Karabel, Jerome. The chosen; the hidden history of admission and exclusion at Harvard, Yale, and Princeton

Kliatt, Sept, 2007 by Daniel Levinson

KARABEL, Jerome. The chosen; the hidden history of admission and exclusion at Harvard, Yale, and Princeton. Houghton Mifflin. 711 p. notes, index, c2006. 978-0-618-773558. $16.95. SA

This is a long book, and it's heavy enough that a school interested in it might prefer a more durable hardcover version. It's a story told with great care and diligence, superbly researched and documented, about how American higher education has defined merit in the last 150 years. In its narrowest scope, it's a history of how exclusive colleges define and execute admissions standards, from the first challenging explosion of an immigrant population of Jews at the beginning of the 20th century to current controversies of gender, race and poverty in American higher education at the beginning of the 21st. In that sense, it's a look at the history of current hot topics by a sociologist who's a staunch defender of affirmative action and diversity. At its widest, it's also a look at how American values have changed over the last century and what qualities educational leaders want to reward and promote by their admissions decisions (and, by implication, what gets taught in college classrooms as well). The narrow focus here works. Karabel's chronicle of the debate between two Harvard leaders, Charles Eliot and A. Lawrence Lowell, on democracy and excellence, is, for instance, a marvelous focal point for many enduring discussions in American history. In the history of those ideas, I think tradition, loyalty and continuity have more value than Karabel ever sees. But when they're used to veil bigotry, Karabel's instinctive distaste is hard to debate.

This is a valuable book for teachers and administrators to read, joining a long list of recent books looking at how well colleges perform on admissions and on their educational function. (See Daniel Golden's The Price of Admissions for a broader look at this same topic.) As secondary schools well know, what competitive colleges are looking for in students shapes high school life in myriad ways. Most chapters probably provide more detail than many readers need. For students doing research papers in American history on a topic related to issues in higher education, though, the clear chronological structure, the full detail, the superbly organized index, and the insightful end notes would make this a useful source for a topic that is wonderfully appropriate for them to explore. Daniel Levinson, Teacher, Thayer Acad., Braintree, MA

S--Recommended for senior high school students.

A--Recommended for advanced students and adults. This code will help librarians and teachers working in high schools where there are honors and advanced placement students. This also will help extend KLIATT's usefulness in public libraries.