Harvard Crimson Editorial:" On Asian American Admissions"

Parents Forum
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<p>Harvard Crimson has decided to offer their opinion on "Asian American Admissions" Read and let the discussion begin....</p>

<p><a href="http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=515908%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=515908&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>Opinion
On Asian-American Admissions
Affirmative action, despite its shortcomings, is largely effective
Published On 11/20/2006 1:18:20 AM
By THE CRIMSON STAFF</p>

<p>A Nov. 11 Wall Street Journal article by Daniel Golden—a 2004 winner of the Pulitzer Prize for his series of articles exposing the huge admissions advantages afforded to privileged white students—exposed what might appear to be another disturbing college admissions trend. Some analyses of standardized test scores show that Asian-American applicants, on average, must attain higher scores to snag admission to some of the nation’s most desirable schools. But these statistics, while initially disturbing, are the result of a just and well intentioned system of affirmative action in college admissions. That system should not be abandoned in the face of harsh numbers.</p>

<p>Yet the numbers are startling. A study by the Center for Equal Opportunity found that Asian-American applicants to selective colleges have significantly higher test scores than applicants of other races. For example, in 2005, the median test score for Asian students offered admission to the University of Michigan was 50 points higher than the median score for white students, 140 points higher than Hispanic students, and 240 points higher than black students. (The SAT used a 1600-point scale at the time.)</p>

<p>This comparison yields figures worthy of pause. It suggests the existence of an implicit quota on the numbers of Asian-American students at some schools. (Asian-Americans make up about 4.5 percent of the nation’s population, but only 10 percent to 30 percent of students at elite U.S. universities.) But there are two reasons why the score gap is not as startling as it should seem. First, the nature of affirmative action exaggerates the differences in measures of academic success for which it is trying to correct. For instance, students of color, who tend to be poorer, average lower SAT scores than wealthier students. Their lower SAT scores perhaps indicate a lack of opportunity to succeed academically, because of their financial circumstances, more than they suggest an academic deficiency.</p>

<p>Second, quantifiable academic criteria, especially SAT scores, are not the sole criteria for college admissions. Colleges are first and foremost academic institutions, but when a college chooses each new class, it does so with the knowledge that not everybody who graduates will be launched into an academic career. A college such as Harvard is searching for students who will be leaders in all spheres of the world, and that search requires picking applicants from all walks of life. Moreover, colleges seek to balance their classes with students of all backgrounds, which is difficult to do if some minorities are not sufficiently represented.</p>

<p>Colleges, then, are right to forgive some students’ lower scores. Leadership qualities, extracurricular involvement, achievement outside of the classroom, and raw demographics are factors that are key in evaluating every applicant. When the numbers are tabulated, a few snapshots of the data will look extreme, but this is no reason to flee from a worthy process.</p>

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<p>The most important word in that Op-Ed piece = "snapshot." It is by snapshot that some posters on other threads have evaluated just who is supposedly, in their great wisdom and experience evaluating applications, destined or worthy of upper-level admissions to various schools. A snapshot does not a portrait make.</p>

<p>And I actually thought the piece danced around the edges, if that was the complete citation. Tame support for class balance.</p>

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<p>Here's my problem with statements like this: Why do we seem to accept without question that ethnic Asian students apparently exhibit less "leadership qualities, extracurricular involvement, [or] achievement outside the classroom" than other students? Stated that way, it seems nonsensical. </p>

<p>For me, it is an article of faith that intelligence is a human quality, not related to race or ethnicity. (By the way, nothing much in the policies I support turns on that.) Why would anyone think that leadership, compassion, energy are unevenly distributed by race and ethnicity? All things being equal, I would expect ethnic Chinese, Korean, and Indian kids to exhibit those qualities in about the same proportions and degrees as ethnic Anglo-Saxon, Jewish, Polish, Italian, or African-American kids. </p>

<p>So when Asian kids complain that they seem to be held to higher standards on the SAT/GPA front, why is it any kind of answer to say "Oh, well the colleges are looking at things holistically. Leadership, etc., counts too."? I would think that anyone arguing for a vast leadership deficit among ethnic Asian kids equivalent to 50 SAT points would have an enormous burden of proof to carry. I haven't seen any proof at all.</p>

