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<p>In order to emigrate to America, Asians needed to be very educated or have technical careers (i.e., the “brain drain”). This is not true of other ethnicities. </p>
<p>So it shouldn’t be a big surprise that the kids of these Asian immigrants are better academically on average.</p>
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<p>Is railroad building considered a technical career?</p>
<p>Annnnd after the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, Asian immigrants mostly stopped being a source of cheap/uneducated labor. I’m pretty sure most of the Asians in America emigrated in decades recent enough for collegealum’s point to be true.</p>
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<p>Yes, that was my point really. </p>
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<p>Dwight, by “before” I meant the same as currently, in response to the expressed worry from a number of the posters throughout CC that the removal of race based admission policy would supposedly even further increase the percentage of Asians in coveted schools (which they deem to be unacceptable and undesirable). I just wanted to point out that this is directly contradictory to the equally prevalent claim that somehow the rejