Juna Bobby MD, EdMFounder, MindBodySpace LLC · RELAX TO SOAR™️ Method Workshops • Mindbodyspace Podcast • NYU SOM M.D. • Harvard Ed.M. • Juilliard Resilience Faculty

Comparison Gets You To Top Schools 🧠 Mom-M.D. Harvard Trained Educator #shorts #parenting #brain

21 Jul 2025 · 1 min

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In this short video, the speaker argues that comparison can be a powerful tool when used deliberately as data to guide a child's next steps. By showing children where high-achieving peers are—such as observing Juilliard students at concerts—parents can expand the child's sense of possibility and encourage them to aim higher. The speaker emphasizes the need to push children to the next level appropriate to their abilities, especially when targeting elite schools, and introduces the concept of a "spike"—a concentrated area of exceptional strength—that admissions committees look for. The overall message is that strategic comparison, coupled with experiential exposure and focused skill development, can help children build the profile needed for top-tier school admission.

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I think comparison is there as a tool. Mm-hmm. So if you use comparison as a tool, like this is where these people are and I'm here, so then I need to work harder to come up. Mm-hmm. Or maybe I'm here, so maybe I need to go to a different place to get even better at what I'm doing. So comparison is good when you use it as data, as a tool for your next steps. So I said, look, see the— we even went to concerts and watched kids at Juilliard and said, You can play that. Yeah. And so that made him think like, okay, maybe it's a possibility, you know? Yeah. But if I, we hadn't like investigated, we wouldn't have known. Always push them to a little, you know, or a lot next level. Mm-hmm. If you see something in them. Yeah. You know, not to say that you shouldn't work at things that you're not good at, but I do think that when you're trying to get into these very high level schools, you have to have what they call a spike.