Kind of Student

pinkytolip
Mon, 11 Dec 2006 03:02:41 +0000

This is an excerpt from a letter from Dean of Admissions Marilee Jones about how MIT selects from its applicant pool:

"There is so much frenzied buzz about how and why some students get admitted and others do not, and so many rumors that there is a formula of sorts. Let me take a moment to put these rumors to rest and tell you the truth…

Turns out, there is no formula. There is only what we refer to as “the match.”

Admissions is really always about the match - on both sides. For example, after studying up on us, you decided that MIT might be a great place for you, and after reading your application, we decided that you would be perfect for us. Your application was read, evaluated and advanced through four to five different stages involving as many as 12 different staff members as we tried to determine if you had the qualities we know will ensure your success at MIT. We’ve been doing this for a long time and always conduct a vigorous assessment of our evaluation tools, so we don’t make mistakes - ever.

The match comes down to a few fundamental principles and to understand this, it helps to understand the circumstances of MIT’s birth. MIT was an idea born in the mid-1800s by William Barton Rogers, the premier geologist of his day and the president of the National Academy of Sciences. He was frustrated that the great universities of his era were either schools of philosophy, theology or of the classics. He felt that America needed a new type of university at which students would learn the principles of science and technology. He believed that the nation could use more people who could look into the future instead of studying the past.

Then the Civil War happened. Because Rogers lost many friends, family and students on both sides of the war, and because he was horrified by the waste of it all, he changed the original charter of MIT. The new mission was to teach students to apply science and technology “for the betterment of humankind.”

We know that an MIT education is an instrument of enormous power. Very much like electricity or fire, it can be used for destruction or it can be harnessed to benefit the greater good. With Rogers’ mission in mind, we in Admissions work hard to admit and enroll students who will join us in solving the great problems of our era, to fix the world for those who cannot fix it for themselves. That’s why we picked you.

Yes, SAT scores and grades are good measures of potential and talent. But above all else, character matters. How you live your life, the fact that you live your own life and not the life of your parents or friends, the fact that you are awake and thinking and fully involved in your life - that is what matters to us. Not some formula."

There’s nothing jaw-dropping if you’ve read the admissions blogs, but it reinforces what Mollie and others on CC have been saying.