Why such an emphasis on holistically building a class?

[Anonymous]

I wonder if its fair to discriminate against young applicants for not being exposed to more opportunities.

For example, if a kid with parents focused on academics or athletics not letting them experience other things?

Usually a lot of extracurricular activities are only affordable for wealthy or poor with aid and waivers, middle class can't afford it, upper middle class can on paper but with full or high college cost, practically they can't spend much.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:All the TO talk makes me wonder - what's the point of creating a specific class to your standards, whatever those standards are? Just a prestige thing?

Because for financial and logistical reasons they need a certain % of the class to be “… studies” majors. It costs way more to run labs and educate STEM majors, and since tuition doesn’t vary by major, they need to balance it out. They need a way to attract and keep the rich donor and otherwise connected kids who can’t keep up with more rigorous courses. They need to enrich the said kids’ experiences by providing structured but very low pressure interactions with the slice of population they will never encounter on their own. They want to be able to field a bunch of sports teams (big money there). Etc, etc.

No, the “diverse” class is not for your benefit.

This is why the institutions are big on non-science liberal arts. What does the funding of a math or English department look like:

Annual budget: Chalk— $800

[Anonymous]

Ironically holistic admissions developed in the early 20th century at elite American universities, particularly at Harvard and Columbia, partly in response to the growing number of Jewish and Catholic students entering these traditionally WASP institutions at rates that the traditional American aristocracy viewed as a threat to their power. During this time, the percentage of Jewish students at Harvard exceeded 20%, and at Columbia 40%. So Ivy League deans decided to adopt a more holistic approach to admissions that emphasized traits like legacy, athleticism, character, and other non-academic traits partly as a way to justify admitting more "traditional" (i.e. WASP) applicants over Jewish and Catholic students. Some schools even asked applicants to list their mother's maiden names, and provide photographs in order to filter out which applicants were Jewish. Even after the end of the Jewish quotas in the 1950s, this system carried over into the present. It's a bit shocking that universities continue to practice holistic admissions since its origins are blatantly racist and anti-Semitic.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Ironically holistic admissions developed in the early 20th century at elite American universities, particularly at Harvard and Columbia, partly in response to the growing number of Jewish and Catholic students entering these traditionally WASP institutions at rates that the traditional American aristocracy viewed as a threat to their power. During this time, the percentage of Jewish students at Harvard exceeded 20%, and at Columbia 40%. So Ivy League deans decided to adopt a more holistic approach to admissions that emphasized traits like legacy, athleticism, character, and other non-academic traits partly as a way to justify admitting more "traditional" (i.e. WASP) applicants over Jewish and Catholic students. Some schools even asked applicants to list their mother's maiden names, and provide photographs in order to filter out which applicants were Jewish. Even after the end of the Jewish quotas in the 1950s, this system carried over into the present. It's a bit shocking that universities continue to practice holistic admissions since its origins are blatantly racist and anti-Semitic.

This is America. We utilize systems that are historically racist and unfair for good all the time. It’s kinda our specialty.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:One thing that’s missing- most elite schools can’t support 100% of their classes being the same 3 majors. They need people to subscribe to their other departments.

It’s also good to have students with excellence in a lot of different areas. To be Frank, few people get famous off of engineering or science even at the elite level, so you wanna cast the net wide for the highest probability of getting an impactful, important alum

Holistic admissions doesn't mean not admitting to the same 3 majors. It means admitting a variety of students to those 3 majors.

No it’s also a population control element. Someone has to be in the classics department, even if they’re lower tier than the CS majors. Same with area studies.

"Lower tier"?

Worse student. The CS and engineering students are some of the best students across most universities. The humanities students…eh

lol
this is why you went to a state school

I went to Amherst and Yale buddy, but good try.

sure.
hahahah

[Anonymous]

A lot have already said similar things, but to me, holistic class design is important because college is about so much more than classes and attaining an education in the classroom.

You want diversity to draw out the best from as many people as possible.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:To promote inquiry with exposure to different perspectives and lived experiences.

This! I have an example. I was one of those “diverse” students in college. I was born here, but grew up in South America, close to my relatives. During a geography class here in college, the professor took us to the library to show us some older, outdated maps. One of the maps showed the country I had grew up in. It’s territory was almost cut in half. As soon as I saw it, I gasped, and complained. The professor said he had purposely pulled out that map, so my classmates would see my reaction. I made his point about the importance of maps in national identity.

