Watching Megan go through the college admissions process has been really hard.
On the one hand, I fully get why we have quotas and the need for diversity. I support it. If I were an elected official I’d vote for affirmative action in college admissions every time. Why? Because achievement isn’t just a personal accomplishment it’s also the result of a system that benefits some more than others. As a result, to make things more equitable, you have to favor one group or class over those who may have been more privileged the whole time.
On the other hand, it sucks when your kid has worked her butt off and the simple reality is it probably won’t matter because the scales are tipped in favor of others.
In high school, she literally could not have done more. She went to the only high school she got into via the lottery system. She took the hardest schedule her school has ever produced, completing 4 years of math in 2, taking every AP class she could, every dual immersion class they offered, she’s a class officer, volunteered like crazy, and interned along the way. She got the highest PSAT, then SAT, in her school’s history. She’ll graduate with the highest GPA in the school’s history– a reluctant valedictorian. And while it doesn’t show up on her transcript in most of her classes she finished with far more than 100% because she did all the extra credit, too. Because that’s what she does. Everything.
Admissions officers will never know she did all of these things not because of her school’s amazing curriculum but despite its failures. Her counselor and the principal barely knew her name until the day she got her SAT’s back in the Spring of junior year. But they know her name now. So do their donors. In truth, she’s never had a science teacher for an entire year. So many teachers… Turnover in charters is a problem and boy has she suffered through it. By graduation only 2 teachers will remain from her first year. Maybe. Three different people taught her AP Chemistry class last year because they quit, got fired, or just dropped off the planet. Consequently, they only got through half the material. So when she wasn’t in China last summer she completely re-taught herself her AP Chemistry class, all by herself, so she’d be prepared to take the SAT subject test… which she did while we were on vacation. Of course, she did great on that too because that’s what she does.
Looking back, this kid couldn’t have done more. And she made it look easy. Fun almost.
I think it’s awesome when kids get into their dream schools. Children of immigrants, refugee kids, kids who were homeless, or in foster care, or disadvantaged because of their race, ethnicity, gender identity. I cry when I watch videos of those kids opening up their emails and learning that their dream school selected them.
But my kid has dreams too, you know? I long to watch her celebrate like the kids in those videos. I want her to know that all that hard work has paid off. She too is hoping one of those big, fancy schools selects her. And who knows? Maybe they will? But probably not.
Over the past few months I’ve watched her pour herself into selecting the right schools for the right reasons, working tirelessly on essays– pulling all-nighters, getting recommendations, and everything else while raising her GPA even higher and managing an internship.
I say all of this because it’s been hard to watch Megan navigate an admissions system that, because of reasons we intellectually agree with, is built to favor things she can’t change about herself. She’s done all of the work but this system isn’t built as a meritocracy, it simply doesn’t favor her. She’s too normal. She’s just another middle class white girl with perfect everything. Dime a dozen.
And so we wait. She gets it. We get it. I get it.
But it’s hard.
Justice is a Funny Thing
Postscript
I wrote this angsty little essay on January 4th, 2019 as a reflection on all of the effort that goes into just applying to colleges. At the time she had submitted everything and was just beginning two months of waiting.
I decided to hold the essay instead of publishing it in the moment so that the dust could settle on the process. I’m glad I did.
Ultimately, she was accepted at 5 of the 11 schools she applied to. 5 acceptances, 5 rejections, 1 waitlist. Everything is peachy.
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