My son goes to Wisconsin. There’s an incident every week up there where it’s 14% Jewish and a “top school by Hillel for Jewish students”. His non-Jewish girlfriend goes to Auburn where there are no Jews and I doubt even has a Hillel. His weekend down at Auburn was the only weekend since October he didnt see a protest or worse.
Pick your poison.
This. Over and over we have heard families and students mention protests on many campuses not just the ones in the news: many many campuses have conflict right now, and some have far more frequent and aggressive protests than the headline schools. I hope all schools move toward turning the debate less divisive.
And 40 students withdrew applications, which is a protest because they could just have let it ride and just not go if accepted. Which suggests to me there are a bunch more who wouldn’t attend if admitted.
To me the allure of Harvard just ended.
This is the result of a number of issues, probably starting with the admissions lawsuit. However, there is just a limit. I think that the top universities (for some definition of “top”) should be largely merit based, and should respect basic human rights. While freedom of speech is essential, allowing calls for genocide are not. I have hit my limit.
I am not Jewish. However, I am also not blind.
I understand that any university is a huge collection of only loosely connected efforts. I understand that every university has a number of excellent faculty doing very interesting and potentially valuable research. I understand that researchers at Harvard are going into work every day and working to understand and find cures for the same diseases that my daughter wants to cure. I understand that they have excellent lab facilities.
To me Harvard just isn’t special anymore.
Harvard lost its allure for me a long time ago after watching way too many kids live their lives in order to get into Harvard, which, in the end practically made them one-dimensional parodies of the well-rounded student.
I have to wonder how much of the misguided social justice we see Harvard producing is a byproduct of that.
My family is not Jewish. We are UU (Unitarian Universalist), and we have a couple of prominent members of our local church who are Jewish.
My kids have eliminated a number of colleges on the grounds of “religious objection” – which is largely directed by “where abortion has been made illegal” or “where trans people are not welcome”, but they have also added “where Jewish people are not welcome” as part of their elimination criteria.
I don’t know if it’s largely driven by “recent events” so much as “general populations in the state/legislature of the state”.
And, hey, we’re only one family, but we’ll take our tuition money (which would not pay full freight at an exclusive private, but is also a reasonable amount of cash over 4 years) elsewhere.
Harvard actually seems to prefer applicants with high stats and extraordinary achievement in a particular area, in other words, “spiky” applicants. I do think that they’ve admitted a large number of social justice warrior activist types, leading to what we are seeing on campus currently.
Yes, but I’ve seen many of those social warrior types go that route as an EC/essay/this is what Harvard wants type activity.
Then the issue is attributable to something other than the current situation as applications were due Nov 1 so it unlikely the drop is related. Probably people just realizing the amount of work it takes it a lot when odds are low. But let’s face it, the fancy schools will always get top students. It is us, as parents, who need to make sure we don’t support a decision to apply to schools that are not aligned with our own principles.
People here are forgetting that Harvard led the way with the statement released on October 9th by over 30 student organizations blaming Israel for the Oct 7th massacre, before any Israeli military response had begun. “We, the undersigned student organizations, hold the Israeli regime entirely responsible for all unfolding violence,” the statement from the Harvard Palestine Solidarity Groups said.
That was before any Israeli counterattack, right as the scope of Hamas’ horrific massacre was coming to light. And it happened three weeks before the EA deadline. The statement, which effectively served as a statement of solidarity with Hamas’ massacre, was well-publicized in the media. So yes, the drop in applications most definitely could have been associated with this.
Families should opt out of schools that do not align with their principles but even with a 17% drop, regardless of the reason, Harvard will still get top students.
It says here that there was a 17% drop in Harvard apps due to antisemitism with some even rejecting early acceptances. However, is the drop in early apps really due to antisemitism or is it just correlated? Because UPenn’s went up early I think. Are we expecting to see a drop in apps from Jewish Americans at these institutions for the upcoming admission cycle? What does this mean for admissions for non-Jewish Americans?
I don’t know if they will be able to tell if the drop is from Jewish students or not. It is very likely an “anit-woke”/ anti-left statement as much as it is a stand by Jewish applicants.
Surely these “woke” kids will still apply after all it is Harvard and their safety isn’t directly threatened as much as it is for other students
I think I explained it poorly. I think although many Jewish students will not be applying,there is also a group of (Conservative) parents pushing the “I’m not letting my child go to that “woke” / liberal school” narrative as these parents were already convinced that Harvard was a place of liberal brainwashing due to how it’s being presented on certain TV stations.
I’m the OP of this thread and I’m watching numbers with interest, but also know that we probably don’t know the causation of such numbers. Or at least not yet. Which is one of the reasons I was asking for personal experiences. My kids D22 and S23 are both on very apolitical campuses and haven’t experienced any protests or comments from teachers. We do have family members that were taken hostage on 10/7 so I speak with my kids every day about this. I’m glad it’s not another layer of issues they need to worry about at this time.
ah ok that makes more sense
I think it’s hard to attribute the 17% drop in EA at Harvard (against the increasing # of apps trends seen almost everywhere else) to only Jewish applicants. Cleary, there are non-Jews in those numbers as well.
So the question is, why? I agree some of it could be attributed to the general “anti-woke” crowd but I think a lot of it, as evidenced by comments on CC, is non-Jews and their families who are just simply disgusted by what they see and don’t want to be in a intolerant environment, regardless who is the target. I have been heartened and gratified by comments by people who “don’t have a dog in this fight” as it were.
This is us. I wouldn’t categorize us as part of the anti-woke crowd, although I do prefer my politics with moderation.
Anti-semitism doesn’t have anything to do with politics but my family won’t be paying tuition at schools where we feel they haven’t stood up to anti-semites. We’re not Jewish but really that should have nothing to do with it.
“So the question is, why?”
Perhaps the Supreme Court ruling? Although it applies to all, the main name attached was Harvard. Perhaps some URMs decided not to apply, thinking they no longer have a hook?
