The problem is, most people probably wouldn't want to see all the true numbers. There will always be someone who thinks the process is unfair. Because all citizens and states pay federal tax, and the academies are paid for mostly by federal taxes, the federal law says that each state must be be equally represented with appointments. Approximately half of the appointments are from senator and representatives slates. The academy is free to choose from the non selectees of these slates, and from other slates, to complete filling the class size they want.
The problem is, an appointee in a state, say South Dakota, may have a lower total score than a non appointee from the state of Florida. But that appointee with the lower score, may have been the highest score on the slate in their state.
Depending on what the makeup of the 50% appointees from the senator and representatives slates look like, the academy may choose accordingly from the national pool to complete the class size. This might mean more woman over men. Or more blacks over white.
But before too many yell that it's not fair that way, stop and think of the alternative. It's been a proven fact, that a more diverse organization is more efficient in productivity and innovation. Not just diversity is race or gender, but also in other backgrounds and experiences. Urban and farms. Rich and poor. Educational levels. Background experiences, adversities, challenges, etc. it's also proven that when the upper management of an organization, the officer corp for our topic, is also diversified and similarly represents the diversity of their subordinates and workers, that the organization is even more efficient and productive. Well, the enlisted corp, these are the subordinates and workers, are extremely diverse. Every background imaginable. So it's logical and efficient to try and make the officer corp as diverse. Imagine out of 1200 appointees, if 95% were men, 5% woman, 97% white, 2% black, and 1% other. And that 93% of the appointments came from 7-8 states that had the most private schools or best opportunities to excel. E.g. 1100 of the 1200 appointments came from Maryland, Virginia, Florida, California, Texas, Colorado, and Connecticut? How would that affect our military.
The academy, and military, have a responsibility to their soldiers, sailors, airmen, marines, etc. as well as to the nation in which its protecting and funding this mission, to be the best and most efficient with what they have. Unfortunately, taking the mathematical best from #1-#1200 is not the best or most efficient. Excellence and innovation comes from thinking outside the box. It comes from challenging your people. It comes from personal development. Having a generic plain vanilla organization where everyone is similar in experiences, background, perspective, and beliefs, is not the most efficient or productive. Even with the military's and academy's diversification of students, they are still able to manage a class where the average gpa is 3.86 and the average ACT is 30. It's better to have the diversification with gpa' covering 3.2 through 4.0 than to have an organization where the gpa average is 3.97, ACT of 34, and very little diversity among the cadets and future leaders.
