Competition

When I was in high school, there was plenty of competition to get into "top" colleges, but it wasn't insane. Since then, it has gotten a lot worse. Nowadays, it seems like kids aren't allowed to have summers free if they want to get into a prestigious school (of course, you can get an equally good education and have a good experience at hundreds of non-"prestigious" schools, but competitive parents don't want to hear that).

Students who want to get into top schools often spend their summers doing research internships or volunteering. While I think kids should learn about volunteering, I hope that today's kids get time to be kids, too.

Hard to speculate what drove this kid to suicide last week.

[Note: Glen Rock H.S. in New Jersey is not to be confused with Glen Ridge, where a) Tom Cruise went and b) football players were accused of raping a learning-disabled girl in someone's basement years ago in a famous case.]

Related reading:

The Overachievers: The Secret Lives of Driven Kids. (I read this book last year.)

http://nymag.com/news/features/24398/index.html The Superapplicants (article.)