The dread personal essay is easy to game and ultimately unreliable as an admissions tool. I have a piece to that effect in The Daily Beast. Here is the beginning:
The recent arrests in Operation Varsity Blues put the entire college admissions structure under well-deserved scrutiny. In addition to exposing the wealthy parents who allegedly bribed, cheated, and lied their children’s way into elite universities, the scandal brought increased attention to the many legal-but-sketchy ways affluent families have been able to move their offspring to the head of the queue.
Rich kids can raise their numbers with the aid of tutors and test prep courses, and they can enhance their resumes with expensive “public service” vacations, unpaid internships, and private lessons in sports like crew and water polo. And if all else fails, there are always outright contributions.
Even in such a badly broken system, however, there is one component that does not need to be fixed. It just needs to be scrapped completely. I am talking about the dread personal essay, which is too easy to falsify, and mostly worthless even when it hasn’t been faked.
You can read the entire piece here.
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