1951

Finding my news on classmates on the very slim side this month, I'd like to devote this column to a discussion of another kind of news. My decision was inspired by a note one of my favorite classmates wrote to Class Treasurer Merle Thorpe upon receipt of his dues notice.

If the good old Alumni Mag adheres to its usual schedule, you will find in the pages of the November issue a list of alumni sons and daughters in this year's freshman class. I don't yet know how many there are from '51.I also don't know how many were accepted but chose to go elsewhere, or how many applied but were not accepted.

To have the latter two statistics would be of no assistance to my message. Regardless of their dimensions, they would only serve to distract from my message to classmates with sons and daughters who already have had, or in the future may have, their applications for admission to Dartmouth REJECTED!

Even as a crusty, aging bachelor, I can understand the hurt, even the anger, which afflict a classmate when he learns the unhappy news. What concerns me is when the hurt and the anger endure to the detriment of both the Class and the College.

As some of you know, I did a lot of alumni interviewing of applicants, as many as 25 a year, while I was in Philadelphia. The applicants included a number of alumni sons, whose fathers I knew personally in many cases. I also went to bat, sometimes hitting a homer and sometimes striking out, for applicants who my committee thought could make a real contribution to the College, particularly when some aspect of their record suggested possible problems with the Admissions Office.

While I must admit to some disappointments, I was never shocked by a rejection. The Admissions Office never presented me with a rejection for which I had not foreseen the reason. I also noticed that alumni sons I regarded as borderline candidates seemed to have a better track record than unaffiliated applicants.

It is now eight months after this year's magic April 15 date and four months before the next. This is perhaps as good a time of year as any for all of us to try to be dispassionate.

Let's start with an absurd proposition because it is a necessary foundation to everything which follows - that every alumni (and, at some future date, every alumnae) son and daughter has a birthright to admission to Dartmouth.

Even before coeducation reared its lovely head, the rate of procreation of Dartmouth men (even averaging in the bachelors) probably would have required an expansion in size in the student body without admitting any non-alumni sons. Since coeducation, it would be an impossibility.

The idea of expanding Dartmouth's size has never had much appeal to alumni. I therefore assume that at least most alumni would oppose it, even if it required not admitting their progeny.

The next question is whether alumni sons and daughters should receive preference regardless of the qualifications of other applicants. At least those of us who are first generation Dartmouth men should have pangs of conscience about accepting any such proposition.

In the first place, it just isn't fair to deny to non-alumni sons and daughters the opportunity of a Dartmouth education. In the second place, too much intermarriage could deprive the College of the virility which comes from the infusion of new blood.

I recall seeing, when I was in law school, a study of undergraduates at another Ivy League institution which admitted alumni sons almost automatically. They had a much higher flunkout rate than other admittees, monopolized the bottom quarter of the class academically, and contributed far less to the institution as a group in terms of extracurricular activities.

I also recall encountering, when I was interviewing, an occasional Dartmouth son whose father had dreams of his son going to Dartmouth long before he was born - but the son really wanted to go to some other college. The old man, who got mad as hell, may not have known it; but his son was happy for the rejection.

You should also realize that acceptance could be a disservice to the son or daughter involved. It seems to me that a rejection of the application for admission is a far less traumatic experience than flunking out or, for that matter, scraping through by the skin of one's teeth. How much can one enjoy Hanover when teeter-tottering in and out of academic probation?

This doesn't mean that the alumnus wouldn't get accepted today. Given the same context for development, I suspect that few present alumni would fail to gain admission. But let's accept the law of averages. Unless you married a wife who is a genius descended from a line of genius, the odds are that half of your children will be brighter - and half stupider - than you are.

Going back to when you were admitted how would you have felt if you had been displaced by the stupider half of alumni children when your qualifications were better?

With all of this, I am not suggesting that the Admissions Office is perfect in its decisions. Its staff is human, just like you and me, which is why you bleed when your son or dauehter doesn't make it. I doubt that, given the opportunity, you would relish "having Eddie Chamberlain's job. In spite of all of my fights with him, I certainly wouldn't.

I do not deny you the right to bleed when your progeny are rejected for admission to Dartmouth. But, for God's sake, let's not be so shortsighted that bleeding turns into hemophilia or hypochondria. P S. Let me share with you one of the fights I lost with Eddie. The young man was in the top 10% of his class at one of the best high schools in Pennsylvania, president of either his class or the student body (I've forgotten which), captain of an outstanding football team, and an Eagle Scout. Unfortunately, his College Boards killed him, even though I spent hours voluntarily tutoring him. He was accepted by, and graduated from, Princeton, made the All-Ivy. League Football Team, and is now an M.D P.P.S. A gridiron opponent of his from another suburban Philadelphia high school, who really wanted to go to Princeton, was rejected there but accepted at, and graduated from, Dartmouth.

Secretary, Apt. 32-A, 45 E. 89th St. New York, N.Y. 10028

Treasurer, Dolly Rd., Hopkinton, N.H. 03301