“When a student asks us, as teachers, college advisors, parents, ‘What should I do?’, the answer we give is drawn from a narrower vocabulary than most of us would defend if pressed. I am interested in why we keep using it anyway.”

Ahead of the CIS-EARCOS Institute on International Admission & Guidance in Bangkok this September, we spoke with keynote speaker Nick Alchin about some of the big questions shaping our work with young people today.

Nick reflects on the language we use to guide students, the pressures they carry, and why our community may need to think more broadly about what success, purpose, and education really mean.

We asked him, why "A Wider Answer"? What feels narrow about the default?

The default answer that our culture gives to the purpose of education is some version of "learn this, get qualified, doors will open." It has worked for two centuries and for many families it remains the only route to a better life, so I am not dismissing it.

But it is narrow in a particular way because it treats education as an instrument for producing something outside itself: a qualification, a career, a return on investment. The first question it asks is "what will this lead to?” and I have called my keynote "A Wider Answer" because the language we have for advising young people has shrunk to fit that question.

We talk about potential, “best self”, growth, and fulfilling talent. It sounds like encouragement, but on closer examination, it points at the gap between who a student is and who they could be; a gap that, by definition, can never be closed.

A wider answer would also ask who a young person becomes by what they encounter, and whether a life that touches more of the world is, in itself, more of a life.

Nick explains that the pressure shows up most sharply inside each individual.

He refers to the work of philosopher Byung-Chul Han about ‘an achievement society’ where the supervisor has moved behind the eyes, and sounds like our own voice.

Students experience the obligation to optimise themselves as freedom, which is precisely what makes it so hard to see and so hard to push back on, and the system rewards exactly this.

Liberal arts colleges are designed for a slow, humanistic exploration. They offer the possibility of students being changed by what they encounter. They value autonomy and the self-directed student who has authored their own path.

But autonomy of that visible kind—the kind needed to get in, frankly—is often how internalised pressure appears on paper.

The student whose profile looks most authored is often the one who has installed the supervisor most efficiently. Students narrow themselves to reach institutions built for the kind of person who has not narrowed.

Put simply, the kind of “independence” or “self-direction” people show when trying to get ahead (e.g. into a system, institution, or opportunity) often isn’t truly free or natural—it’s actually shaped by pressure they’ve absorbed over time.

Nick invites a more honest conversation about the assumptions that shape our work.

For those supporting students through admissions, guidance, and transition, that may be exactly the point: to pause, look again at the language we use, and ask whether it helps young people feel more seen, more open to possibility, and better supported in defining success for themselves.

Hear more from Nick live in Bangkok

Join us at the 2026 CIS-EARCOS Institute on International Admission & Guidance in Bangkok, Thailand on 18–19 September. It is a key event in Asia, connecting the region’s international schools with universities from around the world. Together, they create an engaging and supportive atmosphere packed with networking opportunities, regional updates, and peer learning.

Related resources
If this conversation resonates with your work, you may also be interested in:

• Post-secondary pathways: Ways to broaden definitions of success
• Key trends in international university guidance and admissions
• Beyond the results: Reducing anxiety in the university admissions process