Excellent Sheep Summary

William Deresiwicz description of an excellent sheep in the book, “Excellent Sheep, is a student who goes above and beyond to reach college “standards.” This include dozens of clubs they have join, the fifteen AP courses they took, and 7.0 GPA they manage to obtain over the four years in high school. This thirst for overflowing their resumes with countless awards and achievements is in order for them to have the right credentials so they can get accepted to the most elite of colleges. Myself being a student makes me wonder whether I myself am an excellent sheep. At high school I would have simply answered yes, however now as a college freshman it is not as clear cut. During high school Deresiwicz would agree that I lacked “learn to live with risk” quality. As a high school student wanted to do well to get into a prestigious college risk never really appealed to me. Taking a class that would most likely not get me the grade I wanted was practically academic suicide. However, now more so than ever as a college student Deresiwicz words hold merit. Deresiwicz recalls the moment he blew a test for the first time and later goes on to state, “I walked out feeling like I no longer knew who I

Though you may think by now I should be able to think, but I’m not talking about the thinking required to answer a test question, but rather Deresiwicz form of thinking. Deresiwicz defines thinking as, “It means developing the habit of skepticism and the capacity to put it into practice.” (79) This level of critical thinking was never stressed in high school. Many students and I, were taught to think to solve equations as Deresiwicz stated. This form of thinking wasn’t really made crucial to me until I got to college where I had to think and analyze more on subjects, topics, and people than their face value. Critical thinking allows us to think genuinely for ourselves and not inherit and become dominated by anyone’s own