tonight on booktv, sarah javy provides a look at the work that some work should be done -- charles koch and the koch foundation president offer their thoughts on how to tackle economic and social challenges in u.s. and awe broad. judge ed raykoff talks about the u.s. legal system and how to reform it and federal new york federal reserve chair weighs in on how to build economic sustainability for workers, tonight at 6:55 p.m. eastern. visit booktv.org or con suggest your program guide for more information. giant welcome to tower virtual presentation of "guilty admission and who getness and why." we're here today with authors

nicole la port and jeff -- this involves audience qbe a and ask the ask a question feature and vote for any questions you would like for our speakers to answer and they'll make their way to the top of the list. please consider supporting our book store by purchasing a copy of any of the featured books. just click on the green purchase button directly below the viewer screen and it will take you to our website. volvoman is the oldest informant book store. 126 years old and we appreciate any kind of support that you can give us tonight. and with that said let me briefly introduce our guests and then gets the event started. nicole la port is an l.a. based serb rite are for fast company. she previously was a columnist for "the new york times" and a staff writer for news week, the daily beast and variety and the author of the men who would be

king, movies, moguls and a company called dreamworks. joining husband is jeff salingo who has reported on higher education for more than two decade. his writing at appeared in the washington post, new york times, atlantic and many more and also the best selling author of there is life after college, and college unbound. with that said, i'm going to turn off my camera. enjoy the talk everybody. >> great. welcome, everybody. i'm coming to you from washington, dc, and which plays a role in the varsity blues scandal. at georgetown university which we will be talking about with nicole. we'll be focus 0ing on both books but lieb into nicole's here because it just came out yesterday. le. >> yeah, yesterday. >> congratulations. >> thank you. >> so nicole, i want to talk about the journey of the book. you started to plan this book within the days of the varsity

blues scandal breaking, and obviously this was like a fascinating story, right? the 20-plus years i have covered higher education i don't remember a higher education story leading the news, being on extra, being on the -- at the supermarket, on us weekly and other things. so many juicy angles to the story but you decided to focus on the book on the l.a. as the epicenter of the scandal. what about l.a. angle of this story made it so interesting for the book? >> well, first of all when i first started, it was maybe a week after the scandal broke so i shamelessly pursued a book deal. but the story is just so sprawling. so many parents involved. over 40. coaches, so many stories with the story. the story of rick singer himself, and i literally kind of put note cards down on the floor that very week and i was just

like i can't -- i don't know -- i can't tackle all of this and knew the book needed to be turned around fairly quickly. so i just knew i had to pare it down and make it manageable and i wanted to bring my unique vision it to because there are other projects in work, poo people jumping on the story i and i didn't know that l.a. was the way i would go in but it came up pretty quickly because i started calling around to talk to parents at high schools in los angeles, and i was trying to get to information but the parent involved in the scandal and i was looking for anyone who knew the parents, who were they, their reputation, what kind of information could i get about them and i can't having phone calls we parents at private schools and i just kept hearing this same thing, and at that point i wasn't getting that much on the actual parents but just was talking to parents high

school kids and there was real disspare and real fear and the sense of i'm doing everything i'm supposed to be doing, i'm paying this money for this wonderful school, and my kid is captain of the soccer team, she has a 4.0 and yet we're being told or getting the sense that my child is not going to be able to go to he school he or she wants to. that was one thing, very surprising. thought you are going to that school, the kid is doing everything right. what is college admissions turned into this? and the other thing that was just a culture of fundraising at the schools and how these kids are admitted to these schools and a week later they're being sent a letter requesting a quote-unquote donation, and that factored into the scandal because rick singer used donations as the veil for what were bribes, and so again i'm talking to parents who are sort of complaining to me about this culture of fundraising and writing checks endlessly and

many of them don't know why. i will do anything to help my kid so if this gets me influence i'll do it it i don't believe in it. so i thought, a., there's interesting subculture that people don't know about that might be interesting to write about and for people to read goutment and, two. i'm hearing the context of the scandal. if you can understand this environment and you can understand what these for the most part very privileged parents are feeling and they're terror they're feeling and the culture as i call it pay to play you get that much closer to understanding thescape and how we got here. >> right. i think that idea of the anxiety of college admissions, talking about that later because that's something i saw in my book in terms of we used -- especially today's parents who probably went to college and the 80s,arm 90s, when it was easier to get into many of these selected schools than today. we think that this is a much

