15 #3
“However, it would be misleading for us to take credit for the fact that our students come from loving families who care immensely about education, for the fact that we have among the most motivated young people, and that the students are willing to do the incredibly difficult work of becoming a desirable applicant while managing their studies, sports, and inner lives.”
The parents murmured.
“Your children are asked to sit for an assessment just to be considered for our hagwon. We didn’t want to give the exam, but it was easier to explain why a child was not accepted to the families when there was a data point, rather than just saying there is no room.
The assessment was a kind of objective measure; however, I want you to know that I would prefer not to do this.
I would prefer to have a lottery system, and each year, we argue about this.
We feel terrible that we cannot accept every student who wants to study at Fortress. ”
Peter doubted that this made any of the hopeful parents in the audience feel better, but it was the truth.
“We take some of the best students in Orange County, and in the summers, some of the best students from Seoul have been flying in just for our essay boot camps. So while I believe we may have the strongest teachers and the most effective methods, it shouldn’t be a surprise that our hagwon gets among the very best results in California.
Now, take that very simple idea and apply it to, let’s say Yale, where I spent the first two years of college. ”
The parents in the audience knew he had gone to Yale, then transferred to Pomona College, but they’d never asked why.
“If Yale has thirteen hundred seats for the class of 2009, and if twenty thousand students apply, then 93.5 percent of the applicants will be unable to attend. These schools want geographic diversity, which means your children are also competing against children from each of the fifty states and every country in the world. Your children come from Orange County, one of the strongest applicant pools in the United States. The 93.5 percent who are not accepted are already from a pool of self-selected accomplished students who felt that acceptance was possible. I’ve seen extraordinary individuals of every race, class, and background get rejected from these highly selective schools.
The admissions committee of each school considers numerous factors in each applicant’s evaluation.
Fortress gets better results because our students were already selective.
Your children may not be considered remarkable in their senior year from the viewpoint of an admissions committee, but they could become remarkable in a more meaningful way later. Children develop at different rates.”
The parents shook their heads in irritation, incensed at the suggestion that their children might not be remarkable. They were visibly offended.
Lion moved toward the standing microphone, and Peter stepped aside.
“You’re looking at the problem in the wrong way,” Lion said gently to the audience as if he were speaking to a math student.
No longer did he care if they got upset, but he didn’t want Peter to take the heat alone.
“If you make your child into the perfect object that these schools want to purchase, then you might make the sale. However, will you get what you want?
“I wish I could tell you how many times I’ve heard the term ‘return on investment’ being applied to young humans,” Lion said, and his voice broke.
Yun, still seated by the stage, inched her chair toward her husband, never having seen him like this.
She touched her growing belly, not knowing if she should do something.
Lion spoke into the microphone. “Many of our children, out of the goodness of their hearts and because they love their parents, will do as well as they can. They will try to get that trophy to earn your love or to feel good about themselves, but it will never be enough.
“I’ve seen wonderful students get accepted into top schools, and once they get in, they break down, no longer understanding why they’re there at all.
Once the schools have accepted your child, they can only do so much to help him or her flourish.
Forget the acceptance rates or the average salaries of majors, I want you to look at attrition rates and the mental health data.
If your child is eighteen and over, the schools will not even tell you if your child is not doing well, and it could be too late.
“If your children live in the dorms, they no longer have Mom waking them up, or Grandma making their breakfast, or a hagwon teacher asking about their calculus final. They are on their own. They have gotten into the school, but many of them didn’t do it for themselves.
What’s worse, if they didn’t get into the school that they thought they wanted or feel they should have gotten into, they might even feel like they failed you and themselves.
“If you’re just focused on what it takes to get in, you have the wrong question, the wrong tests, the wrong child.
“I am pleading with you to consider not the needs of the buyer or the seller. I am pleading with you to remember that your child is a young human being, and that the purpose of an education is to transform his life into who he is meant to be. He needs an education. He needs to learn how to solve problems. She needs to ask good questions and to be critical. She needs to value her judgment. If your children can do those things, they will be able to survive and flourish. No one needs to be a superhero. Our children should not have to save us.”
Lion looked at them, arms by his sides.
“There is a crisis in this country and in the country where many of you were born. The crisis is in our education and what it is meant to do. Having a degree from the Big Three or any of the SKY universities will not protect our children from harm. You know of many stories of people who graduated from these schools who did not have a safe and perfect life. I am asking you to consider at least the anecdotal evidence each of you has to disprove the theory that an elite education will create a successful life.”
A balding man in the front row handed Lion a clean handkerchief, and Lion wiped his eyes.
The woman in a skirt suit next to him gestured to Mido for the microphone.
“Why can’t you just increase the size of your hagwon? I’m sure in this room, there are bankers who’d give you loans to buy bigger buildings and hire more people. Even our church raised $6 million for a new learning center. There’s money in our community for our kids—”
Lion smiled.
“Thank you for the handkerchief,” he said to the man, then turned to the woman.
“If it were just a simple formula of providing test materials and the same training, then we would have done that already. We will keep our hagwon at this size. We just wanted to appeal to you to consider the humanity of your children.”
Lion glanced at Peter, and he stepped in front of the microphone as naturally as if they were performing onstage at Rascals.
“The highly selective colleges and universities want to build a class made up of all different types of students, including scholars, class presidents, debaters, athletes, actors, musicians, journalists, and poets, from every place on the planet. However, just because the highly selective school that your child or you may have dreamed of accepts only one student from your child’s high school, we cannot treat our students as objects to shape and bring to the market.
The market theory is wrong because they’re young humans, minors who can’t even sign a contract.
Their brains aren’t even fully formed. As the director of a hagwon, I see how they are suffering under this weight.
“It’s not one group’s fault. It’s that children are being asked to respond to market demands and to believe that life is only about scarcity and musical chairs,” Peter said. “This cannot be right.”
George stood up and spoke without the microphone.
“The students in Korea work much harder than our kids. They have to go to hagwons almost every day, some starting as early as kindergarten, and not just once a week. Our American kids are just lazy.”
Everyone laughed except for the tutors. Lion looked out at the audience, and he shook his head.