Lisa Belkin does a great job summarizing elite schools’ admissions controversies that have recently been in the news:
Two school admissions policies made news last week for opposite reasons — Harvard University, because it is accused of admitting too few Asian-American students, and New York’s most selective public schools, because the city’s mayor thinks it is admitting too many.
Taken together, they illustrate the dilemma faced by the gatekeepers to the most desirable educational opportunities, continually tweaking their formulas and always accused of discriminating against one group or another. As admissions at the nation’s most competitive schools become evermore competitive — Harvard admitted 4.59 percent of applicants this year, while the acceptance rate at New York’s Stuyvesant High School has been estimated at 17 percent — the controversies are a reminder that every change in the admissions equation that increases the chances of members of one group inevitably disadvantage others.
I would like to see preferential admission of recruited athletes under scrutiny at elite academic institutions.