Comment by pyuser583
4 hours ago
I don’t feel the same. My own alma mater is a niche school. It officially gives admissions pref to legacies, but unofficially depends on parents sending their kids as the school is not well known.
Harvard on the other hand - people go to Harvard to become elite. That only works because they get to hobnob with princes and the like. Thats the point.
The Ivy’s do a good job of admitting non-elite students. I’m glad that pathway to eliteness is there.
I’m proud of my small liberal arts Alma mater. I have no desire to network with billionaires and princes (as opposed to say, brilliant engineers and researchers).
But I’m glad the legacies at Harvard are sharing a classroom with kids from Appalachia. And that only happens if you get in the legacies.
The wild thing is that America pretends itself that it is a meritocracy while ... literally defending deeply nepotistic class based system like this.
If the Harward did not took that many legacies, they would spread out to different schools. And mixed with others there. You dont need to collect kids of powerful in one place to achieve that.
I’m reassured by the fact that grads of non-Ivy Leagues do extremely well.
The focus on Harvard is really overblown.