To the Editor:Re “Legacy Admissions Don’t Work the Way You Think They Do,” by Shamus Khan (Opinion guest essay, nytimes.com, July 7):The convoluted justification for legacy admissions presented by Dr. Khan, a Princeton professor, is both insulting and patronizing to us not born into privilege — i.e., “poor students, students of color, and students whose parents didn’t have a college degree.”Per Dr. Khan, we receive a boost from attending elite schools because they connect us to students born into privilege and acculturate us “in the conventions and etiquette of high-status settings.”Wrong. We benefit from admission to elite schools because it signals our accomplishment and our merits to employers — a signaling we need in the job market because we lack the connections that legacy kids have. However, the benefit we receive has absolutely nothing to do with picking up “shared literary references” and the “right” sport. If indeed acculturation in these “conventions and etiquette” is a byproduct of legacy admissions, then that is even more reason to end the practice. Perpetuation of cultural traits of privilege is repellent and not the place of any university, including an elite one.

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Persons: Shamus Khan, Dr, Khan, didn’t, ”, “ Locations: Princeton