Dating

Checking mates

by Tom Meek

Online dating services are nothing new, but here's one that tries to carve out a niche by putting its nose in the air: Good Genes, which bills itself as "an introduction service for the Ivy League et al."

Which got me wondering: what constitutes the "et al"?

The site, which screens clients on the basis of the college they attended, stipulates that it will accept Ivy Leaguers and "alumni of schools on the same level." Of course Harvard and MIT are on the "acceptable" list. So are Holy Cross and Boston University. But how about another local school -- say, Northeastern?

Nope. According to a Good Genes representative, Northeastern University is not a "high quality" institution, and graduates would not be accepted for membership. When asked how Good Genes distinguishes between a high-quality university and a low-quality one, the representative specified that it is based on the school's admission standards -- namely, SAT scores.

As a former student at both Northeastern and Hobart and William Smith Colleges, I discovered I would be accepted as a Hobart grad but not as a Northeastern grad. It's hard to say why. Barron's college guide lists both schools as "competitive," meaning their academic standards are roughly the same. Princeton Review gives Hobart a "selectivity rating" of 75 to Northeastern's 74. But Good Genes gives Hobart the green light and nixes the Huskies. Could it be because of Hobart's relative affluence and predominantly prep-school-grad population?

Hmm. Despite the strict gatekeeping, a quick look through the site's sample member profiles turns up two males with undergraduate degrees from Northeastern. When I pointed this out to the representative, she quickly responded that they both had law degrees -- and, sure enough, on the list of "acceptable" schools, one of the entries is the generic category "Law Schools."

So what does all this mean? Who knows. There's probably no harm in thinking there's an über-mate out there for every über-scholar. But who'd want to date someone too dumb -- or desperate -- to see through the gimmick?