On College Admissions...

I received an interesting email at work that was about a New York Times Op-ed article on college admissions for women. The writer is upset about her daughter and other college-age women who are rejected or wait-listed from colleges due to the enormous amount of qualified women who apply.

Few of us sitting around the table were as talented and as directed at age 17 as this young woman. Unfortunately, her test scores and grade point average placed her in the middle of our pool. We had to have a debate before we decided to swallow the middling scores and write "admit" next to her name.

Had she been a male applicant, there would have been little, if any, hesitation to admit. The reality is that because young men are rarer, they're more valued applicants.

A great deal of this article is in this same thread. The interesting thing is if you remove the word "women" and insert "white man" and remove the word "male" and insert "minority" one (myself included) would wonder if this same story would find an audience.

Of course, the article has one non-sequitur:

Once you become decidedly female in enrollment, fewer males and, as it turns out, fewer females find your campus attractive.

So, more women at a college means less men will apply? What world is this writer living in?

An interesting article nonetheless.