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You’re probably being too real.A lot of people assume that they are supposed to show their true, authentic self when interviewing. For a lot of people, their true self would be considered unprofessional in most workplaces.You have to remember that you’re playing a role for a company. It’s like acting.I’m not encouraging you to lie, but to consider your “professional self”.Imagine yourself in 5 years, succeeding at the goals you are currently trying to accomplish. How would that person answer the questions? Imagine your mentor, or the person you consider to be the “ideal professional”. How would that person answer?A lot of personality assessments are not technically legal. They ask questions like “are you prone to depression” when, in reality, major depression is considered a protected class under the Americans with Disabilities Act.If you are prone to depression, anxiety, social phobia, emotional sensitivity, or other mental health conditions (along with at least 25% of the US population), you may be unfairly screened out and disqualified.Here’s an excerpt from WSJ on the topic:Workers who apply online at RadioShack Corp. must say if they agree with the statement: "Over the course of the day, I can experience many mood changes." Lowe's Cos. asks job seekers if they "believe that others have good intentions." A test at McDonald's Corp. said: "If something very bad happens, it takes some time before I feel happy again."The use of online personality tests by employers has surged in the past decade as they try to streamline the hiring process, especially for customer-service jobs. Such tests are used to assess the personality, skills, cognitive abilities and other traits of 60% to 70% of prospective workers in the U.S., up from 30% to 40% about five years ago, estimates Josh Bersin, principal of consulting firm Bersin by Deloitte, a unit of auditor Deloitte LLP.Workplace personality testing has become a $500 million-a-year business and is growing by 10% to 15% a year, estimates Hogan Assessment Systems Inc., a Tulsa, Okla., testing company. Xerox Corp. says tests have reduced attrition in high-turnover customer-service jobs by 20 or more days in some cases. Dialog Direct, of Highland Park, Mich., says the testing software allows the call-center operator and manager to predict with 80% accuracy which employees will get the highest performance scores.But the rise of personality tests has sparked growing scrutiny of their effectiveness and fairness. Some companies have scaled back, changed or eliminated their use of such tests. Civil-rights groups long focused on overt forms of workplace discrimination claim that data-driven algorithms powering the tests could make jobs harder to get for people who don't conform to rigid formulas.PROBING QUESTIONS | FROM RECENT ONLINE TESTSJob applicants at McDonald's must say which statement out of a pair they agree with more. An example:I sometimes get confused by my own thoughts and feelings.I do not really like when I have to do something I have not done before.RadioShack asks potential employees if they strongly disagree, disagree, feel neutral about, agree or strongly agree with specific statements, such as:Over the course of the day, I can experience many mood changes.I am always happy.Sometimes there is so much stress I wonder how I am going to make it through the day.Source: the companiesJulie Brill, a Democrat on the Federal Trade Commission who has examined companies' use of data, says algorithms designed to reduce bias "ironically could have the effect of creating a new kind of discrimination." The FTC doesn't have the power to regulate workplace issues.Whole Foods Market Inc.stopped using the tests in 2007 after managers noticed that workers who cleared the personality-screening process sometimes lacked basic food-preparation skills. "For us, it just wasn't a good fit," says company spokesman Michael Silverman.Xerox quit looking at data about job applicants' commuting time even though data showed that customer-service employees who got to work faster were likely to keep their jobs at Xerox longer. Xerox managers decided the information could put applicants from minority neighborhoods at a disadvantage in the hiring process."There's some knowledge that you gain that you should stay away from when making a hiring decision," says Teri Morse, Xerox's vice president of recruitment. Overall, though, the company is "shocked all the time" by the accuracy of tests it began using in 2012, she says.Xerox has begun probing for compassion in pre-employment tests, since applicants who score high for empathy tend to excel in customer service, according to the company. The tests are provided by Evolv Inc., a closely held San Francisco firm that calls itself the "recognized leader in big data workforce optimization."Evolv's chief executive, Max Simkoff, says personality-related criteria are a small part of its overall test, which also examines a job seeker's motivation, creativity and technical aptitude.The Equal Employment Opportunity commission is investigating whether personality tests discriminate against people with disabilities. As part of the investigation, officials are trying to determine if the tests shut out people suffering from mental illnesses such as depression or bipolar disorder, even if they have the right skills for the job, according to EEOC documents.EEOC officials won't comment on the investigation. In general, though, "if a person's results are affected by the fact that they have an impairment and the results are used to exclude the person from a job, the employer needs to defend their use of the test even if the test was lawful and administered correctly," says Christopher Kuczynski,EEOC acting associate legal counsel.Employers are watching the investigation closely. A ruling against personality tests would "set a tremendous precedent," forcing companies and test makers to prove their tests aren't discriminatory, says Marc Bendick, an economist and consultant who studies workforce diversity issues.Test sellers have said their own studies show personality tests don't have an adverse impact on applicants based on race or gender. However, little work has been done on disabilities.In 2011, Rhode Island regulators said there was "probable cause" to conclude that drugstore chain CVS Health Corp. might have violated a state law barring employers from eliciting information about the mental health or physical disabilities of job applicants.The Woonsocket, R.I., company's personality test asked potential employees to say whether they agreed or disagreed with statements like "People do a lot of things that make you angry," "There's no use having close friends; they always let you down," "Many people cannot be trusted," and "You are unsure of what to say when you meet someone."CVS removed the questions in 2011 and settled a civil "charge of discrimination" filed by the Rhode Island American Civil Liberties Union, which claimed the test "could have the effect of discriminating against applicants with certain mental impairments or disorders."CVS neither admitted nor denied wrongdoing. The company confirmed the settlement but declined further comment on the Rhode Island case. The retailer still uses personality tests in hiring but has changed suppliers.Job-screening personality tests are largely based on a psychological model developed in the 1930s. Until recently, job candidates often took the tests well into the hiring process, and the results were considered along with interviews and past experience.As the hiring process gets more automated and employers begin incorporating more data into hiring, the tests are used more often and earlier in the process to winnow applicants for specific jobs.The responses to an online personality test are fed into an algorithm that scores each applicant, sometimes on a scale of red, yellow and green. Scoring systems vary by testing provider, and the companies can customize their methods to fit an employer's demands. Red applicants—and sometimes yellow ones—rarely get the chance to interview for a job.Automated personality tests can "screen out the 30% of applicants who are least qualified" before an employer even looks at a résumé, according to Ken Lahti, vice president of product development and innovation at CEB, an Arlington, Va., company that provides pre-employment tests.Deniz Ones, an industrial and organizational