scarcer commodity now, not even a commodity, just a scarcer thing and as a result, we kind of pull out all the stops to get our kids into school and these parents went a little bit above that, in this case. i want to ask you about rick singer. we have heard so much about him and one thing that interests me, when he was in sacramento and then he got into l.a., and you say -- you point out it was the sacramento effect where singer was previously only times ten. one thing that interests me about singer is, in l.a. it seems -- connections matter. get into social circles. hough did he end up infiltrating those circles so that he was so well-known and so deep in all of these private high schools, like it just an interesting character to kind of come from another place and get in to those social

circles. how was he able to get into the circle? >> yes, justing the contact with sacramento because rick started his business in the early 90s in sacramento it and was pure word of mouth and sacramento is different vibe and place and culture, and then early won it was legitimate, wasn't cheating going on, but he would work with the kid and get them in and -- like the old farced wood of mouth and one parent talked to other parent and it grew. so very grassroots and organic and you cut to a. later and southern california, not just los angeles, in 2009, he starts, he comes in at a much higher level. one of the parents involved in the scandal, douglas hodge, the ceo of a financial institution, and through doug, rick was giving his presentations at places like pemco. oppenheimer and got into the

wealth management circle. so if you're not just a wealthy person, wealth manager, probably very wealthy, and you're being invited to oppenheimer or pemco to watch -- here's this guy talking about college admission. so, it just sets a totally different tone. you're not questioning his legitimacy. you're totally buying it. he is coming with the seal of approval. sacramento was -- giving presentations in sacramento at the rec center and the swim club and in l.a. it's hotel belair, and so it was just a completely different entree, and once there were enough of those connections in those circles, then it was word of mouth. >> opens the doors everywhere else. >> right. >> interesting. it was interesting you're talking about parents but when the scandal broke it was often the mothers who were heavily involved in this, and you mentioned in your book kind of

the mother insecurity, and it's interesting to -- i'm a parent as well, and my wife and i talked a lot about this during not only during the scandal but the reporting for my own book because one thing i noticed when i'm out -- as i was reporting the book only colleges and universities and admissions your ear tens to perk enwhen you hear people near you talk us but admissioned. eye be on planes and coffee shops and it was interesting how it was always this mothers discuss thing issueses and worried about their kids. what -- can you explain but how singer kind of played to the mothers' insecurities and instincts to help their children? >> yes. not even specific to this scandal. i have a chapter on preschools and i talked to the head of one preschool here and she said -- one of these schools where the

parents -- some parents show up and say, okay, this preschool leads to this school going to end up at harvard. >> of course. >> of course, that's how it works. but she told me it was always the dads who asked that, or the dads put the emphasis on the school and name brand which show us 'in the scandal. tads are like get this done and get the kid into usc or into harvard or whatever but the moms it's different and the narrative replays itself if you look at the parents in the scandal. one of them is felicity huffman and james buckingham and both those too talked a lot about mother guilt and this term mommy guilt we all know, and they felt that they had been bad mothers. felicity huffman had a whole business, and website about being a bad mom and felt like she had always been working and didn't do enough dropoffs and

pickups and i want there and jane buckingham had the same story, and shower that's a calculus going on that is like, i haven't been there for you as much as i would have liked up until now but i'm going to make it up to you with college. i'm going to get this done. i'm going to compensate. and so -- and woven into this is the sense that they're doing it for their kid. all they want is the best for their kid and since the kid is dying to go to this school i'm going to make it happen. it's much more tied into the sense of a mother who failed and how this is an opportunity to make that right, and i think we're very cognizant of it and with jane, for example, going through a divorce, basically a single mom when that'sing going on he would say you're amazing mom and he knew exactly who was playing and what he was working with. >> by the way, folks are asking questions. please keep those coming.

