Acad-Admissions

In the most recent issue of Harvard Today, Dean Bender reiterates his admissions philosophy: that the College should seek a diversified student body, not one composed merely of the most academically proficient. With the constantly increasing number of admissions candidates, this philosophy deserves to be kept in mind.

The increasing number of applicants for admission will make it easier for the College to choose a larger number of freshmen from those applicants with a predicted rank list of Group I or II. Indeed, even now there is much support for choosing the incoming class from those candidates with the highest predicted Rank List. This feeling is most prevalent among the younger faculty members, products of the modern Ph.D. factories, and among some members of the science departments.

It is perhaps inevitable, as the number of admissions increase, that the average predicted Rank List of those admitted will be improved. This definite, numerical description provides the easiest way to choose among applicants. In addition, it is understandable that the faculty should want only academically oriented students admitted to the College. However, there should be a continued effort to maintain admission to Harvard College on a broader base than that of predicted academic performance.

Not only are the predicted Rank Listings to a large extent inaccurate, but these Listings would become even less meaningful as the academic caliber of the College increased. Besides, limiting admission of students to those with the highest Predicted Rank List of Groups I or II, would discriminate against students from the poorer secondary schools, thus greatly decreasing the geographic and social distribution of the College.

But an even more harmful effect would be the changed intellectual character of the College. The academic intensity produced by limiting admission to the most scholastically proficient would not be the most favorable atmosphere for development of student abilities. While Harvard College would certainly produce more academicians by drawing from only the top students, it would not provide us many leaders in other fields of endeavor. It would be a perversion of the function of the American college to force undergraduates into a graduate school environment.

To limit admission to the most academically proficient will be the easy way to dispose of the growing burden of applications, but the Committee on Admissions should attempt, as much as possible, to continue its policy of seeking a diverse college body. To do so will require an increasingly larger admissions staff, but the money expended will be worthwhile if Harvard avoids a mechanistic, mathematical selection of admissions candidates.