
Ask HN: Advice for accomplished but unchallenged high school senior - mswen
Will graduate from High School this spring with about 70 credits from Community College. Already accepted into college of science and engineering at local Big 10 University for next fall. We know that they have a good history of accepting these CC credits. He has math up through multi-variable calculus, chem I, physics I &amp; II, liberal arts general classes pretty much done.<p>He has been in robotics - combat initially and VEX last few years.<p>Finished one semester intro to computer science, says that he gets binary and hexadecimal counting systems, did a lot of pseudo code with that class and is now teaching himself C++ because that is what is required for the computer engineering degree.  I got him started on Project Euler as a way to give him specific problems to solve using C++ and give him a way to measure progress.<p>So far none of these seem to have really challenged him. He faithfully attends class, takes sparse to okay notes and studying for a major test consists of an hour or so of browsing back through notes and reworking a couple of problems for math and physics and less if it is a liberal arts class - maintaining 4.0 without much effort while taking the hardest classes available.<p>I suspect that there are a number of people here on HN that were very much like him as a high school senior.<p>What would you suggest as ways to challenge him?<p>Suggestions for summer job - he did some construction grunt work a couple summers ago, then tutored math last summer.<p>If you were like him at that age what might you do different? Or, what was really engaging that might not be obvious?<p>Thanks
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zachlatta
I dropped out of high school at 15 and moved out at 16. Currently 21 and
running [https://hackclub.com](https://hackclub.com).

I know that when I was in his shoes, I felt like I tried everything to find
meaning (community college classes, reading books, learning new subjects,
etc), but it took me literally moving out and into a group house in San
Francisco to find a community of other people like me (see
[https://stories.californiasunday.com/2015-06-07/real-
teenage...](https://stories.californiasunday.com/2015-06-07/real-teenagers-
silicon-valley/) for my story).

I think it's all about finding like-minded peers that push you. If he's into
computer science, perhaps there are hackathons near him? Or maybe he'd get
value out of our Slack
([https://slack.hackclub.com](https://slack.hackclub.com))? We have a lot of
students like him in our community.

We put together
[https://hackathons.hackclub.com](https://hackathons.hackclub.com) to
aggregate high school hackathons and
[https://mlh.io/seasons/na-2019/events](https://mlh.io/seasons/na-2019/events)
is the best resource for college hackathons if it's helpful.

------
philipkglass
Does he _want_ to be intellectually challenged and just hasn't figured out the
right path yet?

If he _wants_ a challenge, it sounds like he should look for professors
offering undergraduate research opportunities. It doesn't necessarily have to
be directly in CS. I worked with a professor on a polymer chemistry project
while earning my undergraduate CS degree. He got someone who could
troubleshoot data acquisition hardware and write software for analysis; I got
to learn more about chemistry and statistics. It was a fantastic experience.

I was at a small liberal arts college. I would presume that there would be
even more research opportunities at a Big 10 university, though I don't know
if it is hard to make personal contacts on such large campuses.

~~~
mswen
He finds things interesting but so far I haven't detected a real passion for
any subject. I think engineering is his choice because it is at least
interesting and foundations in math and science come very easily to him. So it
seems logical to him to go down that path even if he isn't 'passionate' about
it.

------
rajacombinator
My brief advice: don’t try to race through undergrad using the extra credits.
Take enough time to explore and digest higher difficulty coursework while
maintaining high GPA, goal should be to land in a top grad school. Also, take
time for personal learning and development in undergrad. (This means things
that don’t result in receiving a grade. Go study abroad or something.) Your
kid sounds smart but unmotivated. Finding that motivation is up to them.

Edit: also don’t get cocky. Nothing you wrote sounds particularly impressive
to me.

~~~
AnimalMuppet
Learning that stuff is somewhat impressive. It's not spectacular, but it's not
chopped liver.

> Also, take time for personal learning and development in undergrad.

