Affirmative Action

Applying to College
21

<p>I don't really see how the SATs is biased.... but whatever. I've heard some black people say the SAT is racist and that is possibly the dumbest statement I've heard.
Ever. </p>

<p>Sure... let's say that African Americans suffered more than Asian Americans. That still does not explain why African American students underperform on standardized tests. I mean, an African American student can't say that... "I did badly on the SATs because at one point 100 years ago, one of my ancenstors was a slave..." That really doesn't make any sense. </p>

<p>I agree, AAs have not always had the same opportunities as their white counterparts. However, now they do. And yet they are not performing as well as their white counterparts.</p>

22

<p>Wait wait wait. Those were two different statements. I didn't mean to say that the Asian American vs African American thing had anything to do with SATs. I was talking about Affirmative Action in general.</p>

23

<p>Education is biased (it's definitely not available to everyone at the same standards) and the SAT--for all its promises of just being a 'reasoning test'--is basically a measure of education. People who read a lot do well with vocab questions, etc. But it's impossible to make a test that isn't biased in favor of someone, and the SAT does a good enough job testing ability levels.</p>

24

<p>I was merely posing a question because I had just looked at this website
<a href="http://www.fairtest.org/facts/bias.htm%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.fairtest.org/facts/bias.htm&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>What are SAT scores most closely related to? Family income. </p>

<p>Family Income 1988 SAT (V+M) 1994 SAT (V+M) </p>

<p>Family Income 1996 SAT (V+M)
Over $100,0000 1129</p>

<p>$80,000-$100,000 1085</p>

<p>$70,000-$80,000 1064</p>

<p>$60,000-$70,000 1049</p>

<p>$50,000-$60,000 1034</p>

<p>$40,000-$50,000 1016</p>

<p>$30,000-$40,000 992</p>

<p>$20,000-$30,000 964</p>

<p>$10,000-$20,000 833</p>

<p>under $10,000 873 </p>

<p>ETS On Cultural Bias </p>

<p>In 1970, ETS reacted to charges that their tests were biased by adding one "minority-oriented" reading passage to the SAT. In 1974 ETS was asked in an interview for New York Magazine why they added these new passages: </p>

<p>Q: If the tests weren't culturally biased in the first place, why did you make the change? </p>

<p>ETS: Because minorities feel at ease reading this kind of passage. </p>

<p>Q: If they feel at ease reading this one, does that mean they don't feel at ease reading the six or seven others in the text? </p>

<p>ETS: No. It just means they feel more comfortable with this one. </p>

<p>Q: Well, if they feel more comfortable with this one, does that mean their scores will be higher? </p>

<p>ETS: No, I don't think there will be any difference in "scores." </p>

<p>Q: Well, if there won't be any difference in scores, why would you make the change? Was it just so you could look like you were doing something? </p>

<p>ETS: No, it's because when people are more comfortable, they'll do better on the test. They feel less threatened. (emphasis added). </p>

<p>(from David Owen, None of the Above, Houghton-Mifflin, 1985) </p>

<p>What's Wrong With The SAT? </p>

<p>INACCURACY: For young women, the SAT fails by its own standards. Its only scientific purpose is to predict first-year college grades, yet it regularly underrates the abilities of girls, who earn higher grades than boys in both high school and college but receive lower SAT scores. This happens even when they have the same academic preparation. </p>

<p>MISUSED: According to ETS, the SAT has a margin of error of 65 points and two test-takers' scores must differ by at least 138 points before it's sure that their abilities differ. Yet colleges and agencies such as the National Merit Scholarship Corporation routinely use cut-scores, where even 10 points -- just one question -- can mean the difference between acceptance and rejection. </p>

<p>BIASED CONTEXT: Not surprisingly, research shows that test-takers do better on questions set in familiar situations. So boys tend to do better on questions about sports and people of color performed "unexpectedly well" on a question about Mexican-American families. But there are many more questions set in contexts that are familiar to males and whites than to females and people of color. </p>

<p>BIASED FORMAT: The timed, speeded nature of the test works against young women and members of minority groups. Guessing is also a barrier for females, and possibly for people of color. The forced-choice format does not allow for shades of meaning, working against girls' more complex thinking-style. </p>

<p>COACHABLE: What ETS and the College Board won't tell you is that a good coaching course can raise your score -- if you can afford it -- by 100 points or more. </p>

