Tuesday, October 28, 2008
Would Colleges Approve?
After reading Rachel’s post about the IGSS program New Trier is offering next year, I became curious and decided to try to find answers to her questions. This morning I went to Mr. Rogan’s office, one of New Trier’s college counselors, and asked him about the program. I asked him if it would affect a student’s ability to get into a “good school”. He did not say it directly, but he said that colleges would most likely prefer sticking to the traditional curriculum. His reason being that colleges are not familiar with the program and therefore would have a more difficult time evaluating the student. If students knew that participating in this program could negatively affect their ability to get into a “good school”, most students would probably choose not to participate. If the program were to help a student get into a “good school”, on the other hand, everyone at New Trier would want to join. Either way, students find a way to put the focus back on grades, whether they mean to or not, so is it worth trying to put an end to this struggle?
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3 comments:
Great idea interviewing Mr. Rogan! Will you be willing to share this in class?
I do not think that by creating the IGSS program, the intention necessarily was to rid our school of its struggle with the "good college" obsession. But rather, to give students who are interested, a chance to break free from the constant focus on grades and scores. I think that New Trier will always be surrounded around admitance into a "good college". We are living in a very competitive country and especially now with the economic crisis and the constant focus on money, getting into a "good college" and securing our futures (whatever this may mean/if it is even possible) is a very high priority.
Mr. Rogan's response to these questions is very surprising to me. In fact, I know several students who were thinking of joining the IGSS program next year for the single reason of getting into a better school. It is interesting to know that colleges want to see students follow a traditional curriculum. It seems that if everyone follows this, the only diversity between students applying to colleges is their GPA's within these traditional classes, and their scores on tests such as the ACT. These numbers, as we discussed in class, do not define a student. Therefore, I believe that colleges should find a different way of accepting students. This obviously is idealistic, however, I think that it is something that colleges should work toward in order to enroll more versatile students into schools.
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