KATELYN TUOHY TO NC STATE

Why the surprise?

Better weather than every Ivy. Not a sh-thole city, either.

NC State is no slouch for sure. Its a perfectly fine school, especially for "stem". Its also not Stanford, Vanderbilt, Rice, Georgia Tech, UVa, Notre Dame, etc

I would have opted elsewhere if I were her but I'm not, and she'll be fine.

NC Stater wrote:

Is this the best decision for her? The team is loaded and they have some great recruits. She seems to have leveled off this year. I am concerned that she won't be top 5 next year and may get discouraged. It may have been wise to use her talent to get admitted to a better academic school that is not as good at running. It would lessen the pressure to perform.

I'm concerned that she will tire of pummeling the competition and will switch to tennis to find a new challenge.

Pummel - "strike repeatedly with the fists"

Is this really how you want to describe a soft spoken 17 year old girl?

For the teammates, the coaches, the facilities, and the overall fact that it's a top running program

That's like saying to a math genius why are you going to MIT when you could have a lot more fun at Ohio State

If your number one priority is being an awesome Runner and being part of an awesome running program then it kind of makes sense

Basically the best running program on the east coast and she's super good friends with a lot of the teammates.

Yes. Sorry, that's what I want to write in my sarcastic post.

Exactly. I don't understand people who say X University/College is a terrible school. It's about individual programs or departments. There are great and terrible professors at every university.

Also, plenty of great running around Raleigh and the Triangle, and having Umstead Park in your backyard is pretty nice.

Wow. Why? This is a shock. She could have wrote her name to any school she wanted and NC state? Wasn't she like a straight A student too?

Agree, she seems team-oriented, she probably knows and likes the other girls and/or wanted to be part of a very strong team

She must have liked the campus, facilities, people more than the other places she visited

Why go to a “top” school if you’re going to be unhappy?

I went to a highly ranked school which was highly ranked mostly because of professors doing research, most were poor at teaching and for that and other reasons I didn’t have a great time. It probably helped me get jobs but plenty of colleagues and bosses also went to lower-ranked schools and had no problems.

Dude you should definitely try to get in touch with Touhy’s parents to let them know. I doubt they did the sort of research you did. My guess is they threw a dart at a board full of shitty schools and LO and behold NC State here she comes!

I don't see why everybody feels like they know better than her where she should have gone. It looks like geography was a consideration if we believe the reports of where she visited and did not visit. I can see a lot of positives to NC State, but most importantly it seems to be where she liked things the best. Wish her success both academically and athletically. And just let it go.

Guy Stecklov wrote:

Kev2 wrote:

I know this does not sound PC, but I don't think being white is that much of an advantage anymore. If I apply to many academic jobs, I am supposed to address diversity issues in the application. This is becoming a huge red flag, and I won't waste my time on that. At one time, certain minority groups were repressed and discriminated against, now I think the pendulum has swung in the other direction. Being male also does not help either, but that is another issue.

Your facts are wrong. I study this issue. In certain very specific sectors of society, minorities and women are making headway, but in the vast majority of arenas in the United States, being black or a woman is still a major limitation in success.

There are numerous biases affecting women and minorities in the workforce. It's often harder for them to receive more senior roles, women don't receive as much direct feedback as men do, and they are sometimes evaluated differently during review processes.

That said, to say they don't receive benefits as well (especially during the hiring/applications process) is completely untrue. If you want to have a discussion about the topic at least make sure everything you are saying is true.

Here are a couple facts for you:

- I was in an interview review discussion this fall where the recruiter asked if we could swap out one of the guys for a woman. There was no discussion of how qualified each of them were, they just asked who the bottom guy was and swapped in the top female to help the ratio.

And don't try to say that biases led to the ratio being lower to begin with - we have software that removes PII from all resumes so people don't know the person's gender or ethnicity when reviewing the resume.

- I studied mechanical engineering and applied to an ME internship in my hometown while in college. I knew the head of the mechanical engineering department and he told me later that even though my resume was much better than the other candidates, I didn't have a chance because I wasn't a female or minority since they had to hit certain numbers. Sure enough, I saw a picture of the interns at the end of the summer and he was right about who ended up being chosen.

