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Agree. This review and the ideas behind this book are really interesting (I've not yet read it). I'm surprised though that the reviewer discounts legacy prefer
by maroonblazer 9y ago
Agree. This review and the ideas behind this book are really interesting (I've not yet read it).
I'm surprised though that the reviewer discounts legacy preferences at universities. Given the degree to which a well-qualified school can open up opportunities for someone this seems like a perfectly valid and effective policy proposal.
- umanwizard 9y agoOnly a tiny minority of even people in the top quintile were admitted to top schools as legacies.
- yborg 9y agoAgree, we're talking about a few hundred people a year if you're focusing on the marquee schools, the issue is lifting up millions of kids. Improving existing public schooling and colleges/universities would do far more to providing mobility opportunities than eliminating legacy admissions at Harvard. For one thing, where will the next generation of lobbyists come from if we can't supply law firms with well-connected dullards whose parents went to an Ivy League school?
- maroonblazer 9y agoI didn't take him to mean only Ivy League schools, but rather universities broadly.
- umanwizard 9y agoAre people really getting into random mediocre universities by being legacies?
- maroonblazer 9y ago"random mediocre universities" like Duke, UNC Chapel Hill, Vanderbilt, UVA, U of Michigan, UC Berkeley, Notre Dame...
- dorchadas 9y agoYep. I went to Notre Dame as a non-legacy. I knew several people who got in off the wait list simply because they were legacy.