<p>And aren’t there different types of “culture”?</p>
<p>In my son’s case, homeschooling was one “culture”. Math circle, competitive chess, music, and church were all different types of “subcultures” that shaped who he was. Those were apart from his socio-economic status, neighborhood, family, and ethnic backgrounds. All those things helped shape him, and I am sure he tried to communicate that with MIT.</p>
<p>Each student is unique. Share about what makes you “you”.</p>
<p>Could someone elaborate on the importance of cultural identity/gender in university admissions?</p>
<p>Guys, interpreting this question as solely about race or gender is far too narrow.</p>
<p>
Anyone?/////</p>
<p>@ZepHead:
One of the coolest things about MIT is the huge variety of people here, and what they can teach each other just by virtue of being different. In order to facilitate that quality of the MIT experience, it’s important for an accepted applicant to be interesting, to have had unique experiences and therefore a unique worldview. There’s no one quality you need–including sex and race–to be interesting. Are you interesting? Yes, simply by being human.</p>
<p>For this question, i simply put: I am of Italian and Scottish descent. Will this hurt me?</p>
<p>Your race and ethnicity will never hurt you.</p>
<p>@Dangitdang, I think that question was referring to the short answer rather than the content.</p>
<p>Sorry for being unclear but I was referring to the short answer. My culture has never really played a major role in my life so I didn’t think twice about writing that. Does anyone think I should have wrote more for this?</p>
<p>@angels - Because this is part of an optional question, your response only adds to your app. A short response will not hurt. It will simply have a neutral effect on your app.</p>
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</p>
<p>True, but other stats are much more skewed. For example, the meritocratic half of the system probably likes students who have done science competitions, the Olympiads, stuff like that. If you’ve qualified for the USAMO, you have to really have a passion for math! (and as somebody that knows a significant fraction of the people on this list, they’re not robots or soulless or anything anybody here might knee-jerk label them as)</p>
<p><a href=“American Mathematics Competitions | Mathematical Association of America”>American Mathematics Competitions | Mathematical Association of America;
<p>Out of the first 50 qualifiers, I found 27 names that were unquestionably Asian, 30 that were possibly. I refuse to talk with anybody who would claim these people are “less interesting” because of their race… so that leaves the diversity issue. That cuts them from 60% of the USAMO pool to 20% of MIT. Isn’t that a bit much?</p>
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</p>
<p>This brings to mind a related question. Why are there so many Jews? They have no disadvantage and have huge, huge financial advantage. They’re overrepresented by a factor much more than Asians are. Yet they just <em>don’t</em> contribute diversity, since they’re, by tradition, all the same! Same race, same religion and rituals going back thousands of years. Being an orthodox Jew is all about falling into line with that. </p>
<p>MIT is getting just about no added diversity, no different <em>anything</em>, from an entire 10% of the student body. They almost outnumber AA’s, who have the cultures of an entire continent and discrimination like hell against them. </p>
<p>Under this logic, shouldn’t you require all admitted Jews to be, I dunno, 2 standard deviations above the MIT mean, much like admitted Asians look like they’re 1 standard deviation above the MIT mean right now?</p>
<p>Excuse me?</p>
<p>
When my parents applied to college, there was a separate entrance exam for Jews. I’m lucky to be living in a country and a time where that’s not the case. Let’s please keep it that way.</p>
<p>
See above.</p>
<p>
Generalizing and stereotyping is a tricky business. When we immigrated to the US we were very poor. Before we immigrated to the US my dad had to work a nightjob as a taxi driver just to buy food for the next day. My mom was literally putting on stockings in the morning and sewing them up at night. I didn’t have a crib; I slept in the bathtub. Had I not been born we might have been able to stay in Russia, but we actually did not have enough food for the three of us to survive. Being Jewish did not give us any financial advantage there and it hasn’t given us any financial advantage here.</p>
<p>
Oh really.</p>
<p>I find this new rise of antisemitism hugely offensive. It does not belong in a conversation about discrimination in college admissions.</p>
