These young French women who shine at Harvard

They call it “the H Bomb», like the bombshell they feel like they’re dropping when they say they’re studying at Harvard. This short moment, usually frozen, when the gaze of their interlocutor changes… before he starts talking again but in a suddenly more learned way. Harvard. The word fascinates as it translates both American excellence and the inaccessible elite, but also the large tree-lined lawns, the red brick dormitories and the secret fraternities. Harvard College is the most prestigious university in the world, the one where Bill Gates, Barack Obama and Mark Zuckerberg went. With an admission rate of only 3.2% in 2022, it is also the most selective: out of 61,221 applicants, 1,984 were admitted, 85% of whom were Americans, leaving little room for international profiles. Despite several reminders, the university has not communicated to us the number of French people currently on campus – some years, there are none. Among the few elected, five…