. I never pressured him about grades again. He did well in high school and attends USC now. I learned my lesson.
24
These kids do not need so much stuff to grow up and be happy. When we worked in NYC years ago there was a suicide cluster for a couple of years near Chappaqua, a wealthy community in the northern suburbs and before it was home to the Clintons - several teens jumped in front of trains. Turns out most were coddled with everything but love from wealthy but absent parents. Kids need their parents more not less, and they need less stuff not more to get through childhood in a healthy manner. Our daughter now brags about having the least plastic junky toys of any of her friends! She grew up just fine, went to a good college, is working on a Masters Degree, has no debts and is now a high school teacher.
9
Before all the commenters jump on overparenting, helicopter parenting, Tiger moms, and plain old bad parenting: Unfortunately, growing up in this sort of culture can be pretty toxic even when one's parents don't buy in. Mine didn't— I think they would have been relieved if I'd screwed up and goofed off a bit in my teens— but I and most of my friends were as miserable and anxious as any Gunn kid. I went to private school in San Francisco, which is a similar animal. Even my HS actually tried to counter that prevalent prep school culture, but when you get enough kids from a certain socioeconomic class together, there will be some parents with bad priorities, and they pressure the schools for a certain kind of curricula and certain kinds of outcomes and pressure their kids to perform at a certain level; some faculty and administration are still locked in deference to their own elite pedigrees, and some I think may just be grudgingly receptive to the priorities and criticisms of the wealthiest parents; some kids just want Stanford and Yale. And then the kids talk. Some (the anxious ones especially) absorb (exaggerated) ideas about what it takes to get into a "good" college and what a "good" college is from their peers— or just from the ether. Unfortunately, the problem is more insidious than the parents of the most troubled kids; it is collective and cultural.
101
Ontogeny recapitulates phylogeny. Or some would have it so, except that as regards the embryos created by very successful people, similar life outcomes aren’t always a lock, even if parents tend to think they should be. That can be a serious drag for kids expected to excel at the levels attained by parents, but probably can’t, regardless of immense efforts and endless AP classes. Don’t be too surprised if it leads to very careful embryo-selection, once genetic science advances to such levels – which won’t be much longer.
Why should all of this surprise us? Did we think that society could become ever-increasingly complex, with the conditions for success or even bare sufficiency becoming more intense by the year, and that kids would react to life’s demands basically as they did in 1950’s Rydell High? Not likely. Because this is basically an economic issue, and a macroeconomic one at that, it would be good grist for a second Nobel for Paul Krugman to bring some mathematical, predictive order to the phenomenon.
It’s not just communities like Palo Alto: life’s getting tougher pretty much everywhere -- in the world.
But is it actually superficial to say that one should “want the best for your child, not for your child to be the best”? When being the best in an ever-toughening world really may be the deciding factor distinguishing economic sufficiency from a marginal existence? We won’t get away with dismissing this as a superficial problem with a feel-good answer.
Why should all of this surprise us? Did we think that society could become ever-increasingly complex, with the conditions for success or even bare sufficiency becoming more intense by the year, and that kids would react to life’s demands basically as they did in 1950’s Rydell High? Not likely. Because this is basically an economic issue, and a macroeconomic one at that, it would be good grist for a second Nobel for Paul Krugman to bring some mathematical, predictive order to the phenomenon.
It’s not just communities like Palo Alto: life’s getting tougher pretty much everywhere -- in the world.
But is it actually superficial to say that one should “want the best for your child, not for your child to be the best”? When being the best in an ever-toughening world really may be the deciding factor distinguishing economic sufficiency from a marginal existence? We won’t get away with dismissing this as a superficial problem with a feel-good answer.
4
It is interesting that in Silicon Valley, entrepreneurs are encouraged to fail. Failure means something big, new, and challenging was attempted. Why has this not filtered down to the high schools?
8
This is so easy to fix. Parents - stop it. Just stop.
Demonstrate by your example the values of integrity, compassion, hard work. Your children will follow in your footsteps eventually.
Otherwise, let them find their way. Let them do their own homework, take the consequences of the grades they get, go to college or not, be admitted to the college they have earned - not you. Let them find their career and excel -- to learn to deal with not excelling, or choose not to excel in favor of time with family and friends.
In our family, one person walked the straight and narrow, got two Ivy League degrees, and has a great career in journalism.
Another didn't finish high school, had kids as a teenager, didn't quite finish state college, finished law school and became a lawyer.
A third got a GED, dropped out of state college, and has a great career in Hollywood.
A fourth stopped going to school in 8th grade, got a GED a few years later, went to community college, transferred to a top state school, and is a software engineer with a high-paying job in Silicon Valley.
Get the picture? Stop the pressure. It will work out when the kid wants it to - and they'll still be alive.
Demonstrate by your example the values of integrity, compassion, hard work. Your children will follow in your footsteps eventually.
Otherwise, let them find their way. Let them do their own homework, take the consequences of the grades they get, go to college or not, be admitted to the college they have earned - not you. Let them find their career and excel -- to learn to deal with not excelling, or choose not to excel in favor of time with family and friends.
In our family, one person walked the straight and narrow, got two Ivy League degrees, and has a great career in journalism.
Another didn't finish high school, had kids as a teenager, didn't quite finish state college, finished law school and became a lawyer.
A third got a GED, dropped out of state college, and has a great career in Hollywood.
A fourth stopped going to school in 8th grade, got a GED a few years later, went to community college, transferred to a top state school, and is a software engineer with a high-paying job in Silicon Valley.
Get the picture? Stop the pressure. It will work out when the kid wants it to - and they'll still be alive.
17
Kids need hope. And kids need to believe in themselves, and that they have value and worth. This is largely instilled by parents. It's not about money, it's not about success, it's about believing you're here for a reason. In a country where 40,000 people a year kill themselves, we need to pay attention.
6
Wait, so Palo Alto parents ease the crippling anxiety of the legacy of their success by passing on both to their children?
Genius.
Genius.
4
How did I guess that it would be Palo Alto.?
2
Perhaps the stress is due to exposure to TMI (too much information) and perceived loss of control over one's destiny.
3
I am now in the happiest period of my life and almost 70. But I remember vividly the 7 shot .22 pistol I kept as a teenager, and why I kept it. Not for others, that pistol was for me. But I promised myself I'd shoot myself in the foot first - literally - and that joke on myself was enough to get me through.
Now I wonder if children and teens know everything about what and how but know nothing of why. Are they simply crushed by the work, demands and expectations that have no reason, at least as far as they can see?
Now I wonder if children and teens know everything about what and how but know nothing of why. Are they simply crushed by the work, demands and expectations that have no reason, at least as far as they can see?
10
How do we build a nation with leadership hell-bent on destruction? What Mr. Bruni seems to be discussing here is misguided elitism run amok.
Most children of achievement-obsessed adults survive the tragic suicides of their peers to live beyond their teen years. Too many of those survivors develop into the "empty bodies" of competition and hatred cited in Mr. Bruni's column. As a result, we have a political class consumed by venom and utterly devoid of constructive vision, serving as today's role-model to an emerging citizenry of elite but thoughtless drones.
Bruni's reflections offer a telling counterpoint to today's column by David Brooks which talks about the moral strength of selfless generosity. It's a question of the good life versus the privileged life.
Most children of achievement-obsessed adults survive the tragic suicides of their peers to live beyond their teen years. Too many of those survivors develop into the "empty bodies" of competition and hatred cited in Mr. Bruni's column. As a result, we have a political class consumed by venom and utterly devoid of constructive vision, serving as today's role-model to an emerging citizenry of elite but thoughtless drones.
Bruni's reflections offer a telling counterpoint to today's column by David Brooks which talks about the moral strength of selfless generosity. It's a question of the good life versus the privileged life.
8
Remember what Albert Einstein said to make yourself a value not a success.
6
"...the shortfalls of some modern parenting, which, in her view, can be not only overprotective but overbearing, micromanaging the lives of children, pointing them toward specific mile markers of achievement and denying them any time to flail or room to fail."
So often this is done under the pretense of preparing the child for a competitive and unforgiving world, but I fear that all too often the real motivation is the parents' desire to stoke their own sense of "accomplishment." I hope the last line in this article--“Want the best for your child, not for your child to be the best”--is taken to heart by all.
So often this is done under the pretense of preparing the child for a competitive and unforgiving world, but I fear that all too often the real motivation is the parents' desire to stoke their own sense of "accomplishment." I hope the last line in this article--“Want the best for your child, not for your child to be the best”--is taken to heart by all.
7
Reading Mr. Bruni's columns is one of life's the pleasures. He is bright, thoughtful, and has heart. But it continues to amaze me how few journalists, including him, seem to really "get it." Get what? -At some gut level we all all know there is not enough good work out there. And there probably will not be. When the competition is global, and more work is automated the gap between the top and bottom will spread, and most will fall to the bottom. Keynes predicted the 'end of work' over half a century ago. '- But rather than trying to figure what to do with this brave new world, the people at the top of society focus on pushing our children into elite schools. And their children pay a price. This is the mentality of our elites: narcissistic and short sighted.
134
When people wondered why so brilliant a prose stylist as Kazuo Ishiguro should veer into science fiction, I got ahold of "Never Let Me Go" and realized it's anything but.
You're told one set of things - how special, unique and creative you are - then find out the world works in a whole different way. And the very people who've been cosseting you all this time, say "Deal."
Not that I was that happy a teenager, but I wouldn't want to be one today. Our behavior itself may have been constrained, but we had way more freedom to make our own mistakes, seek our own level and think for ourselves.
You're told one set of things - how special, unique and creative you are - then find out the world works in a whole different way. And the very people who've been cosseting you all this time, say "Deal."
Not that I was that happy a teenager, but I wouldn't want to be one today. Our behavior itself may have been constrained, but we had way more freedom to make our own mistakes, seek our own level and think for ourselves.
7
Why did you stop your column there? I was looking forward to reading about more positive and loving solutions to this issue. Please continue on this topic of solutions in the future. Thanks!
4
What in the world is going on, or not going on, in the land of ours?
I wonder if we are all too busy to truly care for one another, and that includes parents and kids. Cellphones cut out conversations that matter far more than the one standing right next to you. Soccer moms and hockey dad stuff their vans full of equipment and travel distant destinations with nothing meaningful discuseed beyond how Joey got jobbed by the referree.
Years ago, in the land of the emerging Camelot, moms worked hard at home and dads worked hard at their jobs, all to put food on the table and a clean shirt on our back. They held high aspirations for us. We didn't talk much about it, but we knew it. We worked hard to reach our goals, but if we didn't make it, we picked another makeable goal. There were no sentries watching trains either.
Back when success in life was more about satisfaction and less about money, there were far fewer suicides. Something important in our lives has been lost. Anyone want to guess what it is?
I wonder if we are all too busy to truly care for one another, and that includes parents and kids. Cellphones cut out conversations that matter far more than the one standing right next to you. Soccer moms and hockey dad stuff their vans full of equipment and travel distant destinations with nothing meaningful discuseed beyond how Joey got jobbed by the referree.
Years ago, in the land of the emerging Camelot, moms worked hard at home and dads worked hard at their jobs, all to put food on the table and a clean shirt on our back. They held high aspirations for us. We didn't talk much about it, but we knew it. We worked hard to reach our goals, but if we didn't make it, we picked another makeable goal. There were no sentries watching trains either.
Back when success in life was more about satisfaction and less about money, there were far fewer suicides. Something important in our lives has been lost. Anyone want to guess what it is?
7
Death by train, with multiple imitators and occurrences?
Might we start to address this problem specifically by removing ANNA KARENINA from any required or optional reading lists?
Might we start to address this problem specifically by removing ANNA KARENINA from any required or optional reading lists?
3
It is always a mystery how to bring up children and I have found this to be very difficult without any easy answers. Coming from modest circumstances and becoming well to do you want to give your children all the things one never had growing. I really now believe that the children are what they are and what they will be is really up to them and our contributions are greatly exaggerated. I have two children, brought up the same way, one is still troubled and trying to find his way and the other is a great success at a young age and recognized player in her field. As I said, bringing up children, lifes greatest mystery........
3
We teach economics, physics, baseball, lacrosse, and measure ourselves on the size of our salary, bonus, house, car. We say nothing about how to love, care, have compassion, help those in need, live a life of grace & balance.
We then look around and bemoan the brutality, violence and hatred of our city, country, world. To quote some modern philosophers "Duh!" To quote some a little older: "You reap what you sow."
We then look around and bemoan the brutality, violence and hatred of our city, country, world. To quote some modern philosophers "Duh!" To quote some a little older: "You reap what you sow."
12
It's always been that way and it will always be that way. Silicon Valley. Jeeez. When I lived down the road in San Jose, Palo Alto was considered untouchable. The kids there couldn't even hang out at the malls without being driven in mommy or daddy's BMW or Audi. The same sorts of kids hung out in Los Gatos in front of the coffee store and bagel shop. Now, where's that gated community? Or Los Altos? Their parents did that stuff to them....
4
My heart goes out to these families. The rest of us, in the "middle class", hoping to keep our families" here", barely have the money for State Universities, to fund our retirement accounts, and hope one of us is not laid off. If that happens, then college for our kids, is out of reach. Retirement, out of reach. A different world, but I understand their fear.
9
I know this would applied to a very small group of the readers, but here is a very good resource providing grief support after the death of a child. There is such a lack of resources.
Compassionate Friends
https://www.compassionatefriends.org/home.aspx
https://www.facebook.com/TCFUSA
Compassionate Friends
https://www.compassionatefriends.org/home.aspx
https://www.facebook.com/TCFUSA
2
Superficial treatment: pressures on teens to achieve are not "problems of affluence and privilege" except in the limited sense that so few Americans get there. The cause of the problem is an unfair economic system where the vast majority of the population struggles with flat pay and benefits while the top few percent suck the nation dry. Tragic as teen suicide is, it is but a dim reflection of the despair of the working class living under totalitarian capitalism.
10
Obnoxious, overbearing hyperparent behavior isn't for the benefit of the kid, it's all about mommy and daddy.
9
When I was a kid about a hundred years ago I was nearly free from parental supervision except when it was obviously needed. A friend's mom asked my mom why she wasn't more worried about where I was and what I was doing. My mom answered, "Because I trust him."
And despite all that parental neglect, I somehow managed to get into one of the most selective schools anyway -- with no one pushing me there except my high school guidance counselor.
I feel sorry for these kids today. They have no childhoods.
And despite all that parental neglect, I somehow managed to get into one of the most selective schools anyway -- with no one pushing me there except my high school guidance counselor.
I feel sorry for these kids today. They have no childhoods.
7
"The suicide rate among all teenagers . . . was 8.15 per every 100,000 Americans between the ages of 10 and 24 in 2013; the rate was 6.74 in 2003."
That's a lot. That's a rise of over 20% in 10 years.
It's a shame that this newspaper does not have enough statistical savvy to point this out explicitly.
That's a lot. That's a rise of over 20% in 10 years.
It's a shame that this newspaper does not have enough statistical savvy to point this out explicitly.
3
Best and brightest? Not really. How good and smart can you be if you swallow America's society's insanity hook, line, and sinker?
I'm sure Walden is on the syllabus. Read but not understood I'll bet.
I'm sure Walden is on the syllabus. Read but not understood I'll bet.
6
While it may be good to re-evaluate what we put our American kids through so that they can find their way into a top notch school such as UC, if for one minute they pause and only take 10 AP classes Instead of 12, they open themselves up to competition from foreign students who would be more than happy to take their places. These students prepare their whole lives to do just that. Then we will hear from corporate Ameica that out students do not have the skills so the jobs go to foreign workers. It is a vicious cycle and as elizabeth Warren notes, the game is rigged.
10
I firmly believe that what college you attend is important primarily to land your first job. After that it's your work experience that matters. I think what college you attend is more important for parents' bragging rights.
4
And take the time to teach your children how to sing. Happiness can't be forced, but it can be learned. Be a source of happiness for your child. If they can pass happiness on, well then, you've done your job.
6
The problem I feel is that everything in America today is exponentially distributed: your wealth and your health, security, emotional and physical is exponentially worse as you slide down the distribution. The fastest past the post gets stellar everything? You wish. Money and success will preclude the most important fruits of a life among equals: emotional satisfaction. If you look at your daily life and see loyal friends, a devoted family, a satisfied curiosity and urge to do well by your neighbors, you have succeeded. The majority of Americans don't even know their neighbors. Then they ask themselves, "Why do they fight us?" It could have been at one point because they want what Americans have. Now, I think they fight because they don't want what Americans are convinced everyone must have, which is in reality nothing but fear of failure.
2
MIT, this means you. You must stop accepting all the rote learning, violin playing, tiger mom generated, first Asian in their family to go to college, and start accepting more quirky kids with lower grades but high SAT scores, and lots of imagination, and little tolerance for doing what they're told. Sick of seeing my recommends passed over in favor of kids with nervous ticks already as high school students and killing themselves when not everyone can get As at MIT.
14
What is really sad is the mistaken belief that all will be well if these children can just reach Stanford. But when they do they will still not know how to relax and be happy. These are bad habits of stress and obsession that they will carry with them throughout their lives.
83
Some things that are rarely on kids' to-do lists, but ought to be (the earlier, the better): (1) Get cut after a tryout for at least one thing you were really hoping to do (a team, a drama audition, a orchestra audition, etc). Notice how life goes on. Practice hard and try again next season. (2) Fail a test and/or get a bad term grade in a class. Notice how life goes on. Instead of arguing your way to a higher grade, just seek out help if needed and work harder next time. (3) Be lucky enough to get a teacher who is generally acknowledged not to be one of the nicest in your school. Notice how you can manage to adapt even to difficult people. (4) Spend time with people who are better than you at any particular thing (academic subjects, sports, art, music, whatever). Notice how *not* being the (smartest, fastest, most advanced) one in the room is usually the best way to learn something new. (5) Volunteer -- as much as possible. Notice that you are not the center of the universe, but you can still make improvements in the lives of the people around you.
12
On the PBS station that serves L.A. and Orange County, we have been seeing commercials deploring those who walk on railroad tracks. They stress the dangers of doing so and a dramatic fashion. Yet suicide is not mentioned and Mr. Bruni's Op-Ed piece is a shocker. I must believe that his words are reflecting in concerns over the untimely deaths of our young.
1
How tragic and ironic that the natural result of unfettered capitalism and its winner take all outcomes has come home to roost in one of that economy's epicenters.
I'm glad I'm not a kid these days; getting into Yale or Stanford just wasn't a life or death thing.
I'm glad I'm not a kid these days; getting into Yale or Stanford just wasn't a life or death thing.
4
Years ago, at one of my child's yearly check ups, our wonderful pediatrician told him that it was important to do his best in school as long as it was"consistent with happiness and sanity". Very wise words and ones too few neurotic, helicopter parents allow their children to follow.
123
How many of these kids who have committed suicide ever waded knee-deep into a marsh to catch tadpoles and bring them home in a jar to show Mom? Or, at the age of eight took off for a day on their bikes down the footpaths along a river's edge, with lunch consisting of a sandwich of white bread, Miracle Whip, and Velveeta, with a bottle of Coke to wash it down, to return home in time for supper with nothing to show for it but scratches and a new hole in their jeans? Or spent an afternoon in the attic of a friend's home reading comic books ranging from Casper to Batman to Donald Duck to Sgt. Rock or Billy the Kid? Or clipped playing cards to the braces of their bike's wheels so they would chatter in the spokes, turning that Schwinn into Harley?
Childhood today more and more seems to be as regimented as Army Basic Training was in 1968. And you had to be at least 18 to do that without your parents' permission. Not everyone with the potential to be a physician, physicist, or politician should enter those or any other profession their parents deem as evidence of "Success."
Sometimes life's best choices result from play.
Childhood today more and more seems to be as regimented as Army Basic Training was in 1968. And you had to be at least 18 to do that without your parents' permission. Not everyone with the potential to be a physician, physicist, or politician should enter those or any other profession their parents deem as evidence of "Success."
Sometimes life's best choices result from play.
10
Just another symptom of our competition obsessed culture. The winner take all philosophy of the Republican party will destroy our once great nation. When only the .1% prosper and are the only ones seen as virtuous we can expect more of these kinds of tragic consequences.
11
I think this same kind of stress is evident in other countries, primarily Asian, that we see ourselves educationally "competing" against. Intense pressure from Day One of school.
3
There is no need to blame Palo Alto and all other otherwise successful parents or any other parents whose children died from their own action, whether it be suicide, drug overdose, bullying or auto accidents. Teenagers at this age are not adults, and they are too young to solve life's complicated issues on their own. Some of them may even become physically, psychologically, or mentally ill not because of any specific actions of their parents.
One might, however, suggest that the top universities refrain from publishing the acceptance or rejection rates, and to be more transparent about their admission process and criteria even at the risk of reducing the number of applicants who have no realistic chance of getting admitted to those schools.
There are more than one way to succeed in life, and the important lesson really is not give up even if one does not succeed in their first try.
One might, however, suggest that the top universities refrain from publishing the acceptance or rejection rates, and to be more transparent about their admission process and criteria even at the risk of reducing the number of applicants who have no realistic chance of getting admitted to those schools.
There are more than one way to succeed in life, and the important lesson really is not give up even if one does not succeed in their first try.
8
I'm not sure its the "pressure", its the emptiness of it all that these kids see. They see that "wealth" does not guarantee a life with meaning, nor feeling part of a wider society, nor feeling even really important as an individual. Perhaps they question if all that matters is how much money you make and how narcissistic you become.
13
I love it - in a nation of 330,000,000 with a high suicide rate, and the most frequent a white middle aged man, we manage to focus somehow on the children of the affluent and wealthy.
How did that happen?
How did that happen?
4
No discussion of ideology? Idea's (models) that are treated as if natural law. What works for a individual doesn't work for a society. If all education acted like Stanford we would only have 5% of the population educated. We have reached a point in which the individual model to success has become societies (a large number of individuals) model to success. In other words, what if every university wanted to be Stanford. By definition, exclusion or prestigious means it's worth something because you can't join. It would be a disaster for many individuals and for society. That's what's happening to these kids, they are following a competition based model (zero sum) versus a cooperative based model (expand the base). Ideology gets expressed in behavior, and these kids compete on a curve, no matter if the difference between each individual is a narcissism of small difference. We judge the most complicated machine in the world based on a very narrow difference between these machines. Maybe these kids should be judged on what they create, what they do, and not on these arbitrary differences.
3
As a parent with two children in New York City public schools, I find the pressure here starts early. By 4th grade (or earlier), many children become aware that they must apply to middle school. Parents can try very hard to shield them from it, but children realize that their grades and test scores are going to count. Some children also become aware that their performance on the state tests not only affects them, but may also affect their teachers' future employment. Kids talk. And they hear adults talking about the ridiculous weight that is given to state test scores. In 6th grade, children go through the natural ups and downs of starting middle school, then by 7th and 8th grade they're already worrying about getting good grades and test scores to get into a decent high school. If a child hopes to be "matched" with a high school that is right for them, where they will be happy and thrive, a significant amount of time during 8th grade must be spent on high school tours and open houses (which again remind kids of the pressure they're under). Many take the grueling SHSAT, in addition to other tests and school interviews. By the time they enter high school, kids may think it's time for a breather. But pretty soon, they realize that yet another school search is coming--the biggest of them all--with more tests, more tours, more endless requirements. Parents can try find creative ways to spin it, but from 4th grade on, kids in New York City are on a school application treadmill.
7
Yet the suicide rate among NYC teens is somehow lower than Silicon Valley teens. Kids raised in NYC must be more resilient than kids raised elsewhere. OTOH, it's probably also why most of them are such cold hearted money worshippers.
