Bookworm

Good Luck Getting in to an Ivy League School

"Harvard turned down 1,100 student applicants with perfect 800 scores on the SAT math exam. Yale rejected several applicants with perfect 2400 scores on the three-part SAT, and Princeton turned away thousands of high school applicants with 4.0 grade point averages. Needless to say, high school valedictorians were a dime a dozen.

It was the most selective spring in modern memory at America’s elite schools, according to college admissions officers." [NY Times]

Get a free college education online

"Many colleges and universities offer free courses online in the form of podcasts, lectures, tutorials and full-blown online classes. Most of these courses, while extremely smart-making, will NOT award any college credits or degrees." [Lifehacker: Get a free college education online]

I'm obviously nuts to be excited about taking a course for no credit. . . but the Greek mythology sounds interesting. . . yeah, right, like I've got the time for this right now.

NPR : Testing Computer Literacy

A good, frightening story on information/computer literacy of so-called Millenium generation students. [NPR]

Societal Change

"Most college women want a high-powered career that they are passionate about," Ms. Smyers said. "But they also want a family, and that probably means taking time off, and making dinner. I'm rushing through here, taking the most credits you can take without paying extra, because I want to do some amazing things, and establish myself as a career woman, before I settle down." [NY Times]

I found this very interesting.  I don't think I would have thought of this when I was just out of high school.  But it's smart for a woman who eventually wants children to be really focused in her late teens and twenties.  She could do a lot careerwise and still have time for children without waiting until her mid-to-late thirties.