Each summer, my family watches every episode of American Ninja Warrior. We have favorite and least-favorite competitors, strong opinions about different obstacles, and, although the kitsch factor can sometimes be overwhelming, we never miss a moment. We are invested in the outcome of every race. We cheer for all of the athletes. We become emotional at their backstories.
Maybe because I am, at the same time, thinking a lot about college admissions—reading essays, talking with students and families, answering questions about the process—I can’t help but think there is a metaphor here. There are some valuable lessons for students (and parents) to be gleaned from the courses and sidelines built in Las Vegas for the ANW spectacle each year.
To qualify for the regional semifinals, each athlete has to prove their ability in local ninja competitions. The ANW film crew visits many of these athletes to film them in their daily lives, building stories around competitors, particularly those who have overcome immense challenges to get where they are: the ninja whose wife, also a ninja competitor, recently passed away; the ninja who is allergic to essentially all food; the ninja with cerebral palsy; the ninja whose mother is in remission from cancer; the ninja with a prosthetic leg; the ninja who received a kidney transplant.
Thanks to the courage of these competitors in sharing their stories, and to some very effective editing, we can’t help but root for each and every one.
So here’s how getting on American Ninja Warrior is a little like applying to college.
The regional competitions that allow each competitor to demonstrate their ability? That’s your record: the activities, courses, grades, and test scores that demonstrate your readiness for college-level work.
And the backstory film? That’s the essay.
Who are you, the person behind the grades, scores, accomplishments, and activities? What experiences have shaped you? What do you want the people watching from home to understand about you?
Each competitor also has their own “ninja identity” and T-shirt. On the sidelines, their parents, friends, and coaches wear the shirts. When multiple members of a family compete, their parents sometimes have to perform remarkable quick-changes to get into the proper attire for each child’s race.
And this is where I think students and parents can learn something from Ninja.
In the head-to-head races that make up so much of the recent competition, one athlete comes out on top. The other might fall into the water on an early obstacle, or the two might race neck-and-neck all the way to the buzzer.
Sometimes there are surprises.
A heavily-favored ninja might misjudge a distance to a handhold, try to go too fast, or simply slip and lose their grip. A less experienced ninja might have a burst of speed and agility that propels them to the end.
What happens next? The ninja who falls, or who loses at the buzzer, claps and cheers for the ninja they were racing.
On the sidelines, you see the families of the fallen competitors hugging the parents of the ninja who hit the buzzer. Maybe the athlete who fell is thinking, “I’m embarrassed to be standing here in this water while my competitor is getting all the glory.” But what they do is cheer.
And the winners are just as gracious. They talk about how they could never have won without such a strong competitor pushing them to go faster. They hug. They acknowledge how hard the course was, and how random it can be to fall just when you think you have everything under control.
What’s the lesson here for students and parents in the admissions process?
It is inevitable that there will be other students you know in the hyper-selective admission pools you enter. There will be other students from your high school, students you know from athletics or music, and students whose accomplishments you have watched develop.
You will be competing in a gauntlet shaped differently from a ninja course that is no less demanding in its obstacles, and no more predictable.
What can you do if you are the one in the water, even in a race you thought you “should” have won? What do you do when someone you expected to lose gets to the buzzer first?
Clap. Cheer for the other athlete. You just ran the same gauntlet. They just got to the buzzer first.
And if you are the parent standing on the sidelines as your child falls unexpectedly into the water or misses the buzzer by hundredths of a second? Go hug the parents of the winner. Practice grace.
This is hard. College admissions is especially hard. We want to believe that if you work hard enough, accomplish enough, and prepare enough, the outcome will follow. But admissions, like ninja, doesn’t work that way.
Training matters. Preparation matters. Skill matters. Persistence matters. And then there are obstacles, timing, competition, and just regular randomness. We can celebrate the winner without deciding that everyone else’s effort was somehow less remarkable.
Because they all ran the course. They all faced obstacles that looked impossible. And every one of them did something amazing.
That deserves all of our cheers.