The Value of Legacy Admissions: Why LA and AA are two different things.

Legacy Admissions get a very unfair rap from progressives. And the reasons for this rap in my view, are quite simple. I feel we would have a different value of Legacy Admissions if the cost of college tuition weren't like 20 times what they were in the 80's, or even the 70's. Getting a 4-year degree education used to be accessible to the everyday American, and now it's not and that has massive financial and national security concerns.

As it relates to Legacy Admissions and how the cost of tuition intertwines with our prospective of it, let's get a fairly neutral(but fair) definition of legacy admissions:

https://scholarships360.org/college-admissions/legacy-student/

I hope everyone can agree this is not a right or left leaning site, it's just a factual observation? Good, okay. So a TLDR version is that if your parent has attended/graduated the university, that's a significant leg in the door, and there's practical reasons for why colleges have this: Parents know the school etiquette, likely knows what its like and still has contacts, etc.

And if you have other family members, it's considered helpful, but less so. But the key phrase is 'attending the university'. Now, for my left-leaning members let me give you a bone and lead you in the right direction: What happens if costs for college skyrocket, in addition to this system?

The answer is that college costs which are so prohibitive, knock out a vast majority of Americans leaving only those affluent enough to successfully spend enough money to get into college. And It is these Americans who get to pass on their legacy to their child.

Conservatives are correct, that it's proof of the good choices the individual made and their family, but liberals are also correct that at least 60% of US Citizens don't have that combination of good fortune and ties.

But it's not racist. And it's not useless. Imagine, if we still lived in a time of the 70's. Imagine if college were more affordable, AND more accessible. Then everyone can enjoy the admissions process, not just the rich. Now everybody can attend college. Legacy Admissions, visualized in this way could be a part of a solution to the education drain in the US.

A long-term solution to college costs, lie in tuition and overhead costs(much like many US programs in my opinion). If we can find ways to reduce overhead and admissions, we can reduce college costs by about 55% or more and we can take one step closer to the American dream. Because whether you're a liberal or a conservative, everyone deserves access to higher education.

 

Then have the govt pay for it.

 

I've got it! Allow legacy candidates but require them to either score high on admissions or provide a scholarship for a higher scoring but poor candidate. WIN WIN!

 

Well one applies mostly to while people, obviously.

 

that doesn't sound merit based. IMO it needs to be scrapped like AA

 

Maybe a generations ago, but after all the years of AA and sports programs, they will apply to blacks and other as well. Different schools handle their preferences differently obviously. I got in-state admission preference for grad school even though I never lived in the state because my parents own property in that state, for instance. That could arguably favor whites as well even if it is race neutral or maybe it was the fact that it was grad school was why there was an overwhelming number of 1 black person in my class. My undergraduate in-state school was super diverse, but with a Asian and Middle Easterner from many different ethnic backgrounds

 

If we are truthfully concerned with merit based admissions, I agree. We can't give permission to some and deny it to others. I think that a good student (woman?) would also have a claim if they said I have higher grades and entrance test scores than half of the men on the football team why did they take them? It certainly isn't merit....

 

Half?

 

I disagree, it's built on the merit of the past(the student-faculty member who obviously attended and likely graduated.). Also, even if it's not the merit of the individual, it is the merit of the society that we open up numerous avenues to education. The stats have been out there about US decline in education. We must do something at both the k-12 and college levels, to revive an intellectual renaissance in America.

 

Well wouldn't even a few be too many?

 

Wait, are you admitting that Affirmative Action got black people into colleges they wouldn't have been able to without it?

 

The merit of your parents isn't your merit. And as the first response to the OP states, the obviously better answer to funding is taxes.

 

First I have to admit that virtually all of my brothers and I directly benefited from LA as sons of a law professor. It was the reason my Dad decided to take the job! He could never have afforded to offer much help to four kids reaching college age at about the same time. Because the admission standards were the same as anyone else, it never occurred to me that I might be depriving anyone else of a chance.

Now that I think about it, I realize now that the all I had to do, was meet that minimum standard of SAT and GPA! I did not have to actually compete, or worry about improving my application, or extra curriculars or sports etc. There is no real benefit to anyone but me, and my Dad and the school's retention stats for their teaching staff. I don't doubt for a second that there were better applicants than my 3 brothers and I. I did not deserve that spot. It was affirmative action program for kids of professors, and we sure as hell did not need one.

I can't support them anymore.

 

If we could tax our way out of the problem, we would've already done so(I believe that a huge problem is the monopoly the teachers's union has on the Democratic Party. Most of the money is going to slush/retirement funds, instead of actually improving education.)

But I disagree. It might not be my merit personally, but if we invested in family groups like this, the more chances of overall success we would have. Every family can benefit from legacy admissions, and so too can the country.

Again, the problem is that not enough gain access to college in the first place, for LA to be the open wormhole to education that it has the potential to be.

 

not anymore with all the black affirmative action legacies from the 60s and 70s whose kids are now applying to colleges.

 

obviously without affirmative action, recipients of it most likely would not have gotten into elite colleges ahead of better qualified white or Asian applicants

 

Wait, what are you talking about? Do you think the 1 person in my graduate school who was black was by default unqualified to be there? She was smart AF and a real hard worker.

 

It seems hypocritical to celebrate doing away with advantages for one group while endorsing advantages for other groups. Be consistent folks.