<p>Thank you Dad of Three, that was kind. I wish I could do a Joe Peschi imitation from Goodfellas, the "so, what, I amuse you, you think I’m a clown . . . " riff, but it wouldn’t come off any better live than it does in this text box. The lingering death of my step-father, work, and the demise of politics here have kept me at bay, but my daughter’s college search and a brief lull has me sniffing around again. We’re all good here now, and hope all is well with friends and detractors in the blogosphere.</p>
<p>Interesting postscript-in today’s Wall Street Journal Ward Connerly writes," Shelby Steele observed that “the values that made us exceptional have been smeared with derision…Talk of merit or a competition of excellence in the admissions office of any Ivy League university today and then stand by for the howls of academic laughter.” As a former regent of the University of California, I can confirm that these howls , and worse, are not confined to the Ivy League."…“he(Obama) should urge Americans to embrace the color blind vision of John F. Kennedy, who said that “race has no place in American life or law”, and of Martin Luther King who dreamed of a day when the color of his children’s skin would be subordinate to the content of their character”.</p>
<p>Just read that piece this morning and thought of this thread.</p>
<p>ROFL, wasn’t JFK the archetypal example of how kids historically got into the Ivy League – money, connections, handshakes? Why you keep persisting in this fantasy that there was some golden age of meritorious Ivy admission that is now gone is incomprehensible, sm74. As well, how you can these schools don’t reward merit when their admitted classes have sky high SAT /ACT scores and win all kinds of meritorious competitions is beyond me. You can’t make up your own facts and expect to be taken seriously.</p>
<p>Yeah, Ward Connerly heard “howls of laughter” when merit was mentioned. How do you make that little rolling-eyes icon?</p>
<p>The problem here is that some people–apparently concluding both Steele and Connerly–are unable to understand that two somewhat conflicting things can both be true–that colleges care about merit but also use affirmative action to include more URMs. They say that consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds–these guys’ minds are so little, they can’t tolerate any inconsistency at all.</p>
<p>Pizzagirl,</p>
<p>Every age has its issues. Sure, JFK no doubt got into Harvard largely through wealth and connections. Today kids get into Harvard for all kinds of really pretty silly reasons, not so much wealth and connections (they still matter) but for social agendas, carefully constructed resumes that project portraits of altruism and engagement, and sometimes just pure academic merit (the famous two or three hundred referenced in the interview with the head of admissions). Yes, you’re right the average gpa and scores are high so not many dummies are getting in. But lots and lots of sky high achievers get turned away, some honestly higher achieving academically than ones who simply happen to have struck the right note of political correctness, quirkiness, that certain something-ness in their application. That is what is referenced by Shelby Steele and this other piece in the WSJ today.</p>
<p>Yes, there is a big political/social agenda at work in the these admissions, not just Harvard but many of the very selective schools do this. It’s certainly their right to do it. No one is made to apply. </p>
<p>And obviously the slots available at these types of schools are limited, there will always be plenty who just don’t get in.</p>
<p>You seem to think it’s some sort of outrage to scrutinize these institutions that are quite powerful symbols in our society, not question their admissions practices. I don’t know any institution in our society that is given that sort of supremacy. Of course, people will scrutinize these schools, find fault, vent. What exactly is so terrible about that?</p>
<p>My kid went to one of them. That doesn’t make me worship them, defend them against any criticism. They are like any human organization - they are finding their way and part of that process is to listen to the chatter out there. Filter it, of course. If I thought they operated in a vacuum with no regard to their critics I’d tell my hs senior absolutely not to apply to them.</p>
<p>The author of this morning’s piece worked admissions in the UC system, btw.</p>
<p>It’s not just that there never was a golden age where merit ruled, but that there seems to be a fundamental misunderstanding about what Harvard and its ilk were and are still looking for. They are looking for leaders in all fields not just those in academia. They want the future politicians (who may well have been C students), the future artists and musicians, the innovators. Since looking for leaders among 17 to 19 years olds is much more of an art than a science, you have them looking at all sorts of proxies for future potential. Honestly Conant instituted the SAT so they could broaden their base, he realized there were worthy students outside the East Coast Prep School Mafia. I don’t think it’s actually about political correctness, I think political correctness is the current excuse for business as usual.</p>