we'll get to them. closer to the end of the program but we'll try to get to as many as we can so please keep asking them. want to dig deeper into the mechanics of the scandal because it was huge in so many ways but two aspect s told the side door as rick singer called them. one was athletics and one was the testing piece of it. i want to ask you about the athletics piece of it. your book dives into the coaches who enabled this side door scheme at some schools, including georgetown, and these are coaches of kind of lower profile sports, they tend to be anonymous, even at division 1 schools. you describe something like gordy ernst, as the coach at georgetown think put-upon coach largely hid from the public eye and was described as a bit slop

'er, perfect prey for singer. so, they were critical. the coaches were critical to that part of singer's scheme. so how exactly did he find them? it's not like you show up on a college campus, you're rick singer and start saying, well, who are the coaches i can kind of get? so how did he find these coaches? >> well, the thing is he -- rick sicker had been around. start -- rick singer had been around, start in the early 90s and from then on he was at the colleges and one thing i learned -- i learned after the booker wag turn in so may not be in the book but coaches knew him. the water polo coach at usc, his lawyer -- he is fighting the charges but his lawyer said he had known rick forever before it turned into the scandal and illegal doings, rick was at the colleges talking to coaches how to get kids in as recruits, whether it was a walk-on or

scholarship legitimately. so he knew -- another conversation i had post book was someone who was familiar with the athletic department at ucla and he said everybody knew rick. was was this kind of -- very maniacal, aggressive, relentless person who is in people's faces and so i think he had kind -- through this legitimate work he got to know the lay of the land and the personalities and then kind of knew where to press and where -- who was going to give. >> that's interesting. there was still so many people involved. by the way this is -- the great book, really a page-turner in so many ways and one thing i kept wondering, i kept marking the names and just like, wow, you start to realize how wide this scandal was in terms of all the people. so it seems like there's a lot of players in the scheme located all over the country, and it

went on for a pretty long time. so how did it go on for so long with so many partaking 'and doesn't -- obviously eventually falls apart but how did it not fall apart soon center did you wonder when you kept pulling the string? >> especially in these tight knit communities where everybody is talking. but someone said something i think sort of says it best we took answer the question, which is it was a hub and spoke conspiracy. he is at the center, rick singer is the hub and all -- many, many, many spokes but they're not all connected. so, coach i talked to -- you have to understand when rick talks to most of these people, it's all in his veiled language. never saying, it's a bribe. never -- football, when he spoke with john van van den more at stanford the word bribe was never used, wink-wink thing

going on. and coach had no knowledge of any other coaches. some coaches did -- if you look at the fact outside can see but i think -- then rick's operation itself wasser lean. there was an accountant but he was this lone guy running -- wasn't a huge organization he was running. so i think that and -- yeah, then the parents just knew what was on the line. >> there were a group that a little suspicious. i the high school counselors. one in of my favorite scenes in the book where it is felicity huffman's daughter rites when the go to the -- >> lori loughlin. he goes to school, to confront essentially petron, the high

school counselor, who was very skeptical and suspicious of singer and the students who used him because it was actually pretty well -- seems to me a little widespread in the school and the students ignored the school when it came to college counseling. you described a class they have and the students are not really paying attention to the counselors and things like that. so what about the culture not only at mary mount but other high schools that stopped counselors from pursuing this. i get the sense it's because of the money and power of the parents or is it that most of the parents were using independent counselors and the school counselors just don't have time to police them all? was it more about the money or the power, the independent counselors? what was happening that these -- clearly there was some suspicious on the high school counselor's part. >> i think it's both those things. you i'm sure know as much, if

not more than i do but there's this strange dance between independent college counselors who are hired outside the school and the counselors in the school, and no one wants to acknowledge each other, and the schools -- based on the director -- the head of schools i talked to, they don't -- stopped short of saying you can't hire these people because parents are their clients, paying money and you account tell them not to but they will remind them how great their counselors are and know the kids and have been with them for years. but i do think there's a power play not just at marymount whether at the parents their cline. maxima was a big door donor and giving a lot of money to marymount and if he comes in and -- i think it has arizona for the counselors to say you're

lying and that's seems actually something because petron placed perfectly from a legal sense and took notes because there's great details but very careful what he says. he knows the daughters are not -- the older daughter and the olivia are not rowers but he can't say you're lying i don't believe you. so he simply says, i will relay what you're telling me to usc. i'm just going to be the conduit here and i do think it's a power play and i had conversations with administrators and form are administrators and it's a little bit -- the parents -- a lot of parents treat this like a concierge service and the schools play into it to some degree. >> it's a fascinating thing and the details are incredible. >> that's all public. it wag totally public. >> i want to ask about usc in particular.

