The Disciplinary Committee exists to recommend punishments for students who have violated school rules. This should be the end of it, but oftentimes people who were completely uninvolved in the issue seek to make it their business and spread rumors about the outcome. There is nothing to be gained from behavior such as this except further humiliating the students who are actually in circumstances. Harmless speculation about DCs spreads like wildfire, and many people accept falsehoods as quickly as facts, which eventually turns to mere gossip. It’s the committee’s job to decide the truth, not the student body’s. For privacy reasons, details of Disciplinary Committee hearings are kept confidential. We should recognize that, because most of us weren’t actually at the hearing or involved in what lead to the punishment, most of what we hear about DCs is rumor. Details can get blown out of proportion and even made up entirely. As was said a couple of weeks ago in an announcement at school meeting, we should focus on learning from the incidents rather than pointing fingers and distributing blame. Those involved in DCs are still students here and, therefore, deserve our respect.

In light of Science Teacher Dr. James Laughner’s announcement during Sunday sit-down on January 20th, we would also like to recognize the fact that Deerfield really is the kind of place where we can trust each other, a place where students and faculty leave material things out in the open, knowing that it is unlikely people will steal their phones or computers. We would like to commend the members of our community for making our school this kind of place, as it takes the student body to shape such a place. The ability to trust one another is an important aspect of our school spirit. It’s reassuring to know that Deerfield students are honest when it comes to not taking other people’s valuable belongings without asking. It is important to realize that every act of kindness and every honest deed helps create the community spirit we strive to have.

Although Long Winter Weekend is a nice opportunity to escape the bitter cold and academic demands in the Pioneer Valley, it can also be a cause of stress for some. Students from faraway places can have difficulty finding a place to stay during the break—especially new students. Though The Scroll Board recognizes that faculty and staff deserve time off as much as the students, we question why it is mandatory for all students to leave campus. We would like to remind the community to be sensitive about this issue: imagine how awkward it would be to invite yourself to a peer’s house who may have had plans to relax with his or her family. Not only does it create a possible strain on relationships, but it also causes anxiety for new students who may not feel comfortable enough with friends to ask. Students are permitted to stay on campus during Parents’ Fall Weekend—though most students leave. We wonder why the same option is not offered in the winter. It is easy for students to fall through the cracks, which is why the community should show sensitivity and understanding that not everyone has the luxury of returning home at this time.

By sophomore year, I felt a strong need to do everything in order to gain acceptance to an Ivy League school and feel like an active member of the Deerfield community. I tried out for the Rhapso-D’s, volunteered at an elementary school and started on the softball team. All of my activities were important to me—some more than others—until it came to Common App ID 910424. I regret taking on so much more than I could have handled. I believe picking a few activities and probing deeply into them are a better use of time, energy and focus than just padding a resumé that exhausts the character limit on a college application. A long list of activities can compromise your mental and physical health, academic success, personal relationships and happiness. In my case, teachers and mentors constantly warned me that doing everything could ultimately hurt me. “Why do you feel the need to do so much?” my friends asked. “Because I care,” I responded, end of conversation. But it was a different kind of caring, rooted in pleasing everyone through different mediums and pleasing my family by stirring the hope of getting into a prestigious college. I allowed my activities to shape me into a student and individual, instead of taking control of the situation and asking myself whether I was truly learning or just doing the motions. Putting college aside, I grew to become more empowered by knowing what I could handle and diving deep into a couple of activities that challenged me to demand more of myself and genuinely care about what I’m getting out of it—personal growth. It is imperative that students understand the power of “less is more” and “probing deeper, not stretching farther” earlier on in high school. I believe this lesson would have made me a happier person with a more balanced life. We should redefine success to mean those two qualities, rather than a list of achievements or even, say, a college acceptance.