The first Jewish, Muslim and gay people I met were in college. Getting to know them as peers and friends helped me be more empathetic towards their struggles.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:so everyone isn't the same robot STEM kid.
seriously......

balance. a great American college experience is based on diversity of life experiences, thought, interests, background, majors, etc.

also, it allows them to pick students they KNOW will succeed (get jobs, not drop out, etc)

lastly, holistic admissions allows them to make sure they have students in ALL departments.

So every isn't the same white McLean, Langley, Big 3 kid. Bleh

[Anonymous]

“Holistic admissions “ = we reserve the right to accept or reject any applicant for any reason whatsoever.

Now you see why this would be useful to spell it out clearly in advance?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:so everyone isn't the same robot STEM kid.
seriously......

balance. a great American college experience is based on diversity of life experiences, thought, interests, background, majors, etc.

also, it allows them to pick students they KNOW will succeed (get jobs, not drop out, etc)

lastly, holistic admissions allows them to make sure they have students in ALL departments.

But why does this matter? I ask this as a engineering graduate from a large university. They didn't care about a holistic class.

so maybe you weren't at a selective school (yes, i get a selective major)....but a large flagship doesn't care about "holistic" admissions bc their mission is to educate the state's people.

private colleges have different missions.

The reason a large flagship "doesn't care" is because they get a diverse class by virtue of being a big state school. I went to a large state flagship in the mid/late 90s and there were people from all races, nationalities, sexual orientations, socioeconomic backgrounds, academic interests, etc. My college friend group is the most diverse group I'm part of (more than may HS friends, work friends, mom friends, etc.). Your "selective" private college doesn't have a different mission - it needs to be more proactive in recruiting a diverse student body or else it'd end up being overwhelmingly wealthy and white.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:All the TO talk makes me wonder - what's the point of creating a specific class to your standards, whatever those standards are? Just a prestige thing?

Originally it was created to reduce the influx of too many Jews into the Ivy League.
It continued to be useful by providing the children of affluent families a way to bypass academic competition against poorer applicants.

These schools are not selling education, they are selling exclusivity.
The whole diversity rationale is pretty stupid considering almost noone else in the world uses holistic admissions.
Most of Europe uses a single test. A lot of asia uses a single test. Some places use a series of tests.

People here will try to convince you that there is a negative correlation between test scores and things like "passion,"
The liberal elite in america will constantly harp on about how america is doing everything wrong and the rest of the world is doing everything right, but will always make an exception for the one thing that allows privilege to be reinforced through higher education using a holistic admissions process.

As we see in other countries, using a single test results in far more economic diversity at the country's top schools than we have at ours.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:so everyone isn't the same robot STEM kid.
seriously......

balance. a great American college experience is based on diversity of life experiences, thought, interests, background, majors, etc.

also, it allows them to pick students they KNOW will succeed (get jobs, not drop out, etc)

lastly, holistic admissions allows them to make sure they have students in ALL departments.

But why does this matter? I ask this as a engineering graduate from a large university. They didn't care about a holistic class.

Of course they did. They offer way more than just engineering...you have to admit kids that want to study all the things they offer. They also need kids that can play in the marching band, play sports, participate in theatre, etc.

This. A university needs students in a variety of majors that do a variety of things.

You can do that without holistic admissions. All of europe manage to do this without holistic admissions.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:no one, esp a 17/18 yo senior (or if you are DCUM 19/20 yo senior), that gets into a test score only school is picking it over a school that curates a class a la IVY+

Exacly. Which is why there is exactly one school in the US doing this--MIT. And only a very specific kind of student wants to go there, and a very specific kind of student comes out. More international students come to the US for college than anywhere else on earth, because colleges in the US do it right. All of you who think top colleges should be for 1600-only kids need to get out more.

MIT has holistic admissions

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I wonder if its fair to discriminate against young applicants for not being exposed to more opportunities.

For example, if a kid with parents focused on academics or athletics not letting them experience other things?

Usually a lot of extracurricular activities are only affordable for wealthy or poor with aid and waivers, middle class can't afford it, upper middle class can on paper but with full or high college cost, practically they can't spend much.

This is by design.

[Anonymous]

Holistic students bodies are encouraged by the liberal left so they can remind everyone how badly urm are discriminated against.