- It is objectively easier to get into some elite schools if you are certain minorities. Not PC to say, but the statistics back it up - if you want to deny it I'll spend 2 minutes googling it and send you an article.

The first two examples above are two different industries - one in tech/analytics and one in engineering. Are you saying both of these fall within the very specific sectors?

For a more entertaining example, you can also read about runner James Hogue's strategy for getting into Princeton by pretending he was Hispanic (which worked).

Kev2 wrote:

Actually Arkansas is the current powerhouse and they just won NCAA. I know Taylor Ewert is going there. Not sure about their other recruits.

London Culbreath is going there too.

But still, filling in for the top 4 that Arkansas is graduating to make a run at NC state will be a tall order.

Most elite universities were not even coed until the later 60s. And only recently have elite schools hit double figure enrollment numbers for the percentage of different underrepresented minority groups as a percentage of total enrollment. In effect, a whole lot more time would need to pass to counter the impact of decades of elite university admissions policies where you basically waltzed through the door if you were a WASP of a certain economic standing. Probably not a lot of consolation to the children, grandchildren and great grandchildren of the huge numbers of people who didn't do a whole lot to earn their sports at elite academic institutions as they now find themselves part of a much more competitive process, but once again, if dad, mom, grandad and great-grandad all graduated from elite unis, you're probably going to have a much easier path in life than the kid who does come from a family that has enjoyed great advantage for generation after generation.

My son could have gone to Harvard for free but chose to go to his local state school and pay $25k just because he heard Harvard was sort of Liberal. Every other thread has all of you telling every kid to go to the best school that they can get into. Now when your favorite runner can go anywhere, you give the advice that she should follow her heart and her dream instead of going to Stanford or ND for free. Okay. That's consistency.

Buster, you're not taking into account what social conditions lead to a bunch of white and Asian males doing exceptionally well in grades and test scores, etc. You are right that universities want to balance their populations by race and gender but if you assume talent is equally distributed, which I think is a good assumption, but that opportunities are not equally distributed prior to applications, race and gender balancing makes sense. In my view, the difference between really good, mediocre, and bad xc programs at the hs and even middle school level illustrates how the right opportunities (good coaching, good training programs), not genetic ability, really create vast differences that are not due to natural talent. The differences are so stark (low 15 average for Newbury Park, for instance, in comparison to 19, 20, 21 for lousy programs), yet there's no clear genetic component and teams can sustain something close to that for long periods (York being an example).

Better keep her away from that Cake :0-

runnerexpert wrote:

tuohy fan wrote:

Tuohy is very smart. She most likely earned a full ride from one of NC State's academic scholarships.

if you are so smart academically, why go to nc state? 84th ranked per US News. Go to mich or notre dame or stanford, they have scholarships..she picked the lowest ranked school academically on her list.

Have you read the book Where You Go Is Not Who You'll Be? It basically says that if you are smart enough to get into an Ivy League, you'll excel whether you go to an Ivy League school or your state school. In fact, attending an Ivy or Ivy-level school sometimes crushes kids so much that they end up switching majors, struggling with depression, or even transferring. Tuohy is probably smart enough to get into an Ivy (disregarding athletics). She is one of the top students in her class and she is very motivated. If she went to Stanford, Michigan, or Notre Dame, which are all Ivy-level in terms of difficulty, there's no guarantee she would end up staying in her major, maintain her mental health, and graduate from that same school. NC State is a great choice because the academics will not challenge her as much so she'll be able to focus more of her energy into her running. Remember, she had to end her junior track season early because she was struggling to balance academics and athletics. She's probably trying to avoid that problem in the future.

Another point: Graduating at the top of her class from NC State will be much easier and open up more job opportunities than graduating at the middle of her class from Stanford, Michigan, or Notre Dame.

Your son is a man of principle and integrity

I applaud him turning down the ivy league and going to the local school

That boy has grit & you can't teach Grit...

I bet you he does the noble thing. I bet you he graduate with honors works really hard to get an advanced degree and then becomes a plumber or refrigerator repairman. Because those jobs are needed. And they take Grit.

Now send that gritty over to my house I need my toilet plunged pronto.