psychologist at the University of Minnesota, says the tests have some predictive value. For example, a worker's ranking on measurements of conscientiousness can tell bosses about work ethic, she says.RadioShack uses behavioral questions as just one tool to assess job candidates, says a person close to the company. Lowe's says its personality tests help the home-improvement retailer "in developing a workforce that will provide the best shopping experience for customers." McDonald's spokeswoman Lisa McComb says personality questions are used to elicit "accurate and candid responses," not to assess a job candidate's qualifications.Academic studies have concluded that individual personality traits have at most a small connection with performance. "It's intuitively appealing to managers that personality matters," says Fred Morgeson, a management professor and organizational psychologist at Michigan State University, but the link is "much lower than the field has led us to believe."Personality-testing firms and companies that hire them disclose little information about the tests, saying their formulas are proprietary. For example, Kronos Inc. has opposed the EEOC's efforts in a civil lawsuit to force the test provider to hand over internal validity studies and other documents related to its assessments.Since 2007, the EEOC has been investigating allegations by a West Virginia woman that supermarket chain Kroger Co.'s personality test discriminated against people with disabilities.The Cincinnati company declined to comment, but applicants for hourly positions at Kroger stores must complete an extensive online application that includes a personality test.As part of about 80 personality-related questions in a 2012 version of the Kroger test, job candidates were asked to "strongly disagree," "disagree," "agree" or "strongly agree" with statements like "You are always cheerful" and "You have no big worries."In 2012 and 2013, Kroger and six other companies were accused by retired Nokia Corp. lawyer Roland Behm of discrimination against the mentally ill through their use of personality tests. Mr. Behm filed complaints with the EEOC on behalf of his son, Kyle.Kyle Behm says he applied online in 2012 for hourly jobs at Finish Line Inc., Home Depot Inc., Kroger, Lowe's, PetSmart Inc., WalgreenCo. and Yum Brands Inc. He held similar positions in the past and had a personal connection at his local Kroger store. But he says he was turned down everywhere.The engineering student at Mercer University in Macon, Ga., was diagnosed with bipolar disorder about 18 months before the job rejections. He says a Kroger employee told him he scored "red" on the test, which indicated he might ignore customers if he felt upset or angry. He didn't tell Kroger about his diagnosis and wasn't required to under the law.Mr. Behm's father says he contacted all seven companies about his concerns. Most denied culpability but suggested they could find a suitable job for Kyle if he agreed not to pursue legal action. The father and son decided to file discrimination charges with the EEOC instead, hoping to force changes to the companies' hiring processes.The complaints against Kroger and PetSmart were folded into the EEOC's continuing investigation of personality tests, according to letters sent to Mr. Behm by the EEOC. The agency is reviewing Mr. Behm's complaints against the five other companies.The tests used by Kroger and PetSmart were created by assessment vendor Unicru Inc. and administered by Kronos. Kronos bought Unicru in 2006. Kronos Vice President Charles DeWitt wouldn't comment on the Behm case but says testing is "only a small part of our business."A PetSmart spokesperson says the Phoenix company is "committed to fair recruitment and employment practices," declining to comment on Mr. Behm. Finish Line says the athletic-gear retailer is aware of challenges to pre-employment assessments but is "confident" and stands by "Finish Line's employment policies and practices."Jim Pemberton, Walgreen's chief diversity officer, wouldn't comment on Mr. Behm's accusations but says the Deerfield, Ill., drugstore chain has special recruitment programs for people with disabilities."In our experience, we feel we can expect people with disabilities to perform the same job at the same level, with the same pay and the same standards of excellence as people without them," Mr. Pemberton says. "We have no intention to dismiss a population that we're trying to attract."Home Depot declined to comment. A Lowe's spokeswoman says it is "inappropriate for us to comment about Mr. Behm's claims," adding that the company's "hiring assessment complies" with the Americans with Disabilities Act. Yum couldn't be reached for comment.Kroger has dropped from its hiring test many of the questions Mr. Behm and his father found most troubling. A recent version posted online, also administered by Kronos, was 11 pages long, down from 17 pages in 2012, and includes just 12 personality-related statements. Instead, much of the recent test asks applicants to respond to hypothetical work scenarios and choose one of two endings to 19 statements that begin "When at work I…"For example, "…Am liked by nearly everyone" or "…Believe there are some people that don't like me." Kroger declined to comment on the changes or the EEOC investigation.Mr. Behm, who is 24 years old and is in his senior year at Mercer, says he could have lied on tests to give answers that might have seemed more agreeable. "I didn't think it was necessary, and I didn't think it was really ethical," he says.His disorder was never an issue in his previous jobs, he says. "They would've known that if they contacted any of my references."

Early Decision Can Help You Edge Out Your CompetitionBy Peterson's Staff Monday, March 21, 2016Does getting early decision mean an automatic entry into college? This article helps you find out the truth about ED applicants.There's a lot of hype floating around that some schools accept almost all of their incoming freshmen from their pool of Early Decision (ED) applicants. While it's true that there may be a higher acceptance rate among the early action pool, this doesn’t necessarily hold true at every school, nor does it mean that all the spots get filled up early. (It also doesn't mean that all schools even have early acceptance options, because some schools are doing away with them altogether.)Realistically, all schools only have so many openings set aside for the incoming class, and they want to give those spots to the best candidates possible. If they give away every bed they have by December, then they won't have room to accept the Colorado State Spelling Bee Champion who applies in February. Some schools hedge their bets just as some students do when applying to college. They may defer a portion of their ED applicants so they can eyeball what comes across their application desks later in the year.Early admission by the numbersIt’s generally true that many of the most exclusive schools are the ones most likely to offer Early Decision admission options, and research supports the buzz that you stand a better chance of scoring a coveted spot by applying early. On average, 25 to 50 percent of the freshman classes at these schools come from ED applicants. (Those numbers could be higher, depending on the school.) However, that means that come springtime, although there’s still another 50 to 75 percent of the class to accept, you’ll be competing against a much larger pool of applicants and your chances of getting accepted are lower. So, statistically speaking, a larger percentage of the ED applicants are accepted than of the applicants who apply during the normal timeline.There are a few schools who accept a very large majority of their incoming class from their early admission applicants, and the only way to know if your choice school is among those is to do your research. Ask the school directly about their admission statistics to get a better picture of your chances of acceptance and discuss what this means with your school guidance counselor. In some cases, an Early Decision application really may be the only way to edge out your competition. Before you send off that paperwork, make sure one more time it’s what you want since an early acceptance under ED means you have entered into a binding agreement to attend that school and you can’t apply anywhere else.Keep in mind as well that some schools, Ivy League included, are starting to