<p>Yeah conquerer7 I’m asian and I have no problems with diversity. MIT is already 20% asian. That’s a ton compared to the regular population. In addition to your USAMO 60%->20%…USAMO does not autoqualify you for MIT.</p>
<p>^^ yes, and there no longer is discrimination against Jews. That was thrown out of the U.S. way before either of us were born. When was the last time you faced actual, hostile discrimination? (I’m sure you have, but what you and I have faced is <em>nothing</em> compared to what others have…)</p>
<p>In terms of averages, Jews are richer. So are Asians, I believe. But hey, my parents hailed from villages that didn’t have running water then, and still probably don’t now, had to bring our family to America half at a time because plane tickets cost so much… Our races are tough, though. :P</p>
<p>Anyway, I wasn’t being serious, I was just pointing out that under the rule of ‘make the class as diverse as possible’, from a pure cultural standpoint Jews don’t bring as much. I’m not saying your culture is bad – it’s that Jews all share the same religion and race… the same legends! Meanwhile, every country in Asia has a different set of holidays; Japanese and Chinese culture are way, way far apart. </p>
<p>Of course I don’t really condone barring Jewish people from anything, but I wanted to place it alongside barring Asians, because I don’t see why one is acceptable and the other isn’t. I’m glad your people have overcome it, I just want us to too.</p>
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</p>
<p>I didn’t say that. I’m pointing out that if you go purely by performance in competitions like these, Asians should take at least a 50% share of MIT (as they do in the UCs, where affirmative action was thrown out). Since the actual number is not nearly this much, Asians are at a disadvantage “culturally”, whatever the crud that means.</p>
<p>Of course USAMO isn’t a guarantee, and MIT doesn’t only want people like that. But this is the closest thing I can think of to something that’s very MIT-ish…</p>
<p>
You’re assuming that applicants with Asian ancestry make up the same percentage of the competitive MIT applicant pool as they do in the pool of USAMO qualifiers, which is a big leap.</p>
<p>
How many Jews are there…? (I am hoping this question will not be answered with reference to “The Myth of American Meritocracy”, primarily because I am hoping I will not need to suffer through reading it again.)</p>
<p>For the record, I do not think it’s possible, or fair, or rational to argue that all students of Jewish ancestry are the same. Of course, I don’t think it’s possible, or fair, or rational to argue that about students of Asian ancestry, or of any ancestry. And I am certain that the purpose of the optional culture response on the MIT application is not to disadvantage Asian applicants.</p>
<p>
But that’s not true! That’s astoundingly not true! Have you actually met any Jews?</p>
<p>
You can talk about discrimination against Asian Americans without bringing up Jews, much like you can talk about lightbulbs without bringing up real estate agents.</p>
<p>
When exactly were you not being serious? Because none of it was funny, and all of it was offensive.</p>
<p>
Really! A poem for you:
have you actually met a Jew?
Maybe even one or two?
Maybe just a half-a-Jew?</p>
<p>It’s cool to meet someone coming from virtually the same background as me =]</p>
<p>To the one conquerer7, I’m just gonna lay a few things on you, all right?</p>
<p>As a non-orthodox Jew, I’m a Reconstructionist and a bit of an Atheist, I’ve experienced a different kind of Jewish childhood. I don’t know how other Jews do it, but I was raised in a very egalitarian house hold, I had to be able to argue with my parentals before I was seven. So I learned, and I learned fast. My father was a successful man, he went to Colgate, transferred to Harvard, got his MA in English of some sort at Columbia, and got his law degree at Duke, I had a lot to live up to. I was forced to do better than I was capable, vigorously I’ve stumbled through my schooling, I did poorly in middle school for reasons I still don’t know, but once I hit high school something just clicked. The Jewish community of Portland, Oregon, mainly the congregation of Havurah Shalom helped me greatly in my journey to being a scholarly and well minded young man, I was taught, from a young age to think logically, to think cynically, to think objectively. Through my learning and my teaching whilst under Ken Lerner, my Barmitzvah tutor, I grasped the strings to knowledge, and I strung together the person I am today. Without my Jewish upbringing I would not have achieved what I have in my life.</p>
