The Overachievers: The Secret Lives of Driven Kids

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Recommended: Cheating in school

Every fall millions of American adolescents gear up to apply for the thousands of colleges and universities across the nation. For many students this process is a simple-natural progression through a linear educational track in which no extra preparation, beyond a paper application, is required. However, for many students college preparation can begin as early as conception. Alexandria Robbins follows the stories of nine students from Walt Whitman High School in Bethesda, Maryland. Whitman is known for and could be summarized by a simple term in which Robbins’ book is also titled: Overachievers. The author explores the hectic nature of helicopter parenting, bureaucratic admission processes, the culture of Ivy (a term describing the upper echelon of academic institutions), unrelenting and unrealistic expectations, and the cyclonic degradation of innocent and carefree adolescent development.

In The Overachievers: The Secret Lives of Driven Kids, Robbins explores the correlation between perfectionism and academic prowess. Over the course of one year she follows the lives of AP Frank, Julie, C.J., Sam, Stealth, Audrey and others as they transition through high school and into college. These students, as Robbins showcases, epitomize what is wrong with America’s Educational System. Robbins explores the impact of the intricacies produced by America’s scholastic whirlwind on students as expressed by her research participants. Robbins masterfully crafts an informative and emotional roadmap that intertwines topics such as No Child Left Behind, College Board’s SAT, College Rankings, Ultra Competitive Parents, Cheating and Emotional and Medical Distress from a student’s perspective. The author presents each issue by presenting occurrences f...

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...story of AP Frank, Julie, Audrey, Sam and the others can be any number of students they may know. More importantly the book offers readers a chance to also evaluate their own experiences in high school. It is recommended that potential readers of Robbins’ expose’ recall or identify a student in the community or within themselves who are goal driven or preoccupied with success as they read. Perhaps from this perspective the reader may gain an insider perspective to the true culture of academia around them.

Works Cited

Lewinsohn, P.M., Hops, H., Roberts, R.E., Seeley, J.R. & Andrews, J.A. (1993). Adolescent psychopathology: I. Prevalence and incident of depression and other dsm-iii-r disorders in high school students. Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 102(1), 133-144.

Robbins, A. (2007). The Overachievers: The secret life of driven kids. New York: Hyperion.

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