“How many APs are you taking?” has become one of the most common questions asked when talking about school. It has become the bare minimum to take at least a couple weighted classes per year, but why is this necessary?
The college application process, for many high school students, is the most important and high-stakes task. Students spend their academic careers accumulating material to share on their application. Every year the competition for the top colleges grows, showing no sign of slowing down. Every student wants to highlight their uniqueness and exemplify what it means to be extraordinary; hoping they will be the student the admissions committee picks to be their next alumnus.
In a world where the description “average” can coincide with great embarrassment , many students want to seize any opportunity that can make themselves stand out: founding a club, start-up, or other passion project. Something that differentiates a student from the other thousands of pre-meds or computer science majors, which are careers that we’re told have the most potential for success in the future. Students hone their skills just to write on a piece of paper or shove in someone else’s face. Passions are often discarded and replaced with skills we are told will make us successful in life, will give us security of our future and help us into a good school. Why waste your time taking drama when you can take a second science?
I talked to sophomore Eric Ouyang, a student who, since freshman year, has taken weighted classes and joined clubs in order to get into a college of his choice. As a Sophmore, Eric is in AP Calculus and AP Chemistry, while also being an active part of clubs like Speech and Debate and Science Alliance.
“I think all the clubs here are good enough…. I like being in a lot of them. You know, going forward, they’re not exactly my passion, but they’re something I enjoy.”
When asked if he ever worries about not getting into college, Ouyang said honestly– “Every single day; every waking moment of my breath— [I mean] not getting into a good college”
Even in fields students not interested in, they’re told to advance— to show their aptitude in every subject, that you can spread yourself thin and still handle everything on your plate.
Even as students’ mental health deteriorates and they find themselves forgetting to hold club meetings, they are condemned for not being able to juggle it all.
But are students really the ones we should be blaming? Senior English teacher Ms. Lawrence believes the issue is bigger than on an individual level. “Our college system, and what they’re asking kids to do and be is a little outrageous.” Although kids are doing activities performatively, she believes they are justified in doing so. “Do I feel like kids are doing volunteer stuff just for colleges? Yeah I think so, but the expectations are so high, why wouldn’t you?”.
In the race to seem the most interesting, gifted, and remarkable, the admissions process has made students achieve new academic heights, at the price of their authenticity.
