Do Elite Colleges Discriminate Against Asian Students?

Applying to College
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<p>My question about grades and test scores being the only critieria for college admission was based on the fact that some people I know who are against affirmative action personally believe that only the students with the highest grades and test scores should be admitted to college, with no “holistic” consideration whatsoever.(Response to post #127) </p>

<p>I believe that if elite colleges decided to eliminate racial preferences, then they should also get rid of all preferences. This includes students who are legacies or celebrities, for instance. </p>

<p>However, I think that there has to be a stronger argument from those in favor of affirmative action in college admissions than “diversity is a good thing.” </p>

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<p>"Look, even from a stereotypical perspective, let’s say you are an Asian student who studies and has parents who force you into private tutors and push you to get good scores and takes 11 years of piano to pad your resume (basically my scenario and MANY others I assure you) Is it like we don’t work hard for the first 17 years of our lives? That getting those good grades is simply a result of us being Asian??</p>

<p>Even if a lot of AA are getting high test scores and SAT scores, it’s not like we don’t work for them. We study hard. But, instead of being rewarded for it, we’re basically getting screwed over for it."</p>

<p>I think many of you who are going straight by the obvious statistics are missing the point…you can have and be all those things as described (and this is certainly not directed personally at you Mike) and still be a jerk, or too shy, or arrogant, or whatever comes across that makes the adcom give you a lower character rating. Kids may have “great” recs that describe a person as incredibly hard-working and accomplished but somehow convey flatness, or some negative quality. The Ivies rate character very highly, that´s why many kids with 2200s and some 2100s make it in over the 2300s, with grades, ecs being equal. It´s all very fine to work incredibly hard all your life to reach an Ivy, but that is simply not enough and yes, they may take someone who worked slightly less hard but who is nicer, or whatever. While many hard-working Asians have the attributes they are looking for (those are the ones that get in and some with lower stats) many don´t, and you can´t argue discrimination unless you can prove that Asians have those qualities in a greater proportion that what you´re seeing in the admit rates.</p>

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<p>Have you not seen this Duke study? This is the only data point we have. If only the elites are more upfront about their admission policies.</p>

<p>[News:</a> Testing for ‘Mismatch’ - Inside Higher Ed](<a href=“http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2009/04/20/mismatch]News:”>http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2009/04/20/mismatch)</p>

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<p>One of the things I learned here on CC is the importance of the rich and famous. Without them, the elites would not be elites anymore.</p>

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<p>I agree. They certainly impress this Canuck. If only I have kids like this…dream on, Canuckguy, dream on…</p>

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<p>I saw a letter to the editor of a Canadian publication some years ago by Alexander David Mitchell, a Rhodes scholar. He said basically the same thing. It was the nastiest attack on Oxford I have ever seen.</p>

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<p>As an Asian I do find it frustrating that high scoring applicants end up dead meat.</p>

<p>But being Asian, I know many of these high achieving applicants…and they have some pretty large character flaws. Some are more minor like being ridiculously shy or even antisocial (I argue that being antisocial is a negative trait when applying to these top schools), but others have some deeper flaws, the biggest of which is racism/racial superiority, greed, and sometimes it is almost misanthropy in the way they treat others. Racism is a particular problem with Chinese; I am glad that my Chinese parents were strongly liberal and made it a point that I judged everyone fairly. But many, and I mean many, other hardworking Asians I know believe themselves to be the best race, that blacks/latinos/whites are inferior, etc., most of it stemming from their concrete obedience to their parents.</p>

<p>If I were a college I wouldn’t accept these kids even with their 4.0/2380…they are ******bags.</p>

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<p>protagonist,
sincere sympathies from another asian-american for your suffering
and chaosakita, from my experience (ive moved 7 times and lived in japan, china, and the US, and been to over 20 countries) asian americans are generally more active in leadership, music, and community service. as for sports, that i have to admit that we asians as a whole are still weak at…
but seriously, are all asian kids discriminated against, or only international asian students?</p>

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<p>So, you or your parents are different from the other Chinese? In whose eyes?</p>

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<p>This… includes yourself?</p>

<p>Hate your own race will not earn any respects from others!</p>

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<p>This might help y’all in your arguments:</p>

<p>I’m a Hispanic girl with a 3.7 average. My name is not Hispanic (because my grandfather chopped the last 3 letters off, now the name is Anglo) but I am Hispanic, from the Caribbean. I self-reported on my PSATs last year as Hispanic. (Light-skinned, a Shakira look-a-like, but nobody sees that on the test!) My interest is in Economics. PSAT scores were NOT reported because I was a Sophomore, but they were high, a 190 total. </p>

<p>My best friend, also a female, has a higher GPA (4.2) and she indicated interest in the sciences (girls + science = lucrative recruitment) on her PSATs. Her name, also, is Anglo, and because she is an Anglo, she checked “Caucasian” on her test form. </p>

<p>We both checked off that we wanted material from colleges. </p>

<p>She has received NO communication from ANY Ivy schools. On the other hand, I have received catalogs/brochures from 8 of the 10 Ivies, among literally hundreds of other schools, 2nd, 3rd, and lower tier. I have even received phone calls from this one particular college that is willing to give me a full scholarship and they haven’t haven’t even seen my “real” test scores! </p>