Affirmative action: an action or policy favoring those who tend to suffer from discrimination; positive discrimination. Affirmative action policies confront the social imbalances that exist for minorities. I am a proponent of socioeconomic class based affirmative action. I don’t think race should be completely eliminated from the college admissions process but I believe that students whose families are in the lower income brackets (where minority families are overrepresented) are the students who really need a leg up for admission to college. There are many other issues with U.S. education that need to be addressed. And admitting more minority students to selective colleges won’t solve the problem. Just having more minorities in college, some of whom will probably be ill prepared for the schools they’re admitted to, will not create a professional world that reflects the diversity we have in the U.S. The American Psychological Association released a report on Ethnic and Racial Minorities & Socioeconomic Status, in this report, I found three statistics especially compelling: “African Americans and Latinos are more likely to attend high-poverty schools than Asian Americans and Caucasians; in 2005, the high school dropout rate of Latinos was highest, followed by those of African Americans and American Indians/Alaska Natives; and high-achieving African American [quote] Just having more minorities in college… will not create a professional world that reflects the diversity we have in the U.S. [/quote]students may be exposed to less rigorous curriculums, attend schools with fewer resources, and have teachers who expect less of them academically than they expect of similarly situated Caucasian students.” I see these statistics and see a problem with our educational system in general. I see systematic oppression. These are the problems I hope future educational policy can address. In an NY times article, David Leonhardt wrote that in order to bridge social gaps, universities must consider “wealth, family structure and neighborhood poverty. Those factors disproportionately afflict black and Latino students — and hold back children from life’s starting line.” I completely agree with Leonhardt and the statistics from the APA also display the need for class based affirmative action. I think there will be a good balance of minority students without the direct consideration of race for university admission if students are admitted without factoring in income. Of course this requires schools with a great deal of resources but it also doesn’t put students from low-income white families at a disadvantage. The affirmative action policies are supposed to give certain group an advantage; it doesn’t seem right to me that because the minority student advantage other students have to suffer. A class-based policy can also eliminate preference for affluent minority students. If a family has the proper resources to give their children an adequate education, then their children don’t need an upper hand for college admissions. Class based affirmative action will increase access to education, diversify universities and the professional world without undermining disadvantaged majority students.

On Monday, October 29th, 2012, Superstorm Sandy struck, killing over 121 people and causing over $50 billion in damages to homes, property and the economy. Responding to one of the most destructive natural disasters in U.S. history, New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg issued warnings and said, “This was a devastating storm. Maybe the worst that we have ever experienced.” In addition to the loss of life, the mayor faced electric outages across the city and transportation challenges, allowing taxis to pick up multiple customers until the subway system was repaired. During the last weeks of a highly contested presidential campaign, the democratic President Barack Obama, in an unprecedented action, came together with Republican Governor Chris Christie and Democratic Governor Andrew Cuomo to assess the damage. During that news conference President Obama said, “This is a federal, state and local effort.” A few weeks later, I had the opportunity to travel with the Governor of New York when he assessed the damage and helped relieve the suffering of victims. It was one of the most moving days of my life, a day in which I witnessed not only the horrific impact of the storm but also the overwhelming resilience of the survivors. Days before Thanksgiving, we gave out turkeys to families whose houses were in high-damage zones. Our first stop was at Five Towns Community Center, where we joined army personnel delivering boxes of Thanksgiving dinners. The people we met there seemed ecstatic to meet the Governor. We then went to Breezy Point, one of the hardest hit areas in New York, where homes were ripped from their foundations. We stopped at a lunch for the local firefighters who had been heroic in their efforts to help those in danger. The people we applauded looked grateful but incredibly exhausted. We went to Far Rockaway to visit apartments in an impoverished neighborhood that was devastated by flooding. In one apartment we visited, people had bags of clothes sitting in their living room. The stench of mildew was unbearable, and they were advised to throw out their belongings. They expressed despair, saying that they could not afford to lose so much. Again, we met army personnel and helped distribute turkeys. In this neighborhood, people lined the street to pick up their food. Three years ago, I travelled through Alabama to assess damage in the wake of the BP Oil Spill. One woman I met quoted the President, “Obama said the people of the Gulf Coast are resilient. We are resilient.” she continued, “We bounce back. We always bounce back. Bouncing hurts.” In the wake of Superstorm Sandy, we must honor this resilience, not only by recognizing it, but by assuring that this time, with the help of others, bouncing back does not have to hurt so much.

