Hi, I’m Greg, and today, I am going to tell you why you should NOT apply to an Ivy League
college, or basically any other top school that you want to go to.
As a college admissions YouTuber, I want to be 100% transparent with you about what you’re
getting into when you apply to and attend an Ivy League school. I discovered a lot of
this crucial information soon after starting my freshman year at Princeton, and by that
point it was already too late.
In fact, I really wish somebody had made this video for me when I was applying to college.
Now, if you’re anything like me, you've watched hours of college YouTube videos, asked
every resource out there how you can get into an Ivy League school, and are under the impression
that if you get accepted into an Ivy League school, everything will be great and work
out for you.
This is just simply not the case. Today, I’ve decided to compile a list of all the things
I don’t like about Princeton that I believe apply to other top schools as well. I'm not
going to lie, this was a really tough video to make, but I’m going to say some things
that really need to be said, and haven't yet been said here on YouTube, so buckle up and
listen carefully.
For those of you who don’t know what the Ivy league college student’s schedule looks
like, we actually have a lot less class time than we did in high school. For example, I
only have 3-4 classes a day, each of one runs between 50-80 minutes, AND I don't even have
class on Fridays.
That’s only like, 16 hours a week! I mean, in addition to that, I’m the business manager
for my a cappella group, which takes up about 7 hours a week, and I’m a volunteer for
Matriculate, a nonprofit through which I offer college consulting services for underprivileged
students, and that takes maximum 2 hours a week.
Adding that all up, that’s around 25 hours a week, total - which is a little more than
half of the commitment of your average 40 hour work week. Add YouTube onto that, and
we’re looking at about 35 hours a week of class and activities.
I'm going to tell you now that the #1 thing I hate about Princeton and other elite colleges
is that I spend all my time keeping up with the fast-paced environment of the school,
and don't have much time to develop myself. Now, how can this be the case when I’m in
half as much class as a high school student?
Part of the answer to this question is the insane amount of homework that we are assigned
for each class. Of course, this varies by your major and the actual college that you’re
attending, you know, not looking at Harvard or anything... but seriously, homework at
Ivy League schools is pretty ridiculous.
I'm going to give you a real life example of a class that I'm in to show you what I'm
talking about. The class is called Introduction to Programming Systems, and it's a required
prerequisite for my major, Computer Science. On average, we have about one homework assignment
due every week and a half or so.
The website for my most recent assignment reports that the homework takes, on average,
12 hours to complete (it took me around 15). Four days after that due date, we had a midterm
exam. Oh and don't forget, I had three other midterm exams for my other classes, and assignments
of comparable length.
Altogether, on average, completing these assignments takes about five hours a day. That’s an
extra 35 hours per week, putting us at around 70 hours of pure work, class, activities,
every week. Now, that amount of work for a college student is unsustainable, and I’m
about to show you why, but it's pretty much the schedule of most of my friends and a lot
of other Ivy League students that I know.
But before I get into real research that I have done on the ways that the Ivy League's
workload negatively affects its student body, I want to thank you all for 10,000 SUBSCRIBERS!
To thank you guys, I will be doing a Q & A for my next video, so leave a comment if you
have any questions about my life, my friends, anything like that and they will be answered
in the next video.
Also, please give this video a like because it took a lot of time to think about and produce.
AND subscribe to my channel for more information about college admissions, SAT prep, and college
life.
Now, there are two main ways that the extreme workload I’ve been talking about affects
Ivy League college students in a negative way. First, it promotes a very competitive,
sink or swim environment in which most students do not care about their mental health, suffer
from imposter syndrome, and are generally very unhappy during what is supposed to be
“the best four years of your life.”
Second, it gives students little to no time to think about how they actually want to apply
these elite degrees to the real world, making it really easy for companies to push careers
on to students that they didn't necessarily want.
First, let’s talk about students’ mental health. Tiger Confessions is a private facebook
group where Princeton students can submit confessions anonymously; many students make
jokes, talk about crushes, or express their feelings over the anonymous platform. Many,
if not all Princeton students are either part of the group or know of its existence, so
I feel that the contents of the page are a pretty good representation of the feelings
of the Princeton student body as a whole.
I took all 71 confessions that were posted on Thursday of last week and counted up how
many of them included some sort of college-related complaint or some general life complaint.
Out of 71 posts, 21 were negative and mentioned Princeton directly by name, and about a third
of those included the words “depression” or “mental health” exactly.
There were also eight posts about general anxiety, stress, sadness that did not reference
Princeton directly. So, overall, 29 out of 71 posts, approximately 41% of Princeton students
who posted on that day, were unsatisfied, feeling dumb, sad, depressed, alone, overworked,
you name it. So much for the Ivy League making you feel happy forever and ever.
Now, I know that there are all sorts of biases going on here and correlation doesn’t imply
causation, but this statistic is too important to ignore. Going to an Ivy League school will
NOT, by itself, make you happy.
So now you know that we Ivy League students are working super hard to stay on top of our
course load and in the process we’re confused and upset because we don't have time to take
care of our mental health. This is a gold mine for investment banks, management consulting
firms, big tech companies, and even non profits who are looking for super smart, fresh employees
who are used to being overworked and unfulfilled to do all of the grunt work in their businesses.
I mean, it's undeniable. I get at least two invitations to "networking events" every single
week in my Princeton email.
Recruiters will wear fancy suits, they'll take you to really nice dinners, and they'll
talk to you all about the 6 figure income you’re going to make right out of college.
You will feel important, you will feel successful, but according to millionaire entrepreneur
Steve Papa who visited Princeton just a few weeks ago, you will burn out, and you will
realize you are not following your life purpose (at least in most cases). Steve receives hundreds
of job applications from former investment bankers and management consultants, and apparently
they are accepted into his company at much lower rates than average, simply because they
are unmotivated and they have lost touch with their creativity and critical thinking skills.
It’s crazy to me how the world’s brightest minds are being sucked into doing nothing
but making vast amounts of money for huge, huge companies that aren't helping anyone.
The Ivy League makes it really easy for companies to push careers onto students who have not
had time to properly figure out what they want to do with their life, and that really
sucks.
Now, I didn’t make this video to imply that you should not go to an Ivy League school
under any circumstances. Despite all of what I have said in this video, I am super happy
that I chose to go to Princeton-- the connections I've made here with my friends, the trips
I’ve gone on with my a cappella group, and some of the classes I have taken have all
helped me to grow as a person.
Luckily, I’ve also been doing lots of self reflection and my work on this YouTube channel
has actually helped me to discover what I think my life purpose is.
Now that you know what I have told you about Ivy League colleges, I wish you the best in
your college search-- honestly, I really do. I still think that Ivy League colleges are
great, and they're a great tool to help you achieve your goals. It's just important that
you separate what your goals are from what other people say that your goals should be.
If you want to maximize your chances of getting into college, check out the rest of my videos
and hit that subscribe button to be notified whenever I post another one. That’s it for
today guys, peace.