But there’s often a less pure motive in play. In our increasingly status-oriented society, a school’s reputation is bolstered by its glimmer of exclusivity and by a low acceptance rate, which can even influence how U.S. News & World Report ranks it. And unless a school is shrinking the size of its student body, the only way to bring its acceptance rate down is to get its number of applicants up. So, many colleges methodically generate interest only to frustrate it. They woo supplicants for the purpose of turning them down.
.. One of them, Laird Durley, wrote that students insufficiently motivated to write something extra for a school “probably shouldn’t go to those schools anyway,” and he rued the extent to which simply gaining admission to a school with a fancy name — any school with a fancy name — ruled the day.
Three Supreme Court Justices Return to Yale
“I think we have to be concerned that almost all of us are from two law schools,” Justice Thomas said.
The six other justices all attended Harvard Law School, though Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg transferred to and graduated from Columbia Law School.
Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., who has two Harvard degrees, was once asked whether it is healthy for the Supreme Court to consist of only justices with degrees from elite institutions.
“First of all, I disagree with your premise,” he responded. “Not all of the justices went to elite institutions. Some went to Yale.”
What are some good tips and strategies for writing an academic paper?
Keep your abstract short, and write it after everything else. You want somebody to skim your abstract in less than 15 seconds, say ‘hmm that’s interesting’ and then start on the Introduction proper (or at least download your paper for later). An effective abstract can win readers from the start. I’ve seen some monster-sized abstracts that simply defeat the purpose of this mini-section; it’s meant to be a hook, not a firehose. 200 words is a reasonable limit. Anything longer comes off clunky and long-winded. Writing the abstract after the rest of the paper is complete will help you crystallize the work better without gushing/rambling.
Fund-raising for Bard College
Bard has always educated the kind of student that tends not to go to Wall Street. They haven’t made buckets of money.” Unlike the best-endowed liberal-arts colleges, such as Amherst, Williams, and Swarthmore, Bard has done little to foster links to the business community. On campus, this has its positive side: the atmosphere is intellectually idealistic and anything but pre-professional. But, unsurprisingly, an excess of critical-theory-reading photography majors doesn’t make for a promising donor pool.
.. Botstein has written that “it is an embarrassment that so much time, effort, emotion, and money are expended on gladiatorial exhibitions.” But, for better or worse, such activities are at the heart of fund-raising. Noah Drezner, an associate professor of higher education at Teachers College, Columbia University, told me, “Studies have shown that former student athletes, even just those who participated in organized college sports, are more likely to give, and give at higher rates.”
.. Instead of appealing to alumni, Botstein’s chief tactic has been to court a few exceptionally wealthy donors. “We’re in the business of looking for large investors,” he told me. “Basically, the people who created the college are Leon Levy, Dick Fisher, and George Soros.”
.. The proliferation of ancillary programs at Bard reflects a fundamental dynamic in today’s nonprofit world. It’s far easier to interest big donors in funding eye-catching initiatives than in funding unglamorous core activities. (At colleges, the latter usually end up being supported by incremental gifts from alumni, parents, and friends.) Many people I spoke to said that Botstein’s great strength as a fund-raiser is that he thinks like a donor.