do away with early application options altogether. Harvard and Princeton no longer offer the option of applying early and there are a number of schools that are considering doing away with their policies as well. There are several reasons for doing so, but the gist of their reasoning is that it skews the playing field and leaves a number of students at a distinct disadvantage when application time rolls around. Schools that are doing away with early application procedures hope to soothe the competitive nature of "getting in" and allow everyone the opportunity to apply at the same time and under the same conditions.Early action and financial aidIf you’re like most students, finances probably play an important role in making your final decision about where to apply. As part of your decision process about ED, you should meet with your choice school's financial aid office as early as your junior year. You’ll be able to get an idea if the school is an economically viable choice or if it’s just too far out of the ballpark.Ask your parents to bring their tax forms so they can get an idea of their likely Expected Family Contribution, and you can find out ahead of time what financial aid you’re likely to receive. By checking it out early on, you can avoid the wrenching disappointment of getting in but not being able to go. Acceptance decisions for early action applicants show up in your mailbox months before you hear from the Financial Aid office.Early admission and youSo what does all this mean? Should you apply for Early Decision at a school that you’re considering? Not unless you are 100 percent absolutely, positively certain that it’s THE school that you want to attend above all others. However, just because you really want to go there doesn’t mean you should feel like you have to apply early, either. Early application is really only a good tactic when you and the school are truly well matched. In a nutshell, don’t waste their time or yours if you’re not really sure it’s your top choice or if there is a strong likelihood you won’t get accepted.If you decide to go for it, give your all to that crucial essay by emphasizing your strengths and vividly describing what makes the school a perfect fit for you. Schools that have Early Decision options want to accept ED applicants because they are usually the most qualified and most sought-after students, and they are students who are communicating that by applying as ED, they really want to get in to that school. Admission committees look favorably upon excellent candidates who desire nothing more than to be a part of their student body. If it’s a competitive school, you fit the profile, and you really have your heart set on it, then by all means, apply Early Decision and better your chances of being able to call it your alma mater.Early Decision & Early ActionThe benefits and drawbacks of applying earlyEarly decision (ED) and early action (EA) plans can be beneficial to students — but only to those who have thought through their college options carefully and have a clear preference for one institution.Early decision versus early actionEarly decision plans are binding — a student who is accepted as an ED applicant must attend the college. Early action plans are nonbinding — students receive an early response to their application but do not have to commit to the college until the normal reply date of May 1. Counselors need to make sure that students understand this key distinction between the two plans.Approximately 450 colleges have early decision or early action plans, and some have both. Some colleges offer a nonbinding option called single-choice early action, under which applicants may not apply ED or EA to any other college.ED plans have come under fire as unfair to students from families with low incomes, since they do not have the opportunity to compare financial aid offers. This may give an unfair advantage to applicants from families who have more financial resources.ED applicantsApply early (usually in November) to first-choice college.Receive an admission decision from the college well in advance of the usual notification date (usually by December).Agree to attend the college if accepted and offered a financial aid package that is considered adequate by the family.Apply to only one college early decision.Apply to other colleges under regular admission plans.Withdraw all other applications if accepted by ED.Send a nonrefundable deposit well in advance of May 1.EA applicantsApply early.Receive an admission decision early in the admission cycle (usually in January or February).Consider acceptance offer; do not have to commit upon receipt.Apply to other colleges under regular admission plans.Give the college a decision no later than the May 1 national response date.Who should apply early?Applying to an ED or EA plan is most appropriate for a student who:Has researched colleges extensively.Is absolutely sure that the college is the first choice.Has found a college that is a strong match academically, socially and geographically.Meets or exceeds the admission profile for the college for SAT® scores, GPA and class rank.Has an academic record that has been consistently solid over time.Applying to an ED or EA plan is not appropriate for a student who:Has not thoroughly researched colleges.Is applying early just to avoid stress and paperwork.Is not fully committed to attending the college.Is applying early only because friends are.Needs a strong senior fall semester to bring grades up.Encourage students who want to apply early to fill out NACAC's Early Decision Self-Evaluation Questionnaire, in the Deciding About Early Decision and Early Action handout. You may want to share this with parents as well.The benefits of applying earlyFor a student who has a definite first-choice college, applying early has many benefits besides possibly increasing the chance of getting in. Applying early lets the student:Reduce stress by cutting the time spent waiting for a decision.Save the time and expense of submitting multiple applications.Gain more time, once accepted, to look for housing and otherwise prepare for college.Reassess options and apply elsewhere if not accepted.The drawbacks of applying earlyPressure to decide: Committing to one college puts pressure on students to make serious decisions before they've explored all their options.Reduced financial aid opportunities: Students who apply under ED plans receive offers of admission and financial aid simultaneously and so will not be able to compare financial aid offers from other colleges. For students who absolutely need financial aid, applying early may be a risky option.Time crunch for other applications: Most colleges do not notify ED and EA applicants of admission until December 15. Because of the usual deadlines for applications, this means that if a student is rejected by the ED college, there are only two weeks left to send in other applications. Encourage those of your students who are applying early to prepare other applications as they wait to receive admission decisions from their first-choice college.Senioritis: Applicants who learn early that they have been accepted into a college may feel that, their goal accomplished, they have no reason to work hard for the rest of the year. Early-applying students should know that colleges may rescind offers of admission should their senior-year grades drop.Students and parents can use our Pros and Cons of Applying to College Early, in the Deciding About Early Decision and Early Action handout, to weigh their options.Does applying early increase the chance of acceptance?Many students believe applying early means competing with fewer applicants and increasing their chances for acceptance. This is not always true. Colleges vary in the proportion of the class admitted early and in the percentage of early applicants they admit.Higher admission rates for ED applicants may correlate to stronger profiles among candidates choosing ED. Students should ask the admission office whether their institution's admission standards differ between ED and regular applicants, and then assess whether applying early makes sense given their own profile.The ethics of applying early decisionThe Common Application and some colleges' application forms require the student applying under early decision, as well as the parent and counselor, to sign an ED agreement form spelling out the plan's conditions.Make it clear in your school handbook