What the College Cheating Scandal says about talent--and Canada

"The problem with McGill is that it only looks at your grades." I'll never forget that comment from a woman I met a few years ago. She was waiting to hear back on her college applications and, upon learning that I had helped launch Maclean's annual ranking of Canadian universities, asked me why colleges north of the border don't consider nonacademic factors for admission. [Many do, especially for specialized programs, but your marks matter most.] "I'd like to go to McGill or Oxford," she said, "but I'll probably go to Harvard because both my parents went there." I was blown away by both the notion that McGill might actually be tougher for someone like her and by her sense of entitlement as a legacy candidate.

I don't know if she got into McGill but I later learned through social media that she did indeed go to Harvard. Our conversation came back to me when I was reading about the latest college cheating scandal in which wealthy parents colluded to bribe coaches and fake test scores to get their kids into prestigious schools. The audacity of it is outrageous, but schools that give a leg up to candidates whose parents are alumni or major donors have already debunked any claim to being a meritocracy.

I don't think academic performance alone is any indication of future success. In fact, you could argue that the behaviors that produce great marks in school -- following the rules, memorizing stats, pleasing teachers -- aren't what you need to stand out from the pack later in life. That said, academic performance is at least a more reliable indication of readiness for college than your family name or ability to play water polo.

U.S schools seem to take so much pride in how many students they turn away every year. What if they actually took pride in how many students they accepted, and how many lives they could transform? What if they were less worried about annoying alumni than missing out on a chance to find new pools of talent and shape the next generation of leaders? While the colleges in this criminal case were allegedly duped into admitting students who weren't worthy, they have to deal with the embarrassing public reminder that the system isn't fair. Maybe this will prompt them to take a closer look at how they incentivize parents to game the system.