<p>Jazzymom, without a doubt the hidden and open agendas at play in the "admissions revolution" are two sides of the same coin. In this post-affirmative action world that we now live in a debate of these issues do - and should - open Pandora's box. In any case, I don't think that educators such as William G. Bowen have ever argued against using the SAT as a critical yardstick in the admissions process. In fact, he argues cogently in favor of this standardized test as a measure that correlates "neatly with students' eventual class ranks" regardless of the students' ethnic or cultural background. Students should be offered admission to college on the basis of ability and merit first in mind.</p>
<p>That said, it should not be construed to mean that American society should give up on affirmative action programs nor the quest for ethnic and racial diversity in higher education. As Epiphany pointed out small ripples are small and have remained relatively small because the odds are weighted so heavily against the SE disadvantaged. This situation certainly demands a high degree of social and educational responsibility on all levels,including primary and secondary teaching. Obviously, all of this places a tremendous burden of responsibility and accountability on those in charge of admissions into highly selective, elite colleges and universities - these institutions want to invest their time and money in students who will succeed, both in terms of graduation rates and in life. They also want those four undergraduate years to be rewarding and eye opening in this increasingly flat world. The admissions revolution has to address the race card just like all the other factors at play - that is what American education is all about.</p>
<p>Believe it or not, the College Board site provides a wealth of information to anyone interested in the controversies and strategies related to affirmative action. In 2004, the CB launched the Access and Diversity Collaborative to "explore issues related to enrollment management and the law".</p>
<p>Jazzymom, I hope you are still out there, somewhere, but I just wanted to thank you for your astute comments on this debate. For me, anyway, you and Epiphany generated a whole passle of other fascinating questions related to the admissions imbroglio. In addition to race, the concept of diversity and holistic admissions also embraces athlete recruitment - and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation is involved in that too.</p>
<p>sorry to butt in - i'm just a kid. an british kid to be precise. and i'm taking a gap year next year. you've been discussing how gap years SHOULD be compulsory/seen as a good thing etc...but in reality is this so? i think i'm using my gap year well and bolstering my CV and stuff like that...do universities in america, in general, have any specific attitude towards gap years before applying? ...especially yale?</p>
<p>The issue of affirmative action and the how diversity plays into the admissions policies of elite and selective universities is called into question. This article asks whether or not affirmative action policies "lower the bar".</p>
<p>While the Insidehighered article addressed affirmative action and the concept of diversity in law school admissions, the basic premise - and fallout of these issues - affects undergradate admissions at colleges and universities throughout the U.S. The landmark Supreme Court ruling of 2003 shifted the paradigms used for admissions so that the criteria adopted to define diversity and affirmative action moved in tandem toward holistic admissions. At the same time, marketing strategies and enrollment managment also work in tandem to attract the largest possible number of applicants to create a "diverse" pool. </p>
<p>While issues connected to race. gender, and ethnicity are no longer inflammatory they are still controversial and the present "admissions revolution" does directly address the correctness of current affirmative action policies as well as the correctness of taking into account individual, special characteristic of students (holistic) when making admissions decisions.<br>
What are colleges looking for in the students they want to recruit? - that's the question - and all of this is part of the answer.</p>
<pre><code>It touches on a very interesting debate over whether elite colleges -- well in this case elite law schools -- are actually not doing URMs any favors by admitting them if their test scores are well below the average for the school. I had read about Sander's research before since he's a UCLA prof and has written op-ed pieces for the L.A. Times. His argument is that it does a disservice to minority students to be taken into elite law schools, where they serve to provide diversity, but where they are behind the eight ball academically and are more likely to fail and drop out than if they had gone to a less competitive second-tier law school. Sanders argues that his research indicates there would be MORE black lawyers graduating and practicing if they had gone to lower tier schools; in other words, if AA hadn't delivered them to the elite law schools instead. I could see how this assertion would be upsetting to a lot of people --- and other academics have refuted his research findings --- but I do think it raises an interesting question.
