<p>He’s been dumping on Harvard for more than 20 years, including throughout his long previous tenure as a Boston Globe reporter. Indeed, anti-Harvard-animus has been the basis for his whole career.</p>
<p>harvard certainly has its share of such “animated” alumni.</p>
<p>ted kaczynski comes to mind.</p>
<p>When you have iconic status, you tend to “animate” those whose motivation is icon-smashing.</p>
<p>After all, you don’t see a Time Magazine cover saying: “Who Needs Princeton?” or “Who Needs Middlebury?” - do you, scottie?</p>
<p>No. Only the Harvard symbol suffices in such cases.</p>
<p>“There isn’t any doubt that brand matters and that Harvard is the prestige brand,” says Stanley Katz, director of Princeton University’s Center for Arts and Cultural Policy Studies. “It’s the Gucci of higher education, the most selective place.”</p>
<p>Byerly, I love your post #12</p>
<p>“All old chestnuts. Most of his local “research” consisted of Googling Crimson stories and reading Karabel’s book for like-minded sentiments. The author’s agenda is pretty obvious. Favoritism is GOOD if it suits <em>my</em> prejudices, and the group to whi <em>I</em> belong, but BAD if it suits <em>somebody else’s</em> prejudices and <em>their</em> contemptable, underqualified peers.”</p>
<p>It’s really amusing that you’re trying to attack Alex Beam through this post, when actually it pretty much reflects many of the negatives about you and your posting history. You continually trot out your “old chestnuts”–notice how you just posted the Stanley Katz quote for about the 100th time (and no doubt will respond to this if at all with one of your patented “Princeton ■■■■■, I have never denigrated another school” posts).</p>
<p>You yourself cite Karabel frequently for anti-Princeton statements (generally about admissions and Fred Hargadon). You google the Crimson and every other newspaper to find stories that support your points. You have a clear agenda (Harvard wins the cross-admit battles, it’s a winner take all educational system and thus, kids who are smart will choose Harvard).</p>
<p>That said, I would hope that the Golden book is fair-minded and notes that these types of admissions practices occur at many schools (and not overly emphasize Harvard). I think that many of us struggle with equity in the college admissions process. Kids and parents are attempting to use every possible advantage (notice all the kids on CC asking whether they can check off the minority box for even the slimmest of reasons) because of the competitive nature of the process and the knowledge that legacies, minorities, athletes and special development cases receive extra consideration. It’s not a great system right now, but I’m not sure that I would target development cases as being the worst of the problems. There are probably only a handful of them at any school in a given year.</p>
<p>Byerly why do you constantly repeat yourself?</p>
<p>yeah i find that strange too.</p>
<p>Even when you agree with me on the merits, you have to do the nasty, don’t you?</p>
<p>I suggest you read the Karabel book, even though you generally can’t control your twitching when you see/read/hear anything that strikes you as the slightest bit “negative” about Princeton.</p>
<p>It may surprise you to find that he has plenty of “negative” things to say about Harvard and Yale, too. I bet you’ll <em>love</em> those parts!</p>
<p>It is a well-researched book, whether it panders to your prejudices or not. Karabel of course, is a conventionally left-liberal, like D. Golden, and both, unsurprisingly, are firm advocates of affirmative action for URMs and extremely hostile to “legacy” preferences or anything that favors the (boo …hiss!!!) “rich” - at least the white, Protestant “rich.”</p>
<p>Unlike you and your bashing of Princeton Byerly (yeah, yeah, I know, you have never denigrated another school), I have never said anything nasty about Harvard or Yale (I think that Yale is an amazing school and I respect and admire Harvard) and I have continually stressed that I believe that there are many schools in the country that equally deserve the top ranking.</p>
<p>Going back to the original discussion, there is a long thread in the Parents Forum about the book, <a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showthread.php?t=235242[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/showthread.php?t=235242</a>. It makes for very interesting reading.</p>
<p>Ah, I see: you don’t denigrate other <em>schools</em> - just other <em>people</em> !!</p>
<p>Sorry, but I find the “parents forum” creepy.</p>
<p>Byerly doesn’t like being reminded how old he is :D.</p>
<p>Down with the rich! Hey with affirmative actions for URMs you’re giving people that <em>may</em> have had less of an opportunity set at an equal footing…while with the “white protestant rich” they’ve had opportunity their whole life…</p>