<p>The ONLY real difference between us is that I am “coded” Hispanic and she is not. Can this be explained any other way?</p>

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<p>As you say, Caltech’s admissions data gap is very large, though it COULD be accounted for by self-selection. Did you read the links I posted? Lizzardfire, I believe it was, is a student with a long CC history who steadfastly, explicitly states that Caltech does not consider gender or race. She claims to be on the admissions committee, and Caltech adcoms do include both students and faculty.</p>

<p>I like numbers because of their objectivity, but statistics CAN also be misleading. Whereas I am disinclined to believe that colleges outright LIE about anything. E.g. Consider need-blind admissions. If a school DECLARES that they’re need-blind, they probably aren’t considering applicants with $$ numbers in the file. Targeting expensive zip codes, yes, but not explicit FA consideration. There is a target FA budget number, not a hard limit. In this economy, many need-blind schools are seeing a rise in financial need of accepted students.</p>

<p>The logic behind NOT lying is simple: there will always be a disgruntled admissions officer like Michele Hernandez ready to tell all. Turnover is ridiculously high among admissions officers to begin with. Does any school really want to risk a PR nightmare if they call themselves need-blind and are proved to not be?</p>

<p>However, to my knowledge Caltech itself has not publicly declared that it does not use affirmative action. There are rumors that it wants to make its admissions process “more holistic,” which is generally code for “incorporate special interests.”</p>

<p>I did read Daniel Golden’s PRICE OF ADMISSION and find him a fellow skeptic, so I value his opinion, though I came to the Caltech conclusion through CC first.</p>

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<p>sanguinity,</p>

<p>As I mentioned in an earlier post, I know many “Asian” and “Asian-American” students. I know them pretty well, since my house was the big hang-out for my son’s multiracial, multiethnic, multireligious group of friends.</p>

<p>Your stereotype does not in any way describe the kids I know. Unless you count the kid who got enraged if you thought he was from the PRC instead of Taiwan…</p>

<p>It sounds like you have lived in an enclave of sorts. Perhaps the difference is that we are in an academic community.</p>

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<p>I think your revelation raises an important point: Exactly what is it about the elite colleges that makes them “elite?” And does the racial composition of their student bodies contribute in anyway to their elite reputations?</p>

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[QUOTE=Sanguinity]

If I were a college I wouldn’t accept these kids even with their 4.0/2380…they are ******bags.

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<p>So Asians are automatically worse than people of other races?</p>

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[QUOTE=abestmonky]

but seriously, are all asian kids discriminated against, or only international asian students?

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<p>Non-foregin Asian kids get discriminated against compared to non-foreign people of other races; international Asian students just get considered with other international students.</p>

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<p>elizadoo47: Thanks for sharing the information. 190 on PSAT as a soph is a decent score. You can raise it with bit effort. One advice to your friend: Tell her not to apply to the same elite schools you are applying. Unless your school has a history of sending more than 1 kid to the same elite school, you will always win the admission lottery. This is more true if your school is a podunk high school.</p>

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<p>Yes, I am sure that there is discrimination against Asians at the top schools. I know for a fact that at one top school, Yale, there is also age discrimination. I attended a recent regional Yale information session. The admissions rep clearly and repeatedly stated that the Yale admissions dean has a policy against admitting “kids who do not turn 18 during their freshman year” – “these kids tend to crash and burn”. Age discrimination, stated in a rather arrogant, unkind manner. Those of you who have high achieving younger kids ready to apply to college, think twice before you send your $75 application fee to Yale – they will not admit you. As Tokenadult rightly complains in post #2, “Too bad we don’t have explicit statements from college admission committees about just what their policies are.” – this discriminatory practice is nowhere to be found on their admissions website.</p>

<p>I believe that elitism, discrimination, arrogance and prejudice are all wrong. They cause enormous amounts of pain and suffering. I believe that affirmative action is still necessary to ameliorate some of this pain and suffering. I am no expert on affirmative action, so I’ll stop short of diagnosing its current problems or proposing solutions.</p>

<p>To their credit, I do believe that elite university admissions deans and staff struggle with their consciences on these issues, and make genuine attempts to do the right thing. Among them are some good people who understand that with their elite position comes responsibility to contribute to the betterment of society. I also am cynical enough to believe that at the end of the day, it is ultimately money and power that drives decisions on these matters. It’s just not easy to bite the hand that feeds the elite. It seems to be a somewhat circular process: the elite has the power to create the definition of “elite” (that “potential factor”, that “je ne sais quoi”, the ability to pull in a six figure income, or whatever elusive quality is desired); the elite wannabes and some sectors of the public unquestioningly buy into this definition (and pay big sums to be included in it); the elite has the power to choose the next generation of elites who proceed to recycle a newer, improved version of the same definition; and so it goes. Perhaps this is human nature, I’m not sure – we seem to need our heroes and villains, and maybe needing our elite is part of that. Just another reflection of what’s best and worst in human nature. There is nothing inherently wrong with individuals who join or are from the elite – it is the choices they make and how they use their favored status that determines how others may judge their virtues.</p>

