The Foreign Service Journal, June 2015

74 JUNE 2015 | THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL EDUCATION SUPPLEMENT The metrics used by U.S. News in determining a college’s worth are also largely subjective, and Bruni is quick and forceful in dismissing them. An additional factor is an increase in the number of foreign students applying to U.S. universities. The overwhelming majority of American college admissions offices are not need-blind when consid- ering foreign student applications. In other words, if a student from another country can pay full tuition, he’s a very competitive applicant. A Controversial View In addition to explaining the mecha- nisms behind college admissions frenzy, Bruni interviews several luminaries, including former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, an alumna of the University of Denver. She intended to become a concert pianist, but ended up taking an international affairs course that changed her life and provided her with a fine mentor in Professor Josef Korbel. (In an interesting coincidence, Korbel was Secretary of State Madeleine Albright’s father.) The book gets a bit controversial in its examination of the character of today’s elite students. Bruni interviews plenty of past and present Ivy League professors and administrators who describe their students with phrases like “self-satisfied,” “too linear in their thinking” and “a little fragile.” They point out that students who have checked all the right boxes to get into a prestigious school tend to believe that by following When U.S. News & World Report started its college rankings in the early 1990s, it struck gold, and fueled a system which colleges try to “game.”