<p>BIASED LANGUAGE: The SAT contains many words that students might not be familiar with because their backgrounds differ -- in language, culture or otherwise -- from the norm expected by the test. As a result, the SAT does not fairly assess the abilities of these students. </p>

<p>NOT USEFUL IN THE ADMISSIONS PROCESS: Recent research shows that colleges make nearly the same admissions decisions whether they use the SAT or not. The only difference: with the SAT, fewer Blacks and low-income students are admitted.</p>

25

<p>Well, it does make sense...more money = better schools = better education = better test scores. My cousins paid $$$$ to take several SAT courses over the last 2 summers and for private college counseling ...no way I could pay for that...</p>

26

<p>It's not so much a bias in the test as a bias in society in general.</p>

27

<p>Lets stop beating around the bush, students with parents who make a higher income are generally pushed more to do well in school then students with parents who have a lower income. It is just the way it works. Like ive said many times before jude a student on socioeconomic background not race.</p>

28

<p>That is not true all the time. I know many spoiled rich kids who just don't do anything at school because they know they are going to inherit some type of money or business.</p>

<p>I know many hard workins low class people trying to make an education since their parents never had one, which is why they are living so poorly.</p>

29

<p>i kno but generally it works more like that, but not all the time. I kno rich idiots and poor geniuses</p>

30

<p>That site you posted has a lot of invalid statements. I think you should be careful using sites that you look professional nature, but are just filled with b.s. </p>

<p>The timed, speeded nature of the test works against young women and members of minority groups. Guessing is also a barrier for females, and possibly for people of color</p>

<p>---As a "person of color" I have not seen any problems with guessing. I guess the color of my skin has not really influenced my ability to guess. </p>

<p>BIASED LANGUAGE: The SAT contains many words that students might not be familiar with because their backgrounds differ -- in language, culture or otherwise -- from the norm expected by the test. As a result, the SAT does not fairly assess the abilities of these students. </p>

<p>--That makes sense. But it is the type of language that you will encounter in a professional career... or in college. I mean the SAT can't very well test how well you speak ghetto slang.</p>

31

<p>i dont understand how AA makes sense from a management point of view</p>

<p>you lower the standards at the end of production cycle rather than try to find ways to improve the results at the end of the cycle. it's the equivalent of grade-A chicken that you want to eat. your metaphorical chicken isnt very good (not grade-A), but you still want to eat it, so you are satsified with eating low-quality chicken. instead, why dont you find ways to get good chicken where you find it, recruit the good chicken and consume with delight, and then find other meats?</p>

32

<p>I never assessed the validity. It was the broad topic that I was referring to of SAT bias. The page was to summarize a basic idea of what I was talking about.</p>

33

<p>People say that even when AA goes into account, the underrepresented minorties who were accepted for their race tend to have a lower GPA and a better chance of dropping out.</p>

<p>How do others look at this?</p>

34

<p>Which people say this? I'm just interested in seeing. Where are these statistics?</p>

<p>Ultimately, people have their stances, and we must accept what the colleges do.</p>

35

<p>As a Mexican native I am against affirmative action, even if it sound counterintuituve. I want to be accepted because I am competitive as a potential student, not because I am a minority. I think that if a future employeer sees that I am in a minority group, and studied in a scool with AA, he or she might not hire me (even if a studied at a great school and have excelent notes) because they might think I only went there because I am Mexican, not because I deserved to be there. It is just a though, of course.</p>

36

<p>a thought, not a though (sorry)</p>

37

<p>Socioeconomic factors play a small role. Lets compare Vietnamese and blacks. I would also like to point out that I my self am Vietnamese.</p>

<pre><code>In the past the poverty rate of Vietnamese Americans/Immigrants was just as bad as it was for blacks, if not worst. Job opportunities for Vietnamese immigrants were hard to come by. So the socioeconomic status of Vietnamese immigrants was similar to that of blacks. When you look at academic performance, Vietnamese far surpass black. If you it was about socioeconomic status than this wouldn't be so. The average SAT of a Vietnamese person is over 200 points higher than it is for blacks. Vietnamese make up only 1.3% of California population but make up 4-5% of UC population. Blacks on the other hand make up 6.7% of California population but only 2% of the UC population. I am again AA because it claims to be about socioeconomic factors in the URM groups, but that not true because other poor minority groups are doing well in school.
</code></pre>

38

<p>mariana,</p>

<p>I don't understand your point. If you go to a school and get good grades, you will eventually get a job. I highly doubt businesses will think that you're an affirmative action case because how would they know? They see your college record and work experience. I doubt they see your high school application. Not hiring someone because they are a minority is simply racist. If you perform well at the school, you'll put yourself in good position.</p>