<p>Anyway, as concerns the practical realities of college admissions for my child, I liked best the question that Tokenadult posed in post #38 re: should admissions be based on abilities: “Ability to do what?” </p>

<p>My epiphany: After reading this entire thread, I’m questioning whether the top elite schools have necessarily come up with the best definition of “the best”. I hope my daughter can find a college that will not only help her learn in a diverse community of talented people, but will support her ability to examine her own humanity and her relationships and responsibilities to her fellow human beings. For my money, my foremost hope is that she finds a college culture of tolerance and humility, a place where the ability that is most highly valued is the ability to have honest, considerate discourse about all aspects of the human condition. Colleges that practice any form of discrimination do have some elements of intolerance in their culture, and intolerant cultures can and do affect the learning and behaviors of their students. Although all humans are imperfect and there is probably some degree of intolerance everywhere, there probably are some colleges where the culture is more geared towards fighting and overcoming intolerance. I hope that my daughter gets to be a “chosen” student because she shows promising abilities to be a thoughtful, caring contributor to the betterment of her school and her society.</p>

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<p>Just as a point of information, I will note that all of the hundreds of Common Application member schools (including Caltech) </p>

<p><a href=“https://www.commonapp.org/CommonApp/Members.aspx[/url]”>https://www.commonapp.org/CommonApp/Members.aspx&lt;/a&gt; </p>

<p>promise to </p>

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<p><a href=“https://www.commonapp.org/CommonApp/BecomeMember.aspx[/url]”>https://www.commonapp.org/CommonApp/BecomeMember.aspx&lt;/a&gt; </p>

<p>So every Common Application college is “holistic” in the sense of considering other admission factors besides grades and test scores.</p>

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<p>It is not clear to me why you find the attention you received objectionable. Do you feel you are not qualified to matriculate at these colleges? Or do you feel that your self-identification as “Hispanic” is not in fact an accurate description of how you live your life, so perhaps you are not deserving of the attention directed at URMs? </p>

<p>The anti-AA contingent has generally argued that the “catch-up” education for URMs ought to take place in K-12, and not college. Here is an example of colleges making the effort to educate a self-proclaimed URM about college opportunities during her k-12 years, and it seems you still find it offensive. The colleges have not admitted you, nor made a promise to admit you, nor are the elite ones even likely to admit you at all. So why do you take issue with what they have done?</p>

<p>Perhaps you ought to decline to state your race next time, if you prefer not to be targeted as a URM.</p>

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<p>"sanguinity,</p>

<p>As I mentioned in an earlier post, I know many “Asian” and “Asian-American” students. I know them pretty well, since my house was the big hang-out for my son’s multiracial, multiethnic, multireligious group of friends.</p>

<p>Your stereotype does not in any way describe the kids I know. Unless you count the kid who got enraged if you thought he was from the PRC instead of Taiwan…</p>

<p>It sounds like you have lived in an enclave of sorts. Perhaps the difference is that we are in an academic community."</p>

<p>I live in a rich, 95% white town with high levels of education and everything in CT. And some of the asian kids and their parents still believe that blacks are an inferior race, or that Chinese are superior. Are you people telling me that these kids aren’t d-bags? Would universities really want to accept kids like this? I’m not hating asians, but I certainly don’t pride myself in just “being asian”; being proud of your race is pretty unnecessary imo. And I’m not saying asians are automatically worse, but I am pointing out that many asians do have such character flaws.</p>

<p>Maybe in a more diverse place this wouldn’t be happening, but the Northeast isn’t exactly heterogeneous.</p>

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<p>FYI, everyone is racist, white and Asian people equally. Regardless, the issue of individual racism is irrelevant to discrimination that targets ALL people of a specific race.</p>

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[QUOTE=Sangunity]

I live in a rich, 95% white town with high levels of education and everything in CT. And some of the asian kids and their parents still believe that blacks are an inferior race, or that Chinese are superior. Are you people telling me that these kids aren’t d-bags? Would universities really want to accept kids like this? I’m not hating asians, but I certainly don’t pride myself in just “being asian”; being proud of your race is pretty unnecessary imo. And I’m not saying asians are automatically worse, but I am pointing out that many asians do have such character flaws.

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<p>So just because some Asians are racist means that all of them should be affected?</p>

<p>Why in the world are you generalizing people by their race anyways?</p>

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<p>I am just saying that some people have poor character and aren’t going to be accepted. I don’t believe that they are generalized in that manner, but I think that character flaws sometimes are conveyed in the application ====>rejection</p>

<p>All people of all races are racist obviously (Avenue Q!) but it always varies in degrees and what %. In China for example…the level of racism is pretty disturbing, and some of it has transferred to the US.</p>

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<p>^ So Asian people are -more- racist than white people, in general? What evidence do you have for this? Anecdotes are not evidence.</p>

<p>If people have poor character, that will show through on their application. But I suspect any character rejections would be evenly distributed across all races. Otherwise, one race would have poorer character than another, and I’ve seen NO evidence of that.</p>