he scored 800 on the math portion, 680 on verbal at age 12. I scored 800 on the verbal and 530 on the math at 12. He's a tenured math professor and published author. I'm an IT consultant of 20 years and a published author. I think I'm just as qualified to speak on behalf of this group as he is.
I was one of "those kids" as well. I attended MO(S)P in 1999, won national writing awards, wrote a card game at 20 (Ambition) that is not just playable but actually played by a lot of people I've never met.
The problem is the way the school system itself is structured. In the US, we're utilizing a school system that was designed 150 years ago and hasn't changed much since. [...] The need for rigorous schedules became the norm with time zones and train schedules, and later with the whistles and bells of assembly line manufacturing. Strict scheduling in schools helped acclimate kids to the forthcoming work environment. It was a great thing, and helped build a strong and well educated workforce.
As times changed, however, schools didn't. [... W]e don't do nearly enough for the small fraction who are highly gifted. We simply put them into "harder" or "higher level" classes than their peers. We simply put them into "harder" or "higher level" classes than their peers. This isn't an acceptable solution. We need to stimulate them, to find out where their passions lie then feed them accordingly.
From first principles, I agree with you.
However, what has changed even less than the school system is corporate employment. If you're a cognitive 0.01-percenter, being a corporate drone is going to be way more painful than a decent public high school. Trust me, I know both.
Now, one might argue that 0.01-percenters are just unlikely to end up in corporate drone jobs, all being tapped to become proteges of the Gordon Gekkos and Peter Gregories (RIP) of the world. The data don't bear that out. The OP stated (a surprising fact) that the median income, at age 40, of these top-0.01% students was only $80,000. (I knew that the average income of prodigies was mediocre, but I was expecting $150-200k.) The number of 0.01-percenters who end up in corporate mediocrity is shockingly high.
The corporate "real world" is indifferent to the cognitive 1% (unless it comes with pedigree) and outright hostile to the correlates and eccentricities that come with being in the top 0.01%. The school system is doing its job. All that awful closed-campus stuff, the bells and no-backpacks-in-classroom rules, the hall passes and rules surrounding them, are inculcating a deference to authority that the corporate world still demands. And high school makes more exceptions for smart kids than any corporation. (Corporations might exempt political favorites from their bullshit rules, but that's a different set.)
If we want to make a world where the cognitive 0.01% actually get to use their talents (and I fully support such change) and have some autonomy/power, we should make haste to fix the work world. A real fix, not this chickenhawking VC-funded bullshit that seems just as willing to fund turds like Evan Spiegel and Lucas Duplan. We should abolish the current corporate system and reinvent capitalism with the right people in charge. That is the best thing we can do for the cognitive 0.01% (and society as a whole, which benefit sfrom their work). Improving the education system is also valuable, but cognitive 0.01-percenters are able to teach themselves so long as they receive a basically reasonable education (and the average U.S. public school qualifies).
I was one of "those kids" as well. I attended MO(S)P in 1999, won national writing awards, wrote a card game at 20 (Ambition) that is not just playable but actually played by a lot of people I've never met.
The problem is the way the school system itself is structured. In the US, we're utilizing a school system that was designed 150 years ago and hasn't changed much since. [...] The need for rigorous schedules became the norm with time zones and train schedules, and later with the whistles and bells of assembly line manufacturing. Strict scheduling in schools helped acclimate kids to the forthcoming work environment. It was a great thing, and helped build a strong and well educated workforce.
As times changed, however, schools didn't. [... W]e don't do nearly enough for the small fraction who are highly gifted. We simply put them into "harder" or "higher level" classes than their peers. We simply put them into "harder" or "higher level" classes than their peers. This isn't an acceptable solution. We need to stimulate them, to find out where their passions lie then feed them accordingly.
From first principles, I agree with you.
However, what has changed even less than the school system is corporate employment. If you're a cognitive 0.01-percenter, being a corporate drone is going to be way more painful than a decent public high school. Trust me, I know both.
Now, one might argue that 0.01-percenters are just unlikely to end up in corporate drone jobs, all being tapped to become proteges of the Gordon Gekkos and Peter Gregories (RIP) of the world. The data don't bear that out. The OP stated (a surprising fact) that the median income, at age 40, of these top-0.01% students was only $80,000. (I knew that the average income of prodigies was mediocre, but I was expecting $150-200k.) The number of 0.01-percenters who end up in corporate mediocrity is shockingly high.
The corporate "real world" is indifferent to the cognitive 1% (unless it comes with pedigree) and outright hostile to the correlates and eccentricities that come with being in the top 0.01%. The school system is doing its job. All that awful closed-campus stuff, the bells and no-backpacks-in-classroom rules, the hall passes and rules surrounding them, are inculcating a deference to authority that the corporate world still demands. And high school makes more exceptions for smart kids than any corporation. (Corporations might exempt political favorites from their bullshit rules, but that's a different set.)
If we want to make a world where the cognitive 0.01% actually get to use their talents (and I fully support such change) and have some autonomy/power, we should make haste to fix the work world. A real fix, not this chickenhawking VC-funded bullshit that seems just as willing to fund turds like Evan Spiegel and Lucas Duplan. We should abolish the current corporate system and reinvent capitalism with the right people in charge. That is the best thing we can do for the cognitive 0.01% (and society as a whole, which benefit sfrom their work). Improving the education system is also valuable, but cognitive 0.01-percenters are able to teach themselves so long as they receive a basically reasonable education (and the average U.S. public school qualifies).