Letters of recommendation have aggravated me for more than 20 years. Today, as the spring admissions season draws to a close, I break my silence. Having been on every side of the LOR equation — requesting them, reading them, writing them, regarding them and disregarding them — I now call for an end to them. Not just at academic institutions, but at every institution that has historically discriminated against applicants on any basis besides merit. Shameless tributes to America’s longstanding commitment to inequity, letters of recommendation belong in the dustbin of history.
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Being Iranian American is like being the child of divorced parents who refuse get along, not even for the kids. Growing up as one of these embattled children, conflict embedded in my DNA, I’ve never known a moment when my two homelands have been anything short of archenemies. Thus, what most of the world experiences as an external, geopolitical conflict, I and my fellow Iranian Americans experience as an internal, deeply personal one. These are our parents you’re talking about, and we love them both, even when we hate them.
Read MoreNBC Think: Celebrating the Fourth of July as an Iranian-American patriot — who's never felt so hated →
Considering its habit of staging coups and its criminal response to the immigration crisis, you might think I'd have lost faith in America. Here's why I haven't.
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