"In the early 1950s, Griswold [Yale President] zestfully attacked mass education, castigating the
public schools as the 'rotten pilings' of the American educational system. He
argued that the reason liberal arts colleges and preparatory schools [Andover, Exeter, Lawrenceville, Hotchkiss, and St. Paul’s] enrolled
predominantly white Anglo-Saxon Protestants was that immigrants to this country
and their descendants, 'through lack of previous opportunity. failed to
comprehend liberal education and therefore failed to support it.' African
Americans were equally 'beyond the pale, so to speak, of the liberal arts.'”
"Even a seemingly innocuous aspect of the admissions process, considering the
physical characteristics of the applicant, was part of a larger preference for
the average, "all-around" boy who fit the traditional 'Yale type.'"
-- Birth of a New Institution, Yale Alumni Magazine
http://archives.yalealumnimagazine.com/issues/99_12/admissions.html
In the late 1960s under President King Brewster Yale began a concerted effort to change its admission process and student demographics. Was Father Brooks part of movement or a leader? Yale's efforts were focused more on bringing bright public school students who were Jewish and Catholic into the fold. Brooks of Holy Cross was a leader who focused on inclusion of African Americans (in fact Brooks, SJ, was acting in response to Pedro Arrupe, 28th Superior General of the Society of Jesus).
But even in 1970 when a very bright classmate of mine was turned down by Yale Medical School, Holy Cross was told it was because the student wasn't Yale's type of person. He was an Italian American and had nothing in common with Robert Redford or Indiana Jones. My friend wowed them at Dartmouth Medical School (a two year program) and finished up at Harvard Medical School.
By the way the expression "beyond the pale" used above refers to parts of Ireland (An Phail Shasanach) not under control of the Anglo-Saxon English (Shasanach) in the late Middle Ages.
