MovableFeast
However, although there are kids burning the midnight oil and succeeding in incredible ways in many fields, DH and I take a different tack. We are in it for the long haul and want to raise emotionally solid and stable kids so we don't allow too many commitments and there is absolutely no way my kids are staying at school till 10:30pm, more like 5:30pm They have a balanced life.
It's not necessarily a case of either/or.
A huge number of teens here are involved in the fantastic extra curriculars in school and there is frequently a traffic jam near the school between 10 and 10:30pm. With very few exceptions, teens participate in their chosen activities because they genuinely enjoy them. In particular those participating in activities like Spoken Word, three musicals a year plus the summer school musical, plus three different drama groups putting on several productions per year are there out of interest, ditto show choir and orchesis (dance) plus the gospel choirs and many musical ensembles.
Even kids doing sports can also be assumed to do it out of enjoyment and genuine interest. Some kids are really very motivated. There are scholarship funds available to cover costs for students wishing to participate in sports who cannot afford equipment or the participation fee. Participation in extra curriculars is very important for communities within the wider school community who might feel othered or 'on the outside looking in' - a particular challenge is engaging low income African American teens.
Sport is one of the ways the school attempts to build the important sense of belonging of having your contribution appreciated, and performing arts is another. Having a successful team to support makes a difference to many cohorts in the school and success is celebrated at assemblies. A 'C to play' rule aims to heighten students' academic focus. Many black teen boys have managed to graduate with decent GPAs because they have had a good relationship with a football or basketball coach who wouldn't stop nagging them about homework, and a friendly face in the tutoring centre when they had to go there for a week to get their grades up.
In my DCs's school the former head basketball coach taught math and coached basketball for 45 years and was in a position to really make a difference in athletes' lives. Teachers are paid a $10k stipend annually to coach or to direct drama/musicals/singing/dancing troupes or to run a club, etc. and they can develop relationships with students and thus provide a foundation for them that they might not otherwise experience. Not all students have the benefit of a stable, loving family life and parents who know or care enough to guide them as they make choices in their teen years. Some parents have a chip on their shoulders about school and do not support their children as they should.
Developing relationships by means of extra curriculars is really important in giving students a sense of belonging and a strong interest in taking responsibility for their own homework, classroom behaviour and choices outside of the classroom (there are bottom lines - no arrests, no drinking, no drug taking if you are on a team or in a performing arts activity). I assume based on my own observation of local Catholic high schools that integrating communities that are marginalised is not an issue in the one your DCs attend (it wasn't an issue in the RC elementary mine went to and it isn't in the two RC HSs in my area) but in a public high school there can be factors at work that make strong extra curriculars schoolwide very desirable.
My dd is aiming for the local public university which is one of the best in the world and a third of the price of most private unis.
Students expecting to receive a good deal of financial aid are often far better advised to apply to private universities, especially that magic group of between 60 and 70 universities that offer to meet 100% of demonstrated need. The ticket price of private universities is not necessarily what each student pays. So far, two of my DDs have had 95% of the cost essentially waived, in both cases to universities that would have cost over 60K per year. There are many US students who could end up paying more for a state university than for a private university, and as with private universities there is a wide variety when it comes to quality in public universities.
I have been a recruiter for international companies and a college counselor and I know what they are looking for and so know it is not more of the same. So I don't allow my kids to take on unholy amounts of stress but instead our interests as a family are more quirky and community based. I know they would prefer high schoolers to have worked a paid modest job than a lot of the flashy stuff out there.
Again, more activities doesn't necessarily mean more stress.
Not every student has a great family life, or a family that can afford to expose children to a variety of interests. For many students, participation in a drama or playing water polo in school will be the only time they got to experience something outside of the routine. The local high school also offers opportunities to participate in a buddy programme where special ed students participate in outings with mainstream students - to baseball games, to museums, to events around town. There is also a very well subscribed service club whose members participate in all aspects of fundraising for good causes. It's not all me, me, me striving.
A huge number of students work part time - we are lucky to have a lot of local businesses that absorb the demand for work - and many volunteer at the local food bank and local libraries and animal shelters, etc. My DCs all worked part time through school and university, first babysitting and doing yard work, and then on to PT office work, work in shops and cafes, and then full time summer work in offices and also volunteering as summer interns in the office of a local state representative.
My kids have lived abroad and attended schools where they had to survive and learn a new language. That will go a lot further than the insanity of barely any sleep for 4 years. We want to give our kids time to breathe, relax and figure out who they are in a healthy way. I think it is very important not to try and over produce your child and their life.
Again, not every family can offer the experience of living abroad, or speaking another language, and it's not necessarily parents pushing kids into stressful situations. Most parents are more inclined to avoid stressing students out, sometimes to the frustration of teachers whose subjects have a reputation for being demanding - AP European History, AP Physics, and some of the engineering classes for instance.
In my local HS, levels of participation in extra curriculars, APs, etc, are not necessarily because of pressure from parents. Having a school as a focus of efforts to create a community that tries to include and value everyone's contribution and where students feel welcome is in everybody's interest - nobody wins when there is a wide academic achievement gap and significant parts of a community feel they are unappreciated, unwelcome, edged out. One very successful way of forging a community is running a successful football programme (autumn) with its associated wrestling (winter) and strong track programmes (spring) for boys, or a basketball programme. Engagement is key.
We are happy with our choices. Our kids go to Catholic schools for the community and support as well as the academic excellence and they are not as expensive as regular private schools due to parents volunteering time and talents in and out of school.
I have also experienced the hands on expectation for parents in RC school and loved it. But other school models also offer the element of community spirit, and at least in my case the local public HS is an example of that though it takes a different route to that destination.