IMHO, let your kids be kids, don't push them too hard. Life gives you lots of chances if you have a support structure - my family was full of fuckups but our parents were there for us and we all eventually made it through with good careers.

The main thing I want for my kids (they're still young - 7 & under) is to find things they're passionate about - things that makes them want to work hard and overcome a challenge. That could be school, sports, music, games, or whatever.

Of course, I'm just a random internet stranger, why would anyone listen to me :)

> so what does it take to get into the top schools as an Asian?

The comments below on how to get into an elite university (like Harvard or Stanford) have a fairly high hit rate when all of the boxes are checked. This is a fairly detailed and actionable list, but I am sure I left some important parts out (esp. regarding edge cases and corner cases). Feel free to ask follow-up questions if you have any.

My comments/suggestions:

-Strong grades and strong test scores will get a student into most state schools. This is a very solid baseline goal, imho. These same grades and test scores will be table stakes at elite schools -- more will be required in order to be admitted.

- Make sure your kids are actually interested in going to an elite school and making the extra effort that entails. If they are not, then steer them towards state schools. The comments below assume that they want to go to an elite school and are willing to make the extra effort.

- Take a challenging curriculum and get As with maybe a B or two -- the goal is to be top 5% of the graduating class, ideally the top 1%. Note that Bs (more than two) can be overlooked very easily if the rest of the application is strong. Note that the grade criterion can absolutely suck if your kids go to a high school that thinks that AP/honors classes just means that the students should be assigned more busy work. The busy work will take time away for them to do something that is actually interesting (see below).

- Learn how to write well. This will serve the student well in the application, HS classes, college classes, and life in general. Note that students will probably be rated on their writing skills by their references, and they will need to rate extremely highly (e.g., top 1% ever for this teacher).

- Do solid on the SAT. Contrary to popular belief, you do not need a perfect score. That said, a strong score is table stakes. Specifics below.

- My main advice for folks is to prepare for the SAT, mainly by taking practice tests with recent old tests at the same time and a similar location that the student will be taking the real test. The SAT is a marathon, and most people perform below their potential due to fatigue. Getting used to the long slog and the pacing of taking the test helps most people a lot. They will also be able to find gaps in their test-taking skills, and these are usually fairly easy to address when not under time pressure to do so.

- Math -- I would definitely aim for a perfect score in the Math (since it is fairly basic), but a slightly less than perfect score in Math is fine. Engineering people and folks who apply to MIT tend to have perfect or one tick below perfect.

- Verbal -- Most people try to game this a month or two before the test. Big mistake. My suggestion is to read well-written newspapers like NYT, WaPo, and WSJ as well as "high brow" magazines like The New Yorker, The Atlantic, and/or National Review. They should make note of every word that they don't know, and they would do well to learn them. This is easy to do over three or four years and tougher to do over one or two months. Bonus points if you, as a parent, discusses these articles with them so that they are reading critically rather than just casually. The text structures are the same types of (edited and abbreviated) text structures that they will see on the SAT.

- More than grades and SAT scores, the student should be able to impress one or two teachers that they are in the top 1% of students that the teacher has ever seen. Why? This is a common question on the reference letter form. I strongly encourage the student to check out the reference letter forms early in their high school career to see the manner and extent to which they need to impress the people who write them references. The student can do this by showing interest in one or more areas and really going deep into the subject beyond what is in the high school material -- basically, have passion for the topic.

- Also note that there are schools and teachers who know understand how the admissions game is played. The two things that these folks do that help a lot are: 1) to round up their rating of the student (e.g., if top 1%, maybe rate them "best I've ever taught"), and 2) to give detailed examples of outstanding work the student has done. The recommendations give credence to whatever it is that the student writes in their application. Picking who writes recommendation letters is a very important decision that I think many applicants put very little thought into. Not only do these teachers/people need to know you well, but they need to be able to write a good recommendation letter as well (this is a rare talent, imho, unless you attend an elite university feeder school).

- Related to grades/subjects, I would personally encourage students who can do it to enroll in a joint hs/jc program. There will be much less busy work, and one or more of the professors will know how to write a good recommendation.

- Try to figure out one or more areas in which they can do something notable at a national or international level. There is a wide scope of what this can look like, but this is where most people have a substantial gap in their application. This area can be social/leadership (probably the "easiest"), sports, arts, or academics (probably the toughest). I buried this relatively deep in the list assuming most people won't read this far, but this is the one thing that really sets aside exceptional applicants from threshold applicants who have great grades and test scores.

