Never Enough: When Achievement Culture Becomes Toxic—and What We Can Do About It

Journalist Wallace debuts with a smart take on how parents can help their children thrive without putting undue pressure on them. Drawing on interviews with more than 200 parents and children from across the country, Wallace explores why parents push their kids to excel in the classroom and on the field, how this pressure affects children, and how parents can provide less stressful forms of support. She suggests that parents’ fixation on their children’s success stems from an evolutionary drive to secure scarce resources for one’s offspring, but that modern parents struggle to distinguish real threats from such “perceived” ones as “getting cut from the A team... or rejected from their first-choice college.” The consequences can be disastrous, as case studies make clear; a particularly harrowing one tells the story of a Connecticut high schooler whose full plate of advanced-level classes left her so stressed she had to be hospitalized for suicidal ideation. Wallace contends that countering achievement culture requires demonstrating to one’s child that love is not contingent on a test score, and she encourages parents to ensure kids don’t overextend themselves. Wallace’s sharp analysis illuminates the social and evolutionary pressures that drive achievement culture, and her advice is well observed. This more than makes the grade. (Aug.)