<p>That does not mean that I have joined the crowd crying "Discrimination!" I continue to believe that the explanation for at least most of the SAT gap lies with the underrepresentation of ethnic Asian kids among team athletes, children of major donors, and perhaps prospective Classics majors. And I think that's legitimate, and temporary. But that's a far cry from the insulting suggestion that there are fewer leaders and extra-academic achievers among ethnic Asians.</p>

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<p>I agree that the editorial was poorly worded.</p>

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<p>Another viewpoint from Harvard students. They seem to have a handle on the nuances of this issue. </p>

<p>Opinion</p>

<p>Convenient Elitism</p>

<p>Published On 11/27/2006 1:20:36 AM</p>

<p>By DEBORAH Y. HO and SHAYAK SARKAR</p>

<p>Harvard is not a meritocracy. Not only do the costs of this system weigh disproportionately upon Asian Americans, the considerations prioritized above merit also come at the expense of true diversity beyond racial tokenism: a diversity of socioeconomic background and representation from within racial groups. </p>

<p>To pretend that applicants’ qualifications and life experiences are all that matter in admissions only results in superficial explanations for the discrepancies in admissions rates among different groups. College admission is an unavoidably subjective process, and, according to the admissions office, the vast majority of applicants could be successful at Harvard. The limited number of places available demands some kind of secondary screening process beyond academic ability, and rightly so: All students are more than just numbers and contribute both inside and outside the classroom. That said, the rosy vision of the admissions process as choosing a diverse set of the best of the best is not the whole story. </p>

<p>Harvard, for better or worse, would not be Harvard without legacies, athletes, and underrepresented minorities, considerations that complicate an already not-so-meritocratic process. Recent discussions regarding the lower acceptance rate for apparently more qualified Asian American applicants have revealed an ugly bias against Asian Americans at Ivy League admissions offices. According to Jerome Karabel’s book “The Chosen,” this bias has been prevalent since the 1980s. </p>

<p>In fact, in response to public pressure about discrimination and quotas in 1988, Harvard’s Dean of Admissions and Financial Aid William R. Fitzsimmons ’67 asserted that “while Asian Americans are slightly stronger than whites on academic criteria, they are slightly less strong on extracurricular criteria.” These comments are eerily reminiscent of the stereotyping of Jews in attempts to limit their enrollment in the early 20th century. </p>

<p>Daniel Golden reveals in “The Price of Admission” that Harvard admissions officers rank “Asian American candidates on average below whites in ‘personal qualities,’” as well as frequently comment that they are “‘quiet/shy” and “hard workers.” Without evidence to substantiate these generalizations, these comments smack of a self-fulfilling stereotype: Admissions officers expect Asian applicants to have such qualities, and therefore see these in them more so than they would in a non-Asian applicant. Besides the intrinsically problematic nature of such generalizations, since when did shy, quiet, and hardworking somehow become “below average personal qualities?” </p>

<p>We, the students of this university, are not some hand-selected intellectual elite that unquestionably earned our place here. We were chosen to reflect diverse forms of merit in an arguably arbitrary way. Asian Americans are underrepresented relative to their academic performance simply because, in light of other considerations that are prioritized above merit, there are more qualified Asian applicants than will be accepted. Rationalizations based on speculation about the personal qualities of these students compared to those of other ethnic groups are based on ill-informed and racist stereotypes. </p>

<p>Arguably, there are benefits that come with preferring legacies and athletes, but these come at the cost of not only rejecting well qualified Asian applicants but also admitting a more diverse candidate pool. Karabel reports in “The Chosen” that 40 percent of legacies were admitted in 2002 compared to 11 percent of other applicants. There is a bias here that is not simply based on merit: While one might argue that legacy admits are simply correlated with better qualifications, high-performing Asian Americans are suffering the opposite of this kind of preferential admission. </p>

<p>Furthermore, former Princeton President William G. Bowen and interim University President Derek C. Bok show in their book “The Shape of the River” that only one percent of white students at the most selective institutions come from the lowest socioeconomic backgrounds, while over 90 percent of students at these selective institutions come from households above the median American income ($60,000 per year). This lack in socioeconomic diversity is also linked to racial diversity, skewing not only students’ perceptions of what is normal or average in this country, but also what racial categories such as “Asian American” really represent. </p>