- Examples of "notable" (social/leadership): Start a successful business (ideally in an interesting area), start a non-profit that does meaningful work, develop a community program that makes meaningful change (esp. in under-served communities), develop some ongoing development aid project abroad (often seen in church missions), amazing Eagle Scout service projects. Note that all of these are starting or leading a group to new levels of success. Just participating is not enough (anyone can do that).

- Examples of "notable" (athletics): Be a recruited athlete, be an athlete that is not recruited but would be competitive on the university varsity team and expresses an interest to play at the university, win a state championship, be chosen as "all state" in your state (preferably first team), be on an Olympic team or on the short list development squad, win a regional (or wider) event in an "Olympic sport" (e.g., figure skating, ice skating, diving, swimming, etc. that might not be covered in HS sports). On a personal level, I would probably encourage folks to look at less common sports that can be excelled in at a young age -- competitive shooting, obscure martial arts (Japanese sword drawing, anyone?), noodling, etc.

- Examples of "notable" (arts): Be a published author, have an exhibit in a gallery, win a national/international competition (this might be easier than it seems if you're clever), be a national/international touring artist. Note that this can be combined with social/leadership by doing something like creating a highly regarded arts competition, creating a successful touring music group, etc.

- Examples of "notable" (academics): high placement in a nationwide math contest, be selected for the international science fair (a series of competitions), win a Westinghouse competition, publish a research article (as primary or a significant contributor). Note that this is the toughest category to stand out in, imho. The people who apply to elite schools are absolutely crushing this category. "Placed 3rd in state with HS trivia team", while commendable, won't really look that impressive or unusual when compared to a Westinghouse winner.

- With regards to the "do something notable" point made above, this something should be referred to in one or more of the student's references, otherwise it looks like it is completely made up and will probably be discounted. Supporting documentation helps (e.g., awards, newspaper articles, published papers, etc.), and be sure to send in this documentation as "supporting materials". If your kid is doing something special, I hope that they reach out to the press to have their special thing covered -- local news outlets love stuff like this, and it looks great in an application.

- Note that there are weird edge cases in admissions. As an example, UPenn is a private school, but they have to accept a certain number of PA residents per year. While there are extremely strong students from PA at UPenn, there are also some students who are relatively weak (and it shows). Also at UPenn, each of the four schools has an independent applicant pool, so the Wharton pool (9% admission rate) is different than the Nursing pool (25% admission rate). Not to pick on UPenn, but I happen to know details about these two examples.

- When applying to a school, the applicant should have a good reason for going to that school. "Because it is #1" or whatever doesn't cut it. The access to resources at elite schools is amazing, and the applicant should show that they have at least considered how they might utilize some of those resources.

(part 2, since first reply was too long)

A few additional notes:

- Note that many people who attend elite schools almost stumble into checking off all of the boxes above without realizing it. It's amazing how some people just randomly do the right things that pave the path to admission into an elite school, while others who try so hard to get into an elite school either do the wrong things (like overly focus on grades and SATs because someone told them to) or have someone else in the process (e.g., a teacher or guidance counselor) fail them.

- Some people think that what happens at elite schools is what makes their graduates so successful. This is true at the margins. Specifically, the access to specific networks of people that control high value parts of the nation and economy is exceptional, and people who avail themselves of this feature of elite schools will see an outsized return on their attendance at an elite school (secret: many/most don't avail themselves). All that said, many of the people who have crazy success after attending an elite school would also have crazy success after attending any school because they and their families are very well connected. Note that state schools also have these sorts of networks, but they are typically limited to the state or regional area in terms of scope.

- IMHO, the at-school opportunities available to a great student at a big state school (something that I think is relatively easy to be) is probably comparable to the opportunities available to a slightly above average student at an elite school (harder to be due to the admission's barrier). The reason is that most state school students are not ambitious and overly curious and extremely talented, so the best students stand out to the professors at state schools while they are relatively common at elite schools. I think the only potential "loss" of going to a state school is if a student would be one of the best both at the state school as well as being the best at an elite school (this bar is almost unbelievably high).

