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“In 1940, the acceptance rate at Harvard was 85 percent.” I didn’t realize that was the acceptance rate, but JFK’s application to Harvard is interesting and th
by mlac 5y ago
“In 1940, the acceptance rate at Harvard was 85 percent.”
I didn’t realize that was the acceptance rate, but JFK’s application to Harvard is interesting and that acceptance rate adds context: https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2013/11/jfks-very-revealing-harvard-application-essay/281699/ https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2013/11/jfks-v...
And maybe it’s not people pulling the ladder up behind them - it’s that the ladder has become more visible and desirable without expanding or changing.
I do have some hope with Coursera and EdX. There are now blended programs starting online that allow students to start remote and show they can do the coursework, before completing the rest on campus: https://scm.mit.edu/program/blended-masters-degree-supply-chain-management https://scm.mit.edu/program/blended-masters-degree-supply-ch...
I’d argue the knowledge is becoming more open and freely available, but the network is not. Maybe the value of the network would drop if it was less personal and more people were there. There is some optimal program size and it’s possible some programs could hold more. At the same time, do we really need more Cal tech grads? Not a slam at Cal tech (I chose the smallest), but how many people with those skill sets do we need vs. graduates from other less specialized schools.
There is something special about Cal Tech’s community, and I don’t know I would want to dilute it just because other people should have the ability to go there to meet some arbitrary “fairness metric”.
The value these institutions have brought, and bring, to the country by making us the top in the world in a number of fields comes from how selective they are and their massive resources they can put toward problems. This makes them attractive to the world’s top talent and gives them the freedom to work on some things without economic constraints, and that’s a societal benefit. Pulling money away because they’ve managed it well could hurt us long term. And it’s not like the Harvard endowment of $40B is just sitting there - it is invested into the economy like other funds until it is needed for investment in the community.
Lastly - just because you didn’t go to one of those institutions doesn’t mean you can’t be successful or attend one for grad school. And I’ve found grad school admissions to be meritocratic.
- analog31 5y agoAcceptance rates are meaningless. There is no limit on the denominator.
- jacobsenscott 5y agoLow acceptance rates are a key metric to marketing, and schools try very hard to drive the denominator up. I have a highschooler and I see how students fixate on this number. So while acceptance rates don't say anything about the quality of the school they are very meaningful to the school's marketing machine.
- thrower123 5y agoThere's only four times as many people in the USA now as there were in the early 20th century, and still only about a thousand slots for Harvard freshmen.
- q-big 5y agoBut I bet the number of universities has increased by a lot.
- AnimalMuppet 5y agoWhy do you think that's relevant? The post you replied to was talking about Harvard, and the article was talking about the Ivy League. Has the number of Harvards increased? Has the Ivy League expanded very much?
- rejectedandsad 5y agoBecause there are lots of opportunities to get an education that aren’t nearly as selective. The number of total slots has increased considerably. I think they should build more UCs and more UTs and A&Ms etc but to a great extent they already have and increased the class sizes to boot.
- AnimalMuppet 5y agoTrue. But we weren't talking about getting an education. The article is about Ivy League, and the immediate antecedent was about Harvard. Sure, you can get an education anywhere. But Harvard and the rest of the Ivy League are all about prestige and social connections. You aren't going to get that at A&M.
- rejectedandsad 5y agoThat’s the ultimate problem and why these schools are harmful. Letting in another thousand cognitive elites isn’t going to change anything.
- selimthegrim 5y agoHaving gone there, the degree is not the magic wand you seem to think it is.
- mlac 5y agoI don’t think it’s a magic wand. I think it’s a lot like any place and you get what you put into it. But diminishing returns (academically) start at a higher level than other locations. The network is nice, and people will never wonder if you’re smart or not, but yeah - people don’t pay you because you went to one of these schools. It can also limit choices and career paths. And have some people may have chips on their shoulders because they didn’t get in to that school.
- ZephyrBlu 5y agoIn what way is it not? I think that most people will automatically give someone who went to Harvard the benefit of the doubt.
- fakedang 5y agoThe entire business model of the management consulting industry.
- Dracophoenix 5y agoJust to add to your point, in 1940, Harvard (and most other universities) had its own exam and its own application. The person who was going to spend the time to try for Harvard was a boy (and only boys) who had finished high school (an accomplishment achieved by less than half of all students back then), had book smarts (a common quality today but not in the past), and some form of "noteworthiness" (whether that was in family prestige or science fair awards). As you can see, all these things put together make for a very low denominator with which Harvard could have easily achieved an 80%+ acceptance rate. These factors were already self-selecting for the "Harvard Man." Now they aren't. You are correct in your point that the ladder has become more visible. That visibility has bred more competition and more metrics to suss out who should have a seat at the College.
- unishark 5y agoAlso prestige whoring wasn't always as pervasive as it is now. Even as recently as the 90's when I was applying to college, the ivy league proudly proclaimed their lack of merit or athletic scholarships... so I didn't even consider applying there. I think the location of schools was a bigger factor to most of my fellow students than the reputation. New England winters were scary. And my high school actually advised against the nearby elite university because of their recent student suicides. The solid state flagship school was where normal people aspired to go. It's bizarre to compare the world back then to now. My parents' number one concern was they wanted me out of the house and able to support myself.
- tony0x02 5y agoUp until the 60s, most people that went to Harvard lived in the NE. People didn't regularly travel far for college until cars became widespread.