And here's one more thought, when we hold up the 1% lifestyle as the pinnacle, the desired goal, but of course 99% can't achieve it, we have suffering right at the start. I read a recent study about how dangling the carrot in front of people actually creates less productivity and satisfaction then if you just let people collaborate, brainstorm and dream. We now live in a society where a minute percentage of people have taken all the wealth, and hold that up as something the rest of us are supposed to admire and envy. Compassion for those who are impoverished or part of a less-privileged group is distained. It's all compete, compete, compete. It needs to crumble. Even with a society in which so many are now poor, and becoming poorer, we need to reject this game of acquisition. We need to reject it in our laws, in our government, in our values, in our education, in our daily interactions with each other. We need to replace it with a sense of being more concerned for others than ourselves, and then collaborating on how to lift up our society altogether. We need to stop fighting and buying into the fighting. We need to reject the hype. We need to teach our children to reject the hype and trust their hearts.
11
Bravo! I'm in total agreement. I'm 79 years old, grew up poor in economic terms, was not ambitious, felt no pressure from family but saw good examples of family (women), capable of getting educated and a good profession. Marrying an unemployed classical musician at age 25, but always able to get jobs in my profession (med tech), I now live comfortably in lovely (mortgage-free) Manhattan apt., comfortable pension and a clear conscience. Children should learn from good examples and be encouraged to find a passion in life, work towards that (professional) goal, and pursue that diligently and with integrity.
10
As a student who went through the Palo Alto school system I find it troubling that we are so focused on pinpointing one problem, one reason, one explanation for this sad trend. In my experience, it is a combination of pressures, from Stanford being 50 feet across the street, to the high achievement of our peers and their parents, to the overall aura of success that encompasses classes, extracurriculars and casual conversations on the quad, that contribute to the high pressure environment. In a way, Palo Alto prepared me for what lies ahead: I am more resilient because of my experience growing up there. But I also did not feel completely smart and competent until I left the bubble and realized that there is more to life than perfect SAT scores and an admissions letter from an Ivy.
It is not fair to place blanket blame on parents, not all of which are obsessed with typical measures of success. It is not fair to place all the blame on teachers or administrators, not all of which are obsessed with preparing you for the AP exam. It is not fair to place all the blame on Stanford or Silicon Valley.
As a community, we need to examine the multiple factors that contribute to the environment, and arm students with coping techniques. We need to create programs to address mental health and wellbeing. We also need to be compassionate and realize that people deal with stress in different ways. Hopefully ending one's life won't continue to be one.
It is not fair to place blanket blame on parents, not all of which are obsessed with typical measures of success. It is not fair to place all the blame on teachers or administrators, not all of which are obsessed with preparing you for the AP exam. It is not fair to place all the blame on Stanford or Silicon Valley.
As a community, we need to examine the multiple factors that contribute to the environment, and arm students with coping techniques. We need to create programs to address mental health and wellbeing. We also need to be compassionate and realize that people deal with stress in different ways. Hopefully ending one's life won't continue to be one.
6
Breaking news! Millions of people in flyover country attend community college and state university; become teachers or insurance agents or physical therapists or any number of valuable professions and spend mundane lives coaching kids' sports, hanging out in the backyard with friends from the office or church; volunteering for the needy in their community; maybe run a slow 10k a few times a year. Yes, sometimes there's stress from too many bills, but many of us are fairly content. The lifestyles chosen by many in the communities mentioned here are choices. Money and prestige in mcmansion suburbia & Ivy league college does not equal happiness.
20
What are (where are) the statistics showing the incidence of teen suicides for (a) the priviledged pressured teens and (b) the ordinary moderately achieving teens?
Judging from this article (and as a long-ago Stanford parent), I get the impression that there is a major measurable difference in the rates.
Naf 85+
Judging from this article (and as a long-ago Stanford parent), I get the impression that there is a major measurable difference in the rates.
Naf 85+
3
I grew up in Palo Alto and graduated from Gunn High School in 1982.
In the four years I was at Gunn; there were no suicides. I think we had one death, a result of a traffic accident. Most of my playmates were the children of Stanford professors who were just glad their kids would show up to class.
What's changed since then? Well, Palo Alto has changed. Where it was once a university town where everyone was very smart, but not paid very well (Stanford didn't pay very well then) and the town all got along; more or less..
In the late 80's in turned into the Capital of Silicon Valley (we called it the Santa Clara Valley then) and this brought an influx over-paid, over-achieving money obsessed parents from around the world. I feel this cultural shift has destroyed the town and rarely visit anymore.
In the four years I was at Gunn; there were no suicides. I think we had one death, a result of a traffic accident. Most of my playmates were the children of Stanford professors who were just glad their kids would show up to class.
What's changed since then? Well, Palo Alto has changed. Where it was once a university town where everyone was very smart, but not paid very well (Stanford didn't pay very well then) and the town all got along; more or less..
In the late 80's in turned into the Capital of Silicon Valley (we called it the Santa Clara Valley then) and this brought an influx over-paid, over-achieving money obsessed parents from around the world. I feel this cultural shift has destroyed the town and rarely visit anymore.
32
I teach high school in a high performing, diverse school. The pressure on students to conform is enormous. And the administration's pressure on all students to take AP classes adds to that strain. It's no longer enough to have good grades and be a generally good kid. You have to take AP classes, start clubs, volunteer, have a job AND have a compelling backstory in order to get into the elite schools. I teach AP courses and there are nearly half the students who do not belong there. What is more, in my regular classes, kids who would be happy in a vocational program are instead channeled into upper level academics under the false assumption that everyone must attend college. We need technicians too! I pay as much or more to my electricians, plumber or car mechanic as I do my doctor. Yet, in some circles, and especially with Asian families, being a doctor is the goal. As one of my most promising students who happened to be Vietnamese told me "The goal is being a doctor. If you can't be a doctor, you're a dentist. If you can't be a dentist, you're an engineer. If you can't be an engineer, you're a pharmacist. If you can't do those things,you work in the family business until you marry." She's in medical school now. She was probably one of the best painters I have ever taught. Right now, one of my best students is in despair because she didn't get into a program between RISD and Brown that only accepts 14 students. Fourteen! Never mind her other acceptances, she dwells on this.
19
I hope you haven't made the racist mistake of stereo-typing "Asians" based on your experience of your Vietnamese student. As an Asian-American artist, I can assure you not all Asians or even a majority of Asians want their children to be doctors and if not a doctor, a dentist, et al. I wholeheartedly agree with the point of your comment but think a little more work on how racism works would make your argument more convincing.
2
Children are pushed harder and higher starting in preschool. They needed to know their letters and how to print many words BEFORE entering kindergarten. I needed to know them entering the first grade. All classes are started earlier and even the basic classes are time excellerated. Homework is given in first and second grade. Does this give children time to mature and develope. I don't think so.
Kids aren't given time to be kids. Even teenagers need that time to just relax and learn to get along with each other. They need to have time for extra curricular activities and they need to have part time jobs to learn to take direction from an employer, an important life lesson.
All kids are pushed too much. The ones from families that don't push drop out. That leaves another problem for our youth.
Kids aren't given time to be kids. Even teenagers need that time to just relax and learn to get along with each other. They need to have time for extra curricular activities and they need to have part time jobs to learn to take direction from an employer, an important life lesson.
All kids are pushed too much. The ones from families that don't push drop out. That leaves another problem for our youth.
4
You know it's not what you accomplish when you are 18 but what you are accomplishing at 30 or 40 that really matters. The "elite" schools are taking the easy way, using test scores to determine who that may be. Put one of their successful graduates through a large public university and the result would be the same. Ambition,social skills,focus,stamina,and luck are not measured on a test.
3
If Life was a race, would you want to finish first?
2
The older you get the slow lane looks more and more appealing. It was also appealing in my middle and younger years, it allows one to experience and enjoy more of life.
3
I hate to suggest that this is the result of the hardening of the arteries of the American enterprise's ability to allow for advancement and the ever more rigid definition of "success" laid out by the billionaire class. On the other hand . . . . .
5
People write here of best or "inadequate colleges." Be real -- all colleges are adequate, all colleges offer a the multi-faceted experience that college is (learn new stuff, make friends different than you, activities, service, leadership -- a total experience for four years while you grow up), and ALL colleges graduate most of their kids who get first jobs that give them a toe hold on a career that will change over time. Fortune CEOs went to public colleges, Harvard grads are working in bars or are miserable traders. Nothing is guaranteed but let's remember that just going to college should be the goal and the only people obsessed about which school are, too often parents who want a prestige bumper sticker.
2
I wish Bruni had made more of an attempt to tell another side of this story (there's always another side). Interviewing a few people who confirm his point of view leaves me unconvinced. 8 suicides per 100,000, while horrific, isn't that different from the general population, and is far less than the population as a whole, both in the US and in countries as diverse as South Korea and Guyana.
I have to believe that there are many people in Palo Alto who love their way of life, what they've accomplished and built and whose kids are happy and well-adjusted. Let's hear from them as well.
I have to believe that there are many people in Palo Alto who love their way of life, what they've accomplished and built and whose kids are happy and well-adjusted. Let's hear from them as well.
5
Problem with this in part is how much we are all supposed to care. The preciousness of communities like Palo Alto, and there are lots of them in this new Gilded Age, is suffocating to even think about. At a point, a whole lot of nothing going on. This started in the 1980s, with parents endless fretting over how perfect they could make their children's experience. The lists of groups. programs, special schools is endless. People in these communities, especially the Bay Area, often look at the rest of the world as inanimate as they themselves have become, assured of their reality by each new app telling them who they are.
No group of young people have ever been so objectified in our history. They are like their parents lives, sadly over-contrived. This may ultimately end, but not until communities like Palo Alto drain everything and everybody around them in the name of excellence.
No group of young people have ever been so objectified in our history. They are like their parents lives, sadly over-contrived. This may ultimately end, but not until communities like Palo Alto drain everything and everybody around them in the name of excellence.
6
One of the great ironies of this column is that some of the most successful people in the last 25 years, did NOT attend or finish college. Steve Jobs, Mark Zuckerberg, Bill Gates, Michael Dell, etc. Even Brad Pitt left a month before he was to graduate. All got what they wanted out of the educational process, and then followed their own inner compass and left.
About ten years ago, I found myself in the faculty locker room of a prestigious university in my town. I overheard two professors complaining about their students. One complained that he informed his class that they would bookmark what they were studying to see a lunar eclipse that day. The class proceeded to deluge him with questions on the impact of this unscheduled event on the upcoming mid-term. I butted in and asked them a question. Who were the most successful students they had taught in the last then years and what were their grade averages? They reflected, then both smiled, and yes, the most successful students had at best a C+ average. They applied their energies in the classes they were interested in, and glided on the others.
The ironic moral is that sometimes you need to step back and see the forest from the trees, and you don't learn that by obsessing on 'getting into the best college'. In the long run, that's a fools errand.
About ten years ago, I found myself in the faculty locker room of a prestigious university in my town. I overheard two professors complaining about their students. One complained that he informed his class that they would bookmark what they were studying to see a lunar eclipse that day. The class proceeded to deluge him with questions on the impact of this unscheduled event on the upcoming mid-term. I butted in and asked them a question. Who were the most successful students they had taught in the last then years and what were their grade averages? They reflected, then both smiled, and yes, the most successful students had at best a C+ average. They applied their energies in the classes they were interested in, and glided on the others.
The ironic moral is that sometimes you need to step back and see the forest from the trees, and you don't learn that by obsessing on 'getting into the best college'. In the long run, that's a fools errand.
11
When my oldest son entered Jr Hi a work colleague gave me great piece of advice: You just want your son to escape Jr Hi without being weird. He did. He was never particularly academic and I tried not to expect him to be something he could never be.
As he approaches 30 he is a sane solid good human being. I am proud and happy and grateful for the good advice.
As he approaches 30 he is a sane solid good human being. I am proud and happy and grateful for the good advice.
5
I'm surprised that Mr. Bruni did not mention the rash of teen suicides in the Dallas area in 1982 when there were 28 suicides. The suburb of Plano had 5 of them. It was indeed reported in the new York Times..It was very troubling at the time.
http://www.nytimes.com/1983/09/04/us/number-of-teen-age-suicides-alarms-...
http://www.nytimes.com/1983/09/04/us/number-of-teen-age-suicides-alarms-...
The irony to all this is that American society is determinedly adolescent. One's high school years are commonly seen as the pinnacle of American existence. (I don't know about you, but they certainly weren't in my case, which in the long run is probably a good thing.) How many of us, in occasional throes of midlife issues, catch ourselves thinking, if only fleetingly: Oh, to be 17 again.
All I can say is: these poor kids today. Learning coding when they should be taught coping. Their future is looking a lot less bright than ours was. (I know, way to make it worse, but it's true.)
All I can say is: these poor kids today. Learning coding when they should be taught coping. Their future is looking a lot less bright than ours was. (I know, way to make it worse, but it's true.)
7
Is this phenomena just the flip side of deaths from methamphetamine and the like, in poor, rural, communities with low expectations for the kids?
7
What rotten parents.
Giving your kid opportunity means giving them the opportunity to figure out what they want their life to be like, not to live the life you want for them.
Giving your kid opportunity means giving them the opportunity to figure out what they want their life to be like, not to live the life you want for them.
5
Rotten parents? Are you referring to Tiger Moms or Koala Dads? There really HAS to be a balance between your two types.
In the late 1960s my college roommate at Stanford had parents who lived in Los Altos Hills...the very wealthy area above Stanford and Palo Alto. We rode horses through the apricot groves and visited their next door neighbor David Packard of Hewlit-Packard. My roommate had gone to a private prep school in Carmel with her two siblings. One night she and a friend took horses from the school's private stables and decided to ride through Pebble Beach golf course. Her dad had to pay $20 a hoof print to repair this fabulous links.
I said "Wow your parents must have really come down on you!" No. Why? It was the first house I ever visited that had a live in maid. All the kids had a "magic checkbook." No matter how many checks she wrote she never had to keep a balance and she could buy anything.
I remember when her younger brother went into SF to "score grass" and ended up in a sting operation. He never spent a night in jail. I remember when we went out for a ride in their dad's new Mercedes and the "kids" (all over 21) got into an ice cream cone fight inside this brand new car. I just remember seeing ice cream ground into that gorgeous dark blue plush velvet upholstery.
These three got EVERY opportunity possible. Two died of overdoses and my roommate has been in every rehab unit in California.
Rotten parents? Children need guidance and rules.
In the late 1960s my college roommate at Stanford had parents who lived in Los Altos Hills...the very wealthy area above Stanford and Palo Alto. We rode horses through the apricot groves and visited their next door neighbor David Packard of Hewlit-Packard. My roommate had gone to a private prep school in Carmel with her two siblings. One night she and a friend took horses from the school's private stables and decided to ride through Pebble Beach golf course. Her dad had to pay $20 a hoof print to repair this fabulous links.
I said "Wow your parents must have really come down on you!" No. Why? It was the first house I ever visited that had a live in maid. All the kids had a "magic checkbook." No matter how many checks she wrote she never had to keep a balance and she could buy anything.
I remember when her younger brother went into SF to "score grass" and ended up in a sting operation. He never spent a night in jail. I remember when we went out for a ride in their dad's new Mercedes and the "kids" (all over 21) got into an ice cream cone fight inside this brand new car. I just remember seeing ice cream ground into that gorgeous dark blue plush velvet upholstery.
These three got EVERY opportunity possible. Two died of overdoses and my roommate has been in every rehab unit in California.
Rotten parents? Children need guidance and rules.
3
Friend who was Stanford professor and freshman mentor used to say that students' mothers had " iron teeth " .
2
It should be noted that there is a corresponding contagion of suicide among the the bottom 1% here in Indian country. Varying levels of desperation are ubiquitous in the dysfunctional land of unfettered 'free markets'. When the energies and talents and character of a country become so narrowly focused on soulless goals, i.e. money, prestige, purposeless, misspent power, it grinds down its own children's intrinsically vast souls to near zero. The immensity of the profligate savage effects of adopting markets as supremely normative are, ironically, egalitarian and only the maimed survive.
7
This locks in real well with David Brooks editorial this morning. These intelligent young people have everything but a true, convincing moral that gives meaning to their (or their parents) upwardly focused, driven existence. The walls come down, the curtain blows aside, the achievements are found to be unsatisfying, the ambitions uninspiring, and the big Why nullifies it all. Why work so hard to find oneself just be a big part of nothing but a consumer's dream-life ideal.
87
Consider the alternative. It is more fear than greed that drives this, IMHO.
2
There are people who spend endless hours in pursuit of the pinnacle of some unknown mountain, putting off the enjoyment of everyday life to achieve a perfect scenario, caught up in our bizarre culture that values what one has absent how they got there. The results are what we are seeing in our country with the increasing wealth divide and the resulting issues being presented in this writing.
Mother Nature has blessed all people with endless beauty that is free for all to enjoy. Perhaps we have gotten so far from nature that we have strayed from basic values which would enable us to live not only in a more equal society, but in one where we value our environment and all of the people who are a part of it.
Mother Nature has blessed all people with endless beauty that is free for all to enjoy. Perhaps we have gotten so far from nature that we have strayed from basic values which would enable us to live not only in a more equal society, but in one where we value our environment and all of the people who are a part of it.
4
The culture of the nation is all about "being #1." No matter the field, the endeavor, the competition, there can only be a single #1 or winner. Hence, second place and below are all losers. This leads to a tiny group of lonely, or self absorbed, or sociopathic #1s, let's call them the 1%. Below that everyone else is part of the mass of losers.
Many years ago I read an essay on the Benifits Partnership over competition. It opened my eyes. I feel, until the nation can appreciate and foster true partnership (not alliances) over individual exceptionalism, we will continue to decline as a society.
Many years ago I read an essay on the Benifits Partnership over competition. It opened my eyes. I feel, until the nation can appreciate and foster true partnership (not alliances) over individual exceptionalism, we will continue to decline as a society.
4
Any vestige of the child raised in love and acceptance among the privileged classes is gone. these children are taught that it's not who you are that matters to their parents, it's what you will become and how that will reflect on US. Huge house, Porsche, kid in Yale, Brown or Stanford. Happy Mom and Dad.
5
Carolyn Walworth of Palo Alto is quoted as saying, "“We are not teenagers,” she added. “We are lifeless bodies in a system that breeds competition, hatred, and discourages teamwork and genuine learning.” What a condemnation! And it can also be said that millions of adults undoubtedly feel the same.
This is part of the price America is paying for the wealth-driven government before us. It almost appears that compassion is an emotion only affordable by the wealthy.
Under the auspices of our current government mindset, we are digging a very deep hole.
This is part of the price America is paying for the wealth-driven government before us. It almost appears that compassion is an emotion only affordable by the wealthy.
Under the auspices of our current government mindset, we are digging a very deep hole.
4
i can't help noticing that the polarization of economic benefits is intensifying this problem. the bigger the gap between the 1% and the 99%, the more stressful it becomes to try to avoid 'losing.'
also, since our society is addicted to fossil fuels, trying to get to the top of a pyramid that's built on sand not rock adds to unconscious stress.
my suggestions for all youth: www.work4sustenance.blogspot.com
also, since our society is addicted to fossil fuels, trying to get to the top of a pyramid that's built on sand not rock adds to unconscious stress.
my suggestions for all youth: www.work4sustenance.blogspot.com
2
My nephew is a teacher.
He once listed for me all the AP courses the school offers
and showed me the syllabi and past exams.
None of them went into any particular depth -
given they were year long courses.
Many of the Exams were too long and too "factual".
Would it not be better that the "brightest" students were introduced
into foundational issues concerning the subject matter rather than
memorizing a great number of facts for AP U.S. History.
Or learning to spout theories in AP Literature courses ?
And shouldn't the College limit the number of AP Courses they
will consider - say 6 - so that these adolescents may go and enjoy
life instead of having to study day and night because they are driven
to over achieve ?
It might be interesting if the "elite" universities took 5 % of
their entering class from students who actually got a B in a course,
who did not finance and build new businesses each Summer and who actually
went and sat under a shade tree during the Summer and flew a kite
while enjoying the clouds floating by.
[Mr. Bruni - I don't know if all the kids who tragically took their own
lives near Stanford, were from rich/educated families, you might
want to have that checked out. East Palo Alto is a very poor community
and I believe some of the students were from there. ]
He once listed for me all the AP courses the school offers
and showed me the syllabi and past exams.
None of them went into any particular depth -
given they were year long courses.
Many of the Exams were too long and too "factual".
Would it not be better that the "brightest" students were introduced
into foundational issues concerning the subject matter rather than
memorizing a great number of facts for AP U.S. History.
Or learning to spout theories in AP Literature courses ?
And shouldn't the College limit the number of AP Courses they
will consider - say 6 - so that these adolescents may go and enjoy
life instead of having to study day and night because they are driven
to over achieve ?
It might be interesting if the "elite" universities took 5 % of
their entering class from students who actually got a B in a course,
who did not finance and build new businesses each Summer and who actually
went and sat under a shade tree during the Summer and flew a kite
while enjoying the clouds floating by.
[Mr. Bruni - I don't know if all the kids who tragically took their own
lives near Stanford, were from rich/educated families, you might
want to have that checked out. East Palo Alto is a very poor community
and I believe some of the students were from there. ]
4
I live in the area, currently in a nearby area but formerly in Palo Alto. To get perspective on what it's like here, consider the following :
1 - A neighbor recently wrote to everyone on the neigbhorhood forum that he has -- and is selling -- a way to lower teen stress: Entrepreneur camps! Here teens can explore their own ideas for starting a business. Seriously.
2 - The obituary of one victim, clearly written by the bereaved parents, went on for paragraphs about the child's many accomplishments.
3 - When my daughter was in high school in Palo Alto, I asked the science teacher how we could help her do better in class. The teacher's answer was that honestly she barely had time to up with the kids in class who asked questions that were beyond her own expertise. I took that to mean she had no time for my oh-so-average daughter.
1 - A neighbor recently wrote to everyone on the neigbhorhood forum that he has -- and is selling -- a way to lower teen stress: Entrepreneur camps! Here teens can explore their own ideas for starting a business. Seriously.
2 - The obituary of one victim, clearly written by the bereaved parents, went on for paragraphs about the child's many accomplishments.
3 - When my daughter was in high school in Palo Alto, I asked the science teacher how we could help her do better in class. The teacher's answer was that honestly she barely had time to up with the kids in class who asked questions that were beyond her own expertise. I took that to mean she had no time for my oh-so-average daughter.
12
And one more:
4 - Conversation overheard yesterday in downtown Palo Alto. A boy about 10 years old is walking precariously along the top of a narrow cement wall, eyes on his father (walking alongside) in case he needs help with balance. As they pass where we are sitting, we hear the father begin" I think it's time to talk about ..." (I fully expect him to say something about the danger of walking along narrow cement walls) but no it contines "... about programming with data structures."
4 - Conversation overheard yesterday in downtown Palo Alto. A boy about 10 years old is walking precariously along the top of a narrow cement wall, eyes on his father (walking alongside) in case he needs help with balance. As they pass where we are sitting, we hear the father begin" I think it's time to talk about ..." (I fully expect him to say something about the danger of walking along narrow cement walls) but no it contines "... about programming with data structures."
3
Mr. Bruni, I recently saw posters about town advertising your visit to a local high school. Good, because Chicago's north suburbs also need to hear this message. As our kids approached middle school, we did the unthinkable: relocated from these north suburbs to a small town in northern Michigan. Sure, the educational opportunities weren't as great (our youngest did much of his senior year at the local community college as there weren't sufficient challenging high school courses - more a reflection of the school, not due to his superiority!), but the stress level due to competition on everything from grades to family income to where one goes for family spring break (destination Europe, back in these suburbs) didn't even compare. That was a lifestyle my husband and I didn't want for us nor them. After those years, my husband and I returned to that same suburban area - and are enjoying it much more now that it's on our terms, rather than having to step up to or battle the larger community norm.