usc played a big role there and i've been amazed at the lengs people will good into to get into usc because i actually feature, number my book as well usc in my book as well and a section how schools like it, regional schools and then actually usc saw a huge dropoff in applications is a describe in my book after the '92 l.a. riots but it was clear that usc was the fundraising machine. and they had all of these people on their radar. it makes me wonder, couldn't some of these parents just write a huge check to usc to get in? >> yeah. you would think so. and maximo who didn't actually graduate from usc. >> he had a flag, usc flag flying. >> right. loved the school and was part of the fraternity when at the took some classes but wasn't enrolled help was approached by the

development office, in the court documents they're saying can we set up a tour? we know your daughter is about to apply for college, we rod love to help you me and dismisses them. i've got this going on with singer. that speaks to the power of singer and the influence of singer to convince people, very powerful, wealthy people, that it wasn't -- that nothing was enough. you don't have enough. it's going to cost you 50 million to donate a library wing of whatever to usc and i'll charge you 500 grand, so other lot of manipulation just like psychologically. >> it's interesting. that's the thing i saw in my book in reporting who gets in and why are around the idea of scarcity, in particular. so i want to -- before we transition into my book and audience questions. i want to end on this idea of

prestige and scarcity. the scandal is predicated on the idea it was about get into a certain set of schools and really gets into this idea that it matters where you go to college, even if you come from money and fame. so does it? do you feel like that -- everybody thought that even though they had all the privilege in the world to give their kid want they wanted, including by the way no matter where the went to college they could get them jobs and everything else, but yet where they went to school really mattered to them. does that name on the book sticker of the car real where matter as much also we think it does? >> i think a lot in our cultural tell -- culture tells us it does. whether ate bummer sticker or sweatshirts, and college sweat shirt day for seniors seniors ai someone told enemy they're daughter was he embarrassed and

there's a lot that speaks to it but i think there's a shift happening and also comes down to what you offer or investment banks. we all know what schools they're going to tap into first but i think that said there's a lot changing. i think as the people become more educated about the -- all these different types of schools, a lot more books being written, your book, and i think it's in the last year with all the social unrest, i think even that is affecting things. this desire in the culture to shake things up and not just adhere to this kind of hierarchy that we subscribe to. and it was interesting, write for fast company and i did a story on lebron james -- i interviewed his ceo, maverick carter, being doing this a long time and the company does very well and he said i don't want to

have a meeting with my executives or employees and feel like everyone went to the same four schools on the east coast. will never get an original idea out of that meeting. i think shifts like that -- happens at the business level and these other industries that then filter down to parents but there's a shift. >> also has to happen i think with you get real data on it. it's interesting. i was doing the last book, there was life after college, spent time with the hiring people at credit swift and they found was they captain losing high-end graduates, maybe after a year or two they would go on and go work for a hedge fund or something else. they brought in a person from mckinzie around people analytics, their first chief analytics officer which companies are doing now, to get into the data of how they hire and who really survives and

thrives at these firms and al i describe the last book there were 30 elements of the people at credit swift who survived and thrived and one of the things they noticed was that it didn't actually matter where you went to school as much as they thought. gpa didn't matter as much as they thoughtful though thought we only can hire in people in quantitative majors. didn't matter as much. leadership didn't mother as much if it was elective, earned leadership, that mattered a lot. music majors mattered a lot. what credit swift did after this and there's a lot of stuff they wouldn't tell me and how they did the analysis but they restructured their college recruiting calendar and where they recruited. somebody in the comments mentioned, wall street, certain big law firms only recruit in certain places and that was credit swift.