</code></pre>
<p>I mean, is it fair to say that while someone might be statistically better off going to a lower tier school, that he or she should not even be given the choice of going up against the best of the best in an elite program? And if the schools value what URMs bring to the institution in terms of diversity of viewpoint, insight, personal history, etc., shouldn't they do a lot more to help these students be successful rather than allowing them to sink or swim? </p>
<p>Has anyone done research on undergrad drop outs from elite colleges; how many URM go to the Shangri-La of universities only to feel out of place and overwhelmed and leave? Once they've left, how do they get back on track for any college education? There's not much on this in the MSM and I don't have any anecdotes. But I am thinking of the book The Gatekeepers and the bright but underprepared American Indian student who was admitted to Wesleyan. He does eventually drop out and you can't help wondering if it was culture shock, or the lack of academic preparation compared to his classmates, or what. You wonder what happened to him and whether, if he had gone to college in a less academically challenging place, would he have been stayed and completed his degree.</p>
<p>The dropout rate at elite college for students of all backgrounds is very low. The retention rate for African-Americans at Harvard, for example, is only one percentage point lower than for non-Af-Ams (97% vs. 98%).</p>
<p>There is a joke that it's hard to get admitted into Harvard and harder even to drop out of Harvard. But the situation is very similar at Yale and Princeton. The reasons may be many: careful screening of applicants; good financial and academic support.
On the first, while Af-Ams may have somewhat lower stats than non-Af-Ams, they are considered to be able to handle the work; otherwise they would not be admitted. The debate is more about whether they are being selected over someone else more qualified, rather than over whether or not they are qualified. The case of the American Indian student at Wesleyan was a rather egregious exception to the rule. But it is one anecdote against the statistical data. Retention and graduation rates are included in USN&WR rankings, though not broken down by race and ethnicity.
On the issue of financial aid, the top colleges are the ones able to provide the best aid. Financial considerations are often a key reason why students drop out from colleges.
Finally, on the isse of academic support, top colleges have an array of resources to help struggling students and are also less likely to use grade deflation in introductory courses as a weeding out mechanism to correct their looser admission decisions.</p>
<p>edad, how true! In contrast to Sanders, the article mentions Prof. Richard Lempert who staunchly defends affirmative action - which takes us back to the great debate over the value of GPA, number of AP courses taken, and the meaning of standardized test scores etc. in terms of future academic performance; so dear to the hearts of CC posters. While test scores have to be addressed and, as Marite pointed out, students have to be admitted primarily because they show evidence to be able to do the work, disadvantaged SE and URM students are on paper, well, disadvantaged if a holistic admissions method is not used. According to Lempert "diversity is not a common cultural value in our society" to the point that he asserts most people are indifferent to colleges' and universitites' role in society to provide places of learning that expose students to different experiences, cultures and beliefs.</p>
<p>I just have to ask - has Lempert got it right? Are most people basically indifferent to the importance of cultural diversity? I find it hard to believe that the changing face of affirmative action policy is a non-issue. If it is, then that seems to indicate that most everyone agrees that nothing much is wrong with the way elite and selective colleges handle admissions and financial aid. Does this also mean that the larger the applicant pool the better for the colleges and for us as well?</p>
<p>It seems to me that top schools value diversity more than ever, hence the redoubled efforts to identify low SES applicants and to provide more financial aid by HYPS and other schools.
