Harvard Student Newspaper Claims New 200 Word Limit on Admissions Essays is Racist
“How can students reasonably condense discussions about formative life experiences and their identities into 200 words or less?”
Is there anything that the campus left doesn’t find racist? It’s all just so tiresome.
The College Fix reports:
Harvard student newspaper calls new 200-word limit on admissions essays racist
Harvard University’s new application essay requirements, including a 200-word limit, put racial minorities at a disadvantage, the editors of its student newspaper wrote this week.
In an editorial Tuesday, The Harvard Crimson student editorial board said the new short-essay questions “seemingly cater to those from highly privileged backgrounds.”
“Our foremost concern: How can students reasonably condense discussions about formative life experiences and their identities into 200 words or less?” the student editors wrote.
Harvard revamped its admissions process after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in June that its race-based admission practices were unconstitutional.
Among the changes were its essay requirements. The Ivy League school used to allow student applicants to choose from a series of questions and write one long, open-ended essay and two shorter optional essays, according to The Crimson.
Now, the application requires students to write five short essays within a 200-word limit in response to “new mandatory prompts,” the student editors wrote.
These requirements hurt “marginalized” students, forcing them to answer questions that may “not be relevant to their background,” they continued.
“Learning to package yourself within a shorter amount of space is a product of advanced education; longer essays more equitably allow applicants to discuss their experiences in full, particularly if they are from non-traditional backgrounds and require more space to elaborate on nuanced qualifications,” the editorial board wrote.
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Comments
The essay is a test. The document shows the students knowledge. The essays aren’t just about life.
If the editors of the Harvard Crimson had to read hundreds of student admissions essays (as I once did), they would understand why it’s kept to 200 words. In fact, they might beg for it to be shorter.
Someone needs to remind the Harvard Crimson that the accusation “racist!” has been used so often, and with so little justification, that it no longer has any meaning.
Merit is racist, tests are racist, grades are racist, proper English is racist, mathematics is racist, rationality is racist, etc., etc. This laundry list is a direct result of allowing unqualified students to enter colleges where they cannot keep up.
Waiting for the online Mirriam-Webster to update definition #2 for “racist” to “anything a woke person doesn’t like.”
“Learning to package yourself within a shorter amount of space is a product of advanced education”
The purpose of elite schools like Harvard used to be to polish students that had already showed extreme promise — not to turn sows ears into ersatz purses.
“If I had had more time, this letter would have been shorter.”
–Blaise Pascal