<p>While race does tend to correlate with socioeconomic status, a broad range of socioeconomic backgrounds is represented in the category of Asian Americans. Comprised of all people from Asian descent, the majority of whom are close to the immigrant experience, Asian Americans came to the U.S. as everything from job-seeking professionals to refugees fleeing oppressive regimes. A recent post to The Crimson’s blog, The Magenta, admitted that The Crimson’s editorial on Asian American admissions used the term “loosely” to denote people of East Asian descent, completely disregarding entire subpopulations of the term “Asian American.” Sadly, this casual use is far from uncommon but does a serious disservice to populations such as underrepresented Southeast Asian Americans, who were found in a study by New York University to have one of the highest high school dropout rates. </p>

<p>When considering how much further admissions must progress in order to include these and other often forgotten communities, there is more to consider than race. Our concern is not simply about clarifying the contentions regarding Asians in the college admissions process; it is about acknowledging that privileging legacies, athletes, and other groups necessarily precludes a meritocracy. </p>

<p>There is a fine line between subjectivity and systematic exclusivity, and the comments documented by Golden attest to how easily the former can lead to the latter when the process loses transparency and accountability. We sacrifice meritocracy because of our belief in the merit of diversity, but it is our responsibility to ensure that this diversity is not used to justify a convenient elitism. </p>

<p>Deborah Y. Ho ’07 is a biochemistry concentrator in Mather House. She is the co-founder and co-president of the Asian American Women’s Association. Shayak Sarkar ’07 is an applied math concentrator in Mather House. </p>

<p><a href="http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=515995%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=515995&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

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<p>That was certainly a lot better written than the original editorial, and I think it showed a more sophisticated understanding of the issues.</p>

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<p>Another viewpoint from Harvard students. </p>

<p><a href="http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=516072%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.thecrimson.com/article.aspx?ref=516072&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>Affirmative action, after what seemed like a lengthy departure from the headlines, has catapulted back into the public view in large part because of the civil rights lawsuit of Yale freshman Jian Li. </p>

<p>When I told my mom, an ESL teacher at a parochial high school in North Philadelphia, the general outline of the current uproar over Asian Americans and college admissions, she became angry, lifted her voice, and said “This is ridiculous! ‘Over-represented?’ My kids’ parents can’t even speak English! [The kids] work for five or six hours each night in their parents’ stores, and still manage to get all of their homework done by the next day. Without fail. They work harder than anyone.” </p>

<p>You see, my mother works with a large number of Asian-American students, almost all of whom are recent arrivals from China, Indonesia, Vietnam, and Thailand. She went on to detail the superhuman—to me at least—exertions of her students and their parents. Yes, the “hard working immigrant” is a standby American cliché, but the people I had described to me were dedicated in a way that I can only vaguely imagine. </p>

<p>Now because my mother’s students are from decidedly unprivileged economic backgrounds—many of their parents owe a significant amount of money to the people that “helped” them get out of rural China—Ivy League schools are absolutely out of the question. Instead many get scholarships to local schools such as Temple or Drexel. Yet it strikes me as profoundly unfair that these students, or perhaps more realistically their children, could be deemed by some admissions officer to be an “over-represented” minority, and thus really not a minority at all. </p>

<p>Justifying the school’s current policy, The Daily Princetonian incredulously noted “While we all aspire to some mythical ‘colorblind’ society, our society continues to treat people differently based on their race and ethnicity.” While it is possible to disagree about the degree to which racial differences affect life experience in America, only the most foolish would suggest that they do not exist. Yet what is profoundly mystifying to me, is why racism, or “differential treatment,” or whatever else one sees fit to call it, is somehow supposed to magically skip over Asian Americans in general and the sort of first-generation Asian Americans taught by my mother in particular. </p>

<p>What conceivable sort of advantage is provided by having non-English speaking parents who work at least 12 hours a day in menial labor? Clearly such people face some economic barriers and racial discrimination, so why is their treatment not worthy of redress? Is there some sort of “racism scale” on which the difficulties faced by Asians are smaller than those faced by either Hispanics or blacks? If so, who makes such a scale and, more importantly, who is doing the weighing? </p>