In our district, diversity continues to be valued as well, but the criterion used is no longer ethnic/racial; it is SES. The results are not very different from before, showing that SES is closely associated with race/ethnicity.</p>
<p>Absolutely, the substitution of Economic AA for race and ethnicity is part of the changing face of AA - and is still part of the on-going debate.</p>
<p>As far as you know, has any story been done about the NYC conference, "College Admissions in the Public Interest," which was previewed in your original post? No one's leaked any conclusions, discussion details, etc.?</p>
<p>Marite: You have hit the nail on the head. Some AA based on socio-economic status may have been in place for years, but it seems pretty obvious from articles cited on this thread that the trend is going to grow wider and deeper. At first, I didn't quite understand why the private, highly selective colleges would feel such a strong moral or ethical need to improve efforts to recruit low SES students, but it's become more clear to me as I realize what a daunting task it is for large private universities to take "life challenges" into account in regard to admissions when they get more than 30,000 or 40,000 applications a year. </p>
<p>I'm one down and one to go. I wonder how this trend, if it does become a sea change, will affect my ability to shoehorn S2 into a "top" college.</p>
<p>Jazzymom, I haven't stumbled onto anything specifically about the meeting in NYC as of yet but will keep looking. :) Individual college websites might also yield interesting info. about all this as time goes by. Btw, since I have "one down and two to go" I'm with you on this one. I figure the more we know about the admissions process the better off we are! </p>
<p>From what I can tell, there is a strong "trickle down" effect in the world of college admissions with the elite and highly selective institutions marking the pace of change and setting the bar for what becomes, at any given time, "established" admissions practices. One thing that this thread has brought home to me is that these practices are reviewed constantly and updated as new research data comes in. Other colleges follow suit and so basically the admissions world is dynamic and fluid. Marite's incisive post is right on - and does hit the nail on the head. Diversity is more important than ever and the holistic model of admissions - and the changing face of AA - used by H and YPS etc. are on the frontline - not just for legal, ethical and moral reasons but also because it is just plain good business.</p>
<p>I just wanted to add to the above, even though most posters on CC seem to have their eye set on top tier/elite schools, the events presently unfolding promise far-reaching effects on all levels, as the sheer number of applications to colleges across the board increases - even if all of this "only" reinforces existing admissions practices. So, isn't debate and controversy essential when it comes down to the wider picture? That includes our (the public's) views on AA and diversity as well as views on early decision, the common app. etc. </p>
<p>Since I just love links, here is another one on the current state of college admissions from the NACAC from May, 2006.</p>
<p>Honestly, I haven't thought this hard about AA and college admission since I was an undergraduate working on our independent newspaper. (We agonized over our editorial stance but finally decided on "for.") Of course a lot has changed in 30 years. </p>
<p>I don't think I would agree that universities, or the students who attend them or the parents who pay for the educations, are indifferent to the value of cultural diversity. I just don't think that it is now something that is linked necessarily to AA. In other words, it seems that colleges and universities have brought diversity to their campuses -- at varying rates of success -- by tapping into the growing pool of international students applying and by taking the academically and athletically talented students of different races, religions, geographic areas, in this country. As Marite pointed out in an earlier post regarding retention rates, at least the top colleges seem to be doing a good job of selecting URM able to meet the academic challenge so they are not applying AA principles to the point where they are admitting underqualified students for the sake of diversity. </p>
<p>But lower socio-economic students, of all races, have a much harder time finding their way into the elite level of unversities. The change in policies that the college officials were discussing in their conference "College Admissions in the Public Interest" (see first post in thread) would serve to somewhat level the playing field between affluent student applicants and poorer student applicants. I have doubts about whether it will do that much to improve racial diversity, though, since I think the majority of people living at the poverty level in the U.S. are white.</p>
<pre><code>The more I think about it, the college officials at this conference may talk about the changes they'd like to see to bring about a more "ethical" admissions process, but that may be as far as it goes. They still have boards of directors and alumni associations to answer to and those groups may not like some of the changes being discussed (such as eliminating ED or dropping the SAT requirement, etc.) Also, there are limits to how many low-income students they would be able to take, even those with the fattest endowments. These colleges would still want to admit a certain number of students whose families can pay full tuition.
</code></pre>
<p>A "revolution" in college admissions? Nah, I don't think I see it happening. But I do think that in all those "Chances, please?" queries, we will see CC parents much more often responding, "well, what's your family income...if it's below (??), then apply to College X,Y,Z and you're in."</p>
<p>This is another great question and, frankly, I am not holding my breath waiting for any magical panacea that will make the admissions game any easier or even less stressful, but since I am in this for a fairly long haul I am interested, in what defines, and then becomes. policies adopted in the name of public interest. I also want to know how colleges and foundations want to respond these burning issues to remedy what is and has gone wrong with the system. "The increasingly competitive and chaotic admissions system" and the pressure on students to get admitted to the "right" college put parents smack in the middle of a process that encourages rampant competition among colleges that, in turn, feeds into a cycle that has become too intense and too frenzied. At the same time, educators are concerned that American education, instead of leveling the playing field encourages social inequality - and that would certainly seem to be true if we wind up, after all this, making the "million dollar" question of admissions related to family income - whether high or low.</p>