9
Sorry to be blunt, and I realize this is tragic, but - all this story tells me, really, is that the leaders of tomorrow will come from a generation of mentally unstable overachievers, who are already a bunch of burned-out insomniacs before they've even turned 18. Frankly this generation sounds rather sickly, and incredibly shallow. 20, 30, even 40 years from now it will be interesting to see whether this fragile, supercilious 1% is able to hold onto their inherited wealth and privilege (in between their various visits to psychiatrists). Whatever happens, they'll have their parents to thank.
22
That is exactly what they are. Shallow. Not very interesting to talk to; Not going to be able to be like television blather machine Brokaw termed "Greatest Generation.' They look at much of life through this, the internet, which is all they have ever known. They cannot be alone, and they cannot stop doing what they do for one minute for fear of falling behind materially, and that's really what it's all about.
1
Although I do understand the desolation of these students, I don't think it is just because of the expectations of success. I lived in a community where children were expected to succeed (10 acceptances to Harvard, 3 to Yale, 3 to Princeton, 2 to Stanford, 1 to Caltech and more to Brown, Dartmouth, Columbia,etc. in my son's graduating class.) No suicides of teenagers were recorded ten years previous to his class.
The community has many mothers who stay at home and the families forgo the material display of wealth that we see such as expensive cars and frequent vacations.
Children in this community do not necessarily success as the top students wo went to the elite universities, but as I follow the graduates on Facebook I can see that they lead fulfilling lives.
I think that it has to do with the values the family aspires to and the sense of self-worth that children develop rather than a lack of emphasis on achievement. In other words, it's not the aspirations but the values and support that matters.
The community has many mothers who stay at home and the families forgo the material display of wealth that we see such as expensive cars and frequent vacations.
Children in this community do not necessarily success as the top students wo went to the elite universities, but as I follow the graduates on Facebook I can see that they lead fulfilling lives.
I think that it has to do with the values the family aspires to and the sense of self-worth that children develop rather than a lack of emphasis on achievement. In other words, it's not the aspirations but the values and support that matters.
8
Why must it be the mothers that stay home? Is there no benefit to a child seeing a woman work hard and succeed professionally?
Family values needn't be sexist ones.
Family values needn't be sexist ones.
4
Collaboration is much more fun than competition. I don't want to live in a world where everyone else is a competitor swiming against the tide of diminution at the margin either.
14
For over 25 years, I was a middle level manager at a large aerospace corporation, and in this capacity I was responsible for hiring, assessing the performance of personnel, and deciding on promotion of over a hundred individuals.
What I discovered was that if an employee had five or more years of experience, his/her performance during those years was far more important than the college or university they attended and the degrees they had earned. In fact, the two highest rated and most valuable individuals in my organization both went to junior colleges and then transferred to four year state colleges.
What I discovered was that if an employee had five or more years of experience, his/her performance during those years was far more important than the college or university they attended and the degrees they had earned. In fact, the two highest rated and most valuable individuals in my organization both went to junior colleges and then transferred to four year state colleges.
30
i've also observed that the longer you've been in the work world, the less your degree/s matter.
2
Having lost our sense of community and demonizing those whose luck is down, it is no wonder that the young see little reason for security should they be judged a failure. In past times, failing meant not becoming wealthy but still being part of a community of people who still make a contribution. Today, conservatives and the rich make not succeeding a moral failing that demonstrates ones unfitness as a human being and risks ostricization from society. Forget compassion and Christian charity they say, it is all about wealth that proves worthiness. Is it really any wonder that some kids look at that and despair?
34
Most of the Ivies and other elite schools are as liberal as they come. Obama's administration is filled with people from Harvard or Yale. In fact this is something that does not reconcile. The administrators of these schools are so liberal they go out of their way to enforce and justify AA for URMs, yet at the same time give large preferences to children of the wealthy and well-connected, to make sure that a large number of their alumni could go on to lucrative careers in finance and become generous future donors, to keep their endowment nice and rich. The liberal left are the ones who embrace the rich and the poor, and spurn the middle class. Conservatives are the ones who care about the middle class by promoting equal opportunity rather than equal outcome. Get that straight.
1
These suicides are indeed tragic. But what also concerns me is the method they are choosing. There are many ways to exit the world when you've had enough of it, but being pulverized by a train, and reduced most likely to an unrecognizable form of your previous self, perhaps in pieces, battered, bruised, and certainly not able to be viewed in an open coffin, to me speaks even louder about the disdain they hold for the people who left them no alternative but to do this, who forced their hand, shattered their confidence, obliterated their self-worth. Maybe these high falutin colleges could institute some mandatory courses in freshman year to try and offset some of the damage that has been done through their growing up years. And, what part is drug use having in all of this? I am noticing an increase in altered mental states due to chemicals and alcohol all around me these days.
5
My son was in 10th grade when my husband took a job at Stanford. We debated whether to move him to Palo Alto for his last two years of high school. Mostly, we worried about him having to go to school with kids who were awash in so much money. We didn't know about the Caltrain suicides then. We ultimately decided that he and I would stay behind for him to finish high school. It was a difficult decision, but in retrospect, a good one; he got to be a free-range kid in the small East Coast academic town he had grown up in. Of course, the vast majority of kids make it safely through the Palo Alto school system, and he probably would have been just fine. But it's heartbreaking to see so many kids fall victim to what is for them a toxic environment.
15
It is stress, pure and simple. It is everywhere and permeates every endeavor. It is the constant pressure to fulfill the needs, expectations and demands of someone other than yourself for reasons other than your own. In education, employment, in life, there is a relentless push to jump through hoops, not for our own fulfillment, but to gratify other egos and bottom lines. It doesn't require much analysis for a teenager to conclude that, for most, life will be an endless treadmill without the option to stop for a while and the direction one takes in life may well be that of an others choosing or dictated by happenstance. It is the denial of control of ones destiny.
We may be seeing the tip of an iceberg of sorts. A great deal has been written about Colony Collapse Disorder in bees. It appears possible that overstressed (overworked) bee colonies just give up. They disappear. They don't return to the hive to be shipped off to pollinate the next farm. Perhaps there is an apiary equivalent to stepping in front of a train.
We are already hearing a lot of criticism about educational reform. Parents are beginning to question the stresses placed upon their children in the name of achieving a result. There is already the beginning of a movement to opt out of standardized testing. We could be seeing the beginning of Scholastic Collapse Disorder.
This increase in teen suicide is profoundly disturbing and an indicator that we must re-evaluate just what it is we are doing.
We may be seeing the tip of an iceberg of sorts. A great deal has been written about Colony Collapse Disorder in bees. It appears possible that overstressed (overworked) bee colonies just give up. They disappear. They don't return to the hive to be shipped off to pollinate the next farm. Perhaps there is an apiary equivalent to stepping in front of a train.
We are already hearing a lot of criticism about educational reform. Parents are beginning to question the stresses placed upon their children in the name of achieving a result. There is already the beginning of a movement to opt out of standardized testing. We could be seeing the beginning of Scholastic Collapse Disorder.
This increase in teen suicide is profoundly disturbing and an indicator that we must re-evaluate just what it is we are doing.
6
The same parents who screaming most loudly about standardized testing in schools are the ones hiring SAT tutors, editing their kids' essays and buying Brown U bumper stickers when their kid is a junior "jusr so we are ready." they created and unleashed the monster -- now it devours their children's sanity and self-confidence.
3
Re the title of this column: I get the saddest. Of course these children were sad. But what makes them the best? Their wealth? Their successful parents? And brightest? Are the children of the very wealthy brighter than the children of the poor? Really?
I think we might begin to make changes, and put less pressure on these kids, when we stop equating wealth and professional success with intelligence and worth.
I think we might begin to make changes, and put less pressure on these kids, when we stop equating wealth and professional success with intelligence and worth.
23
"The Best and the Brightest" is the title of a book by David Halberstam. It is worth your time to read it. The title refers to the uberachiever generation that came of age during World War 2, and the book is about how they got the United States involved in Viet Nam and made a mess of things there as well as here in the U.S. The choice of the first two words in this article's title reeks of irony.
3
Right on. I don't know who termed that phrase "Best and Brightest". It is insulting to the average American.
I was accepted into Cooper Union. But, I choose to go to Manhattan College. There were several reasons for this.
First, my Assistant Scout Master, who ran Thale Construction, said that he would hire a Manhattan College Graduate over a Cooper Union Graduate any day of the week. He indicated that Manhattan College Engineering Graduates were more in tune with the practical, as opposed to the theoretical Cooper Union graduates.
Second, when I went to the open house of Cooper Union, I could not relate to the super-brainy people I met. They were in the stratosphere. I was standing on the earth. I figured that it would be easier to be a Big Fish in Manhattan College than in Cooper Union.
Third, Manhattan College, at that time, was voted the Number One Drinking School of the US. I do not drink (at all). So, once again, I deemed it would be easier to be a Big Fish at Manhattan College than at Cooper Union.
Today, I run an engineering firm and make a very good salary. So, one does not have to go to the best schools to be the best. As of now, a Google Search on my name (which will not be disclosed here) brings back well over a thousand hits. And I am proud to be a Manhattan College Graduate and boast of it frequently.
First, my Assistant Scout Master, who ran Thale Construction, said that he would hire a Manhattan College Graduate over a Cooper Union Graduate any day of the week. He indicated that Manhattan College Engineering Graduates were more in tune with the practical, as opposed to the theoretical Cooper Union graduates.
Second, when I went to the open house of Cooper Union, I could not relate to the super-brainy people I met. They were in the stratosphere. I was standing on the earth. I figured that it would be easier to be a Big Fish in Manhattan College than in Cooper Union.
Third, Manhattan College, at that time, was voted the Number One Drinking School of the US. I do not drink (at all). So, once again, I deemed it would be easier to be a Big Fish at Manhattan College than at Cooper Union.
Today, I run an engineering firm and make a very good salary. So, one does not have to go to the best schools to be the best. As of now, a Google Search on my name (which will not be disclosed here) brings back well over a thousand hits. And I am proud to be a Manhattan College Graduate and boast of it frequently.
9
it is interesting that you mention Thalle construction. I am 80 now, retired , member of the Moles and owned a Pile driving, Drilling company until 2009 when I closed it as I did not have a worthy successor to sell it to. I did business with Thalle when George Pacciana and Ron(forgot his last name) ran it. I am sure George will remember me. One thing I want to relate to you,in the NY metro area construction industry, it was well known that most of the engineers went to either City college or Manhattan,the jews to city and the Italians and Irish to Manhattan.In fact brother Barry was well known and respected by all of us.Good Luck and try to join the Moles.......Simeon
This report from Palo Alto is heartbreaking. I can say I was lucky enough to have had a happy and stress free childhood, experiencing the pressure of competition only when getting into college. It was not an easy process,but I was older and more emotionally stable. it was nothing that made me want to kill myself. Oh god. It is so paradoxal to grow up in a place that can give you all the oportunities in the world and all you can think is a way out, even if it is to take your own life. I don't get it.
Relax, Palo Alto kids. Don't listen to any of the adults right now. When you feel like a loser, just remember: this too shall pass. when you grow up, like me (i am 29), you will look back at this time and feel like it was the experience of a totally different person. Everything will work out just fine at the end. Believe me.
Relax, Palo Alto kids. Don't listen to any of the adults right now. When you feel like a loser, just remember: this too shall pass. when you grow up, like me (i am 29), you will look back at this time and feel like it was the experience of a totally different person. Everything will work out just fine at the end. Believe me.
4
I fear not only for these young men and women not only now when they are under such intense pressure, both overt and unstated, to achieve but later in life once the have achieved. Then, surrounded by the things wealth can afford, many of them will confront themselves with that bothersome question "Why does any of this matter?"
1
It never ceases to amaze me when I have the opportunity to listen to high schoolers talk, such as at a game, the conversation is all about what AP classes they are taking, their grades, what classes they are taking next year and what schools they want to apply to. What happened to talking about something fun, and frankly, more interesting. It just shows you how burdened kids are by the process it takes to get into a top choice school. It really is all some think about. As adults, we have to remind kids that their future happiness is really not dependent on what "name" school they went to but on their satisfaction with what they choose to pursue.
2
What a tragedy. A niece of a friend just took this route. It seems America's moving to a zero-sum game called "success." If I have it, you can't. And it' limited to a magical group of people who meet the right numbers and demographic- salary, ACT/SAT, IQs, the right school, the right color, the right social class. So many flaming hoops to jump through just to get to adulthood which a more intense form of the "game." With an widening attitude toward the poor that it's their fault or their moral failing, any social net fraying is it any wonder young people are terrified NOT to get into the top tier of winners? Their 50+ parents who were laid off are working at Costco with no hope of rekindling their career, the job market is still weak, and college debt is obscene. The idea of open highways to explore, joy in serving and in working a meaningful job is as crumbling as our highways.
10
the single constant is change. today's future generations will need the "inherited benefit" to keep up with the strivers..the kids who are going to give 10x the effort of the kids secure in the inherited wealth that's woven into the american tax system. That, my friend, is america, baby!
4
Although many people may feel little sympathy for the children of affluent parents, I do. At least one of the parents is probably not around much -- the price you pay for the kind of job that earns a high income. The kids know that they'll experience a precipitous drop in their standard of living after college unless they go into finance. If they go into medicine or law they'll be hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt, unless their parents bankroll their advanced schooling. And forget about social work or teaching -- those don't pay and they're only for losers. Plus, we haven't yet talked about parental love contingent on "success" within these high-achieving families.
High school kids from less affluent communities aren't much better off. They see what happens to parents who lose their jobs. They witness a dwindling number of good jobs in their towns and neighborhoods, and increasing competition for those that remain.
We live in a country with a meager financial safety net, little job security, and the specter of increasing global competition.
I'm surprised that more of us, especially the young, aren't depressed.
Economics isn't by any means the whole story here, but it contributes a lot more to depression and suicide than people appreciate.
We can do better as a nation, but we choose not to. We value the ability of a small number of people to get fabulously rich -- and stay rich -- above all else.
High school kids from less affluent communities aren't much better off. They see what happens to parents who lose their jobs. They witness a dwindling number of good jobs in their towns and neighborhoods, and increasing competition for those that remain.
We live in a country with a meager financial safety net, little job security, and the specter of increasing global competition.
I'm surprised that more of us, especially the young, aren't depressed.
Economics isn't by any means the whole story here, but it contributes a lot more to depression and suicide than people appreciate.
We can do better as a nation, but we choose not to. We value the ability of a small number of people to get fabulously rich -- and stay rich -- above all else.
316
In low-income families both parents probably have to work to make ends meet, maybe even two jobs each if they want to send their kids to college. Lack of parental attention is hardly a problem confined to the affluent.
2
It's that last paragraph and last sentence which really hits the mark and explains what that nebulous phrase, "income inequality," really means.
The psychological basis for "over-parenting" is complex, but certainly related to our obsession with material wealth in this country. We need a big infusion of spirituality, in whatever form it may come.
5
I have raised four kids, the youngest is a senior in high school. I believe that you do need to push kids to succeed, but I also believe that getting into an elite college is not a valid marker of success, nor necessary for success in life.
Three of my four kids went to state universities (U of MN and U of WI) and have done great in life: ER Doctor, PhD in linguistics, career in business). My youngest will be inducted into the US Naval Academy on July 1st, also a public university. All four went to public schools K-12.
None of my kids them took test preparation courses because that would be an absolute waste of time and money. Their time was better spent playing sports and hanging out with friends.
The fact that Stanford only accepts 5% of applicants means that hundreds of fully qualified students did not get in. In many of these cases, not getting into Stanford is not a reflection on the quality of the applicant but rather on the capriciousness of the admission process.
Three of my four kids went to state universities (U of MN and U of WI) and have done great in life: ER Doctor, PhD in linguistics, career in business). My youngest will be inducted into the US Naval Academy on July 1st, also a public university. All four went to public schools K-12.
None of my kids them took test preparation courses because that would be an absolute waste of time and money. Their time was better spent playing sports and hanging out with friends.
The fact that Stanford only accepts 5% of applicants means that hundreds of fully qualified students did not get in. In many of these cases, not getting into Stanford is not a reflection on the quality of the applicant but rather on the capriciousness of the admission process.
22
Congratulations on your off spring's induction into the USNA. It is an awesome place and the community for parents and families is terrific.
There are consequences when you racing to the top or encouraging no excuses charter schools. Let's just admit that fear based approaches to raising or schooling children and adolescents is a very bad idea, which, unfortunately now, appears to have become the answer for every social and economic problem in this country. Our national savior lies in ever increasing educational standards, ever increasing tests, and ever increasing sanctions for those who do not meet the standards or get a high test score. When you start administering standardized tests in kindergarten, you know we have taken a very dark turn in developing the diverse abilities, talents, and interests of our children.
10
We are a society that has turned its children in to another commodity, some kind of adornment for parents to trot out for others to admire like a McMansion or exotic car. They are not. They are human beings and their lives belong to them alone. Children are not accessories, not our belongings in any way.
Children need shelter, emotional support, guidance in decision making (but the decision should be theirs whenever appropriate), opportunities for growth (but not mandated lessons in every field), lessons in compassion, and the freedom to make mistakes.
One of our problems as a society is that we define nearly everything in economic terms and achievement through competition. Well, probably most of what is accomplished is done with others. Steve Jobs did not become Steve Jobs all by himself. He had friends who collaborated with him. Teach children to collaborate. It is a healthier trait than competing and makes for more joy in life. Friendships and self selected meaningful work make for happier lives. Jane Goodall is a woman of accomplishment, and she didn't do it for either the glory or the money.
Children need shelter, emotional support, guidance in decision making (but the decision should be theirs whenever appropriate), opportunities for growth (but not mandated lessons in every field), lessons in compassion, and the freedom to make mistakes.
One of our problems as a society is that we define nearly everything in economic terms and achievement through competition. Well, probably most of what is accomplished is done with others. Steve Jobs did not become Steve Jobs all by himself. He had friends who collaborated with him. Teach children to collaborate. It is a healthier trait than competing and makes for more joy in life. Friendships and self selected meaningful work make for happier lives. Jane Goodall is a woman of accomplishment, and she didn't do it for either the glory or the money.
12
Maybe the Hunger Games wasn't
such an offensive, outlandish precept after all.
such an offensive, outlandish precept after all.
2
The affluence in the family creates the Tiger Moms - they want to live their dreams through their children's life. - a selfish exercise with no link to 'love'. The meaningful life can only be achieved through a balanced development of three elements - IQ, EQ and SQ. All Tiger Moms put all their energy on developing IQ of their children without any focus on EQ and SQ - emotional quotient and spiritual quotient. These two areas are also not the focus of the schools and not measured in SAT or GRE. They are developed in the process of daily life of a happy and peaceful family, practice of caring and contemplation and finally to learn to separate the essentials from non-essentials. We are trying to live a life that is too empty in substance and wants to have fulfillment out of it - it will not work. There is nothing wrong with our kids - parents are in a wrong experiment.
4
Jees. Are you really saying that it's all the mother's fault?
1
Dear Mr. Bruni,
Your article is so critical as we confront the culture of the elite Americans. It is interesting also that this particular American aristocracy has chosen industry and pressure instead of the usual sloth and irresponsibility of successor generations. Filling one's life with meaning has always been a puzzle for the offspring of the wealthy and successful. I wish that thought leaders like yourself would question the very foundations that sustain this culture . . . those are that wealth, status and material success lead to happiness. Very obviously, the compulsive personality traits that lead parents and children to push push push are antithetical to finding oneself and contentment. But, no one seems to believe that.
Your article is so critical as we confront the culture of the elite Americans. It is interesting also that this particular American aristocracy has chosen industry and pressure instead of the usual sloth and irresponsibility of successor generations. Filling one's life with meaning has always been a puzzle for the offspring of the wealthy and successful. I wish that thought leaders like yourself would question the very foundations that sustain this culture . . . those are that wealth, status and material success lead to happiness. Very obviously, the compulsive personality traits that lead parents and children to push push push are antithetical to finding oneself and contentment. But, no one seems to believe that.
7
Common triggers for teen suicide: "major disappointment, rejection, failure, or loss such as breaking up with a girlfriend or boyfriend, failing a big exam, or witnessing family turmoil." Underlying these signs are often substance abuse and/or mental health issues, which promote feelings of isolation, helpless, & hopelessness among vulnerable teens. http://www2.nami.org
The kind of teen suicide Bruni is talking about is related to fear of failure in a highly competitive, status-conscious, anxious and affluent environment. But peer factors also often play a role in teen suicide, such as rejection, alienation, profound feelings of not fitting in, & low-self esteem, (recognizing that these are highly subjective feelings).
I taught college for decades; you see and learn a lot about young people. Keep in mind teenagers may have adult-like bodies, but they are lacking a reservoir of life experiences to draw upon (maybe especially with helicopter parents?), & their minds are not yet fully developed (adept at anticipating the consequences of behavior, dealing with contradictions, & thinking in stark either-or terms).
Society is a factor too. We live in a violent, gun-worshiping, drug-oriented (including prescription drugs & alcohol) culture, where people look for quick and easy solutions to problems. Sociologist Durkheim noted in 1897 societies where social bonds are weak have higher rates of suicide. We do a lot now to weaken not strengthen the social bond. Count the ways!
The kind of teen suicide Bruni is talking about is related to fear of failure in a highly competitive, status-conscious, anxious and affluent environment. But peer factors also often play a role in teen suicide, such as rejection, alienation, profound feelings of not fitting in, & low-self esteem, (recognizing that these are highly subjective feelings).
I taught college for decades; you see and learn a lot about young people. Keep in mind teenagers may have adult-like bodies, but they are lacking a reservoir of life experiences to draw upon (maybe especially with helicopter parents?), & their minds are not yet fully developed (adept at anticipating the consequences of behavior, dealing with contradictions, & thinking in stark either-or terms).
Society is a factor too. We live in a violent, gun-worshiping, drug-oriented (including prescription drugs & alcohol) culture, where people look for quick and easy solutions to problems. Sociologist Durkheim noted in 1897 societies where social bonds are weak have higher rates of suicide. We do a lot now to weaken not strengthen the social bond. Count the ways!
24
Mr. Bruni writes that parents must be aware of "messages they give teenagers, intentionally and unintentionally, about what’s expected of them and what’s needed to get ahead in this world." The tiger parents intentionally give their message to their children but such parents are in the minority (even in Palo Alto).
Most parents fall into the unintentional group where our subtle actions or inactions propagate the notion that the only path to success is for our children to graduate from an "elite" college and find success in a career that provides wealth and/or power. This is the inevitable consequence of wanting children to do better than their parents. The problem is that we struggle to define and articulate the many faces of success.
Most parents fall into the unintentional group where our subtle actions or inactions propagate the notion that the only path to success is for our children to graduate from an "elite" college and find success in a career that provides wealth and/or power. This is the inevitable consequence of wanting children to do better than their parents. The problem is that we struggle to define and articulate the many faces of success.
7
I live very near here and I coach classical music at several of the better off public schools and I can tell you the tiger parents are NOT the minority at some of these schools. The pressure to ace tests, to get into the best schools, to win national championships in robotics and math are enormous. At one of the schools I coached at for a decade, they averaged a suicide a year. It has become part of the culture of the school. The reason this article starts out at Caltrain is that that is the favorite way for the kids to kill themselves. The trains go fast and it's easy to access the tracks on foot.
3
It's sad, sure, but there's some Darwinian logic at play too. I feel sorry for the kids but won't shed a tear for the parents who lost them.
