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The Overachievers: The Secret Lives of Driven Kids
Alexandra Robbins
"You can't just be the smartest. You have to be the most athletic, you have to be able to have the most fun, you have to be the prettiest, the best dressed, the nicest, the most wanted.
Hyperion
August 2006
On Sale: August 8, 2006
448 pages
ISBN: 1401302017
EAN: 9781401302016
Hardcover
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Non-Fiction
With record numbers of students competing fiercely to get
into college, schools are no longer primarily places of
learning. Theyre dog-eat-dog battlegrounds in which kids
must set aside interests and passions in order to strategize
over how to game the system. In this increasingly stressful
environment, kids arent defined by their character or hunger
for knowledge, but by often arbitrary scores and statistics.
In The Overachievers, journalist Alexandra Robbins delivers
a poignant, funny, riveting narrative that explores how our
high-stakes educational culture has spiraled out of control.
During the year of her ten-year reunion, Robbins returns to
her high school, where she follows students including CJ and
others: -- Julie, a track and academic star who is terrified
she's making the wrong choices -- "AP" Frank, who grapples
with horrifying parental pressure to succeed -- Taylor, a
soccer and lacrosse captain whose ambition threatens her
popular girl status -- Sam, who worries his years of
overachieving will be wasted if he doesnt attend a
name-brand college -- Audrey, who struggles with
perfectionism, and -- The Stealth Overachiever, a mystery
junior who flies under the radar. Robbins tackles
hard-hitting issues such as the student and teacher cheating
epidemic, over-testing, sports rage, the black market for
study drugs, and a college admissions process so cutthroat
that some students are driven to depression and suicide
because of a B. Even the earliest years of schooling have
become insanely competitive, as Robbins learned when she
gained unprecedented access into the inner workings of a
prestigious Manhattan kindergarten admissions office. A
compelling mix of fast-paced storytelling and engrossing
investigative journalism, The Overachievers aims both to
calm the admissions frenzy and to expose its escalating dangers.
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