Ireland's big school secret: how a year off-curriculum changes teenage lives

> What he really wanted to close was the cultural gap between rich and poor

This sounds great!

> Then there is the financial aspect of TY: some parents just can’t afford it.

oh for fuck's sake

Yep! Good extracurriculars are expensive.

I remember taking part in Debate, MUN, XC, DECA, Wrestling, Quiz Bowl, Volunteering (NHS/CSF), and a bunch of Olympiads in HS and there was always a cost associated with participating (either a fee or the need to travel to the place hosting the EC).

Unsurprisingly, this meant ECs would skew upper middle class and upper class. Sadly, these same ECs are also blockers for college admissions.

I might get hate for this on HN, but this is why I support unweighted GPA, relative class ranking, and SAT/ACT for college admissions - sort of like what the UCs do. It's the least bad option out of the other options. Alternatively, going open entry with university admissions and then ramping up the difficulty with weedout classes is a good option as well.

Open entry would change a lot of things - lots of schools and rankings use drop out rate as a proxy for how useful attending there is, because of the assumption that if the dropout rate is higher, there's a worse education. It would at least upend the old saying about the hardest part about some colleges is getting in.

I agree with the SAT/ACT part - they pushed "holistic review" during Covid but ultimately SAT prep is way lower barrier (Khan Academy) than gobs of ECs.