1
Bruni keeps hitting the target, but only the obvious one. Nicolas Dupre, whose wise but woefully incomplete comments on Bruni's article appear below, is a man of sensitivity, cultivation and learning, I am sure. But lo and behold, he reduces teen suicide to a disease, mentioning the soul as though it were an invisible organ beset by a virus or bacterium. Neither he nor the elite parents described in the comments comprehend the realty of humans as beings endowed by their creator with apprehension like a god, noble in reason as daughters and sons of God; instead, in the manner of materialists, inexorablely, children are valued for their functionality, their performance. Of course, the daily reality in a suicide stricken family is more nuanced and complex than any abstract analysis of philosophical causes. Yet the philosophical and theological roots of a trend toward dehumanization are often ignored. One is reminded of Central European inclination to flirt with and even embrace notions of the godless Superman in the last century. There, a whole country was led to "suicide."
4
Missing from this discussion is a more thorough look at what teenagers bring to the risk of killing themselves. My particular background is that of a clinician whose work for years was directly with teens who harmed themselves and some teens who succeeded in suicide. Most teenagers who harm themselves engage in para-suicidal behaviors, behavior that is unlikely to be lethal. Another group engages in far more lethal acts. The characteristics of those teens include high levels of determination, they are usually rather bright and achievers in and out of school. They know success. They do what they set out to do in their lives and in ending their lives as well. Because of their level of achievement, suicide is all the more surprising to those who know them. In working with and raising these kids, this awareness is important.
5
Sounds like everyone in Palo Alto and Chicago's western suburbs never read Philip Roth's "Portnoy's Complaint." I refer to the section where he lampoons the boastful parents trumpeting their overachieving offsprings' feats, such as performing lifesaving neurosurgery at 5 in a hospital built expressly for the operation, and so on. Where are the humor, the ease, the tolerance that living in the rarified atmosphere reserved for the 1% should imbue one with? Not in those places, apparently. In my own Federal law enforcement duties we seize huge amounts of powdered Schedule II substances and other drugs in Chicago's pretentious western suburbs, and one sees how the unhappy children of the self-styled elite snort them to escape the oppression of their lives. Having children should be an end in and of itself, not something to play one-upmanship games of bragging and arrogance with one's acquaintances in order to "win."
19
I had to stop reading this column after the first few paragraphs and take a huge gulp of coffee. The rest of the column had me reaching for tissues. It is absolutely heart-breaking to think about what these teenagers must be going through that brings them to even thinking about ending their lives. Because of school? Again, because of school?! This has to stop. If how we have our educational system set up is basically killing children, then there must be an immediate and strong effort to change this now. Now. Now. Now. It will be a long, long time before the picture and thoughts that this column provoked will leave me. I can't even write them down right now. Surely there are enough residents in our country, whether they have children or like me do not, to change this, to stop this as soon as it is humanly possible. It is unfathomable to think that going to school could actually threaten children's minds, attitudes, thoughts and lives enough that they want to die. I can't stop crying.
16
Having recently read the Success Academy story, I can't help but wonder if this is the future of public education. Have we, as a society, lost our bearings?
9
Oh dear, you sound almost as fragile as the troubled youngsters described in the article. Look, this is how the world works - parents screw up their children, and society pays, in ways both good and bad. These parents have screwed up royally, which means opportunities will be opened for kids who came from less affluent, but more level-headed families. There's nothing to cry about here! Why pity a social class that appears obsessed over hoarding its wealth and status?
1
ms walworth has it right: “we are not teenagers, we are lifeless bodies in a system that breeds competition, hatred, and discourages teamwork and genuine learning.”
the primary sources of our anxiety include: 1. the corporate state we live in, one that has re-formed the congress as a force for special interests, in direct opposition to its obligation to the constitutional promise to "promote the general Welfare"; and 2. the dumbed-down educational system, that has no connection to the state of our scientific knowledge of cognition and learning, and so, is far less able to define and serve the potential of our kids than to herd them through a one-size-fits all bubble-test environment that actually inhibits the discovery and development of critical thought and self-expression, key elements in a fully integrated personality that might, if empowered, be the just the thing needed to prevail against the pressures cataloged in the current article.
there are others causes, to be sure, but these, in their connection to materialism (and its attendant economic fears) and ignorance, (and the unreasoned opinionism that precludes mindful debate and the benefits therefrom, which include what ms walworth has as "teamwork and genuine learning").
professor lythcott-haims is somewhat off the mark when she limits the harm done to "the mental health and wellness of our children" to affluent communities and overbearing parents, the condition, however many its causes, is epidemic.
the primary sources of our anxiety include: 1. the corporate state we live in, one that has re-formed the congress as a force for special interests, in direct opposition to its obligation to the constitutional promise to "promote the general Welfare"; and 2. the dumbed-down educational system, that has no connection to the state of our scientific knowledge of cognition and learning, and so, is far less able to define and serve the potential of our kids than to herd them through a one-size-fits all bubble-test environment that actually inhibits the discovery and development of critical thought and self-expression, key elements in a fully integrated personality that might, if empowered, be the just the thing needed to prevail against the pressures cataloged in the current article.
there are others causes, to be sure, but these, in their connection to materialism (and its attendant economic fears) and ignorance, (and the unreasoned opinionism that precludes mindful debate and the benefits therefrom, which include what ms walworth has as "teamwork and genuine learning").
professor lythcott-haims is somewhat off the mark when she limits the harm done to "the mental health and wellness of our children" to affluent communities and overbearing parents, the condition, however many its causes, is epidemic.
11
It's not the "corporate state" but the parents of these kids who push so hard. It's the use of children as status symbols rather than celebrating any and all successes that drives this type of depression. Quite honestly I have had more kids on medication and hospitalized for breakdowns in the last five years than in all my previous years of teaching. The competition to get into colleges is enormous and it is not helped when middle class kids are basically shut out of scholarships and grants. Kids who hold grades equal to their peers but who don't have the benefits of upper class income or lower class liabilities are stuck with attending smaller, sometimes less adequate colleges or racking up thousands of dollars in debt. I saw this personally a few years back when I had three kids in college at the same time. According to the FAFSA analysis, it was okay for my entire annual income to be a "contribution" to their education costs. That was more than half our annual income that the government saw fit to include and therefore deny my kids many financial aid opportunities. I'm not rich, I teach school. But my plight then is what middle class families are facing now. One thing that will result from the scenario where students work full time through college as my own kids did is that it create adults who know how to pay bills and who vote far more conservatively than the average college graduate.
7
with enmpathy (three FAFSAd kids), but
no illusions.
who, pray are the guarantors of your/our economic stress? in the the nordic countries, among others, where corporations are rather joined in than resistant to the social compact, there's no FAFSA...and (significantly not addressed in your reply) more perceptive (the grownups) and effective (the outcomes, if you will) schooling.
no illusions.
who, pray are the guarantors of your/our economic stress? in the the nordic countries, among others, where corporations are rather joined in than resistant to the social compact, there's no FAFSA...and (significantly not addressed in your reply) more perceptive (the grownups) and effective (the outcomes, if you will) schooling.
I have lived, and understand, the college funding scenario you describe, and both our youngest and I will be paying off parent and student loans for ten more years. Isn't it ironic that college costs much more for folks who can't afford to pay the $60+K tuition all at once?
The FAFSA is a joke, particularly when you take into account that its perfectly FINE to deduct the all your private, K-12 tuition, but NOT any of the college loans you've already incurred for an older child.
Where I disagree with you is on your absolution of the Corporate State: how many states and school districts are mindlessly pushing "college readiness" and STEM programs in order to make students more competitive in a "Global Economy?" Our entire educational system is build to serve the industrial model that Sir Ken Robinson described so perfectly a while back. There is plenty of blame to go around.
The FAFSA is a joke, particularly when you take into account that its perfectly FINE to deduct the all your private, K-12 tuition, but NOT any of the college loans you've already incurred for an older child.
Where I disagree with you is on your absolution of the Corporate State: how many states and school districts are mindlessly pushing "college readiness" and STEM programs in order to make students more competitive in a "Global Economy?" Our entire educational system is build to serve the industrial model that Sir Ken Robinson described so perfectly a while back. There is plenty of blame to go around.
1
A lesson in self-reported data:
8% of high school girls report having attempted suicide. However, the actual rate of suicide among high school girls is about 5 per 100,000, or .005%. For the self-reported attempt rate to be accurate, only 1 of every 1,600 suicide attempts by high school girls is successful--i.e. 1,599 out of every 1,600 high school girls who try and kill themselves survive.
While many methods of suicide are much less reliable than many realize--overdosing on pharmaceuticals, asphyxiation, among others--the only explanation is bad data and the weakness of self-reported data. See the 1 in 5 sexually assaulted data for another possible example--also self-reported by teenage females.
8% of high school girls report having attempted suicide. However, the actual rate of suicide among high school girls is about 5 per 100,000, or .005%. For the self-reported attempt rate to be accurate, only 1 of every 1,600 suicide attempts by high school girls is successful--i.e. 1,599 out of every 1,600 high school girls who try and kill themselves survive.
While many methods of suicide are much less reliable than many realize--overdosing on pharmaceuticals, asphyxiation, among others--the only explanation is bad data and the weakness of self-reported data. See the 1 in 5 sexually assaulted data for another possible example--also self-reported by teenage females.
2
While more girls claim to attempt suicide, more boys succeed. Boys are frequently labeled early on for normal boy behavior as ADHD, behaviorally impaired or special education candidates. Schools in their desire to promote the needs of girls have created programs that are counter to the ways boys learn best. Just the pushing of reading into kindergarten makes boys into educational liabilities since most boys do not develop the ability to track and read fluently until they are nearly seven. This puts boys continuously behind and while some are very successful, many boys who don't test in the gifted spectrum, struggle in school. As a result boys are more likely to join gangs, use drugs, get in fights, be in special education, and sadly commit suicide. We have had a suicide a year at my school for the last few years. Every single one was male.And each one did so not because of bullying, but because of rejection by a girl after an intimate relationship.
1
Suicide is too complex and too personal of a decision to simply distill into one cause.
With family in Palo Alto, I understand the concern of overly high expectations.
However, I finger two more important issues to Palo Alto teens.
First, from the time they are born they are taught that they are special, better than everyone else. Every lucky child has parents who tell their kids they love them... but the 2000s has seen this message of exceptionalism explode. How to reconcile this, then when you learn you're really not exceptional?
Second, their friend groups are looser than ours were in my day. 40 years ago you spent every day with your friends making deep bonds. Today? Twitter, Facebook, Vine, Snapchat. It just isn't the same. Also, mom and dad are working all the time and thus never home.. Thus, I believe these children lack a strong emotional support system.
Combine failed expectations built on lies ("you're exceptional") with a person who has been coddled all their life and never before faced failure, and leave that person without an emotional support group and you'll have problems
And even that's oversimplified
With family in Palo Alto, I understand the concern of overly high expectations.
However, I finger two more important issues to Palo Alto teens.
First, from the time they are born they are taught that they are special, better than everyone else. Every lucky child has parents who tell their kids they love them... but the 2000s has seen this message of exceptionalism explode. How to reconcile this, then when you learn you're really not exceptional?
Second, their friend groups are looser than ours were in my day. 40 years ago you spent every day with your friends making deep bonds. Today? Twitter, Facebook, Vine, Snapchat. It just isn't the same. Also, mom and dad are working all the time and thus never home.. Thus, I believe these children lack a strong emotional support system.
Combine failed expectations built on lies ("you're exceptional") with a person who has been coddled all their life and never before faced failure, and leave that person without an emotional support group and you'll have problems
And even that's oversimplified
51
As long as we measure student success and school success based on test scores we will impose stress on students. How can we claim to value the well-being of each child when we promote a competitive grading system that sorts and selects based on comparisons with age cohorts within a school. We have the ability to provide self-paced individualized learning to each student yet we insist on continuing the practice of grouping children in age cohorts and ranking them based on how quickly they learn as compared to their peer group. Our outmoded method of schooling and measurement is creating the pressure that is neither productive for our economy or healthy for our children.
4
As a neurologist and neuroscientist, human behavior is something I tend to analyse and dissect. Three years ago, my youngest cousin took his life with his fathers' gun. He thereby destroyed the life of his parents. They will never recover from it. His dad wrote a book to detail his son's life since his early childhood. I read it attentively, but still I cannot come up with a clear understanding of why he did it. Suicide is a complex issue that cannot be reduced to a single cause, such as overachievement.
What if our societies were not sensitive enough to glimpses of mental illness? As a physician, I am always amazed how the soul produces much more suffering than the body. Yet the maladies of the soul are often invisible, even to the ones closest.
As a society, as parents, friends or grandparents, we need to be much more aware of the suttleties of human suffering, especially at stages of life where the vulnerabilities are great.
What if our societies were not sensitive enough to glimpses of mental illness? As a physician, I am always amazed how the soul produces much more suffering than the body. Yet the maladies of the soul are often invisible, even to the ones closest.
As a society, as parents, friends or grandparents, we need to be much more aware of the suttleties of human suffering, especially at stages of life where the vulnerabilities are great.
45
Should teen suicides be explained by a label of mental illness ?
So many factors can contribute to using it to end all suffering.
Suicides of children, even pre-teens, have been prevalent in Asian societies that place great emphasis on getting into prestigious elementary schools, where screening is highly dependent on entrance test scores, and parents consider school as the first key step for social and economic advancement, as well as family prestige. People in all age range and social/economic status can benefit from attentive kindness and support to value themselves in spite of a sense of failure and total hopelessness to achieve their ideals.
So many factors can contribute to using it to end all suffering.
Suicides of children, even pre-teens, have been prevalent in Asian societies that place great emphasis on getting into prestigious elementary schools, where screening is highly dependent on entrance test scores, and parents consider school as the first key step for social and economic advancement, as well as family prestige. People in all age range and social/economic status can benefit from attentive kindness and support to value themselves in spite of a sense of failure and total hopelessness to achieve their ideals.
3
"Human behavior is something I tend to analyse and dissect."
Um, yeah: maybe that's why you can't understand.
A suggestion, take or leave: turn away from scientific metrics (and from the clear judgement in your tone, and from the assumption that anyone with suicidal thoughts is therefore mentally ill, which judgement actually does more harm than good in that it causes people who do have such thoughts to consider themselves 'broken' and damaged) and turn toward the writers, the poets. Artists understand human despair and human resilience.
This writer's take on it ("there are two kinds of people in the world, those who understand the urge toward suicide and those who don't," she writes) is one of the best I've read.
http://www.amazon.com/Divorce-Dog-Men-Motherhood-Midlife-ebook/dp/B00VO3...
Um, yeah: maybe that's why you can't understand.
A suggestion, take or leave: turn away from scientific metrics (and from the clear judgement in your tone, and from the assumption that anyone with suicidal thoughts is therefore mentally ill, which judgement actually does more harm than good in that it causes people who do have such thoughts to consider themselves 'broken' and damaged) and turn toward the writers, the poets. Artists understand human despair and human resilience.
This writer's take on it ("there are two kinds of people in the world, those who understand the urge toward suicide and those who don't," she writes) is one of the best I've read.
http://www.amazon.com/Divorce-Dog-Men-Motherhood-Midlife-ebook/dp/B00VO3...
IN, yes, we do need to recognize the effects of the overly stressful education system (and the general hyper competitiveness that marks our society) as mental illness. You write is if mental illness is a permanent situation - a life sentence. But, though mental illness can be chronic and lifelong, it can also be episodic. Just as physical illness may last days or weeks or months, we need to recognize that such factors as poor sleep hygiene, mental and physical stress, and a lack of unfettered free time (especially in nature) are just as likely to cause mental illness as exposure to pathogens is to cause physical illness.
So, yes, these kids are mentally ill. Their mental processes and emotions are not functioning healthfully, and they need help. Given a change in circumstances (including increasing maturity and perspective) they are likely to improve their mental health. Please stop assuming mental illness is some kind of personal, permanent character flaw. It is very similar to physical illness in that it varies in kind and degree, and arises from multiple factors both internal and external.
So, yes, these kids are mentally ill. Their mental processes and emotions are not functioning healthfully, and they need help. Given a change in circumstances (including increasing maturity and perspective) they are likely to improve their mental health. Please stop assuming mental illness is some kind of personal, permanent character flaw. It is very similar to physical illness in that it varies in kind and degree, and arises from multiple factors both internal and external.
2
The trend makes sense. The kids parents expect the offspring to become part of the gang of successful producers of overpriced goods and services that leave tens of millions or ordinary workers behind in the American society. There are no lofty goals for these kids just more exploitation of others if they succeed or join the rest of us in the daily grunge of trying stay solvent in an economy that continually taxes an ordinary persons ability to survive.
21
Our world has changed a lot. No one feels secure any more. There is no space for an individual, only a narrow track which must be run as fast as possible, even though there are trip wires everywhere.
I'm 75 years old. When I was an adolescent, there was opportunity everywhere in America, unless you were black. Now there are only limited opportunities to become a cog in a corporate machine, Everyone must serve the plutocrats and the plutocrats are trying their best to destroy the federal government of the U.S. A. because it is their only real competitor for absolute power. As soon as the U.S. govt is really destroyed the plutocrats will turn on each other with private armies: a new dark ages.
I'm 75 years old. When I was an adolescent, there was opportunity everywhere in America, unless you were black. Now there are only limited opportunities to become a cog in a corporate machine, Everyone must serve the plutocrats and the plutocrats are trying their best to destroy the federal government of the U.S. A. because it is their only real competitor for absolute power. As soon as the U.S. govt is really destroyed the plutocrats will turn on each other with private armies: a new dark ages.
101
The world has always had its barons and its serfs. That is not new. The press of population is new. Even among the wealthy, global competition is fierce and grows fiercer with each generation. Overpopulation destroys the planet as, myopically, some countries worry about an "unhealthy birth rate" and strive to shore up social programs while land, air and water are polluted beyond saving, other species die, and individuals lose their worth (easily replaceable). Yeats captured it best, foreseeing the moment when, "Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world..." The only way out is to REVERSE population growth. Even then, do we have enough time left?
2
While teen suicides are up in general, it is informative that the highest rates are found among the lowest-low and highest-high family income brackets. Apparently having too much yet striving for more and having too little with no hope of getting more both appear to be a source of angst and depression. Yet another indicator that grotesque income inequality is harmful to social stability. See: http://www.hsccs.org/poc/view_doc.php?type=doc&id=13737
19
We live in a culture where a new life is created and thought of as an extension of the mother's life until after it is born and then considered an extension of the parents' life. There is less and less recognition that a child is not an object created by parents but a new, separate, and distinct life with its own trajectory. That life can be nurtured but as any loving parent knows, it cannot be shaped by parental hands alone. Attempting to do so distorts and perverts that which is individual and unique in the child. Raising a child a balancing act which can only be achieved through love and respect for the unique life that has been created.
9
I have two children aged 22 and 20. My wife and I raised them with the expectation of living honestly through hard work and a sense of helping in the community. Both of them took whe lot of AP courses and we asked to try their best. If they failed, we told them use the failure as an opportunity to learn something else.
When it came time for College admission neither child applied to Cornell University, an Ivy League, even though both of my wife's parents graduated from Cornell. We gave them the benefit of choosing their colleges.
My best line to them as advice - "Remember your father would have never made it into the college you are applying to"
Very sad about the teen suicides. Tragic.
When it came time for College admission neither child applied to Cornell University, an Ivy League, even though both of my wife's parents graduated from Cornell. We gave them the benefit of choosing their colleges.
My best line to them as advice - "Remember your father would have never made it into the college you are applying to"
Very sad about the teen suicides. Tragic.
13
Families living in Palo Alto for the most part are Tech, VCs or PE moguls. I hardly think they are consumed by their children's achievement to get perfect SAT scores but rather there is a subgroup perhaps what writer was alluding to by mentioning Tiger Moms read "Asians" that are the backgrounds of children that the suicide watches address. I have worked with or known children of these Tiger Moms and most are dysfunctional in social and physical ways that in the work place are bright but are otherwise pushed aside as meek and ineffectual at corporate politics at least in business or law communities. These children do much better in tech industries where the singularity of problem solving and working alone is what they are used to. Otherwise a young life being brow beated to achieve an acceptance letter from Stanford or MIT via a perfect SAT score is a crime - a loss when it doesn't occur and certainly a loss of a natural carefree childhood that allows uncluttered development.
4
It's not difficult for me to remember my son's 11th grade year in HS, when three AP courses were prescribed. Less than two months into the Fall semester he was out of character, an extremely unhappy young person angry at the teachers, his parents, and the school. He was beset with a mountain of papers and essays to write, often deep into the night, and an amount of history to learn that my Dean's List acumen told me was far too daunting for someone his age. He had virtually no time for anything else in his life.
Upon consulting with his history and English teachers, one of whom attempted to tell me that he was not studying enough, my conclusion was that the AP system was a grueling torture test designed mostly for geniuses or students with photographic memories. We were able to support our son through the semester with the promise that he would not have to take any more AP courses - two A's and a B and an introduction to Red Bull later, we never looked back.
This decision affected to which colleges he was accepted. In fact, we were advised at the time that him taking some AP courses, then backing out of more would hurt him when college admissions officers reviewed his transcript. But we chose our son's well being, and having him be allowed to pursue a balanced lifestyle. Things turned out fine.
Upon consulting with his history and English teachers, one of whom attempted to tell me that he was not studying enough, my conclusion was that the AP system was a grueling torture test designed mostly for geniuses or students with photographic memories. We were able to support our son through the semester with the promise that he would not have to take any more AP courses - two A's and a B and an introduction to Red Bull later, we never looked back.
This decision affected to which colleges he was accepted. In fact, we were advised at the time that him taking some AP courses, then backing out of more would hurt him when college admissions officers reviewed his transcript. But we chose our son's well being, and having him be allowed to pursue a balanced lifestyle. Things turned out fine.
98
Glad you made it through junior year. My kid's AP strategy has been to do as much as she can for the class and learn the material in other ways sometimes. I think she learned a lot from "Crash Courses" on YouTube. Her "focus"- and I use the term loosely is on the exam. Mostly she gets 4s, one 5, no 3s I guess. APs are a given here but we don't take them very seriously. Maybe that helps.
When my oldest son was in the 4th grade (at a well-known San Francisco private school), I was a parent volunteer for a 3-day, 2-night outing in the gold country. On the evening we arrived, the teachers in charge called together all of us parent volunteers to explain what medication each kid was to be administered, and when and how. The meeting took nearly half an hour. I was amazed to see that well over half of the 4th graders were taking medication, including some pretty serious stuff. My son was one of them, I'll confess, though my wife and I assured ourself it was needed. I suspect the other parents all told themselves the same thing.
47
I wonder how this compares to Asian countries, where parental expectations are at least as high and far more extensive socially than isolated communities like Palo Alto or Evansville. Is the suicide rate correspondingly higher? I would suspect so. The population densities of these Asian countries are of course much higher, and the battle for social rewards that much more intense and competitive. The population of the US has also skyrocketed, having doubled in the past generation. Perhaps what we're experiencing is a simple by-product of the growing battle for social rewards based on this population growth, and what's going on in Palo Alto is just a harbinger of what will increasingly spread throughout a country that biologically knows no limits to increasing numbers.
8
It's not just Palo Alto. I have 3 teen nieces and only the youngest was not suicidal, she was a sweet kid full of life even in the face of annual months hospitalized for a health problem. The oldest 2 were in treatment for suicide attempts. When they were very young and I was the uncle with Christmas presents, they were brimming with life. Divorce might be a factor. And last year there was more bad news, the youngest one was institutionalized for suicidal ideation; the culture got to the one with the strongest life-force. Whatever is being fed to the young through TV, internet and rumor is terrorizing them, what they digest now is more hardcore than 30 years ago, there is a glut of marketing major graduates. Some 'feelings of hopelessness' can't be successfully allieviated with Madison Ave. psycho-pharmacological potions. They grow the illness, then sell the cure. That's like the drug addict who will steal your wallet then help you look for it.