<p>Jews don’t bring anything to the table? What on Earth are you talking about? The only nation that strives and continues to be generally democratic, although Peres is a bit of a prick and I can’t wait till we have a more liberal, less Hasidic set of governmental officials in place, in a sea of anti-American and, to save myself some breath, negatively viewed and poorly lead countries, and you think we bring nothing to the table? What we bring is what I have outlined for you, at least in my experience; a different way of thinking. The Hasids? Well, I can’t speak for them, but for the rest of us? I definitely can. </p>
<p>“The same race?” I suppose you’re Jewish and you’ve been to nearly all of the synagogues in the country and world, and I suppose that you can speak for the entirety of the Jewish population, right? Oh, you can’t? Did you know that Israelis AREN’T white? I’m white, but I’m Jewish, and, say, Yotam Perel, a Jewish animator, is Israeli, and not white. Have you ever even been to a synagogue before? Obviously not. Yeah, I’ll be the first the say a lot of us are white or Israeli, but there are plenty that are of any other ethnicity. </p>
<p>“The same religion?” If you’re going by just the name, sure, but I wouldn’t compare myself with a Hasid, or an Orthodox. Would a Methodist pair him or herself up with a Catholic, Lutheran, or any of the others? Do you know anything about the Jewish faith?</p>
<p>“The same legends?” As who, the Christians? The other monotheists? I suppose our books are similar, but our holidays aren’t even CLOSE. The Christians have their Sunday, we have Shabbat. What about Rosh Hashanah? Selichot? Yom Kippur? Sukkot? Chanukkah? Tu Bisvhat? Purim? Do you have any grasp on the Jewish religion? The same legends? For us Jesus was just a rebellious Jew who was put to death for pretending to be a prophet, or something along those lines. I’ve never seen such a sad display of accidental antisemitism before in my life. </p>
<p>Culturally you are as inept as a cat with a box on its head. Before you open your gullet and spit out misinformed and misrepresented opinions that have no qualifying features. We’re a very small bit of the world, thanks to the Holocaust, and we were small even before then. There are millions, hundreds of millions of Asians, so comparing us is silly, they’re incomparable.</p>
<p>Edit:
</p>
<p>I’m sorry, but, what? What? What? I’ll have you know we’ve been discriminated against since the dawn of goddamn time. If I had to describe all of our holidays I’d say they are all about “We didn’t die and we escaped! Woo hoo!” We had to INVENT a holiday, Purim (completely fictional), in order to have SOME upbeat festivities for us. We’ve been kicked out of Greece, Russia, Europe, Egypt, everywhere. We’ve gone through hell and back, we almost went EXTINCT in the HOLOCAUST, you know, that one time when Hitler tried to commit genocide against the Jews. We have, quite literally, our own form of racism because of how much we’ve been hated, it’s called Antisemitism, and you’re part of that. You’re a racist, I hope you can live with that, I don’t think MIT accepts racists. Not to say that the plight of the African Americans is not severe, it’s awful, it was terrible, and it’s still really bad. But are you saying that we’re inferior to them in our plight? Because, sadly, I’d have to say you’re really mistaken. We lost 8,861,800 Jews in the Holocaust. I want that to sink in. </p>
<p>We lost 67% of our race, of our brothers and sisters, of my people, and you want to tell me that we’ve never been discriminated like African Americans have been? You must be smoking something, and I’ll gladly have none of it. Do you know how pompous, how stupid, how ignorant and bigoted you sound? No such person as yourself could ever get into MIT, I can’t wait till they reject you on Saturday.</p>
<p>Also, a little bit of knowledge for your obviously deprived, cob webbed brain. Do you remember the part of US history where people tried to send African Americans “back” to Africa? Remember that? Remember how they didn’t want to go? I can’t speak for them, and I won’t speak for them, but history probably can, <em>disclaimer, speaking out of my ass</em> and I think that you’d find a lot of African Americans to identify their home in the US, and not in Africa.</p>
<p>Do you really think that Jews from Russia, Morocco, Iran, Israel, America, Spain, etc. all share the same culture? That’s an extremely ridiculous assumption. They all have rich cultures that are very unique to the places and experiences they come from. </p>
<p>And, by the way, in my Orthodox Jewish community there are families that represent every income level.</p>
<p>Lastly, I was wondering, what percentage of MIT students are Christian? I assume that it is quite high. Should I be concerned with the lack of diversity? </p>
<p>Everyone clearly knows that I am joking, right?</p>
<p>I’m hoping conquerer7 is a very good ■■■■■. If not, I congratulate him for making my Most Idiotic Posts on College Confidential list, as it’s a hard list to make.</p>