As one of the nation’s best schools, Deerfield Academy is home to an incredibly talented and diverse student body. As a proud member of this community, I live and learn among students who are committed to the pursuit of excellence. Much of my inspiration comes from taking classes, participating in sports, and collaborating outside classes with so many gifted peers. Deerfield chose us partly because of our unique talents, a key element in our Deerfield applications. It is safe to say that our distinctive talents contributed to getting us where we are right now: at Deerfield, a diverse and exceptional community. Still, once we arrive, we are expected to conform to a standard academic curriculum, even if, as upperclassmen, we would rather invest more in our unique talents, and less in the general studies we already did for a decade. Entering Deerfield as intellectually curious and talented adolescents, standardized tests and an across-the-board standard curriculum turn us into a homogenous group of students. Is that what our community wants and our society needs? Will Deerfield lead academic innovation with changes in the curriculum that would formally allow upperclassmen freedom of thoughtful choice? I hope so. Centuries ago, grammar, rhetoric, logic, arithmetic, music, astronomy, and geometry (the medieval trivium and quadrivium ) awaited the fortunate few afforded the luxury of education. Today, our transcripts are expected to show, year after year, math, sciences, English, history, and languages. Why? Consumed for so many years with subjects perhaps tangential to our true interests (interests that we discovered along our academic path), we lose our enthusiasm and curiosity. As Deerfield graduates, we certainly should be expected to know quite some math, English, history, sciences, and languages, since we will have been required to study some of these subjects for up to 12 years. But do we allow ourselves – or rather, does Deerfield allow us the choice – to excel in any one single area? The tension is between wishes and wants: we praise liberal arts education, but also know that colleges already expect excellence shown by specific expertise. The thousands of hours of sustained immersion required to excel in one area takes years of focus and dedication and sacrifice. Must we continue to spread ourselves thin, even in the final years of our secondary education? To pursue our dreams, should we not have a choice, so we can prove to have gone beyond the basics in one area, as we dare to excel in sports or science, art or music? Our Deerfield educations prepare us not for college, but for life. As we contemplate our future, it is wise to start focusing our energies in areas essential to our lives as individuals with unique talents and desires, for, as William Butler Yeats wrote, “Education is not the filling of a pail, but the lighting of a fire.” Acadia Brooks ’14 As Deerfield juniors begin their whole college process with standardized testing and visiting schools, some may begin to see how their educational careers have led them thus far. For seniors, though, the process that they have become quite familiar with is nearly over at this point; having sent their applications in with responses pending, there is little left to do but wait and hope for the best. We have all long been aware of this infamous “college process” but it may not have been until the past few months or years that you have really started to put some thought into it. For many of us, as long as we can remember, a college education has been characterized as the end to a long educational road. Some may argue that a high school’s main goal is to do anything in their power to get a student into the college of their choice. I disagree and instead say that the first priority should be to prepare the student for the college experience itself, and for life afterwards as well. The primary focus of any school, and especially one such as Deerfield, should be to create well-rounded and intelligent graduates that will be able to flourish in whatever the next stage of their life may be. And Deerfield does bring this objective to the table first and foremost. From sports to theater and music, and community service and beyond, Deerfield most definitely provides the opportunity to become a very personable and diverse individual. But at the same time, on the individual scale, students should absolutely be trying to take the highest caliber classes they possibly can. But this doesn’t mean that the curriculum in these classes should be shifted to look more appealing to an admissions office. Classes focused on *?Having seen my sister go through the college process, I have learned to expect that it can be very unpredictable sometimes, and that there is no one “application trick” that will get you into a certain school or set of schools. The system in place right now for college admissions is, without a doubt, far from perfect, but you just have to trust that all will work out in the end. It is important to remember that being the well rounded person that Deerfield is constantly advocating will help you succeed in college and the real world alike, where a large spectrum of skills are called upon every day. Putting the work in now at Deerfield will pay off in your college experience, and mostly so only once you get past admissions. So start now to be sure that you will have, indeed, lived your life well. Kyle Burns ’14 How do I feel about the college admission process at Deerfield? I think it’s a little bit overrated. I see all the students of Deerfield (including freshman!) who are already worried about college. I came to Deerfield as a new sophomore with not a care in the world about college. I mean, I just got accepted into a great high school! I don’t think we should worry about college until at least the beginning of junior year. Don’t get me wrong; I think it’s natural for seniors to be