'BETTER LIBERAL EDUCATION': JFK's entrance essay to Harvard goes viral

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A short essay former U.S. President John F. Kennedy wrote as a 17-year-old applying to Harvard is being mocked by some after making the rounds on social media this week.

It was written April 23, 1935 and is housed at the John F. Kennedy Presidential Museum and Library. In it, JFK answers the question: “Why do you wish to come to Harvard?”

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“The reasons that I have for wishing to go to Harvard are several,” he wrote. “I feel that Harvard can give me a better background and a better liberal education than any other university.”

“I have always wanted to go there, as I have felt that it is not just another college, but is a university with something definite to offer,” Kennedy added. “Then too, I would like to go to the same college as my father. To be a ‘Harvard man’ is an enviable distinction, and one that I sincerely hope I shall attain.”

One Twitter user compared JFK’s application to Harvard with the one he submitted to Princeton.

“When ‘do you know who my father is’ plays out in real life. And JFK’s Princeton application essay was basically the same.”

The official Velveeta Twitter account also jumped at the chance to give JFK the gears.

“LOL our product description from our website is 28 words longer than JFK’s Harvard College essay,” the spreadable cheese product exclaimed.

Chester Scoville, associate professor at the University of Toronto Mississauga’s Department of English & Drama, pointed out how ridiculously easy university entrance applications were in the 1930s.

“Academic standards of all sorts are *much much much* higher now than they used to be, and it’s kind of a scandal what past generations got away with.”