Harvard University: admission policy and access control
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.34767/PP.2015.01.01Keywords:
sociology of education, selection, university, Harvard, dynamics of access, meritocracy, Ivy LeagueAbstract
My article is an attempt to reconstruct the criteria for admission to Harvard University in a historical perspective. In particular, I am interested in the evolution of the mechanism of closing/ opening access to studying at this institution of higher education for various social groups. The history of regulating access to the university is at the same time, I am convinced, an excellent exemplification of the dynamics of the relationship between equality / inequality in education taking place in the United States, and also competitive and sponsored mobility based on the principles of meritocracy. In this context, the most important are admissions criteria.They always provide, both in relation to Harvard and most of the best universities in the world, a certain type of social structure. Regardless of the rhetoric of their creators, they only seemingly have an “objective” character and are typically oriented toward academic attributes of the candidates. In fact, they are imbued with different ideologies, arising out of them sometimes openly and sometimes by default or in a hidden way. Their goal is not only to“ select” the best candidates but some times also to control access to institutions of higher education, mainly by creating mechanisms of exclusion.
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