<p>affirmative action is wrong</p>
<p>Affirmative Action works all the way, I know a girl who got into Columbia University through the HEOP program , which is for people under the poverty lines. She was Hispanic lived in a 5 family home who's income was anything the government provided. She attended one of the worst NYC high schools , which was under review. At the end of her school career she had a 80 average and low SAT scores as you can imagine. She got into Columbia , mainstreamed, and she does not have to pay a cent form her pocket and this includes room and board. I am proud to say that she is getting A's in all her classes in engineering, by the way. Now I pose a question to you is she at par now ? Did she not get the same grades that the other students who were top 2% of thier class? Did she not make it? Why don't you protest the legacies that get into all the Ivy's ? is it okay when a unqualified rich person gets in , but not when a poor hispanic gets in ? if you noticed she had a change in enviroment , was it for the better? YES. If you do not like it , then that is just to bad for you. I am a lot more qualified than her , but if I do not get in , i am not going to say that the one poor underqualified Hispanic took my place. Like I always say to live in America you either have to be poor or rich! Is it unfair? maybe , but If you can't stand it then leave. I am proud for her!</p>
<p>I would suggest that you read the blog by Bryan Nance (Director of Multicultural recuritment at MIT) I got 99 problems....Admissions is not one.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.mitadmissions.org/Nance.shtml%5B/url%5D">http://www.mitadmissions.org/Nance.shtml</a></p>
<p>Take note of numbers 23- 26:</p>
<p>23.Don't rely solely on your 2400 SAT/36 ACT scores to get you into MIT.</p>
<p>24.Don't count yourself out if you have considerable lower scores than those listed above. (Ed. note: ...or if you spell like Bryan does.) </p>
<p>25.DO NOT EVER BELIEVE THAT IF YOU ARE A STUDENT OF COLOR THAT YOU WILL BE ADMITTED SOLELY BECAUSE OF AFFIRMATIVE ACTION. </p>
<p>26.If you are not a student of color don't fall into the trap of thinking you won't be admitted because of Affirmative Action. If you are admitted, it will be because of merit. If not, it wasn't because someone else took your spot.</p>
<p>Conyat: good points in post #18...probably wouldn't hurt to have a few Republicans and military veterans among the students and faculty at elite colleges too.</p>
<p>Dennis: I don't know the lady you're talking about, so I can't speak to her situation specifically. But I was a college instructor for 10 years, and I can tell you that the department chairpersons and administrators are very clever in dropping hints about how they'd prefer the grades in general to turn out. I think you're naive if you think that the same administrators who work so hard to get URMs to enroll take their hands completely off the wheel when it comes to grades and dropout rates.</p>
<p>You don't have to be a URM to apply through HEOP, you just need to meet the HEOP guidelines, and apply.</p>
<p>Nobody gets admitted to MIT (or any other top school) "because" of one factor, nor does anybody get denied from a top school "because" of one factor. These schools practice holistic admissions, and they are looking at an applicant's whole story.</p>
<p>Another great MITBlogs entry on this topic was written by Bryan '07: <a href="http://www.mitadmissions.org/topics/life/the_mit_minority_community/fear_of_flying.shtml%5B/url%5D">http://www.mitadmissions.org/topics/life/the_mit_minority_community/fear_of_flying.shtml</a></p>
<p>Most of the people who apply to top schools are "qualified" -- MIT estimates about 70%, and I've heard Harvard say about 90% of their applicants are "qualified". The people who get in are not necessarily more qualified than others who didn't get in (whatever that means), but they were chosen for their other attributes and what they will contribute to the school's community.</p>
<p>I like the way the MIT admissions officers put it:
[quote]
When we admit a class of students to MIT, it's as if we're choosing a 1,000-person team to climb a very interesting, fairly rugged mountain - together. We obviously want people who have the training, stamina and passion for the climb. At the same time, we want each to add something useful or intriguing to the team, from a wonderful temperament or sense of humor, to compelling personal experiences, to a wide range of individual gifts, talents, interests and achievements. We are emphatically not looking for a batch of identical perfect climbers; we are looking for a richly varied team of capable people who will support, surprise and inspire each other.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>
[quote]
Conyat: good points in post #18...probably wouldn't hurt to have a few Republicans and military veterans among the students and faculty at elite colleges too.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Thanks for the kind words. I am sure the elite colleges have plenty of Republican students. George Bush got into Yale, didn't he? I doubt he can be the only member of the party whose degree came from a selective school. </p>
<p>I don't know how many military vets there are at the elites. I suspect that for many of those who are likely to go to elite schools, the career trajectory is elite U/military academy first, enter as an officer, then go back to school for graduate work. </p>
<p>In my experience as someone who has supervised military reservists, ready reserve, and national guardsmen, I've noticed that it's very hard for an enlisted person to complete his or her education while still having any sort of commitment to the military. (You can be reactivated suddenly for years after an honorable discharge). I had a LANG employee who got activated every semester for two years; each semester it was just late enough that she couldn't get much of her tuition back and had to take a W or failing grade. Unfortunately, universities aren't required to make allowances for this the way employers are; some of the students whose Guard units got activated to help with Katrina ended up failing their classes because their professors wouldn't let them make up the work. </p>
<p>So yeah, a veteran preference would probably be a good idea; maybe those who go on to teach would understand better. Some schools may give a veteran preference for all I know.</p>
<p>Re: Republicans at elites... when I got to MIT, I was as right-wing as they come, and I didn't feel particularly out of place as a student. </p>
<p>It was a wake-up call to come to a very diverse school -- I went from basically an all-white, all-Republican small town in Ohio to being the only white kid on my floor at MIT. I did have a bit of culture shock at first ("Wait, you mean not everybody's Christian? Or Republican?"), but I never felt like anybody disparaged my point of view.</p>