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<p>Sure. But this doesn’t mean that “other complaints” didn’t already exist. That’s all I’m saying. It looks like yes, I misunderstood you. You’re just saying that “whiners” will always exist. I agree.</p>
<p>Can I just put ditto marks to refer to my previous responses to the same argument? No? Well, as I’ve said many times before, there was ample proof of anti-Semitic animus and of deliberate discrimination against Jews as a result of that animus. Where’s the similar proof of animus against Asians? Where’s the smoking gun? All I know of is statistical studies of a few colleges (not including Princeton, by the way) that’s more than 10 years old. And that information is only suggestive of discrimination, because it only reviewed a few specific factors. It didn’t review “soft” factors like recommendations–and even the study (of a single school, Duke) that looked at those soft factors didn’t (I believe) consider such factors as geographical diversity, choice of major, distribution of ECs and sports, etc. Again, I can understand the suspicion. But you don’t have the proof.</p>
<p>As for the Jian Li case, Princeton categorically denied racial discrimination, and the case has been silent since 2008, at least insofar as news reports about it.</p>
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<p>I repeat my argument before. There is ample proof NOW. There was not ample proof THEN. Harry Starr prevented Lowell from using outright quotas by somehow becoming privy to the plan and informing the Boston Globe. Despite rabid institutionalized and mainstream anti-Semitism at the time, Lowell was forced to back down from using straight-up quotas because of Starr.</p>
<p>Lowell subsequently tried several tactics, two of which were restricting scholarships to Jews and employing geographic preferences. Like Asians, Jews traditionally have a high marginal propensity to save, so the first tactic failed. His second tactic resulted in getting Jews from Western states. Then, Lowell found the Holy Grail: just redefine “merit” and you can easily control the Jewish population.</p>
<p>We know that NOW. If Jews knew that then, like Starr, they could’ve stopped Lowell. They could not. Now, was that because they approved of his anti-Semitism, as Pizzagirl suggests with her “country club” straw man? Or was it because they didn’t have a smoking gun?</p>
<p>fabrizio, I guess I don’t really understand what you think should happen. Do you think the feds should investigate? They supposedly did so with Jian Li, and nothing has happened. And what if schools came out and said, “Yes, we consider the race of applicants in crafting a diverse student body.” That doesn’t seem to be unlawful. Do you just think it should be unlawful?</p>
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<p>No, they probably would not have. Jewish people were only a small part of the population, so they would not have had much lobbying power. And anti-Jewish sentiment was strong and not considered un-PC back then.</p>
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<li><p>The Feds (i.e. the Office of Civil Rights) should and did investigate.</p></li>
<li><p>Schools already say that on their Common Data Sets.</p></li>
<li><p>Yes. But I can live with a “leave it up to the states” approach, which has been actively pursued since 1996.</p></li>
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<p>But let me be clear that I have a major issue with your feeling “disdain for the argument that people who are getting a lot should be getting even more.” That implies that Jews should’ve been happy with their 15% de facto quota. You balk and say that Jews had a smoking gun, but after I point out that they didn’t know of the smoking gun AT THE TIME, you have nothing to say about that.</p>
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<p>But this begs the question as to why Lowell was forced to back down from his first plan of outright quotas.</p>
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What I say about it is that you have to have some persuasive reason to think that a group is being subjected to discrimination. A gut feeling isn’t enough. Anecdotal cases like Jian Li aren’t enough. And the existing studies, in my estimation at least, aren’t enough, either. I’ve said over and over that I think there is enough evidence to justify further investigation. What more do you want? You want people to accept an unproven position because you have a strong sense that it’s true? Jews who felt they were being discriminated against (at least at Harvard) were right about it, and it was subsequently proven. Asians who feel this way may well be right, too. But they may not be right.</p>
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<p>No one said that’s “all that matters.” </p>
<p>My nephew is 1/4 Hispanic and therefore qualifies as URM. He comes from a very privileged affluent background and had access to an elite private school and advantages that my kids don’t have. Oh well. As long as “the system” rewarded him for being a URM, I don’t see the problem with him claiming such status. I say you play any card you’ve been dealt. I would have played a URM card too, if only I had one.</p>
<p>fabrizio, you are extremely ignorant about social history if you think that the Jewish discrimination at Harvard et al was hush-hush at the time. Anti-Jewish sentiment was pervasive in society at the time. Find me such comparable anti-Asian sentiment today. Oh, that’s right. You can’t.</p>
<p>And how you can fail to see the difference between a “let’s keep a quota of no more than x% of this group” and “let’s make sure we give a thumb on the scale to some others who have historically been underrepresented” is truly beyond me. There’s a complete difference between the two.</p>
<p>There’s no shortage of Asians at elite schools. My D’s entering class at her LAC is probably in the neighborhood of 35% Asian, based on the Facebook class of 2015 members. And there are a lot of African-Americans there as well, as well as people from other countries. I think it’s cool that my white-bread suburban daughter gets to be exposed to a lot of different people from a lot of different backgrounds. That’s part of what I’m paying $55K/year for. There’s “discrimination” only if you think that the purpose of a college is solely to enroll “the smartest” (as determined by SAT scores, however imperfect that may be as a measure). The colleges see their purposes as providing an interesting soup of people to learn from, not just the 2400 SAT-ers followed by the 2380’s.</p>
