<p>With some difficulty, you can change where you live. I myself know parents who were willing to drive their children two hours a day to “better schools” as well as parents who switched their children out of schools where they [the children] were not athletically competitive to schools where they were. It is not easy, especially for poor families, but it is not impossible.</p>
<p>With great ease, you can change your choice of major.</p>
<p>It is impossible to change your racial classification. The government says what you are and what you are not, though you have the option of not identifying with any of their choices.</p>
<p>Thus, we see that these elements you are referring to are not comparable to the use of racial classification, which unlike the others, is intransigent.</p>
<p>I remind you once again that when President Lowell attempted to use geographic preferences to limit Jewish enrollment, he failed, miserably. Who is to say that this cannot also be true of the Jews’ “successors”?</p>
<p>Hey, you know what? You’re right: people are entitled to have whatever preferences they’d like. But I don’t want to subsidize your prejudices, and I surely know that you don’t want to subsidize mine. That’s why my position is that these private colleges can craft a class however they like, but if they are employing racial preferences, they ought to be bold enough to distance themselves from federal assistance.</p>
<p>Straw man. No one is in denial that supply exceeds capacity.</p>
<p>However, when the research presented in the opening post of this thread suggests that race-neutral admissions will increase the percentage of Asian enrollment from the mid-20s to the high-30s, you’d have to be apathetic, brainwashed into accepting a perverse form of social justice, or just plain foolish not to take action.</p>
<p>There will never be race neutral admissions at elite private US colleges because the admissions offices choose to put together classes that reflects and represent the diversity of the US as much as possible. And some people are just too immature and/ or lacking in knowledge about the admissions process at elite colleges to accept it.</p>
<p>First it’s the straw man, now it’s the ad hominem. Using the whole book of fallacies, I see!</p>
<p>Your first sentence supposes that only through race-conscious admissions can diversity be attained. Such a view appears to be widely held among the pro-racial preference crowd, but it is one that is unsupported by research and largely unapproved by Justice Kennedy, the key vote on any matters pertaining to the use and legitimacy of racial classifications.</p>
<p>Again, Espenshade’s research suggests that at minimum, race-neutral admissions will result in 7.5% “underrepresented” enrollment, which is far from a “virtual disappearance.” I have repeatedly emphasized over the past few pages my view that the number can only increase as more “soft” variables are taken into consideration. If you argue that 7.5% is not enough, then I must ask, what is “enough”, and is that not a quota?</p>
<p>Your second sentence is overly smug in its insinuation that the elites’ way is the only acceptable way of doing things. Such a view is close-minded to say the least, and seems to suggest that diversity is only acceptable when there’s viewpoints that you agree with. I ask, is that diversity at all?</p>
<p>If the elites are so committed towards “diversity”, then why do only 15% of their students have Pell Grants? And why aren’t their more bottom-teir students? Don’t they represent a part of America too?</p>
<p>My, you certainly like to read insinuations into what others have clearly posted. I never said that the “elites way” as you put it, is the only way to address admissions, I just said that at elite colleges, which is the subject of this thread, is it not?, admissions officers have made it clear through their admission decisions in recent years, that they make a conscious effort to select a class that reflects the diversity of the US, as much as possible and as they interpret the definition of “diversity”. And your repeated referencing one book by one author to prove a point you wish to make, does not change the way admissions decisions are made. There is no current case before the Supreme Court regarding this issue, and until there is, and the court rules, the way admissions decisions are made by private colleges are not likely to change in the near future.</p>
<p>I never said a 630/630/630 was bad. I was simply expressing my incredulity that it’s “the same” as an 800/800/800. Also, you didn’t answer my previous question: Then under your reasoning, a 630/630/630 Asian or White kid doesn’t need to show any “serious subjective criteria” that out-impresses them over their higher scoring peers of identical racial classification?</p>
<p>Also, I am not bothered by “the SAT score dilemma,” as I don’t even believe there is one. Unlike you, I do not think there’s anything “wrong” with the SAT.</p>
<p>“If the elites are so committed towards “diversity”, then why do only 15% of their students have Pell Grants? And why aren’t their more bottom-teir students?
Because many bottom tier students don’t know, or aren’t aware of the generous FA offered by elite colleges. Take a look at the posts every year year on the FA forums- the students who go to the HS with the best college guidance programs [ the richer high schools] are 'in the loop”. Poor kids who go to low performing HS often have less than knowledgeable guidance counselors. Elite colleges are trying to attract high performing, poor students who might not otherwise even apply, which is one of the reasons they recently expanded their FA award programs, completely replacing loans with grants as a way of helping poorer students afford a college education.</p>
<p>Under my reasoning, (which was that above a certain score, it is possible that elites deem prospective freshmen equally capable of academic success, so higher scores don’t matter - perhaps 630 and above all get a “5” in the standardized testing category, for example), the answer would be “yes.” It would make sense that higher scores might be used to break a tie. But I think it is highly unlikely that all things as between two applicants are ever truly equal.</p>
<p>‘And this type of post is supposed to refute Espenshade’s research?’
