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American Morning
The Big Question: Why Are Some U.S. Colleges Recruiting Jewish Students?
Aired April 30, 2002 - 08:40 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: The big question this hour, why are some U.S. colleges recruiting Jewish students? Well, some schools are doing a hard sell on Jewish seniors, in part based on their grades and SAT scores. Well, the chancellor of Vanderbilt University is clear why he is recruiting Jewish students.
Gee says, "Jewish students by culture and by ability and by the very nature of their liveliness, make a university a much more habitable place in terms of intellectual life."
Our own Martin Savidge went to school to see how Jewish students are reacting.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
MARTIN SAVIDGE, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): At the new Atlanta Jewish community high school, the big question plaguing seniors isn't if they'll go to college, but which college they'll go to. And the students say they've got no shortage of choices.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I know I've received a lot of mail.
SAVIDGE: These days, Jewish teens are some of the prized recruits. And kids admit the whole thing doesn't taste exactly kosher.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It's a good feeling if you're Jewish, to have them think that about you, but it may not necessarily be true.
SAVIDGE: Vanderbilt University, Nashville, Tennessee, the buckle of the Bible Belt, where they're putting the finishing touches on a multimillion-dollar Jewish center, complete with a temple and kosher cafe, and trying their best to bury the ghosts of prejudice and quotas.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They're saying, we want you to apply, we want you to want to go here, and that's I think the message you should get from what we're doing around the Jewish students and every other student.
SAVIDGE: But some suggest the push for Vanderbilt for more Jews on campus has less to do with diversity and more to do with college rankings and rivalry. With statistics showing Jewish students regularly scoring high on entrance exams, university officials are betting they'll pump up the school's academic stature.
Vanderbilt isn't the only university building up, some might say buttering up, to Jewish students. So are other colleges. And with good reason. They look at such notable schools like Emory, and Washington University, where 30 percent of the students are Jewish. Both schools are ranked higher academically than Vanderbilt, according to published surveys.
Back in Atlanta, a hard sell has Jewish students wondering, are they wanted for their diversity or just their test scores?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: If statistics show that people with brown eyes have higher scores and they recruited them, you know, it's just the same. Whatever the statistics show, they go by it.
SAVIDGE: Martin Savidge, CNN Atlanta.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
ZAHN: Joining us now from Nashville is the Vanderbilt chancellor, Gordon Gee. Thank you for being with us, Chancellor.
GORDON GEE, VANDERBILT CHANCELLOR: Good morning, Paula. How are you?
ZAHN: I'm fine, thanks.
So chancellor Gee, no doubt you've heard this criticism that a lot of folks out there saying that your recruitment of Jews has nothing to do with diversity. It has only to do with raising the academic standards of Vanderbilt University, that you want your university to reach Ivy League status.
GEE: Well, first of all, I've been an Ivy League president. I think I have an higher aspiration, which is the world of ideas, and that's what we're about; we're simply about creating a world in which Vanderbilt -- that we have a lot of ideas from different people about recruiting, tall, short, black, white, and from Bismarck and Beijing, and when we took a look at our profile, we discovered that we had some deficits, and so we very clearly targeted, or worked in terms of making those deficits less so. And among those, was the fact we just had not done very well in certain populations.
ZAHN: And what is it that you think Jewish students are going to add to campus life?
GEE: I think what any student adds is the ideas they bring. So we want to make certain we have ideas that are ranging from a variety of folks that have come across this country, and we think Jewish students, among many students that we're recruiting, bring a diversity of viewpoint, and, therefore, make this a more interesting, and lively and intellectually stimulating place. ZAHN: And the time when you're actively recruiting Jewish students, you say, to make up this deficit you have at Vanderbilt University, you obviously have to deal with a bunch of federal laws that have basically prohibited using racial prejudices in cultural in college admissions. What happens if you get a Jewish student and a Christian student with almost the identical SAT scores, and academic rankings?
GEE: First of all, that -- we do a whole host of things in terms of reviewing students, so we have a series of things we take a look at -- their essays, the things they've done in high school, a variety of other things. And frankly, we'd probably admit both of them. We just don't view that as an issue in our institution.
ZAHN: Mr. Gee, if you could hold that thought.
(INTERRUPTED BY BREAKING NEWS)
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