and at college planning events that your policy for early-decision applications is to send the student's final transcript to one college only: anything else is unethical.Keep in mindED and EA program specifics vary, so students should get information as soon as possible directly from the admission staff at their first-choice college.ED and EA applicants must take the October SAT or SAT Subject Tests™ in order for these scores to make it to the college in time.Print out and share the Early Decision and Early Action Calendar with students and parents to be sure they are aware of all the required steps for applying early.Related DownloadsWhat to Know About Applying EarlyEarly Decision and Early Action CalendarA college-admissions edge for the wealthy: Early decisionBy Nick Anderson March 31, 2016Nathan Hanshew, 17, a senior at Washington Latin Public Charter School, is embraced by the head of the school, Martha C. Cutts, after learning that he received a full-ride scholarship to attend George Washington University. GW President Steven Knapp, at lower right, visited the school March 17 to make the surprise announcement. (Logan Werlinger/GW Today)Many of the nation’s top colleges draw more than 40 percent of their incoming freshmen through an early-application system that favors the wealthy, luring students to commit to enroll if they get in and shutting out those who want the chance to compare offers of grants and scholarships.The binding-commitment path known as “early decision” fills roughly half of the freshman seats at highly ranked Vanderbilt, Emory, Northwestern and Tufts universities, as well as Davidson, Bowdoin, Swarthmore and Claremont McKenna colleges, among others, a Washington Post analysis found.The Post found 37 schools where the early-decision share of enrolled freshmen in 2015 was at least 40 percent. At Duke University, the share was 47 percent, and at the University of Pennsylvania, it was 54 percent.[Sortable table: See the details of the early decision advantage]The rising influence of early-decision enrollment underscores a stark and growing divide in college admissions between the masses of students who apply to multiple schools through the “regular” process in quest of the best fit and deal and a privileged subset who apply early and simultaneously pledge to attend just one, without fear of cost, at a time when the sticker price for private schools often tops $60,000 a year. Call them the Shoppers and the Pledgers.College admissions: The Early Decision advantageNathan Hanshew, 17, a senior at Washington Latin Public Charter School in Washington, D.C., said he applied to a dozen schools but did not opt for early decision anywhere.“That was too risky,” he said. “You’re stuck in a bond, like a marital bond.”Shopping around paid off hugely for Hanshew, a Polish immigrant, who learned March 17 in a surprise announcement in front of cheering classmates that he won a full-ride scholarship from George Washington University.Kate Morrison (Family photo)Kate Morrison, 17, a senior at Walt Whitman High School in Montgomery County, Md., said she was drawn to Bowdoin after a soccer coach there encouraged her to apply early. She visited the Maine college last spring. “I just loved it so much,” she said. “I was really, really content.” No athletic scholarship, no financial aid. But she applied early decision in the fall and was admitted Dec. 11. Her search was done.This week, angst is cresting for traditional applicants as prestigious colleges finalize who’s in and who’s out. Ivy League decisions are scheduled to be released Thursday evening. But admitted early-decision students are tranquil; they’ve known for months where they’re going to college. Early-decision applicants also enjoy a crucial edge over the regulars: Their admission rates tend to be much higher. That’s because schools want good students who really want them, and they want to lock them down.At Penn, the admission rate for early applicants was 24 percent for the class that entered in 2015. The total admission rate, early and regular, was 10 percent. Eric Furda, Penn’s dean of admissions, said the academic credentials of students who win early admission tend to be stronger than those admitted later in the cycle. Furda also said more early-decision students than ever are qualifying for need-based financial aid.“This pool is becoming broader and deeper and more diverse than it’s ever been. It’s time to start telling that story,” Furda said. “I don’t want lower-income families to be told, ‘Don’t apply early decision because you’re going to need to compare financial-aid packages.'” These days, nearly as many early-decision freshmen receive need-based grants from Penn as their peers admitted in the regular cycle, he said.The Post reviewed 2015 admissions data for 64 schools as reported through a questionnaire called the Common Data Set. The analysis covered top-60 schools on U.S. News and World Report lists of liberal arts colleges and national universities, and it found 48 schools in which early-decision admits comprised at least a third of the total enrolled class and 16 in which they comprised at least half.[U.S. News college ranking trends 2015]While most early-decision admits enroll, a few do not. The most common reason: If a financial aid offer is deemed insufficient, an admitted student may be released from their pledge.Within the Ivy League, Penn appears to be the most aggressive user of the early process. The early-decision share of freshmen at Dartmouth College was about 43 percent. At Brown and Cornell universities, it was about 38 percent. Columbia University, which also uses early decision, is the only Ivy League school that refuses to make public its Common Data Set reports.Harvard, Yale and Princeton universities also allow students to apply early, but they do not require admitted students to decide on enrollment until May 1. That technique, which enables comparison shopping, is known as “early action.” Stanford, the University of Chicago, MIT and hundreds of other schools use early action.Georgetown University’s longtime dean of admissions, Charles Deacon, said he favors early action because students should be as sure in May of where they want to attend as they were in November. He calls it a “student-centered” approach to admissions, in contrast to “enrollment management” techniques in vogue at many schools.“No matter what anybody tells you, the early pool favors those who are more advantaged,” Deacon said. “They’re the ones who have been better advised. They know more from their families. There’s an advantage, for sure, and that plays itself out particularly at the early level.”Early decision, which developed gradually among elite schools from the late 1950s through the 1970s, has drawn criticism in recent years, earning a critique in a 2001 Atlantic article headlined “The Early-Decision Racket.” In 2006, the public University of Virginia announced that it was ending an early-decision program in an effort to attract more low-income students. It now uses early action.“For us, the early-action plan makes the most sense,” U-Va. dean of admission Greg Roberts said. “And it’s more in line with our values and enrollment goals.” Most top-tier schools with early decision are private. An exception is the public College of William and Mary, in Virginia.[Nation’s prominent public universities are shifting to out-of-state students]Though some schools have spurned the practice, the volume of early-decision applications to elite schools is growing, and some of them are filling a larger share of their seats with those applicants, making it far more difficult to get in during the normal cycle.At Williams College, a premier liberal arts school in Massachusetts, a little more than 40 percent of freshmen come through early decision. Williams President Adam Falk said early decision provides stability for the college in what can be a volatile market, and it provides peace of mind for successful applicants who can then leave “an insane-feeling rat race” during their senior year of high school.Jon Reider, a former Stanford admissions officer who counsels students at San Francisco University High School, said that 15 years ago, early decision was not a central part of most of his advising conversations. Now it is. Another important variable is that ultra-selective Harvard, Princeton, Stanford and Yale are “single-choice” early-action schools, meaning that students may not apply early to any other private school, with few exceptions. So students must weigh their top choice carefully, and it can feel like making a life-altering gamble.But the calculations are much more complex than a simple ranking of choice, Reider said. Sometimes admission to that first-choice school is so tough to obtain, even in an early application, that it makes more sense to apply early decision to a second choice, or even a third choice. “You’ve got one chip,” Reider said. “One card to play. It’s an absolutely crazy system.”Even more bewildering: Some schools offer two rounds of early decision. Some — the University of Miami, for example — offer two rounds of early decision and early action.Charlotte Smith (Family photo)Charlotte Smith, 17, a senior at Walt Whitman High, put her early-decision chip on Wake Forest University, in North Carolina. Her application was deferred into the regular pool. For many applicants, that is demoralizing. For Smith, it was a relief.