<p>But wouldn't you say that a person with a 2400 would probably have more "drive" than a 2100? The SAT, while not a very difficult test, is very difficult to ace without preparation. You have to memorize grammar rules, learn vocab., practice critical reading etc. </p>
<p>Also, you mustn't forget that this Jian Li guy was not only a perfect-scorer on the SAT but a USAMO and UsaPho semifinalist. These tests are genuine indicators of intelligence IMO. The USAMO qualifiers I know are the smartest people I've ever met(ie. one guy took Calculus BC at a neighboring high school when he was in eighth grade and got 105%, more than all the high school students). In some of your previous posts you've said that MIT emphasizes critical thinking and not rote learning, and to get to that level in those competitions requires an extraordinarily high amount of critical thinking ability.</p>
<p>Getting into these top schools is basically a lottery. The odds are so small, and the applicant pool is so strong, that what the admissions officer eats for breakfast the day (s)he reads your app could determine whether or not you get in. People with 2400s get in to MIT, people with 2150s get in. You can't agonize over it - just apply and see what happens.</p>
<p>There was a student a few years ago who was rejected by MIT even though he qualified for both USAMO and USABO (and I think was the only person that year who did so). All the amazing things a student can do are probabilistic chance-increasers for MIT admission, not deterministic guarantees of admission. </p>
<p>But of course the concern of the OP here, really, is about something entirely outside the student's control, namely the ethnic heritage the student was born with.</p>
<p>molliebatmit sound very like a speaker for MIT admission office. You tried to defend for MIT but your argument is too weak in general. Whey you stated "Ben Jones says about 70% of the applicant pool is qualified to attend MIT", that's just another way to say that "MIT can admit anyone it likes from 70%. Application is really a game owned by adminssion officers." In this game, the college is always right, ouch. </p>
<p>While molliebatmit's argument on SAT score is obviously flawed, my point was that how MIT could reject such a student who poses great talent in math and science. SAT only tests student basic aptitude, which is pretty accurate. However the math section is least useful for colleges like MIT because students with a little math talent/effort can easily ace SATI/II math. A middle school in my area has 7th graders score 800 in math regularly. 3 did last year and 2 the year before. Maybe verbal section is even less important for MIT. Why SAT matters to MIT?</p>
<p>It is obvious that the discrimination exists. Everyone knows the reason to certain extent. But many people do not want to to admit. Instead some try to defend discrimination as hard as they can. If this student wants to act like Jian Li, I don't see why OCR (Office for Civil Rights) will ignore it.</p>
<p>
[quote]
It is obvious that the discrimination exists. Everyone knows the reason to certain extent. But many people do not want to to admit. Instead some try to defend discrimination as hard as they can. If this student wants to act like Jian Li, I don't see why OCR (Office for Civil Rights) will ignore it.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>What, are you saying that MIT rejected this kid just because they were Asian and they already "had enough of them"? Is that what you're saying? The poor minority student didn't get enough extra credit for not being white? The purpose of affirmative action is to bring diversity, culturally, economically, or otherwise. It's not a coupon for everyone who isn't descended from a European. I, personally, think it's exciting that Asian Americans don't need as much affirmative action anymore -- it shows that the system actually worked for them. It got people into schools and into a better life than they would have, and now their kids are getting into these schools, and their kids... it's not.. argh, never mind-- I don't want to take this too far. I'm sorry if I came off as prejudiced or too rude - I just think that your perspective on affirmative action is not where it needs to be.</p>
Whey you stated "Ben Jones says about 70% of the applicant pool is qualified to attend MIT", that's just another way to say that "MIT can admit anyone it likes from 70%. Application is really a game owned by adminssion officers."
