Fast Track to Success

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My parents immigrated to the US from Taiwan in the late sixties and eventually settled in Southern California.  My dad was an engineer and my mom was a nurse. They worked hard and saved money to invest in a small multi-family property that over time they would trade for more units. My parents also bought and flipped the homes we lived in which dictated where we lived and went to school.  By the time I was in junior high we had settled into a permanent home and my sisters and I into the Garden Grove Unified School District.


Freshman year of high school l I became ambitious. Nobody pushed me, it just happened. After a childhood of not fitting in and prejudiced taunting (Hey Chink, Jap, Slanty-Eyes, etc.), I finally found my groove in academics.  It was like a button was pressed and I just started to Go. I chose the hardest classes, piled on a wide-range of extra-curricular activities, furiously practiced the piano, and pushed myself to acquire leadership positions to assemble the strongest college application possible for admittance into a prestigious university.  Since my high school was not particularly competitive and my relentless effort not the norm, I was rewarded with straight A’s. And so I pushed myself more. I excelled academically and earned numerous department awards. I took the maximum number of A.P units. I placed in piano competitions and studied abroad. I lead community service projects and participated in academic competitions. I joined numerous clubs (many of which I had no interest in or talent for)  knowing it would look impressive on my college application. All my hard work culminated at the end of my senior year with one particularly thick envelope in the mailbox: I got into Stanford.


Comments

  1. UnknownSeptember 30, 2018 at 10:41 AM

    Thanks for sharing your story Tina. This begs the question. When is the best time and place to explore career interests? If the kids are bogged down by extra curricular activities (whether self imposed or parent imposed), where is the mental space to observe themselves, their likes/dislikes, exploration, etc.? If they are on a hamster wheel just "trying to get in," they might be disillusioned once they get in and don't know where they are going. A big problem is "the system." They don't feel they have the luxury to explore, they just need to be competitive and get in and sort things out later. But we, as parents, know what the proper and correct course of action should be. We don't have to fall prey to the college admissions frenzy and let our kids be ruined in the process.

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