“I’m actually glad,” Smith said last week as she had several applications pending and some offers in hand, including some with scholarships. It’s hard in November, she said, “to pick one school and say this has everything I want.” As students, she said, “we’re still trying on different versions of ourselves.”Micah Guthrie, 17, a senior at Washington Latin, is shooting for liberal arts colleges but not through early decision. “I make a lot of my decisions last minute,” he said. In the fall, he said, “I really didn’t know a lot about a lot of colleges.”Grade Point newsletterNews and issues affecting higher education.Sign upMicah Guthrie (Nick Anderson/The Washington Post)Among his targets is Davidson, advertised on a sweatshirt he wore to school the other day. His mother, Michelle Guthrie, a registrar at Washington Latin, said money is a factor wherever he gets accepted. “We’ll make it happen,” she said. “But I’m hoping some scholarships come with those choices, too.”Davidson had the highest share of early-decision admits in its entering class among colleges The Post analyzed: about 60 percent. Davidson said it is firmly committed to access, with half of the early-decision students who were admitted qualifying for need-based financial aid. That is nearly the same as the share in regular admissions who receive need-based aid. The small college, which has a robust NCAA Division I sports program, said it also relies heavily on early decision for athletic recruiting.A few years ago, the share of early-decision students entering Emory was less than 40 percent, said John Latting, the university’s dean of admission. Now two rounds of early decision fill about half of Emory’s class. Latting said the volume of early-decision applications has doubled in the past four or five years.“Mostly what’s going on is an unbelievably competitive marketplace” for top students, he said. “Early programs bring some calm to what is otherwise a frenzy.”Latting said Emory uses financial aid aggressively to ensure it enrolls a diverse class. About 20 percent of freshmen have enough financial need to qualify for federal Pell grants, a sizeable share for a private university. But Latting acknowledged that early-decision applicants, the Pledgers, tend to be more affluent than the regulars, the Shoppers. That creates added pressure on schools hunting for more students from low-income families.“I wouldn’t for a minute say this is the right system for the nation,” Latting said.Read more:At some colleges, your gender might give you an admissions edgeInside the admissions process at George Washington UniversityColleges often give discounts to the rich. Here’s one that gave up on ‘merit aid.’Meet the man behind the new SAT: ‘I’m in the anxiety field.’https://www.iecaonline.com/PDF/IECA_Library_ED-vs-RD-Acceptances.pdfEarly Admission Ivy League Schools 2016-12STRATEGYEarly acceptance rates to Ivy League schools are drastically higher than regular — but the reason why isn't as obvious as it seemsAbby JacksonDec. 21, 2016, 2:51 PM6,213The figures may look a little out of sync with regular decision acceptance rates to those who follow admissions trends.Courtesy of Stefan StoykovThe Ivy League classes of 2021 are one step closer to attending the school of their dreams.Last week, every Ivy League school, with the exception of Columbia University, reported the number of students who applied and were accepted early this year, giving a glimpse into the college choices of tens of thousands of students.The figures may look a little out of sync with acceptance rates released during the spring.Harvard reported the lowest acceptance rate of the bunch, with 14.5% of applicants gaining acceptance. That's nearly three times higher (meaning more students were able to gain acceptance) than last spring's acceptance rate of 5.2%, which includes both the early and regular decision applicants.Business InsiderHarvard isn't the only school where early application percentage rates are drastically higher than rates released in spring.To give you an idea of where the University stands in comparison to its peers, below are the decision acceptance rates for the class of 2020, released last spring:8. Cornell University — 13.96%7. Dartmouth College — 10.52%6. University of Pennsylvania — 9.41%5. Brown University — 9.01%4. Princeton University — 6.46%3. Yale University — 6.27%2. Columbia University — 6.04%1. Harvard University — 5.2%Every single Ivy League school, by a factor of two or three, appears easier to access when applying early. The contrast appears even starker if you were to isolate just the regular decision rate from the early decision rate, though all of the Ivies announce their spring numbers as a combination of the two.So what gives?Harvard UniversityMarcio Jose Bastos Silva / ShutterstockIvy admissions offices emphasize that the reason it appears easier to get into schools during early admissions is more a factor of the strength of the applicant pool rather than an ease of acceptance.In other words, students who apply early to Harvard are probably better qualified compared the larger applicant pool, and more confident in their chances of being admitted."We have continued to stress to applicants, their families, and their guidance counselors that there is no advantage in applying early to Harvard," William R. Fitzsimmons, Dean of Admissions and Financial Aid, said, in a release from Harvard. "The reason students are admitted – early or during the Regular Action process – is that their academic, extracurricular, and personal strengths are extraordinary."Harvard releases a survey on incoming freshman every year that provides details on the makeup of the class. For the Class 2019 — the most recent survey conducted— the survey indicated that students admitted early had higher SAT scores than regular admissions students, on average. Early admissions students scored an average 2239, compared to 2217 for regular admissions.Still, schools certainly find early applicants attractive as they can lock in a higher "yield" — the number of admitted students who decide to go to the college. Early decision is binding, and early action means that students are only allowed to apply to one school early (though they can apply regular decision to other schools) and then make their final choice in the spring.Some higher education experts feel that there is certainly an advantage to applying early, and that its practice is troubling, as it disproportionately helps wealthier students. The early admissions process is not possible for students who need to weigh the different financial aid packages they are offered before making a decision.Early admissions "significantly disadvantages students from low-income and middle-income families, who are already underrepresented at such schools," columnist Frank Bruni wrote in The New York Times.Still, it doesn't seem that the early admissions process is going anywhere soon. The Ivy League had a record number of early applications this year, and, more broadly, about 450 American colleges accept early applicants.The Ivy League has released early-application acceptance rates — here's where they all standAbby Jackson and Andy KierszDec. 