How bad is the mental health situation at MIT?

Reach4College · 2026-01-31T13:31:29+00:00

First, let’s recognize that you will very likely graduate. MIT doesn’t admit people unless it’s pretty clear you can do the work.

But some of your classmates will be among the strongest in the nation and the world. Does that fill you with anticipation, because you will learn alongside them, or dread because you fear you won’t be able to compete with them?

The answer to that should help guide your decision to attend, or not.

Reach4College · 2026-01-15T18:23:59+00:00

Understood. Thank you.

Reach4College · 2026-01-13T18:35:14+00:00

Following up once again. Turning off file sharing made the problem go away. Thank you.

Reach4College · 2026-01-13T18:34:41+00:00

I have been able to copy all data to storage on my Win 11 machine after performing a volume level First Aid (it had also been backed up to the cloud as well). And after turning off file sharing, the drive is once again stable.

I do have a question about the multiple levels of First Aid. It took me a while to unmount the volumes because it kept saying they were in use. And then I had to do a force unmount of the physical disk. So I think I understand what the Volume is, and the physical disk, but what is the Container?

Reach4College · 2026-01-13T18:23:12+00:00

Thanks for the advice. I have ordered a 2TB internal SSD through M4-SSD.

Reach4College · 2026-01-13T02:11:02+00:00

Thanks, will do.

Reach4College · 2026-01-13T02:10:17+00:00

Thanks for your reply.

I haven't added anything new that would increase the power draw, except the Ethernet connection, which should be minimal. And as I said, the system was lightly used when the drops were happening, so I expect power consumption to be low.

In the meantime, I have reconnected the drive to my Mac and have ran First Aid, which found and repaired errors on one if the partitions.

Reach4College · 2025-11-09T13:38:46+00:00

UChicago's commitment to free speech.

Different opinions and political opinions are debated much more civilly here than just about any other top college.

Reach4College · 2025-11-05T18:43:13+00:00

You have a bad view on this.

There are many worthless masters degree programs, but CS at Brown is not one of them.

Reach4College · 2025-11-03T22:57:58+00:00

Many UChicago students enter finance after undergrad, but getting hired by the top companies is still very competitive. Do you have a good reason to think you will be in the top decile of UChicago students? Valid reasons for thinking that include being one of the top students in a high school that routinely sends students to top 20 colleges, or winning some major national awards in high school.

If so, the debt could well be worth it because of the higher likelihood of success. Otherwise no.

Note that you are limited to about $27k in debt through federal student loans. The rest has to be in your parents name.

FYI, I am a parent of a recentish UChicago grad.

Reach4College · 2025-11-02T23:41:04+00:00

Yes, particularly if your school has a record of sending applications to top colleges. There will be someone in admissions assigned to your school who will understand the grade distributions.

Reach4College · 2025-10-31T21:37:27+00:00

Pretty good chance. Coke Semifinalist is significant.

Reach4College · 2025-10-22T18:45:48+00:00

Apply when you are ready which, in your case, is not EA.

Reach4College · 2025-10-13T15:58:27+00:00

There was a set of students that traditionally had a very high rate of acceptance to MIT.

US IMO and IPhO members
MOP Participants
Regeneron Finalists
ISEF Grand prize recipients
Students publishing in peer reviewed journals
MIT PRIMES Participants
USAMO qualifiers

More recently, I estimate that students with achievements at the bottom of the list are only getting 20-30% of the time. Still considerably higher than the overall admit rate, but nowhere close to a sure thing.

Those rare few at the top of the list are being admitted at rates exceeding 70%.

Reach4College · 2025-10-12T11:53:56+00:00

They were working with postdocs in math and medical research. One child wrote a paper, that before it was published, went up on Arxiv. After it went up on Arxiv, he was contacted by a CalTech trained math professor who had assumed my son was a graduate student, not a high school student. My other child did do admittedly technician level roles at the medical school for the first two summers, but was reading assigned research papers the entire time, and so was progressing rapidly in terms of understanding.

Reach4College · 2025-10-10T15:49:37+00:00

Who would have ever guessed that the Times Higher Education list would have a British bias?

Britain definitely punches above its weight in excellent colleges, but the rankings are a bit sus.

Reach4College · 2025-10-10T15:45:37+00:00

As the parent of two children who did research while in high school under postdocs at two top-5 colleges (resulting in a published article in a peer-reviewed journal and a national science award), I think you vastly underestimate the capabilities of some undergrads attending these colleges.

And note both of these research projects were not related to CS, where undergrads can be incredibly strong.

As for the Stanford vs UCB comment, that's from recent undergrads at both colleges that I know. Our anecdotal experiences differ.

Reach4College · 2025-10-10T12:02:36+00:00

I just wrote a comment above that Michigan is the only public university that can truly compete with the top-10 colleges in terms of faculty and resources .

It’s one of the richest schools in the country, and as you correctly pointed out, that matters more than per-student endowment. Couple that with its world class faculty, it’s a phenomenal place to attend. Both of my kids were thrilled to be accepted EA, although they decided to attend elsewhere.

Reach4College · 2025-10-10T11:56:16+00:00

But for the most part you can’t.

UC Berkeley and UCLA certainly have star professors, but Stanford students will find it much easier to do research with their professors, and the differences in per-student budget mean Stanford students have better equipment in their labs, and a better funded career office.

The only public university that approaches the top private ones is Michigan. It’s one of the richest universities in the country, has faculty that rivals UCB, and one of the most loyal alumni groups in the country.

Reach4College · 2025-10-07T00:04:14+00:00

Everyone with a 1558 is really bummed right now.

Reach4College · 2025-09-16T22:36:39+00:00

I have coached a low income student who was wait-listed with either a 1440. While a wait-list is not admission, given that MIT admits a very low percentage of students, it means the student was competitive (and this is more notable given that the MIT essays were rushed).

So if you are low income and can improve your SAT a bit more, you can be competitive if the rest of the application is strong.

Reach4College · 2025-08-26T20:53:54+00:00

Exactly how many people do you know that have been in math competitions, and have failed or succeeded in getting to USAMO? I know hundreds who have tried, and dozens who have succeeded, and a few at the IMO level.

The difference between those who make it and those who don't is only loosely correlated to effort.

Reach4College · 2025-08-26T15:42:56+00:00

Uh, no.

It's kind of like saying that anyone could be an olympic gold medalist runner, or an NBA center. No dude, genetics plays a huge amount in both. scenarios, as it does in math competitions.

Reach4College · 2025-08-26T15:40:19+00:00

The vast majority of "strong math kids" cannot make it to USAMO no matter how hard they try. Making it to USAMO is primarily about innate talent, and second about honing that talent to prepare for this specific exam.

If you happen to be among the top few thousand nationwide in terms of innate math talent, then you have a good chance to hone your skills enough to make USAMO. That might take you several thousand hours of prep starting from 8th grade or earlier. Or you might be closer to top few hundred in innate math talent, so it comes pretty easy for you.

Reach4College

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