Distinctive

By Victoria Tillson Evans, Ph.D.

Over a lunch of Peruvian chicken, two former clients probed me to find out what makes an accomplished student, you know, the kind that gets into the country’s most selective schools. They were curious to know what precisely the students did, what the parents did to help them, and what they too could do to get their younger children on the same track.

This was years ago and the first time I was asked to clearly define what separates the straight A students who get into top 25 schools and those who don’t. Yes, getting a strong GPA, and elite ACT or SAT scores are essential, but what was in the “secret sauce,” especially for those without a hook? Can it be learned? Can it be manufactured? Are some activities better than others?

These are questions that researchers have been probing for years, and their parameters change from one decade to the next depending on just how selective some schools have become. While there is no single profile that gets anyone into an elite university, there are definitely ways to enhance your chances by increasing your or your child’s level of success. To help you learn from some of the best, here are five book recommendations:

Grit by Angela Duckworth

“Fall down seven times, get up eight.” – Japanese proverb

“Hard work beats talent when talent fails to work hard.” – Kevin Durant 

Angela Duckworth, a psychologist at the University of Pennsylvania and founder of the Character Lab, set out to identify what makes some people more successful than others. Is it innate talent, a learned quality, or a combination of both? After evaluating several groups of high achievers in a variety of fields, from West Point graduates to National Spelling Bee champions, she finds that it is grit: the passion for and ability to persevere to achieve long-term goals. 

Grit is a fascinating read that covers not only how to define this characteristic that so many college admissions committees find desirable in applicants, but also how to build grit in yourself and others. There’s even a chapter on how to parent for grit, if you’re a parent who’s too busy to read the whole book! Don’t overlook the references to Duckworth’s own life. While she doesn’t say it outright, she has won the ManArthur Fellowship (aka the Genius Award) because of her grit and the personal sacrifices that came with it.

How to Raise an Adult and Your Turn: How to Be an Adult by Julie Lythcott-Haims

Overparenting has become a trap, not only for exhausted parents, but also their children. The college admissions process is, of course, responsible for this current state of affairs, as its highly competitive nature seems to push everyone into a whirling state of anxiety. Many parents these days devote their entire non-working lives to their children, and their children are so overscheduled that they don’t have time to question what they’re doing and why, nor explore other options that interest them.

Julie Lythcott-Haims, Dean of Student Affairs at Stanford University, offers a mix of personal anecdotes, others’ stories, and some very practical advice on how to avoid this situation from both sides of the table to ensure that parents and students are set free. We all want to be adults whom other people actually want to be around, and Lythcott-Haims’s advice in both books, one for parents and the other for young adults, will help everyone figure out the process of getting children (or yourself) on your intended path, not one that was pre-selected. Her recommendations start for children as young as pre-schoolers and certainly follow through the college years, emphasizing how to nurture independence, resilience, kindness, creativity, and responsibility in young people and yourselves.

The Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother by Amy Chua

One of the most hotly debated parenting memoirs ever written, Professor Amy Chua’s humbling experience of raising two highly accomplished daughters led many readers to believe that she had written a manifesto on the superiority of Asian American child-rearing. Instead, Professor Chua’s humorous book acknowledges the difficulty of trying to raise all children in that manner. While her first child willingly went along with her (and her husband’s) strict parenting style that highly valued hard work, education, and achievement, her second child mercilessly rebelled. 

If you read her book closely enough, you’ll come to understand that no single parenting style works for every child. Successful children emerge from families that create strong expectations, as well as from others where more freedom is given. This is a wonderful book to read in conjunction with How to Raise an Adult, as it will help you think about how to work with your children to raise them well.

Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell

Most of us like to believe in the myth that we are the ones responsible for our own success. With some hard work, natural ability, and determination, we can achieve anything! But is this myth really true? If it is, how come some people with really high IQs never change the world, and why are so many professional Canadian hockey players born in the first few months of the year? According to Malcolm Gladwell, hard work and natural ability help only to a certain degree. Something else is at play.

In his groundbreaking book, Outliers, Gladwell argues that those who achieve the highest levels of success share two commonalities: they spend over 10,000 hours getting really good at their craft, and they seize opportunities that arise due to completely random circumstances. He examines examples from The Beatles to Bill Gates, and shows readers that putting in the hours combined with lucky turns of events made these people the G.O.A.T.s of their professions, leading us all to believe (incorrectly) that they’re geniuses. His advice and analyses certainly provide great ideas to become highly skilled, but they also show that success depends a lot upon what you can’t control! 

Final Thoughts

Of course, I’ve read all of these books and have implemented their ideas in my practice, but what I’ve seen from working with hundreds of high school students is that most high achievers have the perfect mix of individual drive and ability, and parental/circumstantial support. That’s not to say that highly driven students can’t soar to the greatest heights on their own – that certainly happens, like the occasional homeless student who gets admitted to Harvard – but they tend to be outliers. That’s also not to say that parents who invest every last drop of their soul in their children don’t also help a few get into the most selective schools. But again, those cases are rare. Plus, don’t parents deserve a life of their own? What you really need to cultivate a successful child is, first, their own intellectual curiosity and willingness to make serious personal sacrifices to achieve and then parental and circumstantial support for that child’s ambitions (and that parental support should come in the form of what works for both parent and child). If you’ve got that kind of combination, even if your child doesn’t end up at an Ivy, they’ll have what it takes to live a successful life.