Faculty Book Advises Applicants

How do you get into Harvard?

Good SAT scores, scholastic achievement, legacy status and lots of extracurriculars are the normal answers, but a good first step might be reading a pamphlet the Core Program Office this semester distributed to high schools nationwide.

"Choosing Courses to Prepare for College" is an 11-page booklet addressed to high school students.

The booklet tells them to study English, math, a foreign language and science for four years and to study history for at least two years.

"The response we have gotten in this office has been that people are grateful and supportive," said Marlyn M. Lewis, director of admissions.

"There was some concern that parents would tell schools that they want their children to take this program," she said. "But it doesn't seem to have been a problem."

The pamphlet was the result of discussions over a number of years among the faculty who teach courses in the Core curriculum.

"In the process of discussing what Core faculty thought about their students' background, it seemed only fair to share this information with students," said Susan W. Lewis, director of the Core Program.

"It may help ninth and tenth grade students decide what classes they should take," she said.

Faculty members, including chairs of the Core subcommittees, wrote much of the pamphlet.

The faculty who wrote the pamphlet were not the only ones who thought it necessary, according to Lewis.

"For most of a decade we have had an interest in responding helpfully to the many parents and students who ask us how to prepare for college," Lewis said.

The office of admissions sent some 13,000 booklets out.

Of those, 7,000 went to schools which regularly send students to Harvard and 4,500 were mailed to interviewers.

Lewis said the faculty's recommendation differed in "small ways" from the Admissions Office's current advice to students.

The four years of study of a foreign language and one year of European history that the pamphlet recommends may push some students beyond what they would have otherwise taken, she said.