<p>It’s the “howls of laughter” lie–I mean comment–that continues to annoy me. It’s the suggestion that these schools don’t care about merit, and the suggestion that they admit students who lack merit. I think that’s a slander on the schools, and even worse, a slander on the kids who are admitted with URM and other hooks.</p>
<p>But idealogues like Steele and Connerly can’t restrain themselves from this kind of overstatement.</p>
<p>Hunt,</p>
<p>It doesn’t bother me at all, that “howls of laughter” comment. My kid went to one of these schools and I consider him pretty dumb a lot of the time! Still scratching my head over what made them take him.</p>
<p>But there never were any howls of laughter. It’s just a made-up statement by Shelby Steele, designed to support a false premise. There are certainly kids at top schools who do plenty of dumb things, but there aren’t really any dumb kids there. It’s just nonsensical to claim that those schools don’t care about merit–they do, including among “hooked” kids.</p>
<p>Edited to say: well, it isn’t nonsensical, because Steele and Connerly have a sensible reason to claim it. It just isn’t true.</p>
<p>That is a very curious comment regarding the UCs. Prop 209 outlawed using race as a factor in admissions - UCs are race-blind, do not give preference to legacies, do not accept teacher or counselor recommendations. I wonder what non-merit Connerly is referring to? The UCs do give athletic scholarships, but that is nothing new. Perhaps the preference given to low-income applicants?</p>
<p>In fairness, Connerly is the one who pushed the UCs to stop considering race–I think he is talking about the bad old days before he accomplished that.</p>
<p>I dunno. The “howls of laughter” thing doesn’t bug me.</p>
<p>I think Mathmom makes a very good point though. The thing I really do value in these schools is their willingness to re-think their mission and change their admissions practices. They are a work-in-progress when they could have been anything but. That in itself is huge.</p>
<p>Isn’t Stanford going to open an east coast branch? I wonder sometimes if these schools might broaden significantly their student body number through technologically or additional branches. I think one effect of some of the “howls of laughter” comments is that they are seriously looking at their small number of slots and questioning whether that makes sense any more.</p>
<p>“John F. Kennedy, who said that “race has no place in American life or law””</p>
<p>Luckily, his actions did not conform to this statement. Standing in the schoolhouse door to block a black student, and sending federal troops to force that student inside, are both race-aware actions. One is evil and the other is not evil, but neither one is color-blind.</p>
<p>I find it interesting that here you have the 2 most prominent conservative, black writers today and both single out elite school admissions policies as their example of the decline in exceptionalism and merit in our Country.</p>
<p>How do you think they became so prominent? This is a very controversial issue of great public interest, and their views have a “man bites dog” media appeal. They are so prominent nationwide largely (in Connerly’s case, almost exclusively) because of this one issue. The stand came first and the prominence later.</p>
<p>Who would you say is the third most prominent conservative black writer?</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>I read the same article you did about the Stanford east-coast-branch. But don’t kid yourself that it was due to Stanford (or any other university) thinking, “My goodness, we have a small number of slots. That just doesn’t make sense and it’s forcing us to not take kids we’d love to have.” It’s about their own brand extension and their own interests. Nothing wrong with that (whether it’s Stanford or any other university that engages in any of these extension types of programs - evening classes, outreach to their own community, building campuses in the Middle East, etc.).</p>
<p>Don’t know about most prominent black writer but we are seeing a black politician emerging as a serious contender for the nomination to run for POTUS. I believe his views are consistent with Steele on this. He’s a mathematician/business guy, probably doesn’t write on this stuff.</p>
<p>Then there’s Clarence Thomas, as well.</p>
<p>
Who is currently listed here? I would say Thomas Sowell is actually the most prominent black conservative writer I know of, with Steele and Connerly coming in further down. I don’t really even consider Connerly as much a writer as an activist.</p>