[/quote]
No, I think it's another way to say "you can't rank-order the 10,000 people who apply to MIT every year." There are obviously people who are not qualified to attend MIT, but the applicant pool is quite self-selected, and there are many students who are qualified. I think it must be quite difficult to choose among the 10,000 brightest high school students in the country (and the world), especially since they do not come from a standardized background.</p>
<p>I don't think it's safe to assume that a top math competition qualifier from New York is clearly more intelligent than a student from a small rural school without the opportunity to participate in the competitions. Some students haven't had an adequate opportunity to exercise their potential in high school.</p>
<p>In short, I think it's difficult to have a complete discussion of the relative merits of different applicants when we don't have access to all of the information in the application.</p>
<p>
[quote]
I wonder how many great scientists and mathematicians that have made real contributions to their field participated in Olympiads.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>There have been studies on this issue, replicated in more than one country, and the finding is consistently that Olympiad medalists continue to outperform their peers throughout their academic careers. Steve Olson's book Countdown cites some of the primary literature on this subject.</p>
<p>It's true enough, partially agreeing with Mollie, that humankind is only a partially ordered set, not a totally ordered set, as to any basis for "merit" in regard to college admission. But, again, the concern expressed here is whether ethnicity-as-such has any relationship at all to "merit" for college admission.</p>
<p>quote from molliebatmit: (I don't know the way how others cited, I just make the font mollie favors) I don't think it's safe to assume that a top math competition qualifier from New York is clearly more intelligent than a student from a small rural school without the opportunity to participate in the competitions. Some students haven't had an adequate opportunity to exercise their potential in high school.</p>
<p>No one will argue with you if there exist some uneducated math genius in a rural countryside. The competitions are created to promote student interest and enrich their advanced knowledge in the related fields. At the same time, they serves as an indicator how intelligent/diligent/ the students are from competitions results. Some students do have more opportunities than others. Only USAMTS is accessible by all math interested student. You cannot compare students from NY with those from Nebraska in the same competition. You cannot compare students from different area of NY either. You cannot even compare students from the same school in NY. Because an Asian student has more family influence by default, a black student may live in a tough environment, and a white student is likely more self-motivated with greater potential. The argument can go on and on It is up to admission officers to judge who is more fit to MIT</p>
<p>What I cared is how the majority of people think, how the new applicants react and how the rejected student feels. While all comparisons are relative, what do you think the survey result would be on his chance to be admitted to MIT? At least this student was voted by his high school peers as college-most-sought though he was ranked only 7th. I dont know how the vote was conducted, but it was recorded on paper. </p>
<p>After seeing what happened, I have changed the way to look at college application and to tell what new applicants may do. I spoke out here so that new forum users will learn to not ask naïve questions like how many SAT-IIs to take or is a score of 2150 good enough, how is my chance with this EC... The bar is so low that 70% are qualified; the bar is so high because you cant make it. It is everyones game. It is officers call. Did someone say it is based on the breakfast food?</p>
<p>The problem with the affirmative action conversation is that it's always clouded by ignorace. Such as:</p>
<p>"
You cannot even compare students from the same school in NY. Because an Asian student has more family influence by default, a black student may live in a tough environment, and a white student is likely more self-motivated with greater potential.
"</p>
<p>from the article:
[quote]
Li, who has a perfect 2400 SAT score and near-perfect SAT II scores, was rejected this past year from five of the nine universities he applied to Princeton, Harvard, Stanford, MIT and the University of Pennsylvania and accepted to four: CalTech, Rutgers, Cooper Union and Yale.
<p>With stats and accomplishments like those, I'm surprised that he was rejected by MIT. I'm pretty surprised he was also rejected by Stanford, Harvard, Pton, and UPenn. </p>
<p>We didn't see his essays or his app in general, so it's really hard to say. I think he should be ecstatic that he is now at Yale. He should grasp the full opportunity there instead of appealing admission decisions.</p>
<p>"I don't think it's safe to assume that a top math competition qualifier from New York is clearly more intelligent than a student from a small rural school without the opportunity to participate in the competitions. Some students haven't had an adequate opportunity to exercise their potential in high school."</p>
<p>It's not safe to assume a top math competitior is more brilliant than someone who has not had the oppurtunity to participate in any math competitions?
I guess it depends upon where you set the threshold where you can "assume" something, probability wise.</p>
<p>If I had to guess I would say the top math competitor has a 99% chance of being "brighter", give or take several percentage points.