16, 2016, 12:09 PMThe Ivy League classes of 2021 are one step closer to attending the school of their dreams.Almost every Ivy League school reported the number of students who had applied and were accepted early this year, giving a glimpse into the college choices of tens of thousands of students.Business InsiderHarvard reported the lowest acceptance rate of the bunch, with 14.5% of applicants gaining acceptance versus 14.8% last year. Applications at the school were up by 5% from the previous year, with 6,473, an increase from 6,167, according to a representative for the school.Applications were up across the board. The biggest jump in application numbers came from Princeton University, which reported 4,229 early applications last year and 5,003 this year, an 18% increase year-over-year.Early applications come with some stipulations. Harvard, Princeton, and Yale are restrictive early-action schools, meaning applicants can apply to only one school early but have until May to accept.Brown University, Columbia University (which does not release acceptance figures), Cornell University, Dartmouth College, and University of Pennsylvania are all early-decision schools, which means students must go there if they get accepted.Check out the number of early applications to each Ivy League school this year below:Brown University — 3,170 applications, 695 acceptancesColumbia University — 4,086 applications, does not release acceptance figuresCornell University — 5,384 applications, 1,378 acceptancesDartmouth College — 1999 applications, 555 acceptancesHarvard University — 6,473 applications, 938 acceptancesUniversity of Pennsylvania — 6,147 applications, 1,354 acceptancesPrinceton University — 5,033 applications, 770 acceptancesYale University — 5,086 applications, 871 acceptancesHarvard just released its early admissions decisions — here's how many students got inAbby JacksonDec. 13, 2016, 5:32 PMHarvard University released the early action decisions for the class of 2021 on Tuesday. Flickr / Sam S.Harvard University released the early action decisions for the class of 2021 on Tuesday.Applications at the school were up 5% from the previous year, with 6,473, compared to 6,167, a spokesperson for the school confirmed.Of those applicants, 14.5% gained acceptances, versus 14.8% last year."Early admission appears to be the 'new normal' now – as more students are applying early to Harvard and peer institutions than ever before," William R. Fitzsimmons, Dean of Admissions and Financial Aid, said, in a release from Harvard."At the same time, we have continued to stress to applicants, their families, and their guidance counselors that there is no advantage in applying early to Harvard," he continued. "The reason students are admitted – early or during the Regular Action process – is that their academic, extracurricular, and personal strengths are extraordinary."Harvard is an early action school, meaning that students can only apply to one school early, and have until May to decide if they want to accept. This policy differs from early decision, which requires a student to attend a school if they gain admission.Regular decision Harvard applicants will find out their admissions status in the spring.

Milkman’s doctoral dissertation concluded that people would choose either heroin or amphetamines depending on how they liked to deal with stress. Heroin users wanted to numb themselves; amphetamine users wanted to actively confront it. After this work was published, he was among a group of researchers drafted by the US National Institute on Drug Abuse to answer questions such as: why do people start using drugs? Why do they continue? When do they reach a threshold to abuse? When do they stop? And when do they relapse?“Any college kid could say: why do they start? Well, there’s availability, they’re risk-takers, alienation, maybe some depression,” he says. “But why do they continue? So I got to the question about the threshold for abuse and the lights went on – that’s when I had my version of the ‘aha’ experience: they could be on the threshold for abuse before they even took the drug, because it was their style of coping that they were abusing.”At Metropolitan State College of Denver, Milkman was instrumental in developing the idea that people were getting addicted to changes in brain chemistry. Kids who were “active confronters” were after a rush – they’d get it by stealing hubcaps and radios and later cars, or through stimulant drugs. Alcohol also alters brain chemistry, of course. It’s a sedative but it sedates the brain’s control first, which can remove inhibitions and, in limited doses, reduce anxiety.“People can get addicted to drink, cars, money, sex, calories, cocaine – whatever,” says Milkman. “The idea of behavioural addiction became our trademark.”This idea spawned another: “Why not orchestrate a social movement around natural highs: around people getting high on their own brain chemistry – because it seems obvious to me that people want to change their consciousness – without the deleterious effects of drugs?”By 1992, his team in Denver had won a $1.2 million government grant to form Project Self-Discovery, which offered teenagers natural-high alternatives to drugs and crime. They got referrals from teachers, school nurses and counsellors, taking in kids from the age of 14 who didn’t see themselves as needing treatment but who had problems with drugs or petty crime.“We didn’t say to them, you’re coming in for treatment. We said, we’ll teach you anything you want to learn: music, dance, hip hop, art, martial arts.” The idea was that these different classes could provide a variety of alterations in the kids’ brain chemistry, and give them what they needed to cope better with life: some might crave an experience that could help reduce anxiety, others may be after a rush.At the same time, the recruits got life-skills training, which focused on improving their thoughts about themselves and their lives, and the way they interacted with other people. “The main principle was that drug education doesn’t work because nobody pays attention to it. What is needed are the life skills to act on that information,” Milkman says. Kids were told it was a three-month programme. Some stayed five years.In 1991, Milkman was invited to Iceland to talk about this work, his findings and ideas. He became a consultant to the first residential drug treatment centre for adolescents in Iceland, in a town called Tindar. “It was designed around the idea of giving kids better things to do,” he explains. It was here that he met Gudberg, who was then a psychology undergraduate and a volunteer at Tindar. They have been close friends ever since.Milkman started coming regularly to Iceland and giving talks. These talks, and Tindar, attracted the attention of a young researcher at the University of Iceland, called Inga Dóra Sigfúsdóttir. She wondered: what if you could use healthy alternatives to drugs and alcohol as part of a programme not to treat kids with problems, but to stop kids drinking or taking drugs in the first place?A couple of minutes ago, we passed two halls dedicated to badminton and ping pong. Here in the park, there’s also an athletics track, a geothermally heated swimming pool and – at last – some visible kids, excitedly playing football on an artificial pitch.Young people aren’t hanging out in the park right now, Gudberg explains, because they’re in after-school classes in these facilities, or in clubs for music, dance or art. Or they might be on outings with their parents.Today, Iceland tops the European table for the cleanest-living teens. The percentage of 15- and 16-year-olds who had been drunk in the previous month plummeted from 42 per cent in 1998 to 5 per cent in 2016. The percentage who have ever used cannabis is down from 17 per cent to 7 per cent. Those smoking cigarettes every day fell from 23 per cent to just 3 per cent.© Dave ImmsThe way the country has achieved this turnaround has been both radical and evidence-based, but it has relied a lot on what might be termed enforced common sense. “This is the most remarkably intense and profound study of stress in the lives of teenagers that I have ever seen,” says Milkman. “I’m just so impressed by how well it is working.”If it was adopted in other countries, Milkman argues, the Icelandic model could benefit the general psychological and physical wellbeing of millions of kids, not to mention the coffers of healthcare agencies and broader society. It’s a big if.