If Harvard's "best interest" isn't fairness but rather perpetuating Harvard as an institution for the maximum amount of time into the future, then its admissions behavior makes sense. Colleges and Universities are institutions (like private companies) and (like private companies) it is very difficult to get them to engage in behavior that they perceive may shorten their own lifetimes.
Put differently, the main goal of an institution is survival. Profit (or a huge endowment, or close connections to the wealthy or those in power) is the primary factor in ensuring survival, and institutions know it.
Harvard has been focused on power over ethics for...well, I'm not sure, but certainly over a hundred years. As much as I would like to believe that admitting better-qualified candidates over "better-connected" candidates (heavy quotes here) will be better for their survival in the long run, I wouldn't put money on it. And, it turns out, neither would Harvard.
Extending this thought: if you thought that the primary concern of so-called elite institutions was ever "fairness", you're mistaken. They deal in Influence.
And yes, it's highly ironic that the current fashion for identity politics and all the other "post-modern" ideologies were started and perpetuated by these institutions, which don't actually engage in said ideologies outside of hiring humanities professors that say whatever they please. Even within that behavior, the hyper-left trend of said professors is much stronger outside of the Ivy League than in it. The tip-top institutions are quite conservative when the rubber meets the road.
Of course, one might also note that these institutions are only "elite" because of their connection to the, well, elite. The entire idea of "fairness" here doesn't really make sense. If Harvard committed itself to "fairness" it would no longer be an elite institution, and nobody would care how fair its admissions were.
It sounds like Harvard deals in merit and not egalitarianism, where merit considers the power you bring to the table and not merely your academic skill.
No one sees themselves as evil. I'm sure that "they" just differ in terms of what they consider ethical. If I may play the devil's advocate: Why is it more ethical to favor those born with ability than to favor those born with connections?
I don't have a quarrel with either form of discrimination, but I do have a problem with the dishonesty about how things actually work.
An organization where long-term revenue matches long-term expenses can last forever. There's no need for Harvard to keep piling up their endowment year after year
We should just straight up ban sports, legacies, ect from admissions. They play a part vastly bigger than what people imagine in determining admissions.
I have mixed feelings about this. A friend of mine grew up very poor in a tiny rural town with no known family that ever went to college. But he worked at a nearly superhuman level in high school and got into an Ivy league school.
He is also charming and funny and by his third year was friends with influential enough people that he was attending THE White House Christmas party.
Now he works where and for whom he wants because he has connections in the upper level of society that like him and know his competence. Without legacy admissions for him to make friends with, all that might not have happened.
Merit admissions give the legacies legitimacy. Legacy admissions give the superhumans opportunity.
This is simplified and certainly not the only way to let people achieve escape velocity. But it's what I saw happen to one of the most impressive people I know.
> We should just straight up ban sports, legacies, ect from admissions
Banning is harsh. Top universities are tax exempt institutions. If they want to continue their legacy programs, fine, they're a private institution. But then they--and their endowments--don't get to keep their non-profit status.
Simple change that could even be effected at the state level by way of referendum.
>We should just straight up ban sports, legacies, ect from admissions.
Government banning private institutions from doing things?
I'd prefer an alternate approach, in that government starts legitimizing other paths to education than the collage system. Its mildly absurd that the "keys to upper class society" are held by these private systems and this is reinforced via legislation.
The "25% Jewish" figure is based on decades-old data from Hillel (an umbrella organization of Jewish campus organizations). In a 2016 survey, 14% of Harvard students identified as Jewish. [1] More recent surveys indicated <10%. [2]
Also, not all Jews -- even in the U.S. -- are Caucasian. [3]
Bloomberg is really putting Harvard on a pedestal in the beginning of this article, that along with the unretracted implants[1] story makes me think their newsroom is deeply flawed.
I don't think Ivy Leauge schools are deserving of their current reputations or valuations (in terms of quality), the systemic rot at MIT (having an ice cream social to celebrate Aaron Swartz, happily taking money from convicted criminals), Harvard and nearly every other Ivy League stems from an idolization of money over all else, education and research are only present at these institutions as window dressing.
None of these institutions should qualify as a non-profit, given their abject failure and continuing refusal to act equitably as every other (non-church) non-profit must.
I have mixed feelings about legacy admissions, partly due to the fact that having a pedigree from an elite institution matters a lot less coming out of undergrad than it does for grad school. Graduate admissions are far less likely to have as significant legacy components, but legacies allow the school huge leeway and connections to secure funding for researchers, if not fund it directly.
The article talks about the huge endowment Harvard has, and I wonder how much of the incredible research going on around me would be possible if the university were to "take a hit" financially by reducing or banning legacy admissions.
"Using conventional financial reporting standards, 84 percent, or $31 billion, of the $37.6 billion
in the endowment is restricted by the terms of original gifts."
"Of the endowment that is restricted, the leading restrictions include (1) support for professorships
and faculty salaries (32 percent), (2) financial aid (21 percent), (3) support for teaching and
research programs (8 percent), (4) program initiatives (e.g., cross-faculty programs, global and
international programs, and women’s studies) (5 percent), (5) support for libraries and museums
(4 percent), and (6) maintenance of the physical plant (1 percent)."
