I just read another article about what high school students are doing–with the help of their parents and high-end, private admissions consultants–to market themselves to colleges. [Eye roll]

One eighteen-year-old heading to Yale in the fall turned himself into an old China hand by studying Mandarin on native soil after his sophomore year and returning to the country the following summer for an internship. He drew on his experiences to craft an application essay about “calmly sipping green tea” in the mountains of Nanjing. Come on. Do deans of admission really buy this stuff?

I’m not knocking the kid. He developed a business plan to get into an Ivy League school with the guidance of a consulting firm called Everything Summer—and it worked. The company suggests trips to help teens “augment who they are and discover who they are” with a laser eye on the competitive admissions process. Anxious parents are flocking in droves to companies like this, hoping to unlock the secret of success for their children.

Heck, I was an anxious parent once, too, though never anxious enough to pay for college admissions advice. I was perfectly capable of coming up with my own hare-brained ideas. Like the plan I concocted for my artistic daughter to turn her talent for custom-painting old jeans into a business to highlight her entrepreneurial skills. Never mind that she doesn’t have an entrepreneurial bone in her body. We created a company to beef up her college application and even talked about it on TV in a local news segment about college admissions stress.

Contrast the resumes designed by the consultants cashing in on the collective panic about college admissions with the real-life experience one DC businessman is offering students. He hires young people to run his frozen yoghurt stores. Their on-the-job training teaches them business skills. And, for many who don’t have families who can afford to send them to China for the summer let alone pay for tuition, it helps them earn enough money to put themselves through school.

My daughter’s “business” folded. She only sold two pairs of jeans. And, anyway, the acceptance letter was already in hand. Today she holds many academic honors and a liberal arts diploma from a prestigious university. But she’s having trouble finding a job. Her high school venture isn’t on her resume.