How to Be a High School Superstar, by Cal Newport

I was first introduced to Cal Newport’s blog, Study Hacks, by my son, now a college sophomore. He would tell me about a guest lecture he attended on campus and mention that Cal Newport recommends taking advantage of such opportunities whenever possible, or he would mention his goal of not pulling an all-nighter during his freshman year (a goal he met), again, inspired by Study Hacks.

Intrigued, I checked out the blog, expecting useful but perhaps predictable study tips or advice on time management. What I found was an intelligent, philosophically consistent, and refreshing approach not only to studying, but to living. The author graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Dartmouth College, has a Ph.D. from MIT, and was Microsoft’s spokesperson for a nationwide back-to-school campaign.

That is why I have been eager to review Cal Newport’s new book How to Be a High School Superstar: A Revolutionary Plan to Get into College by Standing Out (Without Burning Out) (Broadway Books, 2010). Don’t let the title fool you. This book is not a succeed at any costs, relentless pursuit of success manual, nor is it a guide to acing standardized tests or packing as many extracurricular activities and AP classes into one’s schedule as possible.

What Newport is interested in is “a little known subculture of students” that he calls “relaxed superstars”:

They dismiss the belief that you should suffer through the hardest possible course schedules; instead they build reasonable schedules that provide challenge but still leave plenty of free time. They abhor crowded lists of extracurricular activities; instead, they focus on a small number of genuinely interest pursuits. Perhaps the most striking trait of these students is their happiness. Spending time with them, I have been astonished by how much they seemed to be enjoying their lives. They flat-out reject the idea that happiness must be deferred until after you get accepted into college, and they prove that living a relaxed and engaging life can actually make you more successful in the admissions process.

If I had to come up with a complaint, the only thing I would think of is that “relaxed” isn’t in the title, because I know some parents who are looking for precisely this kind of approach to learning who might otherwise miss the book.

How does one become a relaxed superstar? Newport offers three laws which are the heart of the book:

• The Law of Underscheduling
• The Law of Focus
• The Law of Innovation

In essence, the three laws propose that students underschedule rather than overschedule, attend to focused rather than scattered interests, and work toward slow, meaningful accomplishments that might be hard to explain rather than overnight successes that can be summed up in a sound-bite.

The three laws are the heart and the organizing principle of the book. Along the way, you will meet many examples of students who are themselves relaxed superstars, and each section concludes with a  playbook that describes how to put the ideas into practice.

One part of the book that I found especially interesting was a long and thoughtful discussion on passion. I’ve often been asked by parents what to do when a child seems to show no overriding passion. Newport’s response is that finding passion is a long, slow process, and that we should instead encourage students to lead “interest-prone lives” that will “attract deep passions.” Doing so requires not doing more, but doing less, with free time “to relax and reflect ‘without something in your ear’.”

He also suggests that “interestingness” is perhaps a better word than passion for what many college admissions officers are looking for—“the student who could sit down and chat about a topic for thirty minutes and hold an educated audience’s rapt attention”—reminding me of a driven and curious student I interviewed who began college at age 16 and told me, “I don’t consider myself gifted. I consider myself interested.”

Our own experience bears out Newport’s advice. As a homeschooler, our son took no AP classes as a high school student, giving him long stretches of time for self-directed reading and study. He took the SAT only once, early in his high school career, which allowed him to take a few college classes as a non-degree student. By the time he entered college as an honors student, he had a healthy approach to learning that helped him to know that having a triple major or pulling all-nighters or taking course overloads have nothing to do with how smart one is or how well one is learning.

I can’t recommend this book highly enough for anyone of any age who is dissatisfied with what Denise Pope has called “doing school.” How to Be a High School Superstar is written for high school students, but it will appeal to many college students, as well. I also recommend it for parents, not only for a valuable perspective on how best to support their children’s learning and goals, but also for new ways to think about their own lives. We may no longer be worrying about getting accepting into college, but doing less and living more sure sound like good resolutions for the new year.