I know there may be uneven annual funding levels due to when a gift was given, but as an estimate 84% * 8% = 6.7% of disbursements are restricted to teaching and research. That's about $0.11 billion dollars in 2016.
In comparison, Harvard received $1.08 billion in research funding from the federal government in 2016.
So federal sources of money for research dwarf the disbursements from the endowment.
If Harvard's endowment were to begin dwindling, I am not sure what would be cut first of the 16% that is not restricted by donor intent, but levels of research funding would appear to be mostly intact.
The only reason the university is worth its tuition is because of the renown that it creates. The fact that rich people enter through legacy is actually why the diploma is worth more.
Much easier for a Harvard candidate to have connections that could lead to a successful angel investment. Once Legacy admissions go away, the value of Harvard my dropped by a large margin.
Crazy world but all these things need to be taken into account.
> Once Legacy admissions go away, the value of Harvard my dropped by a large margin.
Sounds great to me! I worked hard to get into my degree program and get my undergrad too and it has negligible worth - honestly, if the same could be said about the HYPSM+ folks we would all be better off.
> The most shocking number in the paper is this: Of the white students admitted to Harvard, more than 43% are in the so-called ALDC category — that is, they are recruited athletes, legacy admissions, applicants on the “dean’s interest” list and children of Harvard faculty and staff. Furthermore, in the model constructed by the authors, three quarters of those applicants would have been rejected if not for their ALDC status.
I don't understand how any other specific admission criteria would be better and what exactly it suppose to achieve?
Ivy league is just a brand, some people get branded by it and some are not, some people because they were born to the right family, some because they got very high marks and some because they got the right skin colour. There is no "justice" as it is just a lottery winning thing, if you got branded your life would be better after. For any one who get accepted there are 100 who could replace him.
You could study the exact same program and acquire exactly the same knowledge in a different university but you won't get branded, so how is it fair? There is no fair, it is just pure luck that your combination of various parameters didn't get you into an ivy, if they changed it it would be someone else bad luck.
At the end of the day, who is going to be branded to be part of the elite is up to the elite, if you force them to change the rules they will just remove the branding, this branding only worth if the people who are already branded accept the newly branded.
Elite Ivy League universities are where post-modernist theories of all-encompassing privilege hierarchies were initially formed and propagated. Unfortunately, dogmatic belief systems that may be relevant in the bubble in which they form are then excessively projected onto the outside world.
Hm? Isn't this article just proof that privilege hierarchies exist and that those with power are perpetuating them? After all it's not that the professors writing articles like "Romancing the Subject: The Interplay of Race and Gender..." are the people choosing to admit lots of legacies, it's a totally separate part of the university where those decisions get made.
[+] [-] 09bjb|6 years ago|reply
Put differently, the main goal of an institution is survival. Profit (or a huge endowment, or close connections to the wealthy or those in power) is the primary factor in ensuring survival, and institutions know it.
Harvard has been focused on power over ethics for...well, I'm not sure, but certainly over a hundred years. As much as I would like to believe that admitting better-qualified candidates over "better-connected" candidates (heavy quotes here) will be better for their survival in the long run, I wouldn't put money on it. And, it turns out, neither would Harvard.
[+] [-] 09bjb|6 years ago|reply
And yes, it's highly ironic that the current fashion for identity politics and all the other "post-modern" ideologies were started and perpetuated by these institutions, which don't actually engage in said ideologies outside of hiring humanities professors that say whatever they please. Even within that behavior, the hyper-left trend of said professors is much stronger outside of the Ivy League than in it. The tip-top institutions are quite conservative when the rubber meets the road.
[+] [-] darawk|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] traderjane|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] bhk|6 years ago|reply
No one sees themselves as evil. I'm sure that "they" just differ in terms of what they consider ethical. If I may play the devil's advocate: Why is it more ethical to favor those born with ability than to favor those born with connections?
I don't have a quarrel with either form of discrimination, but I do have a problem with the dishonesty about how things actually work.
[+] [-] MarkMc|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] akhilcacharya|6 years ago|reply
Folks need to be clear about calling this out.
[+] [-] shitpostbot|6 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] rjkennedy98|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] sopooneo|6 years ago|reply
He is also charming and funny and by his third year was friends with influential enough people that he was attending THE White House Christmas party.
Now he works where and for whom he wants because he has connections in the upper level of society that like him and know his competence. Without legacy admissions for him to make friends with, all that might not have happened.
Merit admissions give the legacies legitimacy. Legacy admissions give the superhumans opportunity.
This is simplified and certainly not the only way to let people achieve escape velocity. But it's what I saw happen to one of the most impressive people I know.
[+] [-] JumpCrisscross|6 years ago|reply
Banning is harsh. Top universities are tax exempt institutions. If they want to continue their legacy programs, fine, they're a private institution. But then they--and their endowments--don't get to keep their non-profit status.
