Having read the NY Times article, I must say my own instinct is to side firmly with the Asian American parent group. I think there is a tendency on the part of many middle class Americans to overvalue the social emotional element of the tween and teen years, to romanticise or sentimentalise childhood, and to overlook the value of challenge and work as components of social and emotional development. Sometimes a self proclaimed advocate for 'childhood' is under the surface a parent who doesn't want to see his or her child experience failure and doesn't understand that resilience is a very valuable personality component.
I disagree with the explanation offered of immigrant anxiety to see second generation children make it into the middle class. Many immigrants from Asia and south Asia (and from Ireland and Russia and Nigeria, etc) come from educated, middle class backgrounds themselves and they are surprised at the complacency, the certainty that life will always go on exactly as it is, that lots of American middle class parents seem to have. Some parents will push a child to take challenging courses because they see it as a character builder for the child, and because they know that the competition back home will eat their children for breakfast when they arrive in NJ or Chicago or Houston or LA if they allow them to slack at their schoolwork, as they see the American parents' approach. And some cultures simply place a great value on academic focus and mastery. This is true for many sub cultures within the group labeled 'American' as well as many (but not all) immigrant cultures.
The unexamined American middle class assumption that is clearly expressed in the article that people all over the world are willing to sacrifice their children's well being to get a place on the exalted plateau of American middle class life is startling reading for someone whose family enjoyed a solidly middle class life in Ireland or India or Russia. Not all immigrants are the huddled masses.
Many come from systems where the final exam determines your future and see in the American system a much kinder, gentler and incredibly straightforward approach where teachers really support understanding and skill development, and that facilitates all the values the parents wish to inculcate a solid work ethic, a consistent, disciplined approach by the student, a habit of approaching teachers when they don't understand material it often contrasts greatly with the experiences of parents in their own school years, in systems where teachers and students alike are overwhelmed by the pressure of finishing the prescribed coursework and studying seven or eight subjects in preparation for a two week exam period at age 17 in which they will churn out perhaps ten essays in five hours daily, day after day.
The American system by contrast makes success easy. There are parents who see everything laid on and geared for success the lovely facilities, the teachers with their positive attitudes, the simple math involved in 'do your homework daily and hand it in and you will get an A simply for meeting the homework expectation' apart altogether from the work grade it's gobsmacking to see how easily the grades that a college admissions officer will see add up, while in your own native system the fact that exams are held in the middle of hay fever season can make or break your hopes.
Wrt the Palo Alto article -
Suicide is a strange phenomenon, and I agree with the suggestion that among teens suicide clustering can be fueled by social media, glamorisation, and even by media. In my own community a suicide cluster among people in their 50s and early 50s has recently occurred, or perhaps (God forbid) is ongoing. I am not really sure anyone can definitively say that outside forces like school pressure are responsible for individual decisions to take one's own life, apart from a sort of normalisation of it that arises when it seems to happen and generates a huge amount of love and sympathy. (Not that condemnation is the answer, however).
I think the Palo Alto article illustrates the importance of the personal quality of resilience -- to experience failure and to realise the earth is still spinning despite that is extremely important, and I suspect many of the groups singled out in the NY Times article understand that. I also think the PA article underscores the importance of spending actual real time with children and teens, something the children of the very poor and the very rich and busy do not enjoy.
I know many very well off young people who have been brought up by a succession of nannies and babysitters, and at the other end of the scale, teens left to their own devices because parents have checked out for many reasons or are too busy holding down several poorly paying jobs to be able to spend time with them. Parents who are too caught up in their own lives and their own needs are never going to do a good job, even if how they express that doesn't involve living vicariously through their children's achievements. I know one family in particular in which the only way the teens can get their father's positive attention is by engaging in 60s style rebellion and self destructive or attention seeking behaviour and substance abuse. One of the DCs was suspended from school for piercing her nose in class. So another element well illustrated by that article is the importance of good parenting as opposed to neglectful parenting, or ego driven parenting. Praising for effort as opposed to tangible achievement is probably a better way to encourage children than focusing on the end product so to speak.
I believe kids can feel very connected to parents even when they are working hard towards a specific goal in school that appears to be generated by the parents. There are other personal factors involved in the relationship of parents and teens besides parents guiding teens towards a certain educational goal that con contribute to a positive experience for all of using your time efficiently. The importance of parents sharing a hobby or commitment to volunteering were not mentioned, but this can often serve to connect a teen to a wider purpose in life, can give a sense of self worth apart from academic achievement, to appreciate the advantages he or she has over others, to limit the sort of navel gazing that teens can often indulge in, and to bring parents and teens closer.
It's good for parents too, to be involved in community service. It can give them a good sense of perspective, and can take the spotlight off their children when casting around for something to fix. The happiest families I know are those involved in the local food bank and those who make their children volunteer in the library, those who do shifts at the local church homeless shelter. Their teens are just as focused on academic achievement as many others in the community, but they have made a connection to the wider community that has taught them many valuable lessons about themselves.
Maybe I am lucky to live in a community that is very mixed in socio economic terms. I get the impression that Palo Alto is not a place where a food bank feeds many families or overnight shelters take care of 100-150 guests nightly.
Experts can wring their hands all they like about the danger of internalising parental priorities, but (pushy?) parents in affluent communities are also hoping their children internalise their attitudes when it comes to the very easily available hard drugs, alcohol and pot. Many have seen preaching along the lines of 'just say no' fail dismally and have opted for a much more subtle approach. Many parents have siblings or members of their wider families whose lives have been destroyed by drugs or alcohol, etc, maybe members of the Vietnam War generation. In many cases the alternative to the teen party scene is the teen sport/band/orchestra scene or the teen honours class scene and ideally the scene where teens are doing all of that. Having a positive peer group is part of the motivation behind some of the pressure to participate in extracurricular activities and keep grades up. Participation in sports is jeopardised by alcohol or drug use. Schools can administer tests and are in close contact with local police.
There is far more devastation wrought by addiction or risk taking with various substances than by pressure to stay in the honours track or not get cut from lacrosse or soccer. There is also a lot of unbearable social isolation and unhappiness caused when students fail to connect with one or other group. A friend of mine sent her children to the local excellent RC high school, and they were among the very few not to take part in the hard partying scene there. For $15k each per year, her children should have been happier.
America is above all a society where the rich have got richer and the poor have got poorer in recent decades. Most parents and grandparents have seen union jobs disappear even in cities that were historically strongly unionised or with a strong ethnically based mutual help ethos, and everyone is conscious to a greater or lesser extent of the lack of legal protection for employees. Employment at will is a reality for most parents in white collar professions and careers, and access to jobs is now mediated by HR departments. Many have faced sudden unemployment and an ignominious trip home from an office with all their photos and their stapler in a cardboard box, to face the family later that day with bad news. People who live with that level of insecurity feel they are neglectful parents if they do not try to ensure their children get to universities that maximise their chances of solid careers and uninterrupted prosperity.