Keep in mind that the act of preparing for competitions, especially when done regularly and extensively, as is often necessary in order to qualify for higher stages of competition, significantly increases knowledge and ability in the specified areas as well, relative to someone who has not done any preparation for any competitions.</p>
<p>I'm sure many would agree on 99%, particularly those who actually have extensive (as in not taking a competition once a year and thats it) first-hand knowledge of math and/or science related competitions, and have actually seen the type of problems and solutions required at the more competitive levels of competitions (USAMO, USAPhO, USABO, USACO, the chemistry one, and their IMO equivalents). (I'm hoping there are some people like that here to back me up)</p>
<p>Of course, there is the 1% chance that the successful math competitor is not as bright- but merely a 1% chance? I'm sure a majority of the population and any court of law would agree that an assumption would not be unreasonable given the situation, and would probably be warranted.</p>
<p>Maybe the title of this thread is too confusing. People kept mixing this student with Jian Li. Luckily this student was not rejected by 5 schools. If so, he would be staying home now because he only applied 5 colleges totally.</p>
<p>Perhaps I should revise my wording -- I don't think it's safe to assume that a math competition qualifier from New York clearly has more potential than a student from a small rural school without the opportunity to participate in the competitions.</p>
<p>And, for the sake of argument, pretend that we are not talking about a randomly selected rural high school student, but a very bright student, top of his/her class, who is the best his/her town has ever seen, and who is applying to MIT.</p>
<p>Preparing for and participating in competitions increases knowledge and ability, for sure, but so does attending a school like MIT. MIT's job isn't just to pick the "smartest" students in the country and stick them in a box for four years -- MIT wants to pick students with the most potential, and turn them into great scientists, mathematicians, and engineers via an MIT education.</p>
<p>MIT could fill a freshman class with competition participants, but I don't think that's justified when there are so many bright students in the country who simply have not had the opportunity to participate in these activities.</p>
<p>Perhaps my thinking on this issue is conditioned by the fact that I'm a biologist -- I see the error bars on what can be determined about the applicant's merit and potential to be large enough that any choice of a freshman class can be justified.</p>
<p>From mollie:
[quote]
Some students haven't had an adequate opportunity to exercise their potential in high school.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>I went to a pretty good suburban high school with teachers who really cared about their students, but the school culture wasn't gung-ho about sending their students to top-ranked colleges (I was the first MIT admit in a decade or so), so we were never exposed to all of these math/science competitions or other 'smart kids' activities. If somebody at my school were a super math genius, then he/she could never really show it via any of these competitions, unless of course he/she really took the initiative to do so, but it's hard for kids to take the initiative on these sorts of things if it's not cultivated by the parents or school culture.</p>
<p>What pgbovine said. Also, there's something to be said for the social and emotional growth that occurs when kids focus on things like marching band, or gathering with friends every Friday night for movie night or board games, or deciding to write articles for the school newspaper or literary journal. Kids who focus exclusively on grinding through math and science olympiads may be doing those things or may not be--but if they are not it could be that in the judgement of the admissions office they may not have the social skills needed to collaborate on projects, or to support each other or seek support when things are tough academically.</p>
<p>I basically agree with all said in the previous three posts. But when it comes to the objectivity of admission process, it is undeniable that ethnicity weighs in heavily. Asian students (especially male) are unfortunately in the disadvantage end. The case I presented here is just a typical example. I would not argue too much if Harver and Princeton had rejected him. But it is hard to believe MIT said NO so firmly to a math-science oriented student.</p>
<p>Wellllllll.....don't be so sure it's ethnicity. My D. is one of four calc BC students at her HS. They are working more or less independently; they meet four days a week with each other and then once a week with the teacher. The kid in the group who is the most annoying also has the highest test scores, by far, and is a single track math/science kid, including winning some math competitions. He drives everybody in the group nuts with his relentless grade and score grubbing and his daily reminders to the group that he got an 800 on the Math I. He's also the only other kid besides D. who is applying to MIT this year. On paper, he has higher test scores and more science awards. In reality, he's anxious, insecure and immature. </p>
<p>All four kids are mastering the material successfully if their scores are to be believed, but the difference is that three of them are helping each other, by working out and discussing the problems. He's probably a better mathematician than either of the other three, but he's so self focused he's not much help to the team. If he gets something that the other three don't he gloats, rather than explains. If one of the others gets something he doesn't, he's not gracious about that either.</p>
<p>If he does not get into MIT I'm sure he's going to be one of the kids on this board mystified by why his test scores and competition awards didn't mean anything to the admissions office. If he gets in and she doesn't, she said that's OK too, because she's pretty sure she doesn't want to be in a college full of kids like him for the next four years.</p>