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The Underside Of The Ivies
Ever wonder what it takes to get into Harvard, Yale, or
Princeton? Do the happy few who win higher education's
golden ticket get in because of SAT scores or extracurriculars--or
is it because Dad donated a building? Are the Big Three
really academic meritocracies? Have they ever been? These
are the questions University of California-Berkeley sociologist
Jerome Karabel sets out to answer in his new book, The
Chosen: The Hidden History of Admission and Exclusion at
Harvard, Yale, and Princeton. Karabel, himself a 1972 Harvard
grad, is already garnering high praise for pulling back
the veil on the Big
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Three's at times problematic past (anti-Semitic
policies, rampant anti-intellectualism, the exclusion of
women and minorities) and for offering a sweeping 100-year
retrospective on who has gotten into the Ivy giants, who
has not, and why.
You spent much of the 1990s fighting a losing battle for
the preservation of affirmative action policies at Berkeley.
What made you write a 720-page history of Harvard, Princeton,
and Yale?
I thought some historical perspective was needed. I wanted
to call into question the notion that admissions, historically,
had been done meritocratically, that somehow affirmative
action was some violation of ......
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