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I thought this one is pretty interesting...
Also link to entire comment page:
http://news.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/04/29/young-gifted-and-not-getting-into-harvard/
Is a Harvard education essential for success? The immediate reply is to ask for clarification: How are you defining success? Regardless of the answer, Harvard absolutely is not essential for success, of course. I’ve taught undergraduates at Harvard, and plenty of them are amazing young people. But so many of them learn a hidden curriculum that would depress most of us. Too often, while developing inside the pressure-cooker that is their lives, they learn mostly how to work the system, how to emphasize style over substance, how to silently intimidate potential rivals, how to develop the fine art of using beautiful language to say nothing of significance, and how to bring the latest resources to bear on life’s obstacles the way a four-year-old kills an ant with a hammer.
Also, just as an aside, I’ve never experienced more intense grade-grubbing in my life than I did from undergrad students at Harvard.
These skills do lead to a certain type of success in the world, particularly in the ethically-fuzzy business world, but they also tend to produce egomaniacs and arrogant hucksters who can be deadly when carrying out American public policy. For every brilliant Harvard graduate (i.e. the late author/journalist David Halberstam) there are dozens of graduates who do more harm than good in the public arena (i.e. the numerous “best and brightest” officials portrayed in Halberstam’s most famous book; also current Harvard-bred policy-makers such as the Pentagon’s Douglas Feith–it’s interesting to note that Harvard gives us plenty of graduates who carry out American foreign policy and national security policy, but the university is too self-righteous to actually offer an ROTC program on campus for future military leaders).
President John F. Kennedy was a classic example of the “Harvard Man” turned loose in the public realm: Handsome, articulate (though he probably didn’t write “Profiles in Courage” himself), and charming, he immediately led America into the Bay of Pigs incident, played a macho game of “Chicken” with the Russians over missiles, had affairs that made him susceptible to blackmail and the influence of organized crime, and ignored the civil rights movement until Martin Luther King, Jr. forced his hand. The H-Bomb indeed.
Save your money. Send your child to any honors program at a solid state university. They’ll encounter less attitude and a wider swath of America.
— Posted by Kirk Kicklighter
Also link to entire comment page:
http://news.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/04/29/young-gifted-and-not-getting-into-harvard/
Is a Harvard education essential for success? The immediate reply is to ask for clarification: How are you defining success? Regardless of the answer, Harvard absolutely is not essential for success, of course. I’ve taught undergraduates at Harvard, and plenty of them are amazing young people. But so many of them learn a hidden curriculum that would depress most of us. Too often, while developing inside the pressure-cooker that is their lives, they learn mostly how to work the system, how to emphasize style over substance, how to silently intimidate potential rivals, how to develop the fine art of using beautiful language to say nothing of significance, and how to bring the latest resources to bear on life’s obstacles the way a four-year-old kills an ant with a hammer.
Also, just as an aside, I’ve never experienced more intense grade-grubbing in my life than I did from undergrad students at Harvard.
These skills do lead to a certain type of success in the world, particularly in the ethically-fuzzy business world, but they also tend to produce egomaniacs and arrogant hucksters who can be deadly when carrying out American public policy. For every brilliant Harvard graduate (i.e. the late author/journalist David Halberstam) there are dozens of graduates who do more harm than good in the public arena (i.e. the numerous “best and brightest” officials portrayed in Halberstam’s most famous book; also current Harvard-bred policy-makers such as the Pentagon’s Douglas Feith–it’s interesting to note that Harvard gives us plenty of graduates who carry out American foreign policy and national security policy, but the university is too self-righteous to actually offer an ROTC program on campus for future military leaders).
President John F. Kennedy was a classic example of the “Harvard Man” turned loose in the public realm: Handsome, articulate (though he probably didn’t write “Profiles in Courage” himself), and charming, he immediately led America into the Bay of Pigs incident, played a macho game of “Chicken” with the Russians over missiles, had affairs that made him susceptible to blackmail and the influence of organized crime, and ignored the civil rights movement until Martin Luther King, Jr. forced his hand. The H-Bomb indeed.
Save your money. Send your child to any honors program at a solid state university. They’ll encounter less attitude and a wider swath of America.
— Posted by Kirk Kicklighter
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