Dan Lundquist,
vice president for admissions and financial aid, authored a letter (below) in The New York Times responding to a Feb.
13 Times article in which Middlebury
College officials defended the admissions treatment of “legacies” (descendants of alumni and others connected with a college).
'Legacy' Admissions and Fairness
To the Editor:
Re: “Of Sheepskins and Greenbacks” (news article, Feb. 13):
Selective college admission has
been a hot topic for many because the stakes seem so high and the process so mysterious.
Its elusiveness, lack of
predictability and apparent lack of fairness fuel public frustration and fascination.
John M. McCardell Jr., the
president of Middlebury College, is right when he says the admissions process entails
'imperfect human beings exercising their imperfect judgment in rationing a
scarce commodity.'
Like much in life, college
admissions isn't fair and cannot be made fair.
There is no universal yardstick by
which a rich and varied applicant pool can be judged.
Can formulas and goals help guide
the selection process? Yes. Should they drive the process? Absolutely not.
That's where Mr. McCardell's
implication of sensitively and professionally applied equal unfairness for all
comes into play.
Dan Lundquist
Union College