I recently visited the Cornell University homepage, only to be greeted by a nice of picture of a young, smiling Indian woman. “That’s nice,” I thought, “we have Indian students at Cornell.” I then refreshed the page and got another nice picture of a young woman, this time an Asian. Several more refreshes yielded a black and white student, both females.
A few weeks later, I did the same thing. Of the eight students paraded in the main rotating homepage pictures, all but one were female, five were black, two were Asian and one was an indistinct minority. It looked so meticulously arranged — such an embarrassing demonstration of Cornell’s insecurities to any online visitor, particularly to the average prospective student. Come think of it, it was actually quite ridiculous.
The allusion that white women, who make up a third of the Cornell population, are an endangered species, and that their male counterparts are extinct, didn’t quite surprise me. I was used to it. This is my Cornell, the Cornell I left last May after four years of learning that the best way to build interracial bridges is to continuously highlight our differences, even if that necessitates blatant preferential treatment and self-segregation.
I decided to compare this online experience by checking out the similar, picture-rotating homepage of my current academic institution, the George Mason University School of Law. “Law and Economics — A leading center, with courses taught by a Nobel Prize economist,” read the first caption. “On the doorstep of the nation’s capital,” read the next when I refreshed the page. The pictures were those of professors in the classroom, of the law school building with D.C. in the background and of students in a manner reflective of the school’s demographics.
I sat there, glued to my computer, refreshing the site over and over again, trying to find something as shallow as Cornell’s recruitment brochures, but found nothing. How dare the Mason administration promote useful, constructive information such as its academic focus, the quality of its teachers and its geographic location? What happened to the superficial characteristics of the institution that Cornell so loves to advertise as its primary asset, namely, the color of its students’ skins?
Minutes later, I finally found a picture and caption about the Mason student body — this must be where the political correctness quota is fulfilled, I thought. To my pleasant surprise, the caption read, “Our Students — Rich in Experience, Knowledge and Professional Background.”
I would be lying if I said that I didn’t often — very often — stare blankly into my law books only to reminisce about my incredible years at Cornell: going to parties in Collegetown, writing for The Review and then The Sun, playing Halo with my roommates hours before a paper is due, grabbing a bite at Aladdin’s with my dearest, spending entire nights at Turning Stone, watching the freak show at the Commons, rooting for our hockey team and giving hippies hell on Ho Plaza. The fact of the matter is, I still belong to Cornell as much as I now belong to Mason.
But my continuing desire to improve my alma mater extends beyond my affection and these superb memories. The words “Cornell University” will sit at the top of my resume for a long time, and, as such, I can only have a strong interest in encouraging the Cornell administration to worry more about the rankings than about appeasing underrepresented Eskimos in order to prevent their armed takeover of Bailey Hall (try and guess why I picked Bailey).
It therefore breaks my heart when I hear that the administration is expending its efforts, and — quite frankly — wasting its time, on pointless ventures such as the newly established Diversity Council. It is equally painful to hear that it is considering dropping Early Decision just because Harvard did. Come on, so if Harvard jumps off a cliff, would we do the same? If Harvard plays terrible hockey, does that mean we should too? If Harvard decides to set up racially segregated dorms reminiscent of the old South, does that mean we should… oh, wait…
Why is the Cornell administration so obsessed with racial diversity? It would seem that Cornell is more lacking in other, far more important forms of diversity, notably intellectual and ideological. For some reason, however, our administration gets a rush out of a visually pleasing collection of colors, as if students were nothing but pretty ornaments on a big, campus-wide Christmas tree.
A recent Sun news article about the increase in applications to Cornell this year quoted Doris Davis, associate provost for admissions and enrollment. She expressed excitement that minority applications are up, adding, “This speaks directly to Cornell’s continued efforts to recruit and enroll a racially and ethnically diverse class.” That’s what she got out of the good news? She’s not cheering Cornell’s growing popularity and reputation. She’s just happy that the Cornell administration will get to once again prove to the world that it is not racist.
Ironically, it will prove this by lowering its standards and expectations just for blacks and Hispanics, because they are apparently not capable of competing at the same level as whites and Asians. Hey, I’m just the messenger. They’re the ones suggesting you’re too intellectually weak to make it on your own. “But, but… minorities are at a disadvantage,” some might argue. Say that to the white rural farmer’s son with straight A’s who lost his seat to a black doctor’s daughter with a B average. While a convincing argument could be made for the necessity of affirmative action based on socio-economic background, let me assure you, the merits of racial preferences expired long ago.
George Mason is the nation’s fastest rising law school in the USNWR rankings because of its focus on professional and academic excellence and its respect for intellectual diversity. Race relations on campus are infinitely smoother than they ever were in my years at Cornell, largely because both students and the administration here treat people of all colors like human beings — not like PowerPoint presentations.
Cornell is a fantastic institution with incredible academic and extracurricular resources. Portraying it as such, and not as a sociological experiment, would take it far in the rankings and in the eyes of the public worldwide. Please change, my dear Cornell. For as much as I miss your insanity, I would very much rather just miss you.