<p>What I find troubling is the gratuitously insulting tone of Kathy Henderson’s posting. It demeans her and the real argument she is trying to make. She seems so much better than that.</p>
<p>If she is looking for a unique intellectual experience instead of, as she so elegantly put it in another posting “a safe house for preppies”, why not put down you want to do ‘Directed Studies’ or for that matter apply to the University of Chicago “Fundamentals” which amongst those in the know has at least the intellectual cachet of Yale? Chicago also offers an “uncommon application” which to my certain knowledge will give her the scope to explain why she wants to go there. </p>
<p>That being said, there is indeed something very false about a process that taints everyone involved with it. Maybe HPY should all opt for SCEA, set the intellectual bar even to apply SCEA at straight A for everyone, and use the SAT to normalize for differences in grading standards between schools. If the Kathy Hendersons of the world then get to explain on the supplemental SCEA application why they want to go to Yale specifically, it might be a bit less of a crapshoot.</p>
<p>If Kathy’s point is that the Yale Supplemental form doesn’t give her the room to explain why she thinks Yale fits her in a way Chicago or Harvard does not, that is something Jeff Brenzel should look at. If she goes on to suggest that the whole process is one of misguided social engineering driven by a moral perception of diversity that has nothing to do with the mission of a university, she should perhaps phrase this in terms that will not reflexively redound on herself.</p>