This conversation was packed with prompts for multiple lengthy debates. While I respect the accomplishment of being president of Harvard and L. Summers’ many other accomplishments, I can so easily disagree with him. I may not have his breadth of understanding on issues of higher education, but we should be clear that great brilliance in …
This conversation was packed with prompts for multiple lengthy debates. While I respect the accomplishment of being president of Harvard and L. Summers’ many other accomplishments, I can so easily disagree with him. I may not have his breadth of understanding on issues of higher education, but we should be clear that great brilliance in one discipline does not guarantee brilliance in all disciplines. We live in a time, when the fabulously wealthy and well-connected assume that the privilege of a high-born pulpit, and they assume they can be vocal experts in everything. Bill Gates, Elon Muck, and other intellectual titans of industry come to mind.
The first issue: it is more likely the true middle class that has the greatest disadvantage in paying for elite higher education. Assuming comparable SAT’s: The rich pay full fare; The poor will usually great a full ride; and the middle class are left taking out loans because they are not rich enough nor poor enough.
The second issue: Why would the eight name brand “Brooks Brothers” schools need to grow with the population. These schools are already fabulously wealthy and have undue influence in national affairs. Why not grow or found other schools? Consider great courses with great professors; a classroom of 15 to 30 is much different learning experience than a lecture halls of hundreds. I believe that schools have a sweet spot of not being too small or too large before they become corporate behemoths.
Thirdly: no one discusses true diversity anymore: world view and philosophical diversity. Would Harvard admission readers rate a student who proudly listed working in a pro-life, border security, or MAGA campaign as equal to virtue signaling progressive youth who worked in a soup kitchen, planned parenthood, or Bernie Saunders campaign? Many of these youth struggle to perform authenticity for the benefit of the readers. Elite universities have become echo-chambers of progressivism.
Regarding elite sports: well elite colleges are elite, so why the discrimination against fencing, squash, crew, and lacrosse? If elite sports offend, then don’t go to an elite school.
Lastly: elite institutions stop being elite if they surrender meritocracy.
The conversation gets even more dangerous: who is Lawrence Summers? He was the brave contrarian who dared speak the heresy against the postmoderns that there are no cognitive differences between men and women, and this led to his fall from grace at Harvard. This was his greatest moment. The discussion could have and should have been more nuanced, as attempted by Charles Murray in “The Bell Curve”. It is not a question of intellectual superiority but of cognitive styles and complementary strengths and weakness that flowed with evolution, as in women having greater olfaction and higher oxytocin levels than men, thus making making women more aware of the smell of the babies and capable of greater warmth and empathy.
This conversation was packed with prompts for multiple lengthy debates. While I respect the accomplishment of being president of Harvard and L. Summers’ many other accomplishments, I can so easily disagree with him. I may not have his breadth of understanding on issues of higher education, but we should be clear that great brilliance in one discipline does not guarantee brilliance in all disciplines. We live in a time, when the fabulously wealthy and well-connected assume that the privilege of a high-born pulpit, and they assume they can be vocal experts in everything. Bill Gates, Elon Muck, and other intellectual titans of industry come to mind.
The first issue: it is more likely the true middle class that has the greatest disadvantage in paying for elite higher education. Assuming comparable SAT’s: The rich pay full fare; The poor will usually great a full ride; and the middle class are left taking out loans because they are not rich enough nor poor enough.
The second issue: Why would the eight name brand “Brooks Brothers” schools need to grow with the population. These schools are already fabulously wealthy and have undue influence in national affairs. Why not grow or found other schools? Consider great courses with great professors; a classroom of 15 to 30 is much different learning experience than a lecture halls of hundreds. I believe that schools have a sweet spot of not being too small or too large before they become corporate behemoths.
Thirdly: no one discusses true diversity anymore: world view and philosophical diversity. Would Harvard admission readers rate a student who proudly listed working in a pro-life, border security, or MAGA campaign as equal to virtue signaling progressive youth who worked in a soup kitchen, planned parenthood, or Bernie Saunders campaign? Many of these youth struggle to perform authenticity for the benefit of the readers. Elite universities have become echo-chambers of progressivism.
Regarding elite sports: well elite colleges are elite, so why the discrimination against fencing, squash, crew, and lacrosse? If elite sports offend, then don’t go to an elite school.
Lastly: elite institutions stop being elite if they surrender meritocracy.
The conversation gets even more dangerous: who is Lawrence Summers? He was the brave contrarian who dared speak the heresy against the postmoderns that there are no cognitive differences between men and women, and this led to his fall from grace at Harvard. This was his greatest moment. The discussion could have and should have been more nuanced, as attempted by Charles Murray in “The Bell Curve”. It is not a question of intellectual superiority but of cognitive styles and complementary strengths and weakness that flowed with evolution, as in women having greater olfaction and higher oxytocin levels than men, thus making making women more aware of the smell of the babies and capable of greater warmth and empathy.