what was interesting is they broadened the number of places to recruit and who did the recruiting, people who graduated from the selective schools. so what they found then is that somebody who went to harvard would go into another school, unnamed, and they would say, well, they would trust the applicants and judge them hasher and harder and those applicants would never get over the bar to get in. so there was the kind of the analytics piece of chit said broaden it and then the people piece said they went to do the interview that couldn't get in. so i get why parents think about this. but i think we have to remember also is that every year you have millions of college graduates, 60,000 of them. maybe graduate from the most selective schools in the country. so we have more than 60,000 good jobs. is it much harder to get into wall street firms? no doubt and if that's you're

definition of success you probably should go to these highly selective schools but one of the thing is i trace back in my book is the kind of the history of how we got to where we are with these selective schools. i mentioned in the book -- i don't have it in front of -- i interned at "u.s. news & world report." working on college ranges, and when the editor of the college rankings passed away his widow gave me all the rankings back to the late 80s, and i picked up the 1990 or '91 edition. right robbed the time i was looking for colleges. when you look at the acceptance rate of colleges, the time parents on here went or just graduated. it instance like -- you've thick there's typos because, for example, penn, the university of pennsylvania in 1990 accepted 42% of students.

almost half. wash u, 62%. and now both of those are under 10, under 15, under 10 most cases? why? because most of these places nationalized in a way i described in the book this is usc and northeastern did. they nationalized their recruiting in a way that they hadn't been and internationalized it. the other thing is that the concept of distance changed. so somebody on the east coast going to usc, even as late as the 1980s seemed far away. you didn't have devices like this where students could text you or your kids could text you all the time. i remember when we sister went to college she had 0 go down the hall, cull us on pay phone after 10:00 at night when the rates win down. concept of distance then started to change and people -- you started to get the best students from boston and buffalo and

miami. now starting to apply to the same set of ten schools. then you add on top of that the common app and online applications and now suddenly with the press of a button, except for georgetown because they're not part of the common yeah. you could apply to ten or 12 schools. so much easier than when i applied and had to type out multiple applications. ... i remember when i applied in the early 90s all about being well-rounded.

you're pretty decent student used volunteers are good to go pretty much. and now, people's getting back to but it's on but the parents who were so frustrated and confused. does my child has a perfectly branded at age 15? that is such an insane and unfair thoughts. something happened on the college side of this with a silly looking at the class was sort of a roll rounded class as opposed to the student peers. their look at the context of the class but one thing her mind applicants as admissions is nothing to do with you. it has everything to do with the priorities of college. haner given your might want more from south dakota they buy what more to excel able to try to build up their engineering program. they went more to excel in stem field. they might have more narrow ideas.

obviously focus a lot on athletics in the book. the same thing i saw so often in the year i was embedded was a three institution were athletics even a highly selective urban university in atlanta and not division i. but they still have all of these teams to fill part i remember sitting in one instance the admissions officers about the applicant but the coach really wants to fill that seat. all of these priorities coming together you as the applicant unless you fill that particular priority they need, you know to be honest with the other 20 others just like you. it has to match what they want. and that's the problem. you might think i have the perfect took why my not getting in? it's not just me they want

more of. >> what i liked about the book but still a positive book. we have this access. were there for your showing files what i took away for your book was talk about sugar not many parents here tonight who are like why should you not be tearing your hair out and why should you not lose hope. >> first of all i started reporting this book before varsity blues. it would've been very interesting, varsity blues broke the heirs inside the office is at the end of the cycle. be very interesting to visit following you in your approach

whether they would have done it. here is why i give hope. first vote when you you talk about selective colleges, selective colleges is under half of the students and apply. there's only about 200 of them in the country but there are 200 of them there's not ten, the stop five does not 15. really i'm encouraging parents to do is there's much less of a difference between number 20 and number 40 in summer ranking. of how we tend to think of ten, 12, 15 schools. it is very possible that have an 8% acceptance rates. 25% acceptance rates which is still good to thou the institutions out there. i know this after covering

colleges for more than 20 years and looking at the employer's side is a lot of it matters what to do and you are there for you could get into harvard into absolutely nothing. it a harvard degree will maybe open doors for you. sonic when the necessary push you through everything in life prints what you do in college that matters i think a lot more in some cases than where you go. >> i think what i also wish it by book focuses on a different class of people schools with not a lot of resources as the guidance counselor babies not totally up to speed they were the movers they were the drivers there done applying

for these other kids thought even donning on them to apply to colleges he rose how the divide that is will the facts early decision has become perhaps the biggest hair pulling out factor in all of this. nicole i think that plays in a really good question. >> why don't we move to that. something would both recognize. doing change one thing about admissions to make it more fair with that one thing be? i'm going to answer first because it plays right into the question you were answered alternate to you.