13
"Divorce might be a factor". Really??? Why are you letting the parents and their psychological problems off the hook?
Frank Bruni does not mention the pressure in kids' lives from social networks. Not only are they under constant pressure to achieve at school and in extracurricular activities, but also on line. To compete with their friends they feel obliged to expose the minutiae of their lives to the scrutiny of friend and foe alike. Every success,no matter how insignificant, is triumphed out of all proportion and every perceived inadequacy( social, academic, athletic, physical appearance etc.) laid out for the delectation of anonymous trolls who sometimes turn out to be their "friends". Their parents often seem to be complicit in these ego trips with their own accounts. All kids experience periods of anxiety and insecurity during adolescence, but when you are open to exposure 24/7 with no place to hide, is it surprising that some kids go haywire?
19
My students (4th grade) often complain about their parents talking about them on Facebook..they hate that and the amount of time their parents spend on Facebook.
Far too many Willy Lomans expecting their kids to follow in their footsteps. Perhaps living in Silicon Valley with so much more information available in New media has increased a sense of fear of becoming another Willy.
1
The pressure is familiar. Indian students organize wall-scaling cheaters by the hundreds. Taiwanese and Chinese students attend 2 schools each day trying to score higher grades on entrance exams. And US kids compete for elite nursery schools.
Most industrialized states face a Rentier's anti-Eden. The myth of the middle class has no clothes on any longer. Ivy league or a life without wealth, where pensions disappear, and jobs go East without notice or placement. Our children are dying while some of us live like feudal lords. And others wonder where belief in progress went.
Most industrialized states face a Rentier's anti-Eden. The myth of the middle class has no clothes on any longer. Ivy league or a life without wealth, where pensions disappear, and jobs go East without notice or placement. Our children are dying while some of us live like feudal lords. And others wonder where belief in progress went.
102
This article (and its references) raise many excellent points. I was one of those high achievers on the East coast who migrated here for the high tech job opportunities. Now, as a parent of two Palo Alto high school students, I can attest to the intensity that permeates the air here. It's actually an incredible community of creative and interesting people to be around.
However, no one ever mentions that the children of these big fish (who all came from small ponds) are now a lot of big fish in one small pond. While it can be a great learning opportunity to be around so many engaged students, it becomes less so when those kids are competing against each other for grades and honors. Grade deflation seems to be the norm here when the students are put on a bell curve to ration out the grades.... Kids who are below the median of the class don't understand that they may be on the far right of the bell curve for the total (US) student population.... they feel pretty stupid compared to their immediate peers. It takes a phenomenal amount of strength to have the confidence it will all work out years in the future when teenagers can't think beyond the end of the day, if that. I came from pretty humble beginnings and am pretty grounded, but it is NOT easy to do when everything kids do needs to be pushed as far as possible to find their breaking points... all in an effort to sort out a pecking order.
However, no one ever mentions that the children of these big fish (who all came from small ponds) are now a lot of big fish in one small pond. While it can be a great learning opportunity to be around so many engaged students, it becomes less so when those kids are competing against each other for grades and honors. Grade deflation seems to be the norm here when the students are put on a bell curve to ration out the grades.... Kids who are below the median of the class don't understand that they may be on the far right of the bell curve for the total (US) student population.... they feel pretty stupid compared to their immediate peers. It takes a phenomenal amount of strength to have the confidence it will all work out years in the future when teenagers can't think beyond the end of the day, if that. I came from pretty humble beginnings and am pretty grounded, but it is NOT easy to do when everything kids do needs to be pushed as far as possible to find their breaking points... all in an effort to sort out a pecking order.
43
I do buy that some of this is because of extreme pressures about college admissions and status.
But I grew up in a D.C. bedroom suburb of highly educated professionals and outstanding public schools. And what I remember about my friends in high school was the large number of girls who had been sexually molested as children - usually by a relative or friend of the family - or battered, and the numerous girls who were being sexually bullied by dates or boyfriends and in some cases beaten and otherwise harmed by the young men around them. If I am to believe my what I know of my friends, none of these things were rare.
If any of my friends had killed themselves, in families where the girls were being abused, no relative would have admitted to harming the girl who died. And in families where the parents didn't know their daughter had been molested or raped or bullied or beaten, they might well have attributed a suicide to intense pressure about academics or social status, having no knowledge of other serious problems their daughters were facing. I don't remember any of my friends in really serious trouble from any of these problems ever telling their parents what was going on.
But I grew up in a D.C. bedroom suburb of highly educated professionals and outstanding public schools. And what I remember about my friends in high school was the large number of girls who had been sexually molested as children - usually by a relative or friend of the family - or battered, and the numerous girls who were being sexually bullied by dates or boyfriends and in some cases beaten and otherwise harmed by the young men around them. If I am to believe my what I know of my friends, none of these things were rare.
If any of my friends had killed themselves, in families where the girls were being abused, no relative would have admitted to harming the girl who died. And in families where the parents didn't know their daughter had been molested or raped or bullied or beaten, they might well have attributed a suicide to intense pressure about academics or social status, having no knowledge of other serious problems their daughters were facing. I don't remember any of my friends in really serious trouble from any of these problems ever telling their parents what was going on.
18
I think kids today experience more stress simply because there's more competition globally. As underdeveloped and developing countries around the world are gaining a fairer share of the wealth, we in the developed nations are experiencing a tightening of belts. Thus for our children to stay as comfortable as we are, they need to work harder for it. This can be seen as unfortunate for our kids. However, maybe their stress and depression will be assuaged by the knowledge that other peoples who have long struggled just to survive are living in a slightly less inequitable world.
7
My spouse and I have a combined 37 yrs working at Stanford as fundraisers. Readers shd know that Stanford has one of the best financial aid programs in the country. Admissions personnel delight in sleuthing and selecting poor students who are "stuck" socioeconomically. For instance:
I had dinner w a student who had 8 siblings and his parents were manual laborers from Mexico who worked in Monterrey, mainly in cotton fields.
My son's tutor had very little knowledge about the university and was raised in a conservative, Evangelical, blue collar family. The kid was on his high school wrestling team which is how Stanford learned about him. He too went on a full package
Stanford pays tuition, room & board for its students who family income is less than $65k, and if a family's income is under $100k, Stanford will pay full tuition for that person. BC of this type of economic diversity, most Stanford students do not come from big wealthy families and many have experienced real world realities.
I had dinner w a student who had 8 siblings and his parents were manual laborers from Mexico who worked in Monterrey, mainly in cotton fields.
My son's tutor had very little knowledge about the university and was raised in a conservative, Evangelical, blue collar family. The kid was on his high school wrestling team which is how Stanford learned about him. He too went on a full package
Stanford pays tuition, room & board for its students who family income is less than $65k, and if a family's income is under $100k, Stanford will pay full tuition for that person. BC of this type of economic diversity, most Stanford students do not come from big wealthy families and many have experienced real world realities.
12
Dr. Strassberg's opinion piece can be found here.
http://www.paloaltoonline.com/news/2015/03/16/guest-opinion-keep-calm-an...
I found it to be well reasoned, calm and level headed advice for a community struggling with a suicide cluster and a high- pressure environment within its schools.
http://www.paloaltoonline.com/news/2015/03/16/guest-opinion-keep-calm-an...
I found it to be well reasoned, calm and level headed advice for a community struggling with a suicide cluster and a high- pressure environment within its schools.
4
I don't think that parental expectations of success should be diminished. I want to raise my children to be competitive in an ever-increasing competitive world. However, I do believe that among a certain subset of the upper-middle class, there is a very strong emphasis on getting into certain colleges as the destination of high school. I find this to be very troubling. I think the emphasis of high school should be on the excellence of academic and emotional intelligence and development into a healthy and active citizen. Certain colleges, especially the Ivy Leagues, have all sorts of admission quotas and politics to socially engineer their classes to become paragons of academic, intellectual, and racial diversity. I have no objection to that, they suit the needs of their individual institutions. I feel that there are so many variables that determine your admission, that it is impossible to have any degree of certainty or comfort. This balloons into people spreading themselves so thin to tick off every box and market themselves, which I think dramatically increases the anxiety and stress of a high school student in a place like Palo Alto. If you genuinely pursue development and excellence for your own sake, the colleges you get into will come as a byproduct of your efforts. There are so many good colleges in America. Just work hard. I'd would much rather be a valedictorian who went to Berkeley than a lower ranked legacy student who went to Stanford.
8
I grew upon a Boston suburb not unlike Palo Alto in its reverence for academic excellence. As an adult, I've lived in Washington, DC and vicinity, a magnet for high achievers.
My advice: Respect yourself and your children for who you are, not just what you have earned. It is wonderful to achieve, but without respect for yourself at your core, your achievements will never be enough. You are important if you are a kind, ethical human being, regardless of the college you attend, the amount you earn or the title you hold. Don't be held hostage to earning credentials.
My advice: Respect yourself and your children for who you are, not just what you have earned. It is wonderful to achieve, but without respect for yourself at your core, your achievements will never be enough. You are important if you are a kind, ethical human being, regardless of the college you attend, the amount you earn or the title you hold. Don't be held hostage to earning credentials.
41
There are too many simplicities and far too much lack of insight in this column to even begin to address them, but the title says it all. Where in the world is there any suggestion that these kids are the "Best and the brightest"? They are among the most affluent and their parents think they are offering them the most opportunities. Those attributes don't raise strong, resilient children, and that is not their fault. However, if America plans on relying on this group rather than on children who really need to overcome barriers then we are on our last legs.
15
It is simply a fact that many of our best and brightest are concentrated in a tiny percentage of towns throughout the country. This is because many (but certainly not all) of the truly smart people in the US studied at the top colleges, married each other, and had smart kids (IQ is as hereditary as height, for example).
When the kids are older, these generally wealthy parents, put them into strong school districts, like Palo Alto. The cycle then continues.
This was detailed in a recent Economist article called "America's New Aristocracy".
When the kids are older, these generally wealthy parents, put them into strong school districts, like Palo Alto. The cycle then continues.
This was detailed in a recent Economist article called "America's New Aristocracy".
I have seen these "suicidal" tracks which Cal Train has yet to protect by putting up fences around them....but that is another discussion for another day.
What is blatantly obvious to those of us who are parents to high schoolers in Silicon Valley and under the shadow of Stanford, is that one suicide triggers another which triggers another which triggers another, etc.
Practically all of these teens trying to commit suicide (w the exception of one last Oct that I know of) do it in the same way --- by going to the very same location in Palo Alto and jumping in front of a commuter train. This is why many parents and the city have rallied together to pay an attendant to sit in the same location near the tracks where the deaths were in hopes of preventing any more.
And yet, most of us parents sill don't change our actions enough to accept and love our kids for who they are and not expect them to fit into some cookie-cutter over-achiever. A very eye opening film about putting pressure on teens is called "Race to Nowhere" and well worth your 90 minutes (incidentally, it was filmed mainly in the SF Bay Area). http://www.racetonowhere.com/
What is blatantly obvious to those of us who are parents to high schoolers in Silicon Valley and under the shadow of Stanford, is that one suicide triggers another which triggers another which triggers another, etc.
Practically all of these teens trying to commit suicide (w the exception of one last Oct that I know of) do it in the same way --- by going to the very same location in Palo Alto and jumping in front of a commuter train. This is why many parents and the city have rallied together to pay an attendant to sit in the same location near the tracks where the deaths were in hopes of preventing any more.
And yet, most of us parents sill don't change our actions enough to accept and love our kids for who they are and not expect them to fit into some cookie-cutter over-achiever. A very eye opening film about putting pressure on teens is called "Race to Nowhere" and well worth your 90 minutes (incidentally, it was filmed mainly in the SF Bay Area). http://www.racetonowhere.com/
11
Globalization, the global trickle-up economy, information overload, brain damage from HDTV and Blue-ray, predatory paranoia, homeland security and police murdering unarmed blacks, handguns and wars making violence out-of-control both inside the USA and around the world, the US government in a state of paralytic civil war, medical care an oxymoron with only half the people able to afford it, and you wonder why teenagers are killing themselves on the traintracks of Palo Alto?
It doesn't matter whether one wants "the best fo your child, or for your child to be the best one" in our self-shredding, anti-human nation surrounded by a population exploding, global warming, pollution imploding planet.
What matters is that each one shun the madness and stop gerbil-wheeling through life. Just stop. When we are all at a stop, the madness, the suicides, the stress ends. And we can start fresh, slowly, deliberately savouring our newly created, precious peace and sanity.
Mine has just begun.
It doesn't matter whether one wants "the best fo your child, or for your child to be the best one" in our self-shredding, anti-human nation surrounded by a population exploding, global warming, pollution imploding planet.
What matters is that each one shun the madness and stop gerbil-wheeling through life. Just stop. When we are all at a stop, the madness, the suicides, the stress ends. And we can start fresh, slowly, deliberately savouring our newly created, precious peace and sanity.
Mine has just begun.
22
Wow! Lovely. Provocative. I myself am not quite so negative on our contemporary situation, but you are in good company when it comes to the human condition. This reminds me of Wittgenstein's description of how philosophers greet each either: Slow down! And it brings to mind, too, Pascal's idea that all of humanity's problems stem from our inability to sit quietly, alone, in a room. Perhaps our new people could consider some old philosophy (before it became busy busy busy sociology of knowledge).
6
Nathan,
You are a kindrid spirit. I am not committed to any outcome. The suicides committed today by many teenagers in the heart of Stanford University's billionaire brain-trust Silicon Valley is no mystery to me. I was attending Stanford's International Session from 1999-2002, and witnessed a society lost in cyberspace, where the most common letter to the Palo Alto Daily Police Blotter in 1999 was about a lost cell phone, or a call from an elderly person in need of assistance. That changed radically over the next three years, when the Police Blotter was filled with rapes and murders week after week. What happened?
The competition for huge profits from high-tech computer-driven IPO's generating billions of dollars every week brought about a feeding frenzy at Stanford, and throughout Palo Alto and the rest of the "Silicon Valley" nerve centers.
Competition and obsession overwhelmed the students, faculty, and surrouding community. Everyone worked 24/7 except for myself and my paramour, Julie. We had come to Stanford to study fine arts.
We were training under Jim Miller, the Stanford Golf Pro who trained Tiger Woods. We were also studying Equestrian Riding at the Stanford Red Barne, ballet at the Royal Academy of Dance (British RAD), and recording music combined with vocal coaching.
Our investments were in beaux-arts, dancing Balanchine's Symphony in C pas-de-deux. We are what our nation needs to value, beauty and being fine artists. Join us.
You are a kindrid spirit. I am not committed to any outcome. The suicides committed today by many teenagers in the heart of Stanford University's billionaire brain-trust Silicon Valley is no mystery to me. I was attending Stanford's International Session from 1999-2002, and witnessed a society lost in cyberspace, where the most common letter to the Palo Alto Daily Police Blotter in 1999 was about a lost cell phone, or a call from an elderly person in need of assistance. That changed radically over the next three years, when the Police Blotter was filled with rapes and murders week after week. What happened?
The competition for huge profits from high-tech computer-driven IPO's generating billions of dollars every week brought about a feeding frenzy at Stanford, and throughout Palo Alto and the rest of the "Silicon Valley" nerve centers.
Competition and obsession overwhelmed the students, faculty, and surrouding community. Everyone worked 24/7 except for myself and my paramour, Julie. We had come to Stanford to study fine arts.
We were training under Jim Miller, the Stanford Golf Pro who trained Tiger Woods. We were also studying Equestrian Riding at the Stanford Red Barne, ballet at the Royal Academy of Dance (British RAD), and recording music combined with vocal coaching.
Our investments were in beaux-arts, dancing Balanchine's Symphony in C pas-de-deux. We are what our nation needs to value, beauty and being fine artists. Join us.
My husband and I both graduated from Stanford and we lived in Palo Alto for a few years before deciding that a neighboring town, Mountain View, was a happier place to live in. We now have a daughter in the 5th grade. We never mentioned anything about Stanford to her because she's only 10 years old. But one day she came home from school and asked me in a sad little voice, "what if I can't get into Stanford?" I was shocked. Is this what 5th graders talk about in Silicon Valley? So we told her the truth, that Stanford isn't the epitome of education. It's great for making business connections, but it's not the best place for intellectual pursuits. Quite the opposite in fact. When you are surrounded by high achievers, the culture demands that you only present your strengths, leaving little space for critical thinking. In a few years, she might understand when I explain further that vulnerability is required for intellectual and emotional fulfillment.
415
Although homicides make the nightly news, suicides are the major gun menace. Suicide-by-gun occurs twice as frequently (20,000 times annually) as homicide-by-gun (10,000 times annually). Furthermore, those who live in a home with a firearm have a two to three fold higher risk of suicide (not just suicide-by-gun) than those who live in a home without a gun.
Although the Palo Alto suicides were literally "train wrecks", suicide-by-gun accounts for just over half of all suicides. Removing a gun from home is one of the best methods of preventing suicide.
Although the Palo Alto suicides were literally "train wrecks", suicide-by-gun accounts for just over half of all suicides. Removing a gun from home is one of the best methods of preventing suicide.
29
Americans use guns because they are there, and part of our culture. But other cultures that restrict guns still can have high suicide rates -- the victims simply use other methods. In fact, even in the US, guns as a means of suicide are nearly always used by men. Women use other methods. So it is more cultural than a reflection of gun laws.
The Centre for Dewey Studies asks if the revered American educationist John Dewey said, "Education is not a preparation for life but for life itself?" He is purported to have said: Cease conceiving of education as mere preparation for later life, and make it the full meaning of present life. The narrow outlook of success defined by the title and wallet size is unfortunately taking its toll and it's no wonder that according to World Mental Health Day, USA tops among the largest most advanced democracies of the world.
10
What can one say (in my case: a former high school teacher) about teen suicides in a society that places status (looks, money, power) above other goals?
Previously, I was supposed to accept the notion that teens (whose brains have not yet been completely formed) considered death to be temporary, as if real life were the same as video games with their imaginative violence.
Somehow, the worth of every single kid must be communicated; also, the discovery of clinical depression should be in this mix.
Previously, I was supposed to accept the notion that teens (whose brains have not yet been completely formed) considered death to be temporary, as if real life were the same as video games with their imaginative violence.
Somehow, the worth of every single kid must be communicated; also, the discovery of clinical depression should be in this mix.
8
They might be the best and brightest, but the Stanford dean is right - my college students are incredibly fragile. They cannot handle criticism at all and are so focused on the tree of grades that they miss the forest of learning.
The Times has spent a lot of ink recently on how getting into the Ivy League isn't all that important, and that's not true. It's just not the only thing that's important. It's up to the parents to learn that lesson.
The Times has spent a lot of ink recently on how getting into the Ivy League isn't all that important, and that's not true. It's just not the only thing that's important. It's up to the parents to learn that lesson.
20
The only pressure I felt growing up was from myself, my parents never pressured me to perform academically. And when I was in high school I never heard of teen suicides. But times have changed - the economy, the cost of living, job availability, and the overall education system are completely different and not for the better. I feel a sadness that me children's adult life will be more difficult than mine, even if they attend an elite school. And one more thing - mental health is not given the proper attention and resources it needs, only when it's too late. Academic pressures continue in college, so it's important parents talk to their college bound children about their mental health and what to do when they are having problems. Here's advice from a friend and mother about how to have a mental health talk with your child before sending them off to college. http://bit.ly/1IVDDQX
16
What's the end game of life? The one who dies with the largest portfolio wins? The one who dies with the largest house wins? The one who went to Stanford? The neurosurgeon affiliated with the most prestigious hospital in the world? The Nobel Prize winner? The MacArthur fellow? The Oscar winner? What's the purpose of life? What constitutes a life well-lived?
At this point in human history all of us should know by now that money, status, and power may feel good in the short run, but are no substitute in the long run for using your talents to improve the condition of the human race and our planet, and to establish meaningful connections with other human beings.
I feel deeply sorry for children who live in affluent communities with parents who define success and value primarily by money, status, and power -- whose "love" is contingent on the degree to which their children perform in ways that their parents deem acceptable according to these values.
We should have a mechanism in this country for providing psychological asylum for such children.
At this point in human history all of us should know by now that money, status, and power may feel good in the short run, but are no substitute in the long run for using your talents to improve the condition of the human race and our planet, and to establish meaningful connections with other human beings.
I feel deeply sorry for children who live in affluent communities with parents who define success and value primarily by money, status, and power -- whose "love" is contingent on the degree to which their children perform in ways that their parents deem acceptable according to these values.
We should have a mechanism in this country for providing psychological asylum for such children.
45
I understand the part about excessive concern about making money. But you're wrong to disparage people who are passionate about discovering things, saving lives, and achieving great works of art. What makes us human and what drives creativity and novelty in society and culture? These are not worth striving for? Even if they cause some stress?
1
Just went through the process with one son, and will do so again next year with the other. I have mixed feelings about whether the pressure is as bad as the media makes it out to be. The college counselors, at the private school where my kids went, tried to play down the "name brand" schools and constantly emphasized how unpredictable the process is. They told students that they "will land in the right place." I didn't hear any tales of enormous disappointment after results came in. My older son got into some great schools, and luckily for him, he loves where he landed. (Go Big Red!) That said, he was also rejected by many great schools. He's always focussed his energies on his passions, of which he has many, and that will get him through life I figure.
8
"The suicide rate among all teenagers has seemingly risen a bit over the last decade. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, it was 8.15 per every 100,000 Americans between the ages of 10 and 24 in 2013, the last year for which complete data is available; the rate was 6.74 in 2003."
In 1970, the suicide rate among all young people, ages 15 - 24 was 8.8, just slightly higher than it is today. By the late 1970s, it was hovering around 12 - 13, where it stayed until the mid-1990s. Starting in the late 1990s, it began dropping, eventually dipping below 10 in 2001 for the first time since 1971. [Source: Am J Public Health 2006 Oct; 96(10): 1744 - 1751].
Teen suicide is a tragedy that need not happen, and it happens across all ethnicities and socio-economic groups. The reason why a given teen may choose to end his/her life may differ, but the bottom line is that suicide is preventable. Once again it appears to be on the rise today, as it was in the early 1970s. Perhaps we should be asking what was different in the late 1990s and early 2000s that brought the rate down, and what changes have led to it rising again? Was it the economic recession with erosion of economic opportunities? Or was it something else?
In 1970, the suicide rate among all young people, ages 15 - 24 was 8.8, just slightly higher than it is today. By the late 1970s, it was hovering around 12 - 13, where it stayed until the mid-1990s. Starting in the late 1990s, it began dropping, eventually dipping below 10 in 2001 for the first time since 1971. [Source: Am J Public Health 2006 Oct; 96(10): 1744 - 1751].
Teen suicide is a tragedy that need not happen, and it happens across all ethnicities and socio-economic groups. The reason why a given teen may choose to end his/her life may differ, but the bottom line is that suicide is preventable. Once again it appears to be on the rise today, as it was in the early 1970s. Perhaps we should be asking what was different in the late 1990s and early 2000s that brought the rate down, and what changes have led to it rising again? Was it the economic recession with erosion of economic opportunities? Or was it something else?
10
Kids in the locations mentioned are the lucky ones.
They are being raised by parents who care and are in schools that teach.
They will achieve, and they will contribute to society.
In contrast, most kids, in most US locations, are being raised by parents who do not care, are in schools that promote mediocrity, and are being set on a path toward lifetime dependence, underachievement, underemployment, and unemployment in an increasingly competitive global economy.
They are being raised by parents who care and are in schools that teach.
They will achieve, and they will contribute to society.
In contrast, most kids, in most US locations, are being raised by parents who do not care, are in schools that promote mediocrity, and are being set on a path toward lifetime dependence, underachievement, underemployment, and unemployment in an increasingly competitive global economy.
15
"most kids, in most US locations, are being raised by parents who do not care . . . "
Really?
Really?