<p>I know enough of American history to be skeptical of the establishment and its willingness to open itself up to competition—hello there, legacy admissions!—and I’m thus wary of those who argue that our society is already a meritocratic paradise. I’m also extremely wary of those who claim that the best way to fix this is to engage in a sort of therapeutic racism that, inevitably, is forced to decide who among the minorities is a “deserving” minority and who is an “over-represented” one. In theory, admissions should be done the way many elite colleges claim they are conducted: holistically, with no explicit quantitative benefit for certain races. But looking at admissions data, it seems that colleges are giving such weight to considerations of race that the result is de facto quotas. </p>

<p>As I see it, the only way for the situation to be improved—it is not capable of being perfectly “fixed” since it exists in the decidedly imperfect real world—is to shine a great deal of sunlight on a process that is now quite secretive. If universities want to make “holistic” admissions decisions, that is certainly their prerogative. In fact it is probably the only way to build a campus that doesn’t stink of depression as a quick visit to Caltech or MIT will attest. </p>

<p>However, since the leading private universities receive such massive amounts of federal money, and since their admissions slots are so coveted, I think it would be reasonable if they let the public know more about their admissions practices. More specifically, I think that schools receiving a significant amount of federal money, say $50 million, should be required to publicly release the GPAs, grades, SAT scores, AP scores, lists of extracurricular activities, income, geographic region, and race of all students who applied and the admissions decision rendered on each one. Students would of course be identified anonymously. This would allow the public a better idea of just how schools make their decisionbys, and would allow the statistically inclined to run a few analyses seeing how schools treat people from different regions, races, and economic classes. Would this be imperfect? Absolutely, but I still think it would be vastly better than the current system and would allow the public to verify how schools follow through on their own rhetoric. </p>

<p>Please note that I am not suggesting outside interference in admissions decisions, but merely greater public scrutiny of the process. Given that Li’s suit seems possible only in large part because of incomplete or unavailable information, I think that, in the long run, this plan could only help Harvard and other similar schools.</p>

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<p>This is an issue to think about:</p>

<p>
[QUOTE]
What conceivable sort of advantage is provided by having non-English speaking parents who work at least 12 hours a day in menial labor? Clearly such people face some economic barriers and racial discrimination, so why is their treatment not worthy of redress? Is there some sort of “racism scale” on which the difficulties faced by Asians are smaller than those faced by either Hispanics or blacks? If so, who makes such a scale and, more importantly, who is doing the weighing?

[/QUOTE]
</p>

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<p>I don't know about racial discrimination, but low-income students of all backgrounds are eligible for financial aid--up to a full ride under the Harvard Financial Aid initiative. </p>

<p>I find a stereotyping rather interesting. The middle class African American applicant vs. the Asian kid who immigrated as a child, whose parents do not speak English and toil 12 hours a day. My S has some friends from hs now at Harvard. The parents did immigrate from the PRC when they were children, but they are high-tech professionals. They are not rich but they are very highly educated. S does have a friend whose parents toil in the proverbial Chinese restaurant; she is attending a top 10 LAC--presumably on finaid.</p>

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<p>The first editorial is absolute proof that Harvard admission cannot be simply on merit. Yeesh!</p>

<p>OK. Here's a report from the front from someone who actually teaches college students.</p>

<p>The best students do not always get the best grades. In fact, I would say that my very best students almost never do. That may come as a shock to some of you, but it's true. I pretty much have to give an A to anyone who does nothing wrong on a test. Often, that means taking no chances. </p>

<p>I have had many, many students leave my classes with As when I don't believe I had ever heard them speak a single word, contribute a single thing to class, or do a single interesting research project. They color within all the lines.</p>

<p>Now, if I taught at a very selective school, would I want a classroom full of people like that? Ahm, no. In fact, I'd probably have to find a different job, because all the joy in teaching would be sucked right out by students like this.</p>

<p>So, this idea that high grades or even high test scores indicate "merit" is simply, in my experience, untrue.</p>

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<p>If I were on the MIT or Olin Adcom, I would go for Washdad's S with his so-so-GPA but total dedication to his EC, rather than someone with straight As but little else to offer.</p>

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<p>There are many kinds of merit.</p>

<p>The world needs people who color within the lines. It also needs people who don't. </p>

<p>I would prefer to have my teeth fixed, my car's brakes repaired, and my taxes done by the former group of people, but I would be more likely to read a novel written by the latter.</p>

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<p>
[quote]
And, for what it is worth, playing the "poorer menial laborers" card would hardly work in the favor of Asians.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>I'm not sure what this means. </p>