so early decision was always a tool for those students who really knew her they wanted to go. they wanted to be done. what they did starting in about 2008, during the great recession not quite sure will be able to fill a class but let's walk in many students as we can. in that year end that one particular year with point this out in the book maybe they accepted before that 2020 for percent of the class early. that one year he went up to almost 50 part a mishap the class was coming in early they wanted to lock them in early. after that they never went back down. so suddenly students and parent got really savage at this and said to get into these places that apply early. so what happened? market surge apply early preakness surge look at the statistics. it was so interesting the year i was inside the process

interviewing students at these highly selective high schools, private and public really good high schools. in october they would say i am applying somewhere earlier just don't know where. and that to me showed the whole process of early decision made it something barb really wanted to go to something i was trying to gain the system. i don't blame them. bruce colleges that would prep them for that if i change anything in wave that magic wand i would get rid of early decision was never going to happen that's what i would do. what would you do? >> it also do a magic wand that's never going to happen. i think the freshman class size needs to be enlarged. i think especially universities with these enormous endowments of like $30 billion are sitting on. these not to make the class is bigger you can fully screw things are trying to do. have a minimal diverse class change at the demographics a

bit. okay bestowing the kids to help offset costs let them into. the scarcity issue there needs to be more and i don't see why not. that would be my wish. >> what should universities do smooth under the questions are got some goodwin spirits of what should universities do to prevent this from happening in the future? some and asked about blind admissions not seeing anything about what the parents do and who the children are. now that you have been through and inside how this happened, and i'm kind of curious in your reporting, did these colleges really kind of change their profits after this or did they put a few things in place that was the end of it? i'm kind of interested in

that. did colleges really change? and more so from a system level, how might you prevent this from happening? >> the changes i saw put in place or most specifically to do with athletics. a lot of schools there now checks and balances there's more fact checking because you have this athletic profile known was fact checking it. no one was trying to make any attempt to confirm the activity. they trusted the coach. that trust basis system is now gone. i think on that level on the a/d level there has been a lot of changes. i think the bigger systemic problem that we are talking about no i don't think so i don't think so at all. >> do think maybe not allowing people to see who people are in the admissions process customer i don't know how that really have prevented because he was having someone take

tests for people right? that would not really help necessarily, right? >> had this conversation with recently this is her idea not mine. you could resume with students. maybe there's not enough people in the admissions office to handle the tens of thousands of applicants and only doesn't admissions officers. you could outsource that to trusted counselors search trusted people in the community just like the university that sort of thing, some way for the university to xtc the student and interact with them for any amount of time is this kid serious, is this kid seemed like the kind of kid who might drive your? or system cuticle look to the side door.

most the time they don't fit open up face others and alumni interview doing it the question i wanted to take on couple people uploaded here. went to submit sat scores to test optional colleges. they telling us the truth having test optional question markets an interesting question. this the question i got a lot my book first came out. before the pandemic more than thousand colleges were test optional there are few very selective that where the universe is chicago's most selected. less selective schools in the 600 plus more selective colleges were test optional. a lot of parents were suspicious last year.

here's what i will say now that we are kind of almost through the entire admissions process for this first pandemic class. and that is this. when i talk to admissions deans at most of the selective colleges, they will tell me they are applications about test scores, test optional run in or between 25 and 50% of applications. even 20 by 5% is a decent amount. they're mostly running around the same. 25% of the class apply or the applicant's test optional. maybe 25% of exceptional's are test optional. i think this is saying to me is yes. when they say test optional they are test optional. here's the problem for it not because i'm working on a paperback edition of my book and i'm trying to figure out come april how are colleges going to tells of the going to

release the numbers? two things what will happen they released numbers their test optional numbers are really high, they accepted a lot of students test optional and they had a lot of applicants test optional but with the going to see next years huge rise in applications. that way too many of them that the process all them. on the other side and didn't except lot of students test optional but had applicants but didn't except that people are going to go back to this question the person asked them this question like you are not really test optional. he tells you are but you're not. i think there's actually an incentive in so many ways for them not to release that number this year. we may not quite know a lot of details from these institutions. stick the whole sat the whole test optional thing sent admissions kind of into crazy with covid bread >> it was i

