Monday, December 22, 2014
Thursday, December 18, 2014
Wednesday, December 17, 2014
Wednesday, December 10, 2014
Friday, November 21, 2014
Thursday, November 13, 2014
Tuesday, November 4, 2014
Wednesday, October 29, 2014
Tuesday, October 28, 2014
Saturday, October 18, 2014
Wednesday, October 15, 2014
Gasoline: What's Behind the Drop in Prices?
Prices at the pump are the the lowest they’ve been in four years… and analysts expect them to keep on dropping. Why?
Tuesday, October 14, 2014
Ebola: What Does it Do Inside the Body?
Ebola attacks a type of cell in blood vessels. Can early treatment help improve chances of survival? WSJ’s Jason Bellini has #TheShortAnswer.
Monday, October 13, 2014
How do you get into Harvard? "The Applicants" is fiction that's packed with truths about how the process really works
Once in a rare while a teacher or guidance counselor gets
tasked with writing a recommendation letter for a student for whom the usual
overachiever descriptives do not suffice.
Conveying in a page-or-two letter the character, compassion
and off-the-charts intellect of a student who is truly brilliant doesn’t come
easy.
Think about it. Only around six percent of Harvard
applicants get an acceptance letter. Admissions officers could fill each year’s
freshman class with individuals who were their high school’s valedictorian —
many times over.
Would the likes of President Bill Clinton, if he were a high
school senior today, stand a chance of getting into Georgetown, his alma mater
(16% acceptance rate)? Perhaps. But only if he and his faculty recommenders
knew how to write truly standout essays.
The stories within The Applicants, a novel now in paperback from Amazon.com,
written by authors who share the pen name Ari Morgan, offer readers something
more than a great story.
Woven brightly and discernably throughout the book is a
fully-articulated paradigm from which to approach the uber-competitive college
admissions process. At times in the story the parental characters are
painted with-less-than subtle brush strokes. One prays there really aren’t moms
and dads out there who really are as clueless and narcissistic as those
portrayed in The Applicants. But perhaps there are.
The character in the novel to pay closest attention to is
the Head Advisor of Pembrocton College Prep (PCP), Sloane Newhall. The aristocratic
parents of her elite private school grovel at her feet, because Ms. Newhall’s
college recommendation letter is the most important one these
children-of-the-one-percent-of-the-one-percent will ever receive, and it’s one
that can’t be bought. At Pembrocton, “the counselor recommendation was a solo
performance subject to review by no higher authority. It was an object of
unadulterated reverence, naked lust, anguished yearning. And it was hers and
hers alone to withhold or bestow."
Friday, October 10, 2014
Friday, September 19, 2014
Thursday, September 11, 2014
Tuesday, September 2, 2014
Don’t Blame iCloud for Celebrity Hacking
Apple said its investigation indicated certain celebrity online photo accounts were hacked in a targeted attack, and it hasn’t found a breach in its iCloud or “Find my iPhone” systems. The incident comes just a week before Apple is set to unveil its latest iPhone that could push the company deeper into health and finance.
Monday, September 1, 2014
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