39

<p>You've got to look at it both ways. I have seen many closet racists, use affirmative action as evidence that african americans are indeed inferior to white students. So inferior, that they need are leg-up and are inherently under-qualified. </p>

<p>"Not hiring someone because they are a minority" might be racist... but then so is "hiring someone because they are a minority".</p>

40

<p>Race-based AA is a quota system</p>

<p>Please check out:</p>

<p><a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A26499-2004Oct12?language=printer%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A26499-2004Oct12?language=printer&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>washingtonpost.com
Should Colleges Have Quotas for Asian Americans? </p>

<p>By Jay Mathews
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, October 12, 2004; 3:47 PM </p>

<p>Excerpts from above essay:</p>

<p>[And yet the recent U.S. Supreme Court decisions on affirmative action preserved the system at most selective private schools in which Asian American students with very high tests scores are passed over in favor of African American and Hispanic students with lower scores because the schools want significant numbers of all ethnicities on campus. Supporters of such policies say a diverse student body helps everyone learn to live in the real world, and there are plenty of other fine colleges that take students, Asian American or otherwise, whom they reject. </p>

<p>Whenever I raised this point, Chin would accuse me, rightly, of shrugging off the American commitment to fair play for individuals. He cited comments made by Abigail Thernstrom, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute and a Massachusetts state school board member. "I think these racial preferences are very pernicious," she said in an interview on a PBS Web site after voters banned the use of affirmative action based on race in University of California admissions. "I don't think they do black students much good. I think they're poisonous in terms of race relations. And I do not think they are fair to the Asian student, for instance, who has worked very, very hard and is kept out of a Berkeley because a student with a slightly different skin color has gotten in as a consequence of racial identity."</p>

<p>Chin said "Chinese and ALL Asian Americans are PENALIZED for their values on academic excellence by being required to have a HIGHER level of achievement, academic and non-academic, than any other demographic group, especially Whites, in order to be admitted to Harvard, the Ivies and the other Elites in this zero-sum game called admissions based on racial preferences."</p>

<p>This may not be intended as a quota system, but Chin says it sure looks like one. He notes that in the 1980s some colleges, particularly Stanford and Brown, looked hard at their admissions decisions and discovered they were turning down many Asian American applicants while accepting white applicants with virtually the same characteristics. The Brown report admitted to "cultural bias and stereotypes," like the oft-heard canard that Asian American students have 1600 SAT scores and play the violin, but don't do sports. </p>

<p>Chin said if he had the power to change the admission policies of schools that discriminate in this way, he would let them continue to give preference to athletes, musicians, alumni children and any other groups the college wished to favor. And he would admit lower-scoring students whose parents, like his, did not have much money. But he would abolish all preferences based on race and ethnicity. </p>

<p>He noted the recent estimate by Harvard humanities professor Henry Louis Gates Jr. that two thirds of blacks at Harvard were not descendants of American slaves, but the middle class children of relatively recent immigrants from the Caribbean and Africa. "Why should they deserve admission with lowered standards (relatively speaking) based solely on the color of their skin over a high achieving Asian American living in a Chinatown ghetto or a Black ghetto (many Asians live in Black and Latino ghettos) or a poor white from the slums of NYC?" Chin said.</p>

<p>The solution to the problem of lower average achievement among African Americans and Hispanics is not "the Band-Aid approach of race-based affirmative action," Chin said. "It is solved by improving the K-12 schools for the lower economic classes which are disproportionately Black and Latino."]</p>

<p>[But there is one part of his argument, a reference to a sad era in American history, that is hard to ignore. Many selective colleges before World War II had quotas on Jews. They turned down many brilliant applicants in favor of non-Jewish prep school students with lesser records. They didn't call this striving for diversity, but it was a perverse form of affirmative action, and it left a bitter taste for decades. </p>

<p>Chin calculates that with those quotas gone, about a third of Harvard undergraduates are Jews, who make up about 3 percent of the U.S. population. About 17 percent of Harvard undergraduates are Asians, who make up about 4 percent of the population. Since the percentage of Asian Americans at schools of comparable quality that do not practice affirmative action are much higher -- 40 percent at Berkeley, 50 percent at selective New York high schools such as Stuyvesant -- Chin says the Asian American percentage at Harvard and other Ivies would go up significantly if the rules were changed.]</p>