Brown, Cornell, Columbia, Dartmouth, Harvard, Princeton, University of Pennsylvania, and Yale; these are the names that cause any Korean student’s heart to start racing. Some view them as a dream, some as a goal, and others as their chief source of stress
For Korean students who plan on pursuing their higher education in the US, the Ivy League is usually upheld as not only the best choice, but also their only choice. In Korea, ranking and name value are the two most important principles in life, and both parents and students apply them to the college application process. After the Korean War, education was seen as the key to success; thus, a college with a higher ranking was equated with a higher living standard. Thus, Koreans have a tendency to not only seek higher education, but aim for higher ranked colleges. This is because in Korean society, employers generally assess their prospective employees based on their educational background and the “name value” of the college that they attended.
As the trend of studying abroad continues to escalate, both parents and students are becoming increasingly competitive. Wendy Choi, who was accepted to Columbia University, said, “My mother worked hard to find me the most famous tutors for each of my school subjects. She always warned me not to tell my classmates about them, because their mothers might offer them a higher fee and swipe them.”
Adding to that, she said that while she realized that a college’s name value was not the most important thing, it was difficult to ignore the societal values that had been imposed upon her since childhood. “In Korea, most people only know of a few, select schools. Because of this, they automatically assume that any school that isn’t a part of the Ivy League is easy to get into. They don’t realize that different schools have different strengths.”
An Ivy League education in itself is not a flawed aspiration. Yet “It is the most important thing to find a college that best fits your personality,” as Sandra Park, a prospective freshman of Wellesley College advised. As more Korean students have opportunities to study abroad, knowledge about the rich variety of American colleges will disperse. In time, they will realize that there are countless paths to their ultimate goals; personal fulfillment and success.
ahh i think this is something a lot of us can relate to QQ
i know i definitely feel pressure to go to a brand name school (even though i’m always telling myself that attending a college that fits me is the most important thing)
i liked the way you wrote, but thought you could go into a bit more detail and have some more quotes? and use the ap style for quote usage 🙂
this was great though!