worried about what deadlines and all that technical stuff. But if everyone is worried about whether or not they are going to get into a “good” college… I’m sorry, but I find that downright insulting . Let’s look at the stats. According to http://www.boardingschoolreview.com, Deerfield has an average SAT score of 2000 while the national average is 1477, we have 5 more AP courses offered than the average boarding school, our average SSAT score for admission is 87% (99% being the highest score you can get, that’s pretty high.), we have 22 sports offered when the average is 13, 70 clubs compared to 24, and finally our acceptance rate is 13% rather than 60% (lower than a lot of colleges). To those who are thinking “well, are school maybe fantastic, but I’m not”. Please gain some confidence in yourself. You did get into Deerfield Academy . I also know from working in the admissions office that we have a fantastic admission crew that doesn’t just accept everyone. You got accepted because you were someone that they believed had the potential to succeed here academically, could add to the community with your personality, and finally our fantastic admissions liked you! So knowing this, it’s insulting to me that most students at Deerfield worry about college admissions because that’s almost like saying that the admissions choose a “not-so-fantastic” candidate and Deerfield in general isn’t a “good enough” school. Which leads me to believe that you think admission isn’t good at choosing students, and being a Deerfield student really isn’t that special. Stop . I know this isn’t necessarily what you believe but the way some students say “I should be in a leadership position because…college” that’s just wrong. Deerfield Academy is an exceptional school. That fact that you are here makes you an exceptional student. So please, please , please, don’t for one-minute think you aren’t good enough for a college. If you didn’t get accepted, that probably means that even though you were an awesome student, you weren’t what they were looking for in this year’s class. And that’s fine. There are other fantastic schools out there for you. And if you don’t have the confidence that you’re going to get in anywhere, the weird junior writing this op/ed piece will personally tell you “uh huh, you think you’re not getting into college… hahahah”. Do I feel like we need to make our curriculum more focused on college? No. We already have a fantastic curriculum. Seniors stop worrying, because as juniors if you fantastic students think that you can’t get in anywhere “good” it makes us worry too. Leigh Tanji ’14 We all know how overwhelming college admissions and the imminent process of applying can be. It is always in the back of every Deerfield student’s mind, freshman to senior (although albeit it may get a tad more present as the years progress). The fact is that the entire sequence of classes, testing, and applications weighs so heavily on students that the solution cannot lie in making it more omnipresent than it already is. The idea of balance is being lost in its entirety and I do not think we can afford that. There cannot be a one size fits all path to get anywhere. Hard classes might be good, but who cares if you’re not interested in the subject? Take classes that have relevance to you and that you want to learn something from, not just walk away from with an A. Hypothetically, you could die tomorrow, and any time you spent planning for a day that won’t come is lost. Don’t get me wrong, there is plenty of merit in planning ahead and aiming for the next step, but it shouldn’t be at the expense of where you are and the life you have now. There needs to be a balance between where you are and where you want to go. After all, why would you ever want to apply to anything as someone you aren’t? Your goal should be to improve yourself, not become someone else who other people say is better. Get better, learn, aim high, but don’t lose yourself along the way. Austin Parenteau ’15 If Deerfield will prepare us for college, what will the college prepare us for? Many of our peers live with the hysteria of ‘near tomorrow’ — the notion that today ought to be spent in a way that will make tomorrow better. Or ‘minute frenzy’ — that rushing by this current minute should make the next minute easier for us. Don’t we think this way even with Facebook posts? Our incessant scrolling is constantly driven by the assumption that the next post will be funnier. This month, Joshua Bell, one of the most talented violinists in the world, played incognito in a D.C. metro station for 45 minutes during the rush hour, as part of a social experiment about perception. 6 people stopped and listened for a while, and 20 gave him money. Washington Post reported the story with the conclusion: ‘If we do not have a moment to stop and listen to one of the best musicians in the world playing the best music ever written, how many other things are we missing?’ It is necessary for us to have a farsighted and brave goal for our lives, and perhaps appropriate to have a long-term designation of our chronic resource, but I feel we should approach our goals like a snowball — collecting all that seem beautiful and not beautiful along its path, and not like a tractor, who tramples little wild flowers along its way without even knowing. We shall be receptive of our own growth, unfilled for the scenics yet to be seen, and keep in mind that ‘the times they’re a-changin’’. For that reason we should enjoy the sacred and precious tranquility exclusive to high school students while we still are one, and not worry so much about college. ‘Therefore do not be anxious about tomorrow, for tomorrow will be anxious for itself.’ (Matthew 6:34). And also, don’t ‘pinch a hook’ that fast, as my fellow Bartoner Bryce Klehm calls it, but open our eyes to what we have not seen before, for I think talent is no more than enthusiasm. Sal Liu ’15