Well -- what is true is that if your parents are in the 1% or close to that, they can bail you out of nearly any trouble and make up for any shortcomings....fancy unpaid internships....nepotism....foreign travel....money to start up businesses....multiple degrees (engineering doesn't work out? Just try law!).
The difference with middle class or working class kids is your parents can usually only afford one shot -- if you don't make it, you don't get multiple "do overs".
The difference with middle class or working class kids is your parents can usually only afford one shot -- if you don't make it, you don't get multiple "do overs".
1
I lived in Palo Alto for a number of years while working as a single person, then left the country, then ultimately returned to settle in Berkeley, CA, also a college town. The reason was because there was a broader spectrum of humanity, human potential, a wider variety of interests, careers, and ways of being in Berkeley than there was in Silicon Valley.
This focus on high achievement has been going on at the high school level for several decades, and yet still our social, economic, environmental, and health problems multiply. I don't think the answers are going to be coming from those that grew up in Palo Alto.
This focus on high achievement has been going on at the high school level for several decades, and yet still our social, economic, environmental, and health problems multiply. I don't think the answers are going to be coming from those that grew up in Palo Alto.
23
Being a teenager is difficult in myriad ways. This is true regardless of your desperation to get into Stanford. I've known several teenagers who committed suicide, and none were concerned about their SATs or what college would accept them.
I agree it's a bad idea to have kids stressed about college and their prospects in the indefinite future, but it's an entirely separate issue from teen suicide.
I agree it's a bad idea to have kids stressed about college and their prospects in the indefinite future, but it's an entirely separate issue from teen suicide.
10
We worship winning and competition, and fail to recognize that unchecked competition takes over the world and subjects all to its rhythms. We can see this in education, where what is learned is doing well on whatever tests are used to assess test performance, whether these tests make any other sort of sense or not. Usually whatever sense they make fades into the background and what becomes important is just doing well.
What is taught is the ability to figure out what both the official and the real rules are and use them to do well, to function with extreme motivation in an environment that does not make sense, and have no expectation that it will or should make sense or be what it says it is. Those who lose this ability after having it are in real trouble.
What is taught is the ability to figure out what both the official and the real rules are and use them to do well, to function with extreme motivation in an environment that does not make sense, and have no expectation that it will or should make sense or be what it says it is. Those who lose this ability after having it are in real trouble.
6
I don't like the grading systems in most high schools. Parents can troll around and look at every single assignment, at every single grade. There is no privacy. To address the issue of academic pressure, change the grading system, to a more binary type, complete or incomplete, pass or fail, with key assessments along the way. Make school more about creative performance, group problem solving and safe risk taking rather than this humiliating graded and ranked status. Who are we kidding anyways?
12
I agree that the availability of grades adds to the pressure. My eldest asked me not to check since often what was in the system wan't reality, meaning the last test wasn't included. I told him I would check at the end of each semester and not in between. It made our lives a lot easier and he agreed to tell me in between if anything was going south. I've adopted that with the other three and our lives are much pleasanter. They all work hard, do well but they don't have me hanging on each grade for each assignment.
1
Teen suicide is something that was previously hidden. I am 60 and had a cousin commit suicide which was hushed up and buried. I had 6 classmates and acquaintances take their lives for no outward reason in our 20s and just recently had a successful father, spouse and business owner/friend take his life after his third and youngest daughter got married. So many years apart, young and old we try to find explanations. Whether it's blaming the intensity of competition or the frustrations of achievement, I don't think there is an easy answer. Perhaps in this time of political hatred, an excess of 'reality' programs, and divisions of economic wealth we just need to slow down and listen. I don't think we can ever totally eliminate or understand the why of suicide but we can make strides in being a kinder, more generous nation.
44
Here in small town Indiana there have been many teen and young adult suicides. And these are often lower economic and education backgrounds. There's more going on than just pressure to succeed there's hopelessness. This country is in decline and filled with pettiness. Kids here are relegated to low wage service jobs with no or poor benefits. They don't see anyway to get ahead. Their parents are trapped in similar no prospect for better, jobs.
289
And yet Hoosiers keep electing the same nasty politicians, e.g Governor Pence. Maybe it's important to love your neighbor as yourself, first.
1
My dear, wonderful now adult daughter, Britt, took the SATs three times with no apparent change. When I was a teenager, I decreed for myself that once was enough. I enjoyed the gaming aspect of the test, but not the pressures, the tension and the amount of time it took. Once was truly enough. Britt got accepted at a number of good colleges and made her own choice about where to go. She finished all of her course work in three years, having successfully taken a.p. courses, going to one short summer session and two summers abroad. It was the super-duper, big name elite schools that lost out in not having such a well balanced, intelligent and, in other judgments than my own, beautiful young woman.
The point is that colleges in America have determined to distinguish themselves by rejecting most of the people who might like to go there. That's the game. Show how great you are by turning down wonderful people who have a lot to offer, then use those accepted to create an overheated atmosphere in which peer learning, direct exchange of ideas, information and, oh, yes, contacts conspire to create superior opportunities for those lucky few kids.
This statement from a student in the column says volumes: “We are lifeless bodies in a system that...discourages...genuine learning.”
The harsh truth of this statement is embodied in Walter Kirin's book, "Lost in the Meritocracy", which details how his education began AFTER he finished 4 yrs. at Princeton. A startling, stark conclusion.
The point is that colleges in America have determined to distinguish themselves by rejecting most of the people who might like to go there. That's the game. Show how great you are by turning down wonderful people who have a lot to offer, then use those accepted to create an overheated atmosphere in which peer learning, direct exchange of ideas, information and, oh, yes, contacts conspire to create superior opportunities for those lucky few kids.
This statement from a student in the column says volumes: “We are lifeless bodies in a system that...discourages...genuine learning.”
The harsh truth of this statement is embodied in Walter Kirin's book, "Lost in the Meritocracy", which details how his education began AFTER he finished 4 yrs. at Princeton. A startling, stark conclusion.
30
The best and the brightest? At what? Living in a high-tech pressure cooker with overpriced houses and overheated competition for everything? Life in such places - and Manhattan, L.A., D.C., Boston and the tonier Chicagoland, Long Island, Westchester 'burbs are just as ridiculously expensive and intense - is basically a rat race run on a treadmill. You have to earn a huge amount of money just to live there, and that means working crazy hours - and having the kind of job that enables such a 'lifestyle', if you call that living.
Jobs like that go to those with the 'right' (i.e. prestigious pressure cooker) credentials, and what kids see growing up is a need to jump on that treadmill once they're in school. What's pitiful is that they never get to actually have a childhood; they're basically interns once they're out of diapers. And what does each rat race lead to? The next rat race, unless you decide to get off the treadmill and go out and take a look at some of the rest of the world. But to 'tiger parents' that's a most mortal sin; children who think that way are apt to be regarded as having some sort of mental illness that must be corrected. Actually, to one who values the beauties of the mind - curiosity, imagination, and the ability to think independently - it's really as if the asylum walls have been turned inside out. When all is madness - especially expensive, highly credentialed madness - 'tis indeed folly to be wise. And how pitiful that is.
Jobs like that go to those with the 'right' (i.e. prestigious pressure cooker) credentials, and what kids see growing up is a need to jump on that treadmill once they're in school. What's pitiful is that they never get to actually have a childhood; they're basically interns once they're out of diapers. And what does each rat race lead to? The next rat race, unless you decide to get off the treadmill and go out and take a look at some of the rest of the world. But to 'tiger parents' that's a most mortal sin; children who think that way are apt to be regarded as having some sort of mental illness that must be corrected. Actually, to one who values the beauties of the mind - curiosity, imagination, and the ability to think independently - it's really as if the asylum walls have been turned inside out. When all is madness - especially expensive, highly credentialed madness - 'tis indeed folly to be wise. And how pitiful that is.
89
It's foolish to oversimplify what you don't understand as a "rat race."
I wish we elders could have made the lives of these children more hopeful. Many of this generation do everything with intensity, speed and purpose- highly skilled multitaskers who have mastered the game of school by cutting corners on everything from sleep to reading- summoning the sparksnotes on Shakespeare rather than contemplating the truths which they so desperately need to ponder. These modern day Romeos and Juliets suffer not out of love's intensity but rather drown dutifully in a society that worships Competition without reason or ideals within it . The growing power of Ayn Rand's selfishness doctrine is a symptom of a society that cares not for community and the joys of seeing or helping others succeed. An atmosphere of achievement without responsibility and celebration of the few has many consequences, the most profound of which involves the unfulfilled journeys of our youth.
38
These poor sad little rich kids, mere appendages to their parents' hyper-inflated egos. No wonder they crash and burn. When money is not the issue, growing prize-winning kids--like some kind of prize-winning roses--becomes the status symbol. Many in Silicon Valley have engineering degrees, but no culture; ridiculous wealth, but shallow values measured by cars and gewgaws. Young people can excell and prepare for happy lives at myriad colleges and Universities. The vulgar fetishization of Stanford (which is, by the way, an excellent school) is not fair to anyone--not the kinds, not Stanford, and certainly not our nation
37
This kind of culture we have today is what produced the counterculture of the '60s. What was that counterculture about? Having been a part of it in the Bay Area in the 1960s, I can say it was about learning to love, to value ourselves and others, to accept ourselves as we are. For women that meant rejecting the makeup, the fashion-following, the appearance competition, the vying for husbands; and meant looking at who and what we really wanted to be as people, and pursuing that. For men it meant rejecting the "success object" idea and the macho male concept and allowing themselves to be feeling, vulnerable people who sought a life of meaning over a life of prestige, status, and wealth. It meant rejecting the mass produced, the chemically grown, the pursuit of money, the idea that violence and war and competition must rule. It meant embracing the handmade, the simple, the homemade. It meant turning off the TV or getting rid of it. It meant dancing, celebrating, embracing the spiritual side of life in a deep and genuine way. Key words for that time were authentic, genuine, loving, peaceful. Our entire society has driven these things underground. Time again for them to emerge. Imagine.
417
Try that nowadays, you'll end up homeless, thanks to the policies of our elites over the past 40 years to grab back as much of the pie as they can, even all of it if they can. The world has become much more harsh, cutthroat and competitive.
5
If there is one thing this society is entirely lacking it is joy in living. We have no joy at all. We have the fleeting high of "winning", but without real, deep connection to others it is over quickly and forgotten in the pursuit of the next conquest.
All that is need to nurture the joy of living is enough. Enough economic security to pay the basics and a little more for things that bring personal enjoyment, not status purchases. Enough social support of friends and family to share our excitements and good fortune and to half our disappointments and sorrows. Enough community to have safe neighborhoods and basic services that are not constantly under threat by outside forces. Those are the basics for a life well lived. We are all be entitled to such a life.
All that is need to nurture the joy of living is enough. Enough economic security to pay the basics and a little more for things that bring personal enjoyment, not status purchases. Enough social support of friends and family to share our excitements and good fortune and to half our disappointments and sorrows. Enough community to have safe neighborhoods and basic services that are not constantly under threat by outside forces. Those are the basics for a life well lived. We are all be entitled to such a life.
4
In the 1960s, the low cost of living enabled the rise of the counterculture. Today: stratospheric housing / rent, student loans for unis that were once state supported (such as Berkeley, once the counterculture nexus), health care, utilities, car payments, etc etc. In such a world, any thoughts other than a laser focus on the daily fight for survival are sadly foolish meditations on long forgotten dreams. Dreams, by the way, that a previous generation could have help made a reality.
5
My husband and I were in Palo Alto not too long ago. The beautiful weather, clean neighborhoods and upscale stores and restaurants were quite different from the long winters, houses with peeling paint, Ocean State Job Lots and Dunkin Donuts we're used to here in the Northeast. It was a bit of a culture shock.
The biggest culture shock came at lunchtime in a shopping plaza across from Palo Alto High School. We were having trouble finding a place where we could afford to eat, when suddenly the plaza was flooded with high school students getting their lunches. We couldn't help wondering if any of them knew how privileged they were compared to those kids sitting in school cafeterias across the country, many of them qualifying for free lunches.
When they go into San Francisco, those teenagers from Palo Alto have to see the same homeless people we saw. They have to know at some level that their lunch money for a year could radically change the lives of scores of people in African villages. As they pull twenty-dollar bills out of their wallets without a thought do they experience some sort of cognitive dissonance? Money means so little. There's more at the ATM. Money means so much. It's what separates you from your neighbors in East Palo Alto.
In a culture in which value seems so tied to money and paradoxically money is so available it seems to have little value, where do most of us, never mind just already stressed-out teens, find real meaning?
The biggest culture shock came at lunchtime in a shopping plaza across from Palo Alto High School. We were having trouble finding a place where we could afford to eat, when suddenly the plaza was flooded with high school students getting their lunches. We couldn't help wondering if any of them knew how privileged they were compared to those kids sitting in school cafeterias across the country, many of them qualifying for free lunches.
When they go into San Francisco, those teenagers from Palo Alto have to see the same homeless people we saw. They have to know at some level that their lunch money for a year could radically change the lives of scores of people in African villages. As they pull twenty-dollar bills out of their wallets without a thought do they experience some sort of cognitive dissonance? Money means so little. There's more at the ATM. Money means so much. It's what separates you from your neighbors in East Palo Alto.
In a culture in which value seems so tied to money and paradoxically money is so available it seems to have little value, where do most of us, never mind just already stressed-out teens, find real meaning?
185
Childhood is sacred. Early years should be spent playing outside, building with blocks, reading and discovering the world. A love of learning is generally instilled in early years. As children grow older it's reasonable to have expectations for ones children: that they do their homework, study for exams, and occasionally delay gratification. Jumping through hoops, on the other hand, to complete a 'resume' in preparation for the college admissions process seems ridiculous and inauthentic.
My youngest was admitted to one of his two top colleges. His essays were his own, he took the SAT once without a prep class and steadfastly refused to do "ECs" that 'rounded out his profile.' Of course I cracked the whip now and then. While there were a few heated conversations I can confidently say that he never felt like his future was tied to being admitted to a particular college or university.
My youngest was admitted to one of his two top colleges. His essays were his own, he took the SAT once without a prep class and steadfastly refused to do "ECs" that 'rounded out his profile.' Of course I cracked the whip now and then. While there were a few heated conversations I can confidently say that he never felt like his future was tied to being admitted to a particular college or university.
18
"Sacred" it is not. Childhood is about GROWTH. Everything you say is
related to that. I agree 100%.
related to that. I agree 100%.
1
OR you can move. Palo Alto is not the only city most of these tech folks can work in -- if you have those kinds of skills and education, the world is your oyster. It's about obsession with certain places -- high status, wealthy communities -- and how people get focused on living there no matter how costly or what it means for their children.
I graduated from Palo Alto High in 1995. I went to a great college, worked for 7 years, went to law school, met my wife (also a lawyer) and we both work now in Silicon Valley. I worry that these kids don't just worry about college, but about the practical realities of ever affording a home in this area. Starter homes on the peninsula cost over $1M. Starter homes in cities with great schools cost closer to $2M. Every once in a while, I think that we should move away to somewhere more affordable. If relatively successful folks have these thoughts, how can we blame teenagers for feeling hopeless?
77
This is overblown. For every suicide there are a hundred kids who are getting a great education and are going to be exemplary contributors to making our society a lot better. Is the modern world challenging? Sure. But it's challenging in a good way: there are so many opportunities and they require ambition and energy to seize them. If we can find a way to develop children's ambition and skills while reducing the number of students who struggle or fail to thrive, that would be great. But if we throw out all of the good that comes from high-quality education and all of the things that all of those children will create and add to society, just because of a few who don't thrive, we will all regret it.
6
You make it sound like the 100:1 ratio of highly productive children to suicides makes it worthwhile. But just the opposite is true, as that one suicide is too many, and there are far more children that are highly stressed due to the competition.
Children vary in natural academic strength and mental resiliency. A parent's job is to bring out the strengths while conditioning the child to be resilient for the setbacks that inevitably occur. This is not an easy job to begin with, but is much worse when tiger parents get involved.
Children vary in natural academic strength and mental resiliency. A parent's job is to bring out the strengths while conditioning the child to be resilient for the setbacks that inevitably occur. This is not an easy job to begin with, but is much worse when tiger parents get involved.
9
The problem doesn't get any better once they are in one of those vaunted universities. I teach at one of the Ivies. There has been a rash of suicides and attempted suicides in the last year or so; the most recent one that I am aware of happened last week. Students feel intense pressure to succeed, and constantly compare themselves to their peers. Failure just is not acceptable to these kids, even though the school bends over backwards to help students who are struggling; they are not likely to be tossed out of school because they fail one course. But they take anything less than a stellar academic performance as a reflection of their own self-worth. It is hard to have any perspective and to be able to step back and reflect logically on tough times when you are so young. As a teacher, I try to give my students an approachable vibe and let them know they can always come and talk to me. But it isn't always enough.
41
What is so disheartening is that we are accepting this competitive, high pressure society as normal, when in fact it is anything but that. I remember a country where people focused on love and sharing, compassion, and building a better tomorrow. Sounds crazy and a little Pollyannaish even writing these words down now. But it was not really that long ago we talked about how to spend our leisure time and 35 hour work week. What is true is that it takes far fewer workers to produce the goods and services people need, and it is done at a constantly diminishing cost, but our economic system is completely dysfunctional in fairly distributing these goods and services. Let's be honest, there is no reason to spend 80 hours consumed in most jobs. In fact, much of what is done is repetitive or even useless. And these office jobs to nothing to advance human society. I don't have the answer, but I have many ideas. We need to start the conversation. We can start but protecting our kids and unplugging them from this pernicious system.
152
You bring up an excellent point: there is a WORLDWIDE structural problem with employment. It's even more true in Europe, with their liberal social policies, than it is in the US. And the problem is just as you state-- we have more people than every on this planet (7 BILLION), but we need fewer &fewer workers to provide all the goods and services the rest of us consume. The result is a game of musical chairs in which more and more people are left out of meaningful (or even just steady) work.
At the same time, the "haves" compete so furiously for the good schools and the nice housing and the pleasant environments, that the cost has escalated into insanity. It is truly insane that a starter house in Palo Alto can cost $2 million dollars -- even worse, that so few us are willing to point out the insanity.
Compounding this is the fact that the school systems now relentlessly drive nearly all children to attend college -- even the ones who are not ready or have no desire or aptitude. There are few other places to go. No factory jobs or opportunities for work if you don't have a minimal degree. So instead of about 1 student in 4 going to college, now it's something like 6 out of 10 -- making the competition to get in far worse, and the sense of hopelessness when facing overwhelming odds affects even normal, sane kids with good self-esteem. Imagine how horrible it is for anyone who has problems or is insecure, who must struggle with schoolwork or who is not naturally competitive.
At the same time, the "haves" compete so furiously for the good schools and the nice housing and the pleasant environments, that the cost has escalated into insanity. It is truly insane that a starter house in Palo Alto can cost $2 million dollars -- even worse, that so few us are willing to point out the insanity.
Compounding this is the fact that the school systems now relentlessly drive nearly all children to attend college -- even the ones who are not ready or have no desire or aptitude. There are few other places to go. No factory jobs or opportunities for work if you don't have a minimal degree. So instead of about 1 student in 4 going to college, now it's something like 6 out of 10 -- making the competition to get in far worse, and the sense of hopelessness when facing overwhelming odds affects even normal, sane kids with good self-esteem. Imagine how horrible it is for anyone who has problems or is insecure, who must struggle with schoolwork or who is not naturally competitive.
1
My parents were poor immigrants who were denied the education they desperately wanted. You don't have to be a wealthy Palo Alto parent to pressure your child for academic success. One of my least fond memories from elementary school was my mother chiding me: "You only got 95 on the spelling test? Why didn't you get 100?" By high school I too was having suicidal thoughts. Fortunately, I survived that bitter period, but the scars remain. I still struggle with the internalized whispers of my late mother, for whom I never could have been good enough.
138
Your mother was a person who was responsible for her life and how she had believed it including how she projected onto you; you are a person with a life of your own and you alone ought to take it into your hands to live it the way it makes sense to YOU. Our time in this world is limited but really would you be proud of yourself when your joints ache and chronic conditions take away the best of you? Sure I'm in my 7th decade so can appreciate time more, but "scars" from mother's bugging should become too faint to recognize for those who are already living independently.
I live in Palo Alto with three kids in Palo Alto schools. It is difficult to know what to do or how think about the suicide problem. It is too easy to blame the family or the school. It seems that there is something more pervasive and frankly diseased about this society. Even for parents it can be overwhelming.
Largely I think this is an adult problem (but not necessarily a parental cause). In towns like Palo Alto, being very good or even outstanding is not unique. In order to meet these benchmarks the students have to dedicate themselves in a way that is isolating and leaves very little room for failure. Adults have trouble sustaining the type of dedication that is now expected of 14 - 18 year olds.
This does not apply to just academics. In Palo Alto, if you want to be in the orchestra this will be your only activity. For sports, most kids I know have private instruction, are on traveling teams, and even have trainers.
Being very good is not even noteworthy - and the kids in this town know this. It is a common story for many kids to have SAT scores 2300 or better, A's in AP courses, and many outside activities and not get into an elite university. Only 1-2 kids from Palo Alto will be chosen from each school. The odds are stacked against even the most accomplished student.
This achievement struggle can seem relentless and often meaningless. The struggle for parents is to help your child learn to accept and find themselves in this environment.
Largely I think this is an adult problem (but not necessarily a parental cause). In towns like Palo Alto, being very good or even outstanding is not unique. In order to meet these benchmarks the students have to dedicate themselves in a way that is isolating and leaves very little room for failure. Adults have trouble sustaining the type of dedication that is now expected of 14 - 18 year olds.
This does not apply to just academics. In Palo Alto, if you want to be in the orchestra this will be your only activity. For sports, most kids I know have private instruction, are on traveling teams, and even have trainers.
Being very good is not even noteworthy - and the kids in this town know this. It is a common story for many kids to have SAT scores 2300 or better, A's in AP courses, and many outside activities and not get into an elite university. Only 1-2 kids from Palo Alto will be chosen from each school. The odds are stacked against even the most accomplished student.
This achievement struggle can seem relentless and often meaningless. The struggle for parents is to help your child learn to accept and find themselves in this environment.
48
The numbers game is now somehow liberating. I know kids who got in and kids who didnt. Same grades. Same level of achievement. I tell my teens, both at Paly, (Palo Alto High School) that if they make it into a great college, great, if they dont they are just as good or perhaps better than those who do. The admissions process is very flawed.
That people today are beating down the doors to get into higher education institutions should tell us something about our collective understanding of the purpose of higher education as well as about the integrity of the institutions.
6
Is it that everybody in the country financially beneath the successful Palo Alto parents is miserable, or that parents and children in Palo Alto have come up with unrealistic expectations, and when they are not met, the parents and children have a large negative emotional reaction and trouble regrouping?
I remember after my husband died, a friend of my mother's told me I would "adjust." It seemed to me kind of unsympathetic at the time, but we do adjust to our losses and disappointments, so long as we have adequate coping skills, we do learn to regroup and to find opportunity in new circumstances.
I remember after my husband died, a friend of my mother's told me I would "adjust." It seemed to me kind of unsympathetic at the time, but we do adjust to our losses and disappointments, so long as we have adequate coping skills, we do learn to regroup and to find opportunity in new circumstances.
12
Diana, I taught at private high school that included children of professors at a state university. They felt enormous pressure to succeed. No accomplishment was every quite good enough. The kids had very high rates of substance abuse and many were very troubled. This was years ago and they were kids of profs at an average school. I fear this kind of pressure and unrealistic expectations is now endemic in our society. It is, in my opinion, caused by the corporate ethic of competitiveness and bottom line focus subsuming all other considerations.
