Today's College Applicant

A great superhero once said “with great power comes great responsibility.” Maybe what he meant to say was “potential.” The 90’s are officially a past generation, and some might say the teenagers growing up in today’s world are doing it too fast. Whenever I talk to parents of my friends or even my own, they hint at crazy parties and pranks that broke too many laws to count on both hands. “Innocent fun” they called it, back in their glory days. Today, the stakes are much, much higher for teenagers. The job market is crowded and cut-throat as globalization sends foreign students to the already-crowded top echelon of American universities. The piece of the pie for homegrown American teenagers is slimming down every year, and parents are bearing down on their young prodigies to produce above average grades and test scores while maintaining a busy extra-curricular schedule.