“Set up standards of achievement open to all, to the least, to the most inept — and you stop the impetus to effort in men, great or small.” So argues Ellsworth Toohey, the villain of Ayn Rand’s Fountainhead. In an impassioned speech about his quest for power, Toohey reveals the goals of his socialist policies: elevate the mediocre and destroy the successful.
Efforts to remove merit-based admissions and advanced courses from all levels of the U.S. education system are just what Toohey had in mind.
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Initiatives attacking merit and achievement are gaining momentum across the country. Last month, for example, the American Bar Association eliminated the requirement for law schools to factor in an applicant’s LSAT score during the admissions process. The California State University system removed ACT and SAT test requirements from admissions criteria at its 23 campuses in March. Rhode Island, New York City, and even Virginia have seen efforts to cancel honors courses or eliminate advanced tracks for high-achieving students at the K-12 level — all in the name of “equity.”
In response to the ABA’s decision to remove the LSAT requirement, 60 law school deans expressed their concerns and opposition to the initiative in a September letter. They correctly recognized that removing merit from the application, evaluations, and coursework in America’s schools is foolish and will result in more subjective admissions standards. Without an objective metric, a GPA or a test score being two examples, the ability to compete on a level playing field is ceded, and power is handed over to people like the fictional Toohey and those who think like him.
In Rand’s story, Howard Roark is a talented architect. His counterpart, Peter Keating, is an incompetent son of wealthy parents. Keating fails in nearly everything he attempts but is vaulted forward by those in power, including Toohey. “Laugh at Roark and hold Peter Keating as a great architect,” Toohey muses, “you’ve destroyed architecture. … Don’t set out to raze all shrines — you’ll frighten men. Enshrine mediocrity — and the shrines are razed.”
The world Toohey wants is “a world of obedience and of unity.” By placing Roark and Keating on equal footing regardless of their talent or achievements, Toohey consolidates power for himself, a newspaper critic.
Power in education should remain in the hands of the students and their parents. This is achieved with unbiased, measurable criteria, evaluations, and opportunities open to all who meet the standard. Students who make the grade, pass the test, or achieve the right score can succeed and advance. Replace this merit-based system with subjective analysis and the consequence will be an elevation of mediocrity and, worse, a loss of agency for students.
The threat this poses to our nation goes beyond the education system. Removing the expectation of or reward for rigor in education not only teaches students that merit has no place in society but has also been shown to result in lower-quality outcomes. Virginia saw this firsthand: The state moved in 2014 to reduce the number of standardized tests, and by 2022, in a state that previously ranked above the national average, students had fallen behind significantly.
The health and prosperity of the nation rely on a system in which merit is valued. Hard work and talent are essential to the arguments for freedom and individual liberty. Students should be encouraged to achieve and given the necessary opportunities for advanced learning. Testing provides the necessary objective metrics to evaluate performance and promote the most talented. If states, institutions, and school boards deprive students of this, the nation will suffer.
Unfortunately, Toohey would be proud of the ABA. And Rand would be terrified.
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Garrett Exner is the executive director of the Public Interest Fellowship in Washington, D.C. He previously served as a staffer to Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX), as a counterterrorism policy adviser in the Office of the Secretary of Defense, and as a special operations officer in the Marine Corps with deployments to Iraq, North Africa, East Africa, and the South Pacific.