© Dave ImmsHave you ever tried alcohol? If so, when did you last have a drink? Have you ever been drunk? Have you tried cigarettes? If so, how often do you smoke? How much time do you spend with your parents? Do you have a close relationship with your parents? What kind of activities do you take part in?In 1992, 14-, 15- and 16-year-olds in every school in Iceland filled in a questionnaire with these kinds of questions. This process was then repeated in 1995 and 1997.The results of these surveys were alarming. Nationally, almost 25 per cent were smoking every day, over 40 per cent had got drunk in the past month. But when the team drilled right down into the data, they could identify precisely which schools had the worst problems – and which had the least. Their analysis revealed clear differences between the lives of kids who took up drinking, smoking and other drugs, and those who didn’t. A few factors emerged as strongly protective: participation in organised activities – especially sport – three or four times a week, total time spent with parents during the week, feeling cared about at school, and not being outdoors in the late evenings.“At that time, there had been all kinds of substance prevention efforts and programmes,” says Inga Dóra, who was a research assistant on the surveys. “Mostly they were built on education.” Kids were being warned about the dangers of drink and drugs, but, as Milkman had observed in the US, these programmes were not working. “We wanted to come up with a different approach.”The mayor of Reykjavik, too, was interested in trying something new, and many parents felt the same, adds Jón Sigfússon, Inga Dóra’s colleague and brother. Jón had young daughters at the time and joined her new Icelandic Centre for Social Research and Analysis when it was set up in 1999. “The situation was bad,” he says. “It was obvious something had to be done.”Using the survey data and insights from research including Milkman’s, a new national plan was gradually introduced. It was called Youth in Iceland.Laws were changed. It became illegal to buy tobacco under the age of 18 and alcohol under the age of 20, and tobacco and alcohol advertising was banned. Links between parents and school were strengthened through parental organisations which by law had to be established in every school, along with school councils with parent representatives. Parents were encouraged to attend talks on the importance of spending a quantity of time with their children rather than occasional “quality time”, on talking to their kids about their lives, on knowing who their kids were friends with, and on keeping their children home in the evenings.A law was also passed prohibiting children aged between 13 and 16 from being outside after 10pm in winter and midnight in summer. It’s still in effect today.Home and School, the national umbrella body for parental organisations, introduced agreements for parents to sign. The content varies depending on the age group, and individual organisations can decide what they want to include. For kids aged 13 and up, parents can pledge to follow all the recommendations, and also, for example, not to allow their kids to have unsupervised parties, not to buy alcohol for minors, and to keep an eye on the wellbeing of other children.These agreements educate parents but also help to strengthen their authority in the home, argues Hrefna Sigurjónsdóttir, director of Home and School. “Then it becomes harder to use the oldest excuse in the book: ‘But everybody else can!’”State funding was increased for organised sport, music, art, dance and other clubs, to give kids alternative ways to feel part of a group, and to feel good, rather than through using alcohol and drugs, and kids from low-income families received help to take part. In Reykjavik, for instance, where more than a third of the country’s population lives, a Leisure Card gives families 35,000 krona (£250) per year per child to pay for recreational activities.Crucially, the surveys have continued. Each year, almost every child in Iceland completes one. This means up-to-date, reliable data is always available.Between 1997 and 2012, the percentage of kids aged 15 and 16 who reported often or almost always spending time with their parents on weekdays doubled – from 23 per cent to 46 per cent – and the percentage who participated in organised sports at least four times a week increased from 24 per cent to 42 per cent. Meanwhile, cigarette smoking, drinking and cannabis use in this age group plummeted.© Dave Imms“Although this cannot be shown in the form of a causal relationship – which is a good example of why primary prevention methods are sometimes hard to sell to scientists – the trend is very clear,” notes Álfgeir Kristjánsson, who worked on the data and is now at the West Virginia University School of Public Health in the US. “Protective factors have gone up, risk factors down, and substance use has gone down – and more consistently in Iceland than in any other European country.”Jón Sigfússon apologies for being just a couple of minutes late. “I was on a crisis call!” He prefers not to say precisely to where, but it was to one of the cities elsewhere in the world that has now adopted, in part, the Youth in Iceland ideas.Youth in Europe, which Jón heads, began in 2006 after the already-remarkable Icelandic data was presented at a European Cities Against Drugs meeting and, he recalls, “People asked: what are you doing?”Participation in Youth in Europe is at a municipal level rather than being led by national governments. In the first year, there were eight municipalities. To date, 35 have taken part, across 17 countries, varying from some areas where just a few schools take part to Tarragona in Spain, where 4,200 15-year-olds are involved. The method is always the same: Jón and his team talk to local officials and devise a questionnaire with the same core questions as those used in Iceland plus any locally tailored extras. For example, online gambling has recently emerged as a big problem in a few areas, and local officials want to know if it’s linked to other risky behaviour.Just two months after the questionnaires are returned to Iceland, the team sends back an initial report with the results, plus information on how they compare with other participating regions. “We always say that, like vegetables, information has to be fresh,” says Jón. “If you bring these findings a year later, people would say, Oh, this was a long time ago and maybe things have changed…” As well as fresh, it has to be local so that schools, parents and officials can see exactly what problems exist in which areas.The team has analysed 99,000 questionnaires from places as far afield as the Faroe Islands, Malta and Romania – as well as South Korea and, very recently, Nairobi and Guinea-Bissau. Broadly, the results show that when it comes to teen substance use, the same protective and risk factors identified in Iceland apply everywhere. There are some differences: in one location (in a country “on the Baltic Sea”), participation in organised sport actually emerged as a risk factor. Further investigation revealed that this was because young ex-military men who were keen on muscle-building drugs, drinking and smoking were running the clubs. Here, then, was a well-defined, immediate, local problem that could be addressed.While Jón and his team offer advice and information on what has been found to work in Iceland, it’s up to individual communities to decide what to do in the light of their results. Occasionally, they do nothing. One predominantly Muslim country, which he prefers not to identify, rejected the data because it revealed an unpalatable level of alcohol consumption. In other cities – such as the origin of Jón’s “crisis call” – there is an openness to the data and there is money, but he has observed that it can be much more difficult to secure and maintain funding for health prevention strategies than for treatments.No other country has made changes on the scale seen in Iceland. When asked if anyone has copied the laws to keep children indoors in the evening, Jón smiles. “Even Sweden laughs and calls it the child curfew!”