Simple change that could even be effected at the state level by way of referendum.
[+] [-] tryptophan|6 years ago|reply
Government banning private institutions from doing things?
I'd prefer an alternate approach, in that government starts legitimizing other paths to education than the collage system. Its mildly absurd that the "keys to upper class society" are held by these private systems and this is reinforced via legislation.
[+] [-] unknown|6 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] cglace|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] deogeo|6 years ago|reply
For perspective, the demographics of all Harvard students, not just ALDC [1,2]:
[1] https://college.harvard.edu/admissions/admissions-statistics[2] https://www.jpost.com/Diaspora/The-most-heavily-Jewish-US-co...
[+] [-] kpozin|6 years ago|reply
Also, not all Jews -- even in the U.S. -- are Caucasian. [3]
[1]: https://ejewishphilanthropy.com/how-many-jewish-undergraduat...
[2]: https://features.thecrimson.com/2016/freshman-survey/lifesty...
[3]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish_ethnic_divisions
[+] [-] raldi|6 years ago|reply
Not long after, people will be shocked that such a thing ever existed.
[+] [-] StudentStuff|6 years ago|reply
I don't think Ivy Leauge schools are deserving of their current reputations or valuations (in terms of quality), the systemic rot at MIT (having an ice cream social to celebrate Aaron Swartz, happily taking money from convicted criminals), Harvard and nearly every other Ivy League stems from an idolization of money over all else, education and research are only present at these institutions as window dressing.
None of these institutions should qualify as a non-profit, given their abject failure and continuing refusal to act equitably as every other (non-church) non-profit must.
1 - https://www.servethehome.com/investigating-implausible-bloom...
[+] [-] unknown|6 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] twic|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Konnstann|6 years ago|reply
The article talks about the huge endowment Harvard has, and I wonder how much of the incredible research going on around me would be possible if the university were to "take a hit" financially by reducing or banning legacy admissions.
[+] [-] jackcosgrove|6 years ago|reply
In 2016, $1.6 billion was disbursed for university operations.
http://www.harvard.edu/sites/default/files/content/20160401_...
"Using conventional financial reporting standards, 84 percent, or $31 billion, of the $37.6 billion in the endowment is restricted by the terms of original gifts."
"Of the endowment that is restricted, the leading restrictions include (1) support for professorships and faculty salaries (32 percent), (2) financial aid (21 percent), (3) support for teaching and research programs (8 percent), (4) program initiatives (e.g., cross-faculty programs, global and international programs, and women’s studies) (5 percent), (5) support for libraries and museums (4 percent), and (6) maintenance of the physical plant (1 percent)."
I know there may be uneven annual funding levels due to when a gift was given, but as an estimate 84% * 8% = 6.7% of disbursements are restricted to teaching and research. That's about $0.11 billion dollars in 2016.
In comparison, Harvard received $1.08 billion in research funding from the federal government in 2016.
https://ncsesdata.nsf.gov/profiles/site?method=rankingbysour...
So federal sources of money for research dwarf the disbursements from the endowment.
If Harvard's endowment were to begin dwindling, I am not sure what would be cut first of the 16% that is not restricted by donor intent, but levels of research funding would appear to be mostly intact.
[+] [-] lanevorockz|6 years ago|reply
Much easier for a Harvard candidate to have connections that could lead to a successful angel investment. Once Legacy admissions go away, the value of Harvard my dropped by a large margin.
Crazy world but all these things need to be taken into account.
[+] [-] akhilcacharya|6 years ago|reply
Sounds great to me! I worked hard to get into my degree program and get my undergrad too and it has negligible worth - honestly, if the same could be said about the HYPSM+ folks we would all be better off.
[+] [-] kevintb|6 years ago|reply
Yikes.
[+] [-] neonate|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] blakesterz|6 years ago|reply
http://public.econ.duke.edu/~psarcidi/legacyathlete.pdf
[+] [-] golemiprague|6 years ago|reply
Ivy league is just a brand, some people get branded by it and some are not, some people because they were born to the right family, some because they got very high marks and some because they got the right skin colour. There is no "justice" as it is just a lottery winning thing, if you got branded your life would be better after. For any one who get accepted there are 100 who could replace him.
You could study the exact same program and acquire exactly the same knowledge in a different university but you won't get branded, so how is it fair? There is no fair, it is just pure luck that your combination of various parameters didn't get you into an ivy, if they changed it it would be someone else bad luck.
At the end of the day, who is going to be branded to be part of the elite is up to the elite, if you force them to change the rules they will just remove the branding, this branding only worth if the people who are already branded accept the newly branded.
[+] [-] qazqwert|6 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] drak0n1c|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dang|6 years ago|reply
https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
[+] [-] navaati|6 years ago|reply
Genuinely curious, what are you talking about ?
[+] [-] frgtpsswrdlame|6 years ago|reply
[+] [-] eli_gottlieb|6 years ago|reply
I didn't know there was an Ivy League member in France!
[+] [-] johnmulaney|6 years ago|reply
[deleted]