loved that chapter in your book getting a score can't member what you called it. and this person who essentially flew all over the country to essentially take the test for her not take the test for students they were fill out a fake grid essentially he would copy it over "after words" to fill the right things but when i think that showed is what is so true about the sat, this person name is mark right? >> yes margaret alpert he was a good test taker. >> out of a job now. yes he's out of a job right that's the thing about the sat and the act. they are not really, they don't necessarily test what is in high school all the time. one of the interesting thing,

the director of admissions at georgia tech great stem school , he said that 93% other test optional kids this year had taken calculus or above in high school. the thing about the sat is they don't test a lot of calculus pretty can answer the questions a lot faster and better they had calculus. high achieving students come with great haskell records records is not giving us anything anymore. wickets of the questions here. look at the system limiting the number of schools and incoming freshmen could apply

to, could be a solution. in terms of that. one of the things i wanted to ask you because this topic was in the news so much, what surprised you in reporting the book? what thing did you feel like wow, i did not really realize that in all of the news coverage immediately after the scandal broke. >> i think it's just kind of it's everything were talking about brutus really surprised at the frustration or what college admissions had become. you are someone who covers it and has been for a very long time. and so my last memory was applying to college. there are some similarities of it was considered i don't know kind of hard to get into

college. i did not sail in. i was obsessed i got stake the princeton into the thigh could do without that was amazing. totally gaming the system. in the expansion of this whole independent counselor field all the rules are being rewritten. all of its being rewritten. so i guess that is what i would say praise >> go-ahead. one other thing about talking about it in the sat, how hard you think this will be for colleges? even a lot of them are most of them are preaching holistic admissions it's not about the sat score, especially for these couple schools.

sats are still very valuable and swimming down the numbers, at least for a first pass to be hues in the ballpark here and who is not. i wonder how hard it is going to be to lose that very convenient number to look at, and b, will something replace it that is equally unambiguous i guess? >> i kind of laugh i don't know what can replace it that's not just as controversial. i think it comes down to a test being so controversial. i think there will be pressure on colleges and universities to bring the test back once this is over by faculty in some places. faculty controlled the process at the case of the university of california changes my like three times this past year around testing. the faculty report supported testing originally. the report they went to the regents.

of course there's a lawsuit that really changed a lot. that's going to happen in other places at will. i think faculty will want to go to back to testing their standards that have to be upheld and so the test they can do that i think is coded political pressure outside of the faculty including among lawmakers who cannot but this some sort of standards with the test. in among the private alums will say wait a second i think is very similar to the debate around student loan forgiveness. will i paid it, why should people get forgiveness i had to go through that to get into harvard or whatever. i think there's going to be a lot of pressure just culturally to bring back. i'm going to management to about half of the schools do it. think the other half will say they don't feel that pressure

the more applications that when things like that. i think there will be pressure for some of these other schools to go back but not everyone. >> a new and else? >> i think we are running out here. thus the nyu question in the nicole what you have the last word by thing we did not talk about tonight. mention readers for essays how did they feel how's it possible they could read one heard a thousand applications for the actually debarment or the giving must these applications two to five minutes most the cases maybe ten minutes was a lot. ember led this is organized in a way that they don't actually see the real application it comes in electronically to them paid someone is recapping the gpa producing the transcript. mostly selective colleges have

commuted based evaluation with f2 readers at the same time. they split the application in half. for the essay in particular they're really steep reading those. so they'll have one person will be reading those while the other persons look at the transcript they will summarize it as they are going. for most of the essays they are mind numbingly similar. that's one place by the way i think students really could focus on and focus less on trying to write an essay they think the other person on the side of the desk wants to read. and more that gives them a sense of who they are, much more authentic. most of these essays are not that authentic. he read something an essay book about what they should write about orson essay coach or independent counselor should tell them what they should write about that and that been the essay is just really not from their perspective. i just finished the book last week loved it's a page