© Dave ImmsAcross Europe, rates of teen alcohol and drug use have generally improved over the past 20 years, though nowhere as dramatically as in Iceland, and the reasons for improvements are not necessarily linked to strategies that foster teen wellbeing. In the UK, for example, the fact that teens are now spending more time at home interacting online rather than in person could be one of the major reasons for the drop in alcohol consumption.But Kaunas, in Lithuania, is one example of what can happen through active intervention. Since 2006, the city has administered the questionnaires five times, and schools, parents, healthcare organisations, churches, the police and social services have come together to try to improve kids’ wellbeing and curb substance use. For instance, parents get eight or nine free parenting sessions each year, and a new programme provides extra funding for public institutions and NGOs working in mental health promotion and stress management. In 2015, the city started offering free sports activities on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, and there are plans to introduce a free ride service for low-income families, to help kids who don’t live close to the facilities to attend.Between 2006 and 2014, the number of 15- and 16-year-olds in Kaunas who reported getting drunk in the past 30 days fell by about a quarter, and daily smoking fell by more than 30 per cent.At the moment, participation in Youth in Europe is a haphazard affair, and the team in Iceland is small. Jón would like to see a centralised body with its own dedicated funding to focus on the expansion of Youth in Europe. “Even though we have been doing this for ten years, it is not our full, main job. We would like somebody to copy this and maintain it all over Europe,” he says. “And why only Europe?”After our walk through Laugardalur Park, Gudberg Jónsson invites us back to his home. Outside, in the garden, his two elder sons, Jón Konrád, who’s 21, and Birgir Ísar, who’s 15, talk to me about drinking and smoking. Jón does drink alcohol, but Birgir says he doesn’t know anyone at his school who smokes or drinks. We also talk about football training: Birgir trains five or six times a week; Jón, who is in his first year of a business degree at the University of Iceland, trains five times a week. They both started regular after-school training when they were six years old.“We have all these instruments at home,” their father told me earlier. “We tried to get them into music. We used to have a horse. My wife is really into horse riding. But it didn’t happen. In the end, soccer was their selection.”Did it ever feel like too much? Was there pressure to train when they’d rather have been doing something else? “No, we just had fun playing football,” says Birgir. Jón adds, “We tried it and got used to it, and so we kept on doing it.”© Dave ImmsIt’s not all they do. While Gudberg and his wife Thórunn don’t consciously plan for a certain number of hours each week with their three sons, they do try to take them regularly to the movies, the theatre, restaurants, hiking, fishing and, when Iceland’s sheep are brought down from the highlands each September, even on family sheep-herding outings.Jón and Birgir may be exceptionally keen on football, and talented (Jón has been offered a soccer scholarship to the Metropolitan State University of Denver, and a few weeks after we meet, Birgir is selected to play for the under-17 national team). But could the significant rise in the percentage of kids who take part in organised sport four or more times a week be bringing benefits beyond raising healthier children?Could it, for instance, have anything to do with Iceland’s crushing defeat of England in the Euro 2016 football championship? When asked, Inga Dóra Sigfúsdóttir, who was voted Woman of the Year in Iceland in 2016, smiles: “There is also the success in music, like Of Monsters and Men [an indie folk-pop group from Reykjavik]. These are young people who have been pushed into organised work. Some people have thanked me,” she says, with a wink.Elsewhere, cities that have joined Youth in Europe are reporting other benefits. In Bucharest, for example, the rate of teen suicides is dropping alongside use of drink and drugs. In Kaunas, the number of children committing crimes dropped by a third between 2014 and 2015.As Inga Dóra says: “We learned through the studies that we need to create circumstances in which kids can lead healthy lives, and they do not need to use substances, because life is fun, and they have plenty to do – and they are supported by parents who will spend time with them.”When it comes down to it, the messages – if not necessarily the methods – are straightforward. And when he looks at the results, Harvey Milkman thinks of his own country, the US. Could the Youth in Iceland model work there, too?Three hundred and twenty-five million people versus 330,000. Thirty-three thousand gangs versus virtually none. Around 1.3 million homeless young people versus a handful.Clearly, the US has challenges that Iceland does not. But the data from other parts of Europe, including cities such as Bucharest with major social problems and relative poverty, shows that the Icelandic model can work in very different cultures, Milkman argues. And the need in the US is high: underage drinking accounts for about 11 per cent of all alcohol consumed nationwide, and excessive drinking causes more than 4,300 deaths among under-21 year olds every year.A national programme along the lines of Youth in Iceland is unlikely to be introduced in the US, however. One major obstacle is that while in Iceland there is long-term commitment to the national project, community health programmes in the US are usually funded by short-term grants.Milkman has learned the hard way that even widely applauded, gold-standard youth programmes aren’t always expanded, or even sustained. “With Project Self-Discovery, it seemed like we had the best programme in the world,” he says. “I was invited to the White House twice. It won national awards. I was thinking: this will be replicated in every town and village. But it wasn’t.”He thinks that is because you can’t prescribe a generic model to every community because they don’t all have the same resources. Any move towards giving kids in the US the opportunities to participate in the kinds of activities now common in Iceland, and so helping them to stay away from alcohol and other drugs, will depend on building on what already exists. “You have to rely on the resources of the community,” he says.His colleague Álfgeir Kristjánsson is introducing the Icelandic ideas to the state of West Virginia. Surveys are being given to kids at several middle and high schools in the state, and a community coordinator will help get the results out to parents and anyone else who could use them to help local kids. But it might be difficult to achieve the kinds of results seen in Iceland, he concedes.Short-termism also impedes effective prevention strategies in the UK, says Michael O’Toole, CEO of Mentor, a charity that works to reduce alcohol and drug misuse in children and young people. Here, too, there is no national coordinated alcohol and drug prevention programme. It’s generally left to local authorities or to schools, which can often mean kids are simply given information about the dangers of drugs and alcohol – a strategy that, he agrees, evidence shows does not work.O’Toole fully endorses the Icelandic focus on parents, school and the community all coming together to help support kids, and on parents or carers being engaged in young people’s lives. Improving support for kids could help in so many ways, he stresses. Even when it comes just to alcohol and smoking, there is plenty of data to show that the older a child is when they have their first drink or cigarette, the healthier they will be over the course of their life.© Dave ImmsBut not all the strategies would be acceptable in the UK – the child curfews being one, parental walks around neighbourhoods to identify children breaking the rules perhaps another. And a trial run by Mentor in Brighton that involved inviting parents into schools for workshops found that it was difficult to get them engaged.Public wariness and an unwillingness to engage will be challenges wherever the Icelandic methods are proposed, thinks Milkman, and go to the heart of the balance of responsibility between states and citizens. “How much control do you want the government to have over what happens with your kids? Is this too much of the government meddling in how people live their lives?”In Iceland, the relationship between people and the state has allowed an effective national programme to cut the rates of teenagers smoking and drinking to excess – and, in the process, brought families closer and helped kids to become healthier in all kinds of ways. Will no other country decide these benefits are worth the costs?How has this story changed the world for the better? Find out in our update