12
I noticed that you really liked D Brooks essay about moral virtues -- and I think, in keeping with Brooks' theme, if living the truly good life were encouraged by our society instead of longing for a commercially good life, we would all be less miserable because there is light in such a pursuit. But much American religious, legal, political and parental authority is decayed and no longer speaking to our children. Their birthright is to search for the joy of life. I hope we all wake up soon and begin pursuing lives of virtue, thereby teaching the value of same.
3
An important point - it may not be so much the actual college track process, but the relentless message that the only purpose for children and teen to exist is to perform well academically so they can get into a "good" (elitist) college and get a "good" (high-paying) job.
Some teen psychiatrists have found this empties children of any sense of self and self-worth, leading to depression, suicide, and self-destructive behaviors.
One approach is to engage in the family's historic religion, which tends to value each person as a special creature.
Some teen psychiatrists have found this empties children of any sense of self and self-worth, leading to depression, suicide, and self-destructive behaviors.
One approach is to engage in the family's historic religion, which tends to value each person as a special creature.
7
In my experience that parents and kids like this can't imagine a "good enough" middle class life. They've absorbed the idea that we live in a "winner take all," society, and that to attend a third rate college might not ensure a safe and comfortable life. A third rate degree might end with living on your parents sofa.
Can we blame them for this perception? If the Republicans have their way, affordable health care will be gone, and decent public education will be decimated. Unions are pretty much gone already and businesses have no loyalty to their workers, only to shareholders. We are approaching the day when only those who can afford to live in gated communities and pay for private everything will live a reasonably good life.
Like so many problems, this is a consequence of the war on the middle class.
Can we blame them for this perception? If the Republicans have their way, affordable health care will be gone, and decent public education will be decimated. Unions are pretty much gone already and businesses have no loyalty to their workers, only to shareholders. We are approaching the day when only those who can afford to live in gated communities and pay for private everything will live a reasonably good life.
Like so many problems, this is a consequence of the war on the middle class.
379
Blaming Republicans for high youth suicide in Palo Alto is nothing short of absurd. The rich parents in that community are likely Democrats. That does not mean I blame Democrats for their children's suicides. This is a culture thing. Too many parents make their children's success a function of their own insecurities.
5
I agree. What makes me anxious about my children's future is not that they have a million-dollar home and a Tesla (although the 6-year-old has a thing for those), but that they have *healthcare,* a fulfilling job, a way to save for retirement, time to travel and learn, to explore and create. That they have enough money for quality food, for time to stay home with their babies if they so choose, and a way to give their children the same. It just seems like that sort of life is increasingly hard to plan on. I'll keep fretting late at night, by myself!
110
If "winner takes all" is the credo that young adults subscribe to, then it's no surprise their life takes such disastrous turns. Even if parents are so stuck up on material success, what about schools, their friends, the community. If ALL is messed up then the solution is not in labour unions or saving the middle class, its' much deeper and insidious. Idolizing money, you might say, is the problem first and foremost.
4
Having lived near Stanford and taught in an adjoining town, I can attest that kids of overachieving parents rarely see their fathers, who are very busy achieving—absentee dads who regret that they weren't the next Steve Jobs.
Overachieving parents in places like Palo Alto never seem to understand that their kids are socioeconomically destined for success but that their happiness as human beings is far from assured. But people who believe in balanced lives never make it in Silicon Valley. I'm glad I left.
Overachieving parents in places like Palo Alto never seem to understand that their kids are socioeconomically destined for success but that their happiness as human beings is far from assured. But people who believe in balanced lives never make it in Silicon Valley. I'm glad I left.
145
Worse yet, they sound like they became like Steve Jobs, at least the part of abandoning his child.
The Palo Alto High problem could be very unique. A lot of students are from the families of Stanford faculty. Stanford provides allowances equal to half off the tuition price for its faculty but only at Stanford. The race is then to get into Stanford for many of these kids. The failure costs their families up to $200,000.
15
It is all the tuition cost. Tuition is waived for any family with an income under $120K at Stanford.
I read an interesting psychological study a few years ago. That children that were raised in an area where their families were average and others were super rich the average kids tended to have a much higher rate of depression and drug use. Like it or not humans have status and Palo Alto has some mind boggling wealth differences here. The median family income is $122K but that is low pay for an engineer. Wednesday I was at a meeting of some people that were working on "socially responsible" software and several were going to go to Paris for a couple of days for a get together. Imagine being a kid whose dad can't go to Paris for a smooze fest when he wants to? I would be interested to see if the children of the super rich have the same problems? I do know the children of a few and they aced all the AP stuff and sailed right into the top schools with no problems at all as far as I could see.
I read an interesting psychological study a few years ago. That children that were raised in an area where their families were average and others were super rich the average kids tended to have a much higher rate of depression and drug use. Like it or not humans have status and Palo Alto has some mind boggling wealth differences here. The median family income is $122K but that is low pay for an engineer. Wednesday I was at a meeting of some people that were working on "socially responsible" software and several were going to go to Paris for a couple of days for a get together. Imagine being a kid whose dad can't go to Paris for a smooze fest when he wants to? I would be interested to see if the children of the super rich have the same problems? I do know the children of a few and they aced all the AP stuff and sailed right into the top schools with no problems at all as far as I could see.
3
DL, I grew up in Palo Alto and my father was Stanford staff when I was growing up. The Stanford staff/faculty tuition benefit for dependents are half of Stanford's tuition toward ANY institution's tuition. I didn't attend Stanford but was able to take advantage of this benefit and not pay tuition at a Univ of CA school.
6
Stanford pays half of other college fees too. Thats not it. Enjoy Berkeley. It is less robotic than Palo Alto, although not as humane as it used to be.
The biggest psychological stressor facing the most intelligent and capable American school children today?
I would have to say the biggest stressor is the awareness--which hits the most intelligent, sensitive and capable first--of the problematic nature of the human race as a whole, our species which twists and turns on itself like a confined animal, all the war, stupidity, poverty, environmental degradation and successes in life, "the goals to shoot for" which are so often a horrible irony because often ambiguous at best as to whether making things better or worse in the world.
The most intelligent, ethical, sensitive, capable students want to help, make things better in the world, but it seems more and more only suicide or radical measures are the only course of action and thought. How is a child expected to act as weapons get more dangerous and proliferate? How to act as the environment continues to go under? How to act as technology watches all actions of a person's life from birth to adulthood? How to act when pulled from every direction and every direction is declared "road to happiness" yet the world clearly gets uglier even though cities and nations valiantly strive to put on a facade?
Generation after generation of adults have made the world better in a number of ways, but in some ominous ways which threaten to cancel all, the human race is a problem which perhaps no success can disguise and children of the future will have this fall on their shoulders.
I would have to say the biggest stressor is the awareness--which hits the most intelligent, sensitive and capable first--of the problematic nature of the human race as a whole, our species which twists and turns on itself like a confined animal, all the war, stupidity, poverty, environmental degradation and successes in life, "the goals to shoot for" which are so often a horrible irony because often ambiguous at best as to whether making things better or worse in the world.
The most intelligent, ethical, sensitive, capable students want to help, make things better in the world, but it seems more and more only suicide or radical measures are the only course of action and thought. How is a child expected to act as weapons get more dangerous and proliferate? How to act as the environment continues to go under? How to act as technology watches all actions of a person's life from birth to adulthood? How to act when pulled from every direction and every direction is declared "road to happiness" yet the world clearly gets uglier even though cities and nations valiantly strive to put on a facade?
Generation after generation of adults have made the world better in a number of ways, but in some ominous ways which threaten to cancel all, the human race is a problem which perhaps no success can disguise and children of the future will have this fall on their shoulders.
35
Excellent comment.
No mention of drugs here which are omnpresent among children and young adults.
Not just the so called hard drugs but the panoply of attention deficit reducing prescriptions and wide spread anti-depressants.
Instead of recreation and proper nutrition their parents just have them join their own simplistic answers to existential anxt -just pop a pill!
Not just the so called hard drugs but the panoply of attention deficit reducing prescriptions and wide spread anti-depressants.
Instead of recreation and proper nutrition their parents just have them join their own simplistic answers to existential anxt -just pop a pill!
10
I graduated from Palo Alto High School in May 2009, and I can't tell you how exciting it is to finally see real attention coming to this issue - which has been the status quo in the area for so long that it's hard to start momentum. Middle and high school students have been talking to each other about this for at least a decade, and there are some great parents and teachers and community members who have been concerned, but I still haven't seen any real, impactful response.
My friends and classmates from Palo Alto are some of the most wonderful, interesting, bright and motivated people I know - and this is partially because Palo Alto is an amazing place to grow up. But it can also be incredibly toxic, and so many of us carry these assaults to our mental health into our college lives and beyond.
I used to be concerned with identifying the source of the problem (parents? teachers? school policies?), but with more perspective I am now struck but the incredible resources that we have at our disposal in Palo Alto and the tremendous opportunities to use them to comprehensively address mental health. I am seeing energy build in Palo Alto and the Palo Alto alumni community, and am hopeful that we will see much needed change.
My friends and classmates from Palo Alto are some of the most wonderful, interesting, bright and motivated people I know - and this is partially because Palo Alto is an amazing place to grow up. But it can also be incredibly toxic, and so many of us carry these assaults to our mental health into our college lives and beyond.
I used to be concerned with identifying the source of the problem (parents? teachers? school policies?), but with more perspective I am now struck but the incredible resources that we have at our disposal in Palo Alto and the tremendous opportunities to use them to comprehensively address mental health. I am seeing energy build in Palo Alto and the Palo Alto alumni community, and am hopeful that we will see much needed change.
31
A few years back when I was teaching at an elite prep school in the Boston area I had my AP lit students read On The Road. The dominant response? "Why didn't Kerouac just stay at Columbia and major in Econ--He could have made a lot more money and gotten a nice house in the suburbs." We live in a world where many (perhaps even most) kids who come from the top echelons of society are raised to think the goal of life is to be a 'master of the universe' and the marks of that goal are a huge income, worldly power over other lives, and nice things/houses. This view is reinforced by the fact that the middle class appears to be steadily shrinking. The alternative to gross material success then appears to be a life of material insecurity and societal disenfranchisement. Visions of a quest for truth, justice, creative living, and spiritual fulfillment are, in this vision, mere chimera. For teens acculturated to such a view it's not that hard to see how suicide can begin to appear as a legitimate choice. Until we address the forms of spiritual and social impoverishment that plague our country and attack both elite and poor youth (albeit in different ways), we will continue to be perplexed by suicides and drug addiction (among other psycho-social afflictions).
540
Interesting.
When On The Road was first published in 1957, it was the older generation who thought Kerouac should have stayed at Columbia so he could have made more money and bought a nice house in suburbia. The young folks understood, though, and called those who aspired to a moneyed suburbia "squares."
Suburbia struck back, though, labeling the anti-materialist rebels "dirty hippies" who were out to destroy the American Way of Life. Searching for authenticity instead of a job, along with crazy ideas like peace and love, were held up as signs of weakness and depravity, "navel gazing" that was loosely associated in the public mind with Charles Manson and his murderous "family".
Solid, patriotic Americans, we were told, didn't waste their time on spiritual quests, they worked their behinds off in order to acquire a lot of money and stuff, and they kept guns to protect their stuff, and they were manly and strong and hated dirty hippies and everything associated with them.
And yet Kerouac has become more popular over the years. I couldn't find any university courses teaching Kerouac in the 1980s and regularly exhorted my English professors to include him.
Maybe there is hope for the future.
When On The Road was first published in 1957, it was the older generation who thought Kerouac should have stayed at Columbia so he could have made more money and bought a nice house in suburbia. The young folks understood, though, and called those who aspired to a moneyed suburbia "squares."
Suburbia struck back, though, labeling the anti-materialist rebels "dirty hippies" who were out to destroy the American Way of Life. Searching for authenticity instead of a job, along with crazy ideas like peace and love, were held up as signs of weakness and depravity, "navel gazing" that was loosely associated in the public mind with Charles Manson and his murderous "family".
Solid, patriotic Americans, we were told, didn't waste their time on spiritual quests, they worked their behinds off in order to acquire a lot of money and stuff, and they kept guns to protect their stuff, and they were manly and strong and hated dirty hippies and everything associated with them.
And yet Kerouac has become more popular over the years. I couldn't find any university courses teaching Kerouac in the 1980s and regularly exhorted my English professors to include him.
Maybe there is hope for the future.
2
It's sad that this generation's template is "The Hunger Games" instead of "On the Road." And it's even worse your students couldn't even comprehend that what they've been taught to value was an emotional trap Kerouac's generation had good reason to escape.
1
I'm a college professor -- in a community SO different from Palo Alto, with a high poverty rate. We have had a lot of conversations on campus about what's going on lately because it seems like WAY more of a students than even a couple years ago are having an extremely hard time just coping. Anxiety levels are up, and depression, and this year our health center has dealt with 7 suicide attempts (as of sometime in the fall when I heard about that) -- way higher than in the past. We'd been thinking the economic strain of recent years and general high stress levels about that had been the culprit. It felt like there must be something in the water! Then in recent months I've read about the decreased magnesium in soils these days (over the past few decades) and about links between magnesium and mental health, and I have started to wonder if they all could benefit from magnesium supplements. Also low Vitamin D can affect mood. That's probably NOT a factor in Palo Alto, but it sure could be around here. Seems to me it couldn't hurt to advise magnesium and Vitamin D supplements, since most of the population is low anyway.
7
A professor should know that most student's problems are psychological than dietary. I am a doctor. Overachieving is not the path to happiness. There needs to be better middle and lower class jobs as in Europe.
12
Every one of these children lost is a huge tragedy and as a parent myself, my heart goes out to the parents and of course their friends and techers.
It is an important topic to address and Mr. Bruni gives it balanced and appropriate treatment. I would just add that to stop the cycle with college admissions minimizes the challenges these kids face. Once they get into Stanford, the competition only gets tougher and the pressure only gets more intense. These children become trapped in a cycle in which they continually must pull off another trick (get into medical school, law school or a top tier MBA program) to prove their worthiness. It is a game that only a handful will "win." Those who lose will suffer from depression, self-loathing, addiction and so forth.
As Bruni notes, the messages these children receive are intentional and unintentional. Many of the expectations they incorrectly absorb in the very unusual Palo Alto socio-economic microcosm. The best thing I think parents, teachers, guidance counselors and mentors can do is try to keep the lines of communication open (very hard given this demographic) which must start before they get into the cycle and step onto the treadmill. These adults need to help these kids question their assumptions about life. What do you want to accomplish, how do you want to accomplish it and why do you want to accomplish it? What will that mean to you? What makes you believe that? Is it true?
It is an important topic to address and Mr. Bruni gives it balanced and appropriate treatment. I would just add that to stop the cycle with college admissions minimizes the challenges these kids face. Once they get into Stanford, the competition only gets tougher and the pressure only gets more intense. These children become trapped in a cycle in which they continually must pull off another trick (get into medical school, law school or a top tier MBA program) to prove their worthiness. It is a game that only a handful will "win." Those who lose will suffer from depression, self-loathing, addiction and so forth.
As Bruni notes, the messages these children receive are intentional and unintentional. Many of the expectations they incorrectly absorb in the very unusual Palo Alto socio-economic microcosm. The best thing I think parents, teachers, guidance counselors and mentors can do is try to keep the lines of communication open (very hard given this demographic) which must start before they get into the cycle and step onto the treadmill. These adults need to help these kids question their assumptions about life. What do you want to accomplish, how do you want to accomplish it and why do you want to accomplish it? What will that mean to you? What makes you believe that? Is it true?
29
What are these parents trying to achieve? Do they believe their children must mimic them the be successful? If yes - why? Seems to me they don't:
1. reallly believe their own success and need to rationalize it through duplication.
2. have no conception of the elusive goal called happiness believing somehow it relates to material wealth and the temporal security it affords.
3. have such a sure belief that they feel compelled to direct the lives of others (many camps here).
4. other..
Personally I believe this is but one sad example of the social revolution currently gaining momentum. What are we striving for? What is the concensus morality of our society? Does it include a life style requiring de facto slavery in the third world?
I don't know. Maybe there are other readers who can help. I would appreciate it much.
1. reallly believe their own success and need to rationalize it through duplication.
2. have no conception of the elusive goal called happiness believing somehow it relates to material wealth and the temporal security it affords.
3. have such a sure belief that they feel compelled to direct the lives of others (many camps here).
4. other..
Personally I believe this is but one sad example of the social revolution currently gaining momentum. What are we striving for? What is the concensus morality of our society? Does it include a life style requiring de facto slavery in the third world?
I don't know. Maybe there are other readers who can help. I would appreciate it much.
15
I appreciated your comment very much. You hit the nail on the head, for me at least, with your question "What are we striving for?" This is a question I ask every single day, of every single job/career/vocation I see. It seems that they all have one thing in common - they all strive to perpetuate a cycle (which, yes, unfortunately involves duplication, as your #1 rightly pointed out) of trying to make survival more comfortable - better products (business, industry), more equitable or efficient distribution of such products (nonprofits, law, policy) more enjoyable pastimes (entertainment, athletics, etc) without ever asking what this survival is for, ultimately. And yes, I realize that evolutionary theory strongly suggests that there is no such teleology or purpose in nature, so we probably aren't here "for" any reason beyond physics/biology running its course. These poor kids, and probably many adults, have been co-opted into this rat race thinking it somehow means something when, in all honesty, life is just an exercise in biological survival and contributing, if we can, to making that survival a bit more comfortable for ourselves and others. We really don't need to be taking it that seriously, or need to be perpetuating it, if we can help it. Just my 2 cents. Be well, folks.
Interestingly, if Mr. Bruni had just gone a few miles away, he would have come to the town of East Palo Alto. In this location, the demographics are strikingly different: largely Latino, with higher drop out and poverty rates, more gang and criminal activity. The helicopter parents of Palo Alto who only want to bequeath their wealth to their offspring ought to do some soul-searching, and seek ways to help their less fortunate neighbors---not just their children.
382
Thank you for mentioning this. I was a Stanford student in the 80's, and volunteered at a literacy program in East Palo Alto, which was then newly incorporated as a town. The stark contrasts between it and its fabled neighbors were stark, and little has improved over the years despite the booming wealth of Silicon Valley.
4
And here's the problem: so many of us see the world in a binary fashion (thanks, computer language, for making us think like you!): either you (or your kid) pops out as a wunderkind with a special and unique genius for SOMETHING (especially something that offer a high pay grade) OR the alternative is a life of poverty, misery, addiction, crime, and dealth. No growing up to be an ordinary person allowed - no fireman, teach, or letter carrier; nothing between computer whiz, financial manipulator, and out of work laborer.
We all fall for this to some degree. Perhaps the depth of this is new in human history; perhaps not - who remembers? What I recall from my own long-ago childhood was you had to ace the Algebra Regents or the alternatives were either a life of picking up garbage along the highway with a stick with a nail in the end, or coming home from Viet Nam in a body bag if you were male.
We all fall for this to some degree. Perhaps the depth of this is new in human history; perhaps not - who remembers? What I recall from my own long-ago childhood was you had to ace the Algebra Regents or the alternatives were either a life of picking up garbage along the highway with a stick with a nail in the end, or coming home from Viet Nam in a body bag if you were male.
54
I grew up in neighboring Mountain View and was in high school in the years immediately following 9/11. I had had a host of behavioral and emotional problems growing up that culminated in a 22 month detour in residential therapy, so when I returned to my mainstream high school I felt hopelessly off the rails of the track on which everyone else was at full steam ahead. Given the extent of my earlier struggles, the adults in my life wisely cautioned a gradual transition back into high school life, but in that pressure cooker environment, my year and half in what was academically a continuation school and my initially lighter course load upon my return just inspired feelings of profound inadequacy. I felt so inferior to my peers and so unlikely to be worthy of realizing my own dreams that I never noticed I wasn't struggling with AP Chemistry homework or Honors Trigonometry exams the way everyone else was. The simple truth is that the communities surrounding Stanford have enculturated their children in an environment in which no one, no matter how gifted, no matter how talented, is ever good enough. There are far bigger problems in the world -- how fortunate I and my peers were to live in a community with so little want and so much opportunity! -- but it is no surprise that the train tracks behind the football field at Paly have become such a common suicide spot.
279
An important issue, to be sure. Thanks Frank for addressing it. As I read through the college-bound stressors in CA and other pockets of affluence, I couldn't help but think of other causes much in the news of late, regarding the psyches of adolescents.
I'm thinking, naturally, of the nastiness of online media and the culture of bullying and taunting kids that don't fit in. Many a teen suicide has been linked to this taunting, such as the suicide of Phoebe Prince in Holyoke MA, and others. The town next to me is Lexington, also an affluent pressure cooker of a town where I know too many parents of teens that fall prey to substance abuse and other social maladies in response to the nonstop stress from hypercompetition.
A lot is always said about parents who want their kids to have a better life than they had. But when they are already at the apex of achievement, they don't seem to realize what pressure this puts their offspring, who surely see the disconnect.
I don't know how many more kids need to lose their lives before their is a seismic shift in how parents view the rat races they're subjecting their kids to. Adolescence shouldn't be a time of lost sleep, hypervigiliance, and envy of their peers. Because it's one thing to bring kids up in this self-imposed environment, and quite another to have to watch helplessly as they carry such burdens into their adult life with the brains and internal damage of middle age burnout.
I'm thinking, naturally, of the nastiness of online media and the culture of bullying and taunting kids that don't fit in. Many a teen suicide has been linked to this taunting, such as the suicide of Phoebe Prince in Holyoke MA, and others. The town next to me is Lexington, also an affluent pressure cooker of a town where I know too many parents of teens that fall prey to substance abuse and other social maladies in response to the nonstop stress from hypercompetition.
A lot is always said about parents who want their kids to have a better life than they had. But when they are already at the apex of achievement, they don't seem to realize what pressure this puts their offspring, who surely see the disconnect.
I don't know how many more kids need to lose their lives before their is a seismic shift in how parents view the rat races they're subjecting their kids to. Adolescence shouldn't be a time of lost sleep, hypervigiliance, and envy of their peers. Because it's one thing to bring kids up in this self-imposed environment, and quite another to have to watch helplessly as they carry such burdens into their adult life with the brains and internal damage of middle age burnout.
26
Even when you win the rat race, you're still a rat..Lily Tomlin.
2
First let's remember compassion for the families of those dead children. Now here's a thought on the economic psychology of this kind of competition. What do people think they are buying with that college tuition? Is it an investment? Clearly not, or not exclusively. The high default rate on student loans challenges the conclusion that the tuition is an investment. Is it consumption? Well, a little of course -- college is fun, but not $250,000 worth. The fear, or anxiety, described in the article brings us closer to the next alternative: insurance. Supposedly it protects our kids from falling through the cracks in society that so many other commenters rightly point to as perhaps a greater issue. But what kind of society is it that requires $250,000 or so to protect people from social distress. So what is college? It is a tournament. Where bright kids rush through increasingly narrow doors -- AP classes, Stanford, law school/business school, top banks -- or try to. What we should teach the kids to do is look for that open door that no one else is thinking about or even sees. What does society lack that you can give it? What is your unique vision or gift? These are the kind of questions that lead to balance and fulfillment -- from teachers and social workers to founders of billion dollar companies. Education can contribute deeply to this kind of success, once we stop viewing it as a tournament, and use it as a path to that open door that no one else has thought to walk through.
57
And let's break this down. $250,000. For 4 years of college. That's tremendous pressure on families - and on the kids. They have to achieve to have a return on the parental investment -- and that doesn't count those who rely on student loans.
Colleges should not cost so much money. That is a travesty.
And don't count on any Presidential candidate to do a thing about this. Obama is at least trying on the community college level but most affluent parents want their kids to enter a 4-year institution.
Colleges should not cost so much money. That is a travesty.