Sigh… You have latched on to Espendhades research like a pit bull on the leg of the post man. Try reading a lot more books about colleges admissions by many authors over many years, like others have done, and maybe then you will develop a “big picture viewpoint”.</p>
<p>You’re still brushing aside Espenshade’s research as opposed to actually presenting other research that has cast doubt on the findings.</p>
<p>I’m not saying that Espenshade’s research is definitive. Throughout this thread, I have merely maintained that posts such as yours do not constitute true rebuttals of the research, as they do nothing but brush aside the cold, hard truth.</p>
<p>She’s telling you that it’s not the cold, hard truth, because the parameters of the research did not include the real-life dynamics of college admissions, with multiple variables unseen in that research. Research is fine when/if the research applies to the theoretical situation intended; in this case, it didn’t & doesn’t. The researchers artificially narrowed the universe they were investigating, applying not the full set of variables used in that universe, but their own variables, which either they preferred to limit themselves to, or assumed incorrectly were singularly significant.</p>
<p>Validity is at the core of all scientific studies. To be valid, the design of the study (which should take into account the environment being studied), and the data (which should be comprehensive enough to hold all the factors at issue) must be appropriate to the subject or realm studied. In this case, both the design & the data fell short, compromising the so-called “conclusions.”</p>
<p>Siserune has more to say about this on the Columbia board.</p>
<p>I repeat my as yet unanswered question: if the problems are so numerous and so obvious, why hasn’t anyone pointed them out in a published paper?</p>
<p>As I said before, I have a high degree of skepticism to siserune’s posts, as some of his posts on this thread have exhibited a callous disregard for fundamental statistical principles (viz. significance), slipshod mathematical reasoning, or completely unfounded conclusions (viz. Asian parents’ allegedly encouraging their children to pick “low hanging fruit”).</p>
<p>Besides, siserune himself argued, somewhat hubristically, that the standards for admission in social science are “low.” If he’s right, then that’s all the easier for you or he to publish a paper detailing the “flaws” of Espenshade’s research.</p>
<p>Well we certainly differ in our opinions of both siserune and E&C. Based on my own reading, I find siserune’s support for his statistical arguments, both valid and credible in this case.</p>
<p>As he also told you, not every study rises to the level of interest in peers reviewing that study, for a variety of reasons. The absence of a formal review does not in itself validate the so-called “conclusions” in the study.</p>
<p>That doesn’t surprise me, as he shares your views. My views are almost diametrically opposed to his, though I sometimes wonder whether he actually believes what he says and whether he’s just playing Devil’s Advocate. In any case, he has certainly “inspired” me, if you will, to seriously study statistics.</p>
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<p>But is this really one of those “meh” studies? Espenshade’s finding was fairly controversial. Just look at this thread if you don’t believe that! His 2005 paper with Chung found a “loss equivalent to 50 points” for Asian applicants, a finding that was certainly novel at the time.</p>
<p>Also, I can’t help but chuckle at your last sentence, as it eerily reminds me of that classic Rumsfeldian quote, “The absence of evidence is not the evidence of absence,” made famous by the Boondocks.</p>
<p>I completely disagree with your assessment. What else is new? If we can all disagree on the definition of merit, there is no reason why we can not disagree on the definition of bias, right?</p>
<p>BTW, I notice your position has become even more “reasonable” after my initial comment. You don’t have to try that hard to prove me wrong.;)</p>
<p>No offense intended, and none taken.</p>
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<p>My experience here in Ontario is that there is little incentive to “cheat” on admission at the undergrad level. The schools try to maintain an average of C for a large class, but a B average is needed for an honours degree, something that is necessary if you want to go to grad school. I do believe, however, there is a hidden quota for professional programs such as medicine. An old colleague of mine, whose sister-in-law was a registrar at a major Canadian university, told me as much.</p>
<p>I just heard that Qian Xuesen, the brilliant former head of the Chinese space program, passed away the other day at the age of 98. He tried to take out US citizenship during the McCarty years and was accused of being a Communist.</p>
<p>He was held for five years and was exchanged for some US airmen held by the Chinese since the Korean War. His boss and friend, the president of Caltech at the time, said he would rather see his friend die than took all that secret back with him to China. I also can not believe the US did not try to “engineer” an accident.</p>
Please don’t misquote me. There is a big difference between a twinge and a cringe. I think you may not quite get the atmospherics of a group that is already significantly overrepresented compared to its distribution in the population claiming that it is being subjected to systematic racial discrimination. It may be true, but it’s not exactly segregation. And it seems a bit cavalier for you to dismiss concerns about African-Americans in particular being significantly underrepresented compared to their distribution in the population. You seem to think that 2.8% admissions for African-Americans is enough. I remind you that there are almost three times as many African-Americans in this country than Asians (not to mention other URMs). Admitting 2.8% African-Americans and 39% Asians may be justified, but it definitely shows some kind of imbalance somewhere.</p>