Where You Go Is Not Who You'll Be: An Antidote to the College Admissions Mania by Frank Bruni

There is a local private school around here called Stratford. A mom friend told me that her son goes to school there. Then she clarified, "He goes to Stratford, not Stanford." You know, in case I thought that her five-year-old was attending university classes at that other local private school down the road. I'm glad she clarified, I was confused for a moment! Oh, but how many parents dream of one day casually but proudly saying, "My son goes to Stanford."

Did you say you went to Stratford? Or Stanford?

The pressure is great these days for kids to go to a prestigious school. This book argues, using both statistics and stories, that it's not so much about where you go as what you do with your time in college. Some students are much better off at "second-tier" or lesser known schools where they can receive more attention from professors and have more opportunities to study or research what they'd like.

This book should be required reading for all high school freshmen and their parents. Or maybe parents of preschoolers.