In particular, learn how to deal with people - especially people who aren't
like you. Technical stuff can be easy. Dealing well with people is hard.

~~~
mswen
He is more on the introverted side but he has done some of the people
leadership stuff as a team captain and he has developed some pretty close
friends the past couple years.

Do you have any specific suggestions about activities to broaden or deepen his
people skills?

~~~
AnimalMuppet
Given how many decades it took me to get better at people skills, no, he does
_not_ want my suggestions on how to get better at it...

The one thing I might say is that it starts with realizing that people
actually matter. Being right matters, knowing the tech matters, but people
really matter as well.

~~~
veddox
> The one thing I might say is that it starts with realizing that people
> actually matter.

A big, big plus to that! That's the major lesson I had to learn these past two
years. Smart people can achieve clever things. Smart people who also care
about the people around them can achieve great things.

------
impendia
Is he definitely going to the Big-10 university? I almost hate to ask this,
but is attending an elite private university an option?

It is very much possible to get an outstanding education at public
universities. I went to the University of Wisconsin for my Ph.D. in math, and
they have a fabulous graduate program. I know some of the professors there are
also very devoted to excellent undergraduate education.

But my sense is that the usual outcome is a _good_ education, and to get a
truly top-notch education at a large public university, you have to seek it
out. Some people naturally do this, but seeking out opportunities is a talent
-- one I mostly lacked myself as an undergraduate. From what I can discern,
it's easy to miss out.

Whereas at a private university there will be a lot of peer pressure. I went
to Rice as an undergrad, and I met a lot of fellow students who were
incredibly accomplished and motivated at a variety of pursuits (academic and
otherwise). The peer pressure very much pushed me in the right direction.
Although some people don't need this, or don't really benefit from it, I did.

My point is not to say "private universities are better than public" \-- there
are many excellent public universities, and plenty of mediocre private ones.
If the Big 10 place is his only choice, then good luck there -- all of the Big
10 schools are good universities, and some are excellent.

But, if possible, I'd suggest that he be as deliberate as possible in his
choice of university. I wouldn't worry too much about whether CC credits will
be accepted or not; instead, I'd try to figure out (as much as I could) what
the classes are like, and what the student experience is.

~~~
mswen
I share your perspective. He got invitations to do early application at both
Harvard and Yale (and yes I know that an invitation to apply is not a promise
of acceptance) but it clearly suggests that they think he could make a go of
it there. I also told him that it wouldn't really matter if they didn't accept
the cc credits.

I used to work remotely with firms in the Boston area. I would travel to
Boston several times a year and worked with a number of Harvard and other Ivy
League graduates.

I tried to convey to my son the value of the network that Harvard supplies.
Not only your own student cohort, but also the uniformly high quality of
world-class professors and alumni who are in positions of leadership and
influence. But for some reason he wanted to go to school close to home and
chose our state university. At some point I decided that me pushing was not
worth the tension and that he could get a good education at a state
university.

Assuming that he will go to graduate school, maybe he will try for some of the
elites schools at that point.

------
ThrowawayR2
I'd suggest that this student find a way to apply what s/he's learned: write a
mobile app, a game, a web app, or something like that. If s/he prefers
electronics because of the past robotics work, invest in a hobbyist FPGA
development board ($119 or so from Digilent), and they can create their own
hardware devices.

Education is a very important thing but ultimately it has to be applied in
order to be of use. A lot of people who did well within the structured
confines of a classroom environment fall down when they reach the real world.

~~~
mswen
When he and I have talked projects he has been more inclined toward something
on the hardware side of things. Would you recommend the FPGA board from
Digilent rather than an raspberry Pi, or other android boards?

~~~
ThrowawayR2
That really depends on his interests:

A Raspberry Pi board is a computer that one can conveniently attach things to
and control them from software. He could build a variety of interesting
systems with it.

A FPGA board would allow him to design digital circuits. He could, with enough
skill, create his own custom CPU and computer from scratch. That's a fairly
stiff challenge for even college juniors in a computer architecture course.