- Most people think that there is discrimination against Asians because they know or have heard of some Asian who got a perfect or near perfect SAT score and a perfect GPA (i.e., the "standard strong" applicant that is a dime a dozen at elite schools) and did not get into Harvard or Stanford or wherever. As I hope the above post has shown, that result is not surprising if their grades and SAT scores are the most compelling part of their application. Harvard's entering class this year is ~25% Asian (most being Asian-American). The threshold Asian folks who didn't get in probably look a lot like the threshold White folks who didn't get in -- they were very solid but didn't stand out or had one or more red flags in their application. As such, the goal is to be a strong admit applicant rather than be a threshold applicant and hope for the best.

- All of the above seems like a lot of work, and I suppose it is. That said, I think that most of it is something that ambitious and motivated people will be doing anyway just because they want to, and the rest is just polishing the edges (e.g., making sure to get good references).

- Lastly, Cal Newport has written some amazing books about "being a superstar" and "standing out without burning out". I recommend giving his books a read.

I hope this helps.

> Some people think that what happens at elite schools is what makes their graduates so successful...

Thanks for this comment. I think this is really important. I see so many families make huge sacrifices to try to get their kids into top colleges when they really dont seem like the type of kids to be elite class people. I grew up in a country where this didn't really exist so am a bit baffled by the whole game. I'm happy to take it easy and get a regular college, but worry my kids might miss out on some pot of gold.

> but worry my kids might miss out on some pot of gold

The default assumption should be that if your kids enter an elite school as $SES kids, then they will leave the same (SES = socioeconomic status). So a middle class kid will likely leave Harvard still a middle class kid due to their connections, way of perceiving the world, way of interacting with the world, etc. There usually is no pot of gold.

The dream of social climbing is often more of a rug pull than many middle class people realize since it doesn’t just end with school. Some folks with classic hard-working working class or middle class values will go to an elite school, do well, and then get a top job in IB, consulting, law school/law firm, or whatever, and they think they have made it. But then their career path just flattens after a few years of very grindy work. If the social climber did not make a concerted effort to develop a network of higher class friends (which is not easy if you’re not already in it, imho), then partner or whatever becomes much tougher when job performance is basically based on if they can make it rain or not via their social networks.

There are exceptions, typically in academics, in specializing in a topic or group of people that are foreign to northeast corridor people (e.g., oil people in Texas or car people in Detroit), or in certain organizations (e.g., Goldman was/is known for facilitating social climbing).

An example of one guy I know who made a big jump in SES (sort of)…

He came from a family of educators in small town Michigan, but had a very working class mentality (pro-union, kids did manual labor, etc.). The guy was obsessive about being rich from a young age — the type of guy who actually wrote himself a check for one million dollars dated for his 30th birthday and was hell bent on cashing it.

Long story short, he managed to work his way into a PE firm as a partner in his mid 30s after a decade of decent-but-not-great pay grindy work. His speciality was suppliers to Detroit auto manufactures. Note that he knew nothing about cars and the auto industry at the start, but he knew how to talk to Detroit people without sounding like a NYC shyster.

Made a bunch of money (mid 8 figures), closed down the fund, and retired in his early 40s in the Hamptons.

Note the path though… super grindy, didn’t really make it early, relied on his prior SES, a lot of social climbing, and a bit of luck to set himself apart and make it “big”.

This is not a path I would recommend to my kids unless they are hellbent on taking it like the example above.

The experiences I see of those who tried to social climb is that a lot of them hit mid-life and wondered where their high-trajectory career went. That “high-trajectory” was a class-based illusion, imho, and they didn’t do what it would take to make that illusion become real.

Apologies if this sounds overly cynical, but I think it’s important to debunk some of the myths about what makes the elite schools seem so impressive.

To end on a more positive note, I will say that elite schools often help folks reach the top end of their SES range, especially for upper middle class folks. So kids who come from families with wealth in the 10m range might end up with wealth in the 50m range, with a few making a bigger jump to lower upper class. This may seem like a big jump, but it is not functionally since that level of extra money largely just buys QoL improvements rather than access life changing levers.

There was a guy on HN who wrote a really good social class guide and what affordances each class gave you. I will try to find it and link it here later.

Here is a link:

https://indiepf.com/michael-o-churchs-theory-of-3-class-ladd...

Michael O’Church had the original idea. I can’t quickly find a link to his original article in the internet archive (way back machine), but I think it’s still there.

I just got around to checking my HN replies. Thank you so much for writing this out. I'm at least a decade+ from having to put these plans into motion, but I'll refer back to it from time to time.

You can grind leetcode for a few months and get a FAANG role with a boot camp degree. Don't bother tiger parenting.