Got parents with high expectation? Impress them by telling them you got into Harvard.
Got parents with really high expectation? Impress them by telling them that you not only got accepted at Harvard and Stanford with full scholarships, but also that they both want you so bad that they're creating a special joint program so you can attend both schools.
And if that's not enough, tell them that Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg called you on the phone to give you advice on which college to attend.
That's what one high school senior, dubbed by the media as "Genius Girl," did. Too bad that none of it was true and when the story went viral. The Washington Post reports:
The senior’s tale of academic conquest of admission into what turned out to be a bogus program apparently was designed to impress her parents, peers and teachers as part of the annual cutthroat competition for the relatively tiny number of spots at the nation’s top schools. The faked admission story went much further than most teen fantasies: It made its way to the international media, where the student’s parents admitted the truth and publicly shamed themselves before the Korean community. ...
The question now at the school is what caused the student to concoct the elaborate college admissions scheme. The answer seems obvious to students and teachers there: overwhelming pressure to succeed from parents and unrealistic expectations from the teens themselves.
Creating a story that went viral and brought you internet notoriety? Now that's impressive!