turner. so nicole, anything given talks about that you want to make sure? >> i have it right here. >> think i will and by ask you something with these solutions you are are not getting out the problem with attending one school purred one conversation i had for this conflict came up by what's feeding the obsession is the ranking. yes and world report. your kind inside that as well. these rankings make money doesn't exist i was still

students and parents that ranking is a ranking with their measuring but nobody ever looks at them as the u.s. and world report ranking. 20% of the methodology. 20% of the final ranking is based on a survey of college presidents. if you as a parent think this is what another college president thanks of the school, if you think that's important put a lot of stock into the u.s. news world report right now. what percentage of classes are under 20 student summer good. so they gain the ranking they try to make all of under 20 just look better in that peace of the ranking. i think that's really critically important. any other final thoughts to me for signoff? >> now i think you need to read both of our books to see the frustration on one hand

and feel that there is hope. >> thank you so much. >> thank you so much, nicole and jeffrey though such an insightful talk. thank you for those who had thoughtful questions and participate in the chat. glancing at the discussion we had in the chat it has been fascinating so thank you for everyone who tuned in tonight. again, to support roman's bookstore please consider purchasing a copy of tonight's featured book. click on the green purchase button directly below the viewer screen i'll take it to our website where you can complete your purchase. also a replay of this talk will be available after the broadcast ends. if you tuned in later have a friend who is unable to make it tonight, just send them the leak to the stream and they can rewatch it. i think that about covers it. thank you everyone again and stay safe everyone. >> your watching book tv on

cspan2. by america's cable television covered today were brought to by these television companies who provide book tv for viewers as a public service. >> some programs look out for this weekend on book tv. tomorrow at noon eastern player live with best-selling author and new york staff writer elizabeth kolbert virtual discuss environmental issues including global warming and the impact that humans are having on the earth. and answer your questions. call enduring the programmer sent us your questions via e-mail or social media @booktv on twitter, facebook or instagram. tonight ceo and chairman charles cote and charles cook foundation president bryan hook offer their thoughts on how to tackle economic and social challenges in the u.s. and abroad.

new york chair sarah horwich on how to build economic sustainability for workers in the future. mindful schedule information online @booktv.org. consult your program guide. during the recent program u.s. court of appeals judge for the sixth circuit jeffrey sutton here he talks about the late justice is writing an influence. >> i decided i wanted to worker justice scalia. if know my past and background in my family that would not of been your first guess. so why is it that in 1991 i wanted to work for justice glia? this is the thing i think most law students can understand. reading judicial opinions i have to admit as a judge myself and author of them it's usually not a lot of fun. i think this is where a lot of lawyers acquire the habit of drinking more coffee than is good for them. these are not charles dickens

novels. if caffeine is what gets you through. how refreshing when you are doing this to come across a justice scalia majority opinion dissent or concurrence. they stood out for the liveliness and writing this the honesty the request of the good quest for truth fricative carried yes whether justice scalia was a text was the purpose of this a living constitutionalist or originalist. one was get to know him seemed like a lot of fun. i really wanted to learn to write like him. of course it's unrealistic but so be it try to learn to write as well as close to him as you could. that is how i got to know him. that's why i started working with him. and then of course it was really easy-to-follow under his influence his passion for getting his dedication to finding the right answer, making sure you're being honest about was going on in

the case, not being afraid to second-guess yourself. to involve an occasion in his passion for the writing. there is no way you could finish a year with him and not want to be a better writer. so much of becoming a better writer is about wanting to be a better writer. you just could not come out of that experience without it. since 1992 it's been almost 30 years. that year end many times since he would do something i would hear him say something we talk about a case and i'd have this reaction, justice glia that cannot be right. he would sit so forcefully which i suppose i'm a little contrary in to have anyone say think forcefully makes me want to push back. i cannot play the numbs of tom's that happened. and then as i thought about it, sometimes even a couple years would go by how to go, it's a really good point, that's a really good point. so now in writing the introduction to this book, it was not hard for me to it

embrace textualism and individualism. i think it is right. think it's the only answer to avoid displaying the federal courts. i think he has been right all along. but i think going back to the point, why this influence? i think it has something to do with the power of his ideas and the remarkable capacity to express them so well. i thought of bad things to know if you know how to express them you might have some influence. : : overview of webinars, the chat is closed this evening