<p>In the 1990s, there were more Vietnamese students at Harvard than there are currently. One explanation for this was that Affirmative Action was used to help the children of refugees. It's now been nearly thirty years, and these refugee children have now been assimilated into the Asian-American category. That is my hunch--not a result of research.</p>

<p>In the 1990s, I met a Vietnamese student whose parents were refugees and had been relocated to a community in the South. He told me that the Vietnamese teenagers in his town were more or less evenly divided between two groups: the church-going, studious kids who dominated the ranks of vals and sals; and the gang members wannabes who cut classes and adopted a lot of 'tude. they did nothing really bad (hence the wannabe label), but they were definitely not college-bound. </p>

<p>There is something to be considered as well: the highest concentration of Asian-Americans is to be found on the West Coast and TX. For CA residents, the goal is to attend Berkeley or UCLA if possible, or at least one of the UCs, not the Ivies.</p>

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<p>Marian:</p>

<p>I agree with you. In a classroom situation, however, the one's who contribute the most are rarely, if ever, the ones who color within the lines.</p>

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<p>Actually blacks in all economic groups do far worse than Asians in SAT tests, despite the (standard left) attempt to couch the issue as the poor vs less poor.</p>

<p>In addition, blacks at Harvard and most of the super-elites are primarily NOT from lower income categories -but from middle class, upper middle class and above backgrounds - many from private schools - having significant "opportunity"</p>

<p>The article states "colleges, then, are right to forgive some students’ lower scores" - yes ones' w/o any doubt based upon the racial characteristics of certain applicants. </p>

<p>As they admit "that search requires picking applicants from all walks of life" which is w/o any doubt a flat out admission of the use of either direct or disguised racial quotas</p>

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<p>Marite, I apologize for having deleted my posts before I saw your quotation. What I meant is that I doubt that socio-economic data supports the notion of a poorer asian population. For instance, the statistics published by the University of California show that Asians compose the weathiest minority. </p>

<p>I am fully aware of the perils of using generalized statistics that do not account for the differences between ABC and sub-groups such as Hmongs, Khmers, Laotians, and several others. However, the same argument could be made for emigrants from Latin and Central America. </p>

<p>The differences in income and parental education levels among the various sub-groups make the debate about racial discrimination an extremely cloudy one.</p>

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<p>CITATION, we get it. We know you think all African Americans are of substandard IQ, all the result of fatherless, broken homes with mothers who don't attend PTA meetings. They aren't really generationally poor, just lazy, and haven't tried to pull themselves up by their bootstraps, here in the land of opportunity.</p>

<p>I think we all have the score now.</p>

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<p>Massive illegitimacy as a contributing factor to poor educational outcomes will be pointed out by perhaps Bill Cosby or Shelby Steele, and then ignored by the left leaning major media, nor will you see it discussed by the racial quota crowd at these elite universities - instead focusing as usual on the "lack of opportunity" excuse</p>

<p>The intact family, (with father's involved instead of in hiding) as the norm in the Asian community is clearly a key factor in their success</p>

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<p>
[quote]
In addition, blacks at Harvard and most of the super-elites are primarily NOT from lower income categories -but from middle class, upper middle class and above backgrounds - many from private schools - having significant "opportunity"

[/quote]
</p>

<p>This is going to be purely anecdotal. S has several friends who are African-Americans and have ended up at HY. They are middle and upper-middle class--and they have the stats that come with such SES. They are NMFs as well as in top 1 or 2%. Some also have multiple hooks. At least three are legacies, They also had very significant ECs. Two graduated from high school at 16. S also has some African-American friends who did not make it into HY although they had stellar stats as well, but who've ended up in top tier schools. It is true that the AP classes my S took and the academic ECs he participated in had more Caucasian and Asian students than the general population of his high school. But the African-American kids in those classes and ECs were every bit as good as the other students, and those that ended up at HY were really at the top.</p>

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<p>Xiggi:</p>

<p>I agree. Some time ago, UW decided to make a distinction among Asian-American students when it was pointed out that Japanese Americans belonged to the highest income bracket. Chinese-Americans were in the second highest income bracket. But a boost continued to be given to Vietnamese and Cambodian applicants who (at least at the time) had far lower SES.</p>