And don't count on any Presidential candidate to do a thing about this. Obama is at least trying on the community college level but most affluent parents want their kids to enter a 4-year institution.
23
Deeply sad that the mental health of teenagers in the overachieving Palo Alto area and other rich and competitive overachievers' neighborhoods in the US has been eroded to the extent that young people commit suicide "by train". Parenting of the richest 1% among us is poor - no matter how much money and material goods the parents have. If they overstress their children to achieve good grades so they can achieve a "great" education (such as at Stanford University) they are helicoptering their children toward mental illness, toward depression.. You mentioned, Frank Bruni, that you saw crossing guards as sentries at Palo Alto railroad crossings to lookout for possible teen suicides by train. this is beyond spine-chilling to those of us who parented our children in the 1960s and 1970s, giving them free rein to try anything (wrestling, football, bad spelling, "the Flintstones"and "The Muppets", riding city buses alone) and now we watch them parent their children. How terrible the teen-aged people must feel in those "epicenters of overachievement" where affluence and depression are running amok in families that focus on achievement instead of living. These parents do not understand the sweet basic tenets of our brief lives - that less is more. That love of learning is more important than getting into any college, that a successful life means different things to different young people. Parents who spoonfeed their growing children with false values instill fear in them.
75
Less is more. You're right.
I spent a lifetime overshopping and filling up my apartment like a hoarder because I lacked a college education and wanted to show people that I was as well read as anyone who graduated Brooklyn College much less Harvard. Eventually I did go back to school and obtain degrees but it took a long time to learn that less is more. Most of the books that I never even read were donated (and I kept a lot of my own favorite books).
The point is that our society and economy are dependent on spending, on achieving, on college success. Christmas and now even Easter are filled with pleas to buy, buy, buy. How many Easter Egg Hunts did I see last week? Never before did I see so many references to Easter Parties. I spent $150 on an Easter dinner in a restaurant.
There is an illness here and it is the need to buy more and more. And how will that really help our children. The best college, the best car, etc. It becomes an illness.
What really helped was taking the classes I wanted to, learning what I wanted to. Then I was motivated to actually get a degree.
I spent a lifetime overshopping and filling up my apartment like a hoarder because I lacked a college education and wanted to show people that I was as well read as anyone who graduated Brooklyn College much less Harvard. Eventually I did go back to school and obtain degrees but it took a long time to learn that less is more. Most of the books that I never even read were donated (and I kept a lot of my own favorite books).
The point is that our society and economy are dependent on spending, on achieving, on college success. Christmas and now even Easter are filled with pleas to buy, buy, buy. How many Easter Egg Hunts did I see last week? Never before did I see so many references to Easter Parties. I spent $150 on an Easter dinner in a restaurant.
There is an illness here and it is the need to buy more and more. And how will that really help our children. The best college, the best car, etc. It becomes an illness.
What really helped was taking the classes I wanted to, learning what I wanted to. Then I was motivated to actually get a degree.
25
Please, can we stop idolizing the parenting of the 60s and 70s? I grew up in the 70s and attended a middle-class high school far from Palo Alto. In high school, one of my best friends attempted suicide and passed it off to her mother as an accidental overdose of pain medication. I knew many more who spent most of their spare time high or drunk. I can still name the drug dealers in the school - one was so popular he was elected class president. None of their parents had a clue -- until their kid came home in the back of a police car.
4
Nan, to some extent, how our generation raises our kids is a reaction to how your generation raised your kids. Where do you suppose we learned our values?
I'm so relieved I don't have to be a teenager in Palo Alto. My personal experience is growing up where taking yourself or your studies too seriously was a ticket to social isolation, and that was a failure beyond any. What made life as a teenager enjoyable were friends, hanging out and sports. My class cruised along, got horrible and good grades, got serious the last year of high school, got stressed for a few months getting into college and again in the last year then went on to success, to each at his own merit. Top executives, middle managers, inventors, professors, teachers, businessmen and women, engineers, a lawyer, a farmer, and not a few MD's and PhD's among that class of 70 students. The key ingredient was that we were at ease, both teachers and students. I don't remember a single time when a student was too upset about their grades. They even included a serial tech entrepreneur who made a lot of money and not in Silcon Valley. It didn't matter whether we were in the top 1% or 10% or even top 60% of the class. There was practically no serious competition, perhaps because exams were twice a year. There was a place for everyone economically, and all that changed was the brand of car you got or whether you flew first class or economy. Otherwise, we each got what every human being needs: immediate and extended family with time to enjoy them, friends, a retirement, equal healthcare and personal safety. Hint: this wasn't in America, and not even in Europe.
93
Ok, out with it then: Africa? asia? tralfamador?
One possible explanation is the fact that we tend to glorify suicide. I had a friend commit suicide, he was a fifty something gentleman who had a lot to live for, and he left behind a beautiful family. At his funeral there was no anger expressed at him, all of the speakers talked about was how much he'd be missed and what a great guy he was. I truly believe that if the same thing were to occur at a teenagers funeral many impressionable young people could be moved to see suicide as an acceptable end to a life.
In addition we as a society are failing to make our children resilient. A previous comment noted how the children of the affluent don't face the true hurdles those of poverty face. I often think that we as a society are failing to teach our children resiliency. In an article I read years ago a university professor lamented about how today's generation were either Crispies or Teacups, and by that he meant that they were either pre burnt out from excessive cramming in HS or their ego's were to fragile and cracked under the slightest criticism.
In addition we as a society are failing to make our children resilient. A previous comment noted how the children of the affluent don't face the true hurdles those of poverty face. I often think that we as a society are failing to teach our children resiliency. In an article I read years ago a university professor lamented about how today's generation were either Crispies or Teacups, and by that he meant that they were either pre burnt out from excessive cramming in HS or their ego's were to fragile and cracked under the slightest criticism.
16
It's not just children in high school who are failures at resiliency; college students seem to have an aversion to being ... challenged by ideas that make them ... uncomfortable. And the response by the adult community is to provide safe spaces where uncomfortable ideas will never be introduced, to warn students that uncomfortable ideas will be introduced and discussed so that the students may be excused from attending, or by banning challenging ideas totally from the campus. Rather than "Crispies or Teacups," a more appropriate symbol would be the proverbial Ostrich with his head buried in the sand.
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/22/opinion/sunday/judith-shulevitz-hiding...
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/22/opinion/sunday/judith-shulevitz-hiding...
21
Yes, I don't understand this new trend in colleges where people need to be warned before hearing content. I'm someone whose life was transformed by college and what I learned there. It wasn't even the content that was so shocking (most of the time) but learning about the origins of the slave trade in America as well as Jim Crow in the American South.
As for warnings, I recall one teacher, before showing us a film on the Holocaust, telling us that we could leave the room if it was too much for us. I stayed. That was 20 years ago and was the only time in a 25 year career taking college courses (1980-2005) in which a professor gave us the option to leave.
College is to hear the hard stuff that we didn't learn about in our public schools. We grew up learning that Washington and Jefferson were great people. In college, I actually got to read some of what Jefferson said about Blacks and was shocked. And I had no idea that George Washington owned slaves.
And in English class, we read Huckleberry Finn and was startled at the ease the white teacher had in saying the "n" word. This was in 1981; I don't think she'd be as cavalier today.
The world is a hard place. College is a place to get out of our comfort zones. Now if someone is blatantly discriminatory, that is a totally different story. But wanting to go to a safe space and play with play-doh, as described in an article from a few weeks ago, is bewildering to say the least.
As for warnings, I recall one teacher, before showing us a film on the Holocaust, telling us that we could leave the room if it was too much for us. I stayed. That was 20 years ago and was the only time in a 25 year career taking college courses (1980-2005) in which a professor gave us the option to leave.
College is to hear the hard stuff that we didn't learn about in our public schools. We grew up learning that Washington and Jefferson were great people. In college, I actually got to read some of what Jefferson said about Blacks and was shocked. And I had no idea that George Washington owned slaves.
And in English class, we read Huckleberry Finn and was startled at the ease the white teacher had in saying the "n" word. This was in 1981; I don't think she'd be as cavalier today.
The world is a hard place. College is a place to get out of our comfort zones. Now if someone is blatantly discriminatory, that is a totally different story. But wanting to go to a safe space and play with play-doh, as described in an article from a few weeks ago, is bewildering to say the least.
9
My perception is that suicide rates are higher (or hopefully lower)
for all, minors and adults.
Furthermore, driving while drunk/high/drugged is an attempt at suicide, and when that unproven/unconscious death-wish is "successful," who knows the real rate?
Reaching/maintaining desirable social-economic income and/or class is what generally makes us all run, isn't it?
The 1960s youth rebellion has had true effects/influences upon today, while apparently "the greening" is not necessarily prevailing, which I interpret as the theme of your column about "affluenza."
The de-criminalization of marijuana IS an effect today, and (I hope) superior to reliance upon the more traditional drug fortification known as alcohol. Though that's still a debate about a "kinder/gentler" drug versus alcohol.
The attainment of balance or mental health is your overall point, and who could disagree.
for all, minors and adults.
Furthermore, driving while drunk/high/drugged is an attempt at suicide, and when that unproven/unconscious death-wish is "successful," who knows the real rate?
Reaching/maintaining desirable social-economic income and/or class is what generally makes us all run, isn't it?
The 1960s youth rebellion has had true effects/influences upon today, while apparently "the greening" is not necessarily prevailing, which I interpret as the theme of your column about "affluenza."
The de-criminalization of marijuana IS an effect today, and (I hope) superior to reliance upon the more traditional drug fortification known as alcohol. Though that's still a debate about a "kinder/gentler" drug versus alcohol.
The attainment of balance or mental health is your overall point, and who could disagree.
2
Suicides and buckling under social pressures to succeed? The rate of student suicides in East-Asia has been consistently higher than that in America. In East-Asia, where the right of parents to push their children to succeed and excel is supported by the common belief that failure to achieve is traced solely to one's own lack of effort. It is common for parents nurtured in the Confucian tradition to remind their children that the latter's failure to excel in all matters academic just as their neighbor's son (or some legendary overachiever) are entirely their own fault. Before we hasten to condemn these parents, it is worth noting that the success of their children may be the only way for them to escape crushing poverty. American parents referred to in this article are a light year away from poverty. They would do well to understand that no matter how much effort they exert on their children to excel or surpass them, a vast majority of their children will revert to the mean. Parents may propose, bu Nature disposes.
19
The last three Palo Alto suicides this year have been Asian kids. Fact.
Mr. Bruni evinces concern for the over-worked, over-pressured adolescents of Palo Alto. The competition to which they are subject is unhealthy and fails to support intellectual curiosity, a love of learning, and social-emotional development. Yet Mr. Bruni consistently supports the educational schemes and calls for "rigor" that hold up the kind of education these children are receiving as a common good. The contradiction is stunning.
9
I think overworked students and underachievers are two entirely different populations.
26
The downside to not being "successful" in this country is becoming increasingly fraught - basics such as rent, healthcare, higher education, requires money. Getting money means getting a good job in a still weak economy. No wonder these young people are terrified of failing. And they're seeing their parents increasingly walking a razor's edge keeping a job, and if they lose it, the results of age discrimination. The US is a hard place to fledge these days, even for kids with every privilege available.
513
...and I thought I was pressured in an excellent suburban high school from 1962-68! Despite the Kennedy assassinations and that of Martin Luther King, and the developing Vietnam War, not to mention "Silent Spring" (the dangers of pollution), the Cuban missile crisis, above-ground nuclear tests, Strontium 90, and the Berlin Wall, that was a hopeful time compared with the current age of the endless "war on terror" and "starving the beast" to delegitimize government at all levels, science, and facts.
Today's adolescents--and their parents--live in a much harsher environment than that in which I grew up. Perhaps the best reflection of their pressures is a dystopic science-fiction film entitled Gattica (1997)--see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gattaca
I'm also reminded of the repulsive Rush Limbaugh, and once hearing his heartless, inhumane discussion of teen suicide on the radio...his kind are part of the problem, not its solution.
Today's adolescents--and their parents--live in a much harsher environment than that in which I grew up. Perhaps the best reflection of their pressures is a dystopic science-fiction film entitled Gattica (1997)--see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gattaca
I'm also reminded of the repulsive Rush Limbaugh, and once hearing his heartless, inhumane discussion of teen suicide on the radio...his kind are part of the problem, not its solution.
19
Our society, and it's American Dream, always has been focused on UPWARD mobility -- acquiring more symbols of career "success" than the previous generation. At the very least, the socio-economic status of high-achiever parents must me matched. Otherwise offspring are judged as failures. In fact they may be nothing more than quite normally average achievers, simply misplaced in expectation. They had the misfortune not to be born and reared in blue collar neighborhoods, where they would have been seen as quite normal.
In the process of focusing on The American Dream we have forgotten the plight of those who are merely normal, average kids who happen to have well above-average achievers as parents. How do they acquire a sense of worth and dignity when reared in isolated "success-oriented" suburban neighborhoods, in which they cannot possibly remain as self-supporting adults?
It is tragic and needs more recognition and thought -- much, much more. Those of us who were fortunate to have been upwardly mobile and to live in those "success-oriented" suburbs see it all around us. Kids who elsewhere might be perceived as quite normal and acceptable are treated as mental patients who need therapy to become more like their parents, and live up to school board expectations. They end up confused and disappointed in themselves, for simply being average.
In the process of focusing on The American Dream we have forgotten the plight of those who are merely normal, average kids who happen to have well above-average achievers as parents. How do they acquire a sense of worth and dignity when reared in isolated "success-oriented" suburban neighborhoods, in which they cannot possibly remain as self-supporting adults?
It is tragic and needs more recognition and thought -- much, much more. Those of us who were fortunate to have been upwardly mobile and to live in those "success-oriented" suburbs see it all around us. Kids who elsewhere might be perceived as quite normal and acceptable are treated as mental patients who need therapy to become more like their parents, and live up to school board expectations. They end up confused and disappointed in themselves, for simply being average.
5
Excellent, very timely column, Mr. Bruni. Julie Lythcott-Haims has a lot to tell us if we are willing to listen to her prescriptions, working in association with many others who have diligently endeavored to swing back the pendulum away from "overprotective... overbearing, micromanaging" parenting to the more hands-off approach of the past. It is fair to wonder if today's young people are telling us something, too, by their words and by their thankfully very rare but fateful acts.
"Want the best for your child, not for your child to be the best." That is an excellent motto, but it demands a real maturity from parents, in addition to a fresh awareness. It is easy to formulate a strategy that will push your child to be the best; it is much more difficult to stand aside, watching from a close but respectful distance, as your child makes her or his way in the world. Thanks to the impressive efforts of a lot of people, though, we are making it more likely that future parents will choose to emphasize the first part of that motto over the second.
"Want the best for your child, not for your child to be the best." That is an excellent motto, but it demands a real maturity from parents, in addition to a fresh awareness. It is easy to formulate a strategy that will push your child to be the best; it is much more difficult to stand aside, watching from a close but respectful distance, as your child makes her or his way in the world. Thanks to the impressive efforts of a lot of people, though, we are making it more likely that future parents will choose to emphasize the first part of that motto over the second.
21
Perhaps Herman Hess's book " Beneath the Wheel" should be required reading in HS. This is not a new problem, and surfaced in Other cultures before. I think it can only be resolved by making the children aware of what is being done to them. They will then take care of themselves by rebelling where necessary.
9
For children who feel that every niche has been identified and recorded, finding you way forward is difficult. Rage against the machine. For parents who desire their children to aspire to greatness, share as much of the world as you can. Literature, art, music, nature, culture, geography, religion. all of the societal innovations to date.
Kids need to have a clean window on the world, not one smudged with finger prints of their parents pointing out what was important for them.
Kids need to have a clean window on the world, not one smudged with finger prints of their parents pointing out what was important for them.
49
According to the 2013 CDC survey cited, 12% of high school students have attempted suicide--that's 2-3 kids per classroom, have attempted suicide. Yikes!
We as parents have to look at what we are teaching our kids, by how we treat them and ourselves. It's hard to admit, but I see well-meaning parents teaching blame, self-doubt, and over-insensitivity. Add that to the teenage brain which is chemically overwhelmed by changes and hormones, and it's a disaster.
If we can learn how to be more resilient, more balanced, more calm and happy, then we can train our kids to face and deal with the issues they'll face as teens and adults.
Not everyone needs therapy (Cognitive Behavioral Therapy is one approach). But we all can take a hard look at the results--our suffering kids--and ask what we can change in ourselves, to teach our kids what they need to survive emotionally.
We as parents have to look at what we are teaching our kids, by how we treat them and ourselves. It's hard to admit, but I see well-meaning parents teaching blame, self-doubt, and over-insensitivity. Add that to the teenage brain which is chemically overwhelmed by changes and hormones, and it's a disaster.
If we can learn how to be more resilient, more balanced, more calm and happy, then we can train our kids to face and deal with the issues they'll face as teens and adults.
Not everyone needs therapy (Cognitive Behavioral Therapy is one approach). But we all can take a hard look at the results--our suffering kids--and ask what we can change in ourselves, to teach our kids what they need to survive emotionally.
11
I thought your 12% figure had to be massively wrong. It is wrong but not massively, the CDC reports: "7.8% of students reported that they had attempted
suicide one or more times during the 12 months
preceding the survey "http://www.cdc.gov/ViolencePrevention/pdf/Suicide-DataSheet-a.pdf
Still a shocking and sickening number.
suicide one or more times during the 12 months
preceding the survey "http://www.cdc.gov/ViolencePrevention/pdf/Suicide-DataSheet-a.pdf
Still a shocking and sickening number.
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Thanks. It's 12% considered suicide (3-4 kids per class); 8% attempted (2-3 kids per class). (Class size of 24-36 kids.)
And yes, shocking and sickening.
And yes, shocking and sickening.
Sorry for being callous. But the stress of the Palo Alto kids pales in comparison with real, physical, unrelenting stress kids face in downtown cities and other low-income, barren, decrepit, jobless towns. Hunger-pangs, homelessness,
crime, constant threat to life are very real. A child becomes mentally, physically, emotionally stunted - an irreversible process. Their choices are not best of the bet but worst of the worst and it is NOT a choice at all because they have no choices. I'm sorry but I cannot empathize with a case of Affluenza.
crime, constant threat to life are very real. A child becomes mentally, physically, emotionally stunted - an irreversible process. Their choices are not best of the bet but worst of the worst and it is NOT a choice at all because they have no choices. I'm sorry but I cannot empathize with a case of Affluenza.
467
There also can be stress in being a member of the affluenza -- Mental disease is not understood. And one can irrationally perhaps fear poverty -- as much or more as those who have learned to cope with it. One can be impoverished and have more social support than a member of a so-called elite but possibly very isolated group.
48
Perhaps heartless is more accurate. Bright, hard working students jumping in front of trains is something we should all be alarmed about. Perhaps this is the canary in the coal mine for the future of our society. Unfortunately, you don't realize that most people living here are far from affluent. Every cent of income goes to making ends meet even here. The people may be engineers who go where the job opportunities are, but the cost of living is so sky high, that homelessness and feeding the hungry is a real problem even in Palo Alto. It's hardly a case of affluenza.
11
I think you are way off track. The poor kids are often the ones who have the most freedom. No he is telling them what to do with their day. The problem is that they don't get goid examples for making the best choices of what to do with that freedom. I grew up somewhat poor and know of what I speak. I was free to try to make the best grades or not. I choose to do so. The motivation was from me. Having made the choice to achieve academically, I still had more freedom than these kids regarding what to learn and which interests to pursue.
I think people are best left to their own choices even when others think them bad ones. That is hard for prophets, politicians and parents.
I think people are best left to their own choices even when others think them bad ones. That is hard for prophets, politicians and parents.
1
Perhaps the kids are sensing at home the same things that have driven up the overall suicide rate:
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/rundown/chart-americas-rising-suicide-problem/
but do not have enough life experience/grit to know ' things change '.
This column also highlights the fact that income/wealth inequality is fracturing even the tippy top of society, as 1/10th%-ers leave behind the rest of mere 1%-ers, not to mention 2%-ers and 3%-ers, who are beginning to realize they'll never be 1/10th%-ers themselves.
Income/wealth inequality and the stunting of mobility has not been discussed enough in terms of what it does to aspirations of the young.
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/rundown/chart-americas-rising-suicide-problem/
but do not have enough life experience/grit to know ' things change '.
This column also highlights the fact that income/wealth inequality is fracturing even the tippy top of society, as 1/10th%-ers leave behind the rest of mere 1%-ers, not to mention 2%-ers and 3%-ers, who are beginning to realize they'll never be 1/10th%-ers themselves.
Income/wealth inequality and the stunting of mobility has not been discussed enough in terms of what it does to aspirations of the young.
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I estimate takes roughly a top 5% income to be able to afford to live modestly in a town with great schools, and be able to save for your children's college fund, and to eventually save for retirement. While you are living better than the vast majority of people, a job loss of 6 months may mean losing your home because you are quite stretched. These are the families where I expect the most stress to happen, because the parents are "investing" in their children by paying the higher costs of the town with the great school district, and the expectations of the kids is very high.
Once you are in the top 1% (even near the bottom of it, where I am currently), life becomes much easier. Saving, whether for college or retirement, is handled quite easily. And it is easy to live comfortably in many towns with great school districts. The pressure on the kids decreases.
That is, unless I choose to live in a town like Palo Alto, where due to the costs I would be again living modestly, have little savings, and be just a short job loss away from losing everything. I can understand the very rich living in Palo Alto, but why would anyone else want to live there?
Once you are in the top 1% (even near the bottom of it, where I am currently), life becomes much easier. Saving, whether for college or retirement, is handled quite easily. And it is easy to live comfortably in many towns with great school districts. The pressure on the kids decreases.
That is, unless I choose to live in a town like Palo Alto, where due to the costs I would be again living modestly, have little savings, and be just a short job loss away from losing everything. I can understand the very rich living in Palo Alto, but why would anyone else want to live there?
3
This is just the tip of a nationwide iceberg. It goes along with the way modern America (unless its poor, which leads to other problems) raises its children, from being scared into accepting high-stakes testing, to framing education solely in terms job-training, to subjecting them to constant adult supervision any time they venture outside the home. It's hard to expect them to become well-functioning adults if they aren't raised to be increasingly autonomous as children.
191
Where is the high stakes testing?
If you are referring to the SAT, it is just the opposite. It is not particularly hard, can be studied for, and can be taken multiple times. It has an impact on college acceptances, but there are many good schools that don't require it.
High stakes testing occurs in places like Korea, which has a national test day. Businesses start late that day so that the roads are clear for students to get to the test center. Airplanes are not allowed to fly when the all important language listening test occurs. And the test determines the opportunities in your life. That is high stakes testing.
If you are referring to the SAT, it is just the opposite. It is not particularly hard, can be studied for, and can be taken multiple times. It has an impact on college acceptances, but there are many good schools that don't require it.
High stakes testing occurs in places like Korea, which has a national test day. Businesses start late that day so that the roads are clear for students to get to the test center. Airplanes are not allowed to fly when the all important language listening test occurs. And the test determines the opportunities in your life. That is high stakes testing.
6
"If you are referring to the SAT, it is just the opposite."
That's YOUR view, and not necessarily the view of stressed American teenagers who feel they must get excellent SAT scores to get into the college of their (and their parents') dreams.
The whole point of the article is that we should lessen that stress, and provide a more realistic view of the SAT and its importance to American students.
Because Korea has a different cultural approach to education doesn't discount what's happening to American teens.
That's YOUR view, and not necessarily the view of stressed American teenagers who feel they must get excellent SAT scores to get into the college of their (and their parents') dreams.
The whole point of the article is that we should lessen that stress, and provide a more realistic view of the SAT and its importance to American students.
Because Korea has a different cultural approach to education doesn't discount what's happening to American teens.
3