Sarah Sutphin ‘13 would like to clarify that her quote in the Januarry 18th Broadsheet was hypothetical and not meant to be based in personal experience. The Scroll did not give Jade Moon ’13 or Jared Armes ’15 a chance to review their quotes for context before publication. The Scroll regrets these errors.

If the meaning of life were defined by colleges, life would come after April 1st, childbirth after asking “why us?”— instead of Fitzgerald, the literature filling the Barnes & Nobles bookshelves would be Princeton Review stories of success. If Ivy Leagues were to define success, Phi Beta Kappas would run electoral colleges, SAT vocabulary manuals sag the bookshelves, five-year-olds learn to write “me” essays first; unique-tales-about-a-special-rock would be literature, and its theme “community is not me, but us!” All the world would want passports from the US, where internationalism is failed success, where experience is sought to produce literature, to create narratives for top-rated colleges— oh! and make sure your starving children’s charity is the first to have stocked its library with full bookshelves. Learn how to mosey your way around the bookshelves where colleges teach you the ropes of “how to get into us,” so admissions gods might choose you first and make you special, glowing with success, who will be able to write on Facebook: “i am going to college!” and perhaps never again read literature. However, if your unfortunate love is literature, do not roam among the bestselling bookshelves, where all you see is diversity’s success at attending colleges, where being accepted is being able to call your “me” “us,” where losing your own identity is a success, because you will be able to put some sorority first. So perhaps if your life goal is to get that large packet first, before you contemplate any introspective literature, then maybe you shouldn’t expect much success where your name will be lining the bookshelves; perhaps you should consider changing your name to “us” before you apply to those colleges. Whether six or thirty-nine colleges, you have to sell yourself first; Yet you must think in the collective “us” when writing your “me” literature, because of course to make it to the bookshelves, you have to be the perfect story of success. -Stefani Kuo ‘13

Deerfield Academy is a business. Private education, state, local, and federal governments, and even McDonalds are all service industries. Service industries, unlike industries that use machines to mass-produce products, rely on humans and human labor. “The challenge there is that it’s hard to get economies of scale when you’re dealing with bodies,” Chief Financial Officer Keith Finan said. According to Mr. Finan, Deerfield earns money annually from four main sources of revenue: student tuition, endowment, annual fund gifts from alumni and parents and miscellaneous revenues from the Greer store, Café Louis and Hitchcock House. “The investment pool for our endowment is about 400 million dollars, but we can only take a certain percentage of the investment earnings from the endowment annually,” Mr. Finan said. “When alumni give money for our endowment, the contributions not only support the current generation of students, but also future students.” He gave an example of a gift of one million dollars, called the corpus. “Ideally, the investment will earn about 8% on this money ($80,000) every year. Deerfield uses only about 4 to 4½% of the money. The rest ($40,000) is added to the corpus. The following year, the industry will earn 8% of the new corpus, ($1,040,000). On a larger scale, the money adds up; this strategy is effective when there is inflation of gas or food prices.” Where does all this money go? 58% of the money goes to “the salaries of the faculty, administrators, and staff workers, and the benefits we pay them, such as health insurance, pension contributions, and so on,” explained Mr. Finan. Ten percent to 13% goes to the maintenance and utilities of buildings. Five percent goes to academic materials, including books, science lab equipment, and other classroom materials. Three percent goes to student activities, including athletics, co-curriculars, dances, and other weekend activities. In order to find out how much tuition should be worth, “first we think: if we want to provide the programs that we think are important, how much will it cost us?” Mr. Finan said. From there, the Academy can make a rough estimate of how much we’ll earn from the endowment and the Annual Fund. Then, it is very simple to calculate tuitions costs. But if we cannot raise tuition to the amount we need to, then “we need to step back and think about what programs to cut slightly, or not offer,” Mr. Finan said. This is when funding cuts happen. Decisions like these are also based off of the history of the program, demand from students, and how much money the school would need to spend per every extra student in the program. For example, funding for extra students joining the cross-country or swimming team is less expensive than it seems; the Academy only needs to buy another uniform. However, sports like squash require more equipment and therefore more funding. As with many other programs, including the arts, if there were more student interest, the school would be more likely to support a larger program. How does financial aid work, and is it true that every student is technically on financial aid? Mr. Finan explained, “This year 26% of gross tuition fees was covered by financial aid. In other words, $28,500,000 was gross tuition [what we would have earned if everyone in the school paid full tuition]. But in fact, $7,300,000 was financial aid.” Even if everyone paid full tuition, the Academy would still need $13,500,000 in order to run; we need $42,000,000 to run the Academy’s operations. But that’s where the endowment, Annual Fund, and campus stores come in: these revenues cover the rest of the money. So, in theory, if everyone paid full tuition and we only gained money from tuitions, then students would need to pay an extra $22,000 each for the school to operate. In order for large-scale buildings projects to occur, such as the Koch Center (2007), the Academy needs to earn even more money from multimillion-dollar campaigns.

