The frame of "Geeks" is similar to that of Robbins's 2006 book "The Overachievers," which profiles students facing pre-college pressure.
The Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions also heard Joshua Pruyn, a former admissions representative at a for-profit college, describe pressure used to get students to enroll and attend classes for two weeks, after which the college could keep their financial aid.
Is it the helicopter parents, über focused on getting them on a Division One team in college, whose pressure makes it impossible for kids to accept anything else but beyond the best?
If you are a student, or a budget conscious parent of a student, who is feeling the college preparatory pressure, here is an idea for an affordable holiday gift that parents can give themselves and their kids this season: a $49 SAT online class taught by superstar teachers that covers everything on the SAT.
At the time, college students pressured school administrators to support better treatment for the workers who made apparel with university logos; At Yale, Georgetown, and the University of Wisconsin-Madison, among others, students held rallies and sit-ins.
The new measures have been introduced following concern about dramatic increases in the number of requests for remarks from schools and colleges under pressure to secure the best possible grades for their students.
Two years ago I traveled across the country to research The Overachievers, a book about high school and college students pressured to succeed.
And so, with spring approaching, students and faculty at one of America's most progressive colleges felt pressured to make an awkward judgment: whether to ally themselves with the black community or whether to ally themselves with the offended Jews.
One of the Department's representatives, a dedicated career lawyer with a deep knowledge of federal education law, countered that the colleges' high-pressure tactics centered around deceptions, such as saying falsely that the student had to sign up immediately or lose their slot in the class.
"As the numbers of students applying to college increases, the pressure felt by high school seniors gets even greater".
And many who do leave for college often feel pressure to return in a culture that finds comfort at home, and fear and suspicion in the outside world.