<p>I readily agree that the system of affirmative action that we have is imperfect, and I would run it differently if I were the overlord. But some of these things are very difficult. Let’s say you are Harvard, and you believe that it’s a good thing to have some black students on campus. How will you get them? Clearly, you will have to accept black applicants with lower stats in order to get a substantial number (a look at the distribution of SAT scores by race will show you that). But how much lower? If you include high-SES black kids in that group, you will not have to lower the average as much as you will if you only use affirmative action for poor black applicants. Let’s say there’s some stats threshold you don’t want to go below. You do the math, and let’s imagine the result is the following: If you include high-SES blacks in your affirmative action pool, you can end up with about 7% black students in the incoming class. Still far below 13%, but not too bad. If you exclude the high-SES blacks from that pool, a few may still get in, but not all of them–you end up with, say, only 3% blacks in the incoming class. What do you do? What is the critical mass of black students that is “enough?” Is there an advantage to the college and the students as a whole to having 7% black students, even if half of them are high-SES?</p>
<p>Affirmative action…is necessary. </p>
<p>Here is the answer to this affirmative action talk: Haters are going to hate. </p>
<p>What this means: Each year, thousands of asian and white applicants (and maybe even applicants of other races) are going to cry about affirmative action getting them rejected from a particular school. Then, they are each going to show their perfect SAT scores, perfect ACT scores, and their “amazing” EC’s in order to try and make people believe that they are actually “smart” and that they were “unfairly rejected”.</p>
<p>Well, if these people are so “smart” in the first place, why do they have the belief that they NEED to be accepted to one particular college in order to succeed in life? The people that are truly smart would just move on, knowing that they can take their talents elsewhere and be immensely successful.</p>
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<p>I see no reason why he should be rewarded for being 1/4 Hispanic, even less so given that he “comes from a very privileged affluent background and had access to an elite private school and [extra] advantages.” You appear to disagree. Hence, “all that matters.”</p>
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<p>Then why is it that Lowell’s quota plan was axed but his “holistic” plan was untouchable? Oh, that’s right. You can’t answer that.</p>
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<p>Uh, because I don’t see the world through your “privileged white woman” eyes? There’s a complete difference between the two to you.</p>
<p>Fundamentally, there is no difference between the two. They are both instances of racial discrimination. The former is “negative” discrimination whereas the latter is “positive.” So what? Is the “positive” aspect supposed to make me forget that it’s not racial discrimination?</p>
<p>You speak out against “negative” discrimination but staunchly defend “positive” discrimination. I speak out against both.</p>
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<p>Except for possibly the 100th time, I don’t think that way. Despite your persistent efforts to paint me otherwise, I have never advocated “numbers only” admissions. Being opposed to racial preferences does not equate to supporting the international admissions system.</p>
<p>Would you like for me to repeat that for the 101st time?</p>
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<p>I agree that his race should not be a factor, unless he self-identifies as Hispanic. If, for all intents and purposes, he has no connection with his Hispanic heritage, but looks, lives, is treated and responds to questions about his race like a White person (I assume that is the other 3/4), then he should not check the Hispanic box nor receive a preference, because he will not be adding URM diversity to campus life.</p>
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Well, yeah. At least, you should be able to recognize a moral difference between the two. It’s like the diffference between robbing from the rich to give to the poor and robbing from the Jews to give to the Christians. Personally, I consider affirmative action to be similar to taxes that I pay. It costs me something (my kids have been rejected for stuff, and maybe black kids took “their” spots), just as my taxes cost me something. But I’m willing to pay it, because I think it leads to a better society for everybody. Obviously, some people disagree about the value,and they are free to try to elect representatives who agree with them.</p>
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<p>Are you saying that without racial preferences, blacks would disappear at Harvard and its peer schools?</p>
<p>If the SAT is as meaningless as some of the users here claim, what’s the harm in Harvard’s accepting blacks with “lower stats”? Maybe they should drop their “stats threshold.”</p>
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<p>I don’t recognize a moral difference between the two at all.</p>
<p>The former assumes that some minority group–Jews, Asians, and so forth–is undesirable past a certain point. The latter assumes that some minority group–blacks, Hispanics, and so forth–requires assistance to succeed.</p>
<p>The former is repugnant while the latter is paternalistic.</p>
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I’m saying that their numbers would be drastically reduced. Isn’t that the conclusion of the same studies upon which you rely? Remember, even with affirmative action, and even with the pool including high-SES black students, most selective schools are only enrolling between 5 and 7 % black students, and less at some schools. Unless they are deliberately keeping black enrollment at those low levels, my belief is that because there just aren’t enough black applicants with reasonably competitive stats to go around. Berkeley has 3% black students, which may be suggestive.</p>
<p>It would be interesting to see what would happen if a highly selective school decided that it was going to minimize consideration of grades and scores, and concentrate on other kinds of achievements, such as ECs and community service. The racial makeup might change drastically, or not.</p>
<p>Is it paternalistic to observe that poor people need money? The reason that some groups need help to succeed is that they have been the recipients and heirs of generations of anti-help. Ignoring that is an easy way to shrug off responsibility for the past wrongs. (Yes, I know that supposedly colleges can’t use affirmative action to correct past wrongs, but only for diversity purposes, but I don’t feel the need to accept that obvious fiction.)</p>
<p>“My belief is that where there are various factors used as preferences, people seem to complain most about those that are race based. Not that they do not complain at all about other factors. I am not going to do a search, but I am confident that is true here on CC, with complaints about legacy probably coming in second.”</p>
<p>I think the role of having money comes in second. First on the parents forum. Affirmative action is first on the kids forums.</p>