When the college advising office announced that they would be offering to meeting with sophomores for the first time, the decision was met with mixed reactions. Some argued that sophomore year is too early to begin the college process, and relatively few sophomores took advantage of the opportunity in the week it was offered. I am of the opinion that this was the first step in the right direction. Students attend Deerfield (and parents send them there) with our impressive matriculation rates in mind and with the ultimate goal of attending a prestigious college. Knowing this, shouldn’t we begin the process as soon as possible? I think that entering students should be assigned a college advisor right away. This way, by the time an advisor is required to write about their advisee, they have known them for longer than three months. Freshmen would meet with their advisors only once or twice, mostly to discuss class choices or co curricular options and their significance. I know that I would have made different class and testing choices if I had the benefit of meeting with a college advisor before my junior spring. While I don’t see this proposal becoming reality in the near future, I am very glad to see the College Advising Office moving in that direction and I hope that the next time the offer is extended, more sophomores will take it.

College: it’s probably all you’re thinking about. And it’s not your fault. Almost every adult conversation I had from the beginning of my junior year till the end of my senior year was about colleges. Ivy League or NESCAC? Big school or small school? East coast, the South, or California. (Forget the middle…we know there are only cornfields there.) For two years your present has been about planning your future. So let me tell you something I know now: It’s mostly a waste of time. Allow me to backtrack before I get a wave of angry emails—college is important. You should probably go. But the college you end up going to is about as significant as your freshman year Sadie’s date. Think back—you got all excited to be set up with this hot senior so you bought an overpriced costume and you styled your hair and you planned out the conversation you were going to have during the five minute walk from your dorm room to the gym and then…you ditched each other. Maybe that only applies to girls, but you get the idea. We do the same with colleges—we build up this idea of the place we want to go to, put it up on a pedestal, and then try our hardest to get in and fulfill the dream. But the acceptance letter you all will receive is not the key to a blissful future, but to a door of opportunity. And there are a lot of great doors to choose from. What’ll make you stand out is is what you choose to do after you walk in. I wanted to go to Yale but I didn’t get it. In fact, I had one of the most horrendous college application experiences possible (Go ask Ms. Lyman if you don’t believe me, I give her full permission to pass along all the gory details). I applied to 21 schools. First piece of advice: do not apply to 21 schools. I got into around four or five. And for those of you who don’t know me, it’s not because I didn’t give Deerfield my all—I had a 91% GPA, took AP classes, went to Thailand with Round Square, served on the DC, played varsity sports all four years, was in the Acting Tutorial, was a Big Sister…you get it. But the college admissions [pullquote_right]College is not an idea to fall in love with; it’s a school, a group of people, a vibe, and a mindset.[/pullquote_right] process is ruthless and it tore me down. Nothing makes you feel more worthless than a pile of rejection letters and a call from Ms. Lyman over spring break telling you to apply to schools in the UK because your prospects aren’t looking good. But I got through it, and to the Seniors still waiting for that letter of good news, you will too. I’m currently a sophomore at the University of Michigan. It’s a big, Midwestern state school with top-notch academics and boundless school pride, Google it sometime. I’m studying film, I’m a member of the Michigan Student Honor Council, I produce and correspond for a weekly TV news show, I have a part-time job, I spend my Saturdays with over 100,000 fans cheering on the Wolverines, and I’m super happy. True story. I got rejected by my dream schools and I’m thrilled. Because, like I said, there are a LOT of great doors out there, and because you’re a Deerfield kid a lot of them will open for you. But you have to find the one that opens for you. Confused? Here’s what I mean: colleges may accept you because you’re smart. Or because you can play lacrosse. Or because you’re one-of-a-kind juggler. But other schools will accept you because fifteen people in your family went there. Or because they have a dorm named after you. Or because your mother dated this guy back in the day whose brother is now the head of admissions. And that school might be number one on U.S. News & World Report. But it’s not necessarily the school you should go to. When you walk onto a college campus you should feel at home. Not intimidated. Not obliged. If you choose a college because someone else says you should, you’re doing yourself a grave disservice. You will not thrive in an environment where you were let in as a courtesy. You will find success at a college that accepts the person you really are. I got lucky because almost every other door had to be slammed into my face before I walked through the right one. But maybe you’ll be smart enough to choose that school on your own. I certainly hope so. Let me leave you with this last thought: College is not an idea to fall in love with; it’s a school, a group of people, a vibe, and a mindset. And there’s no right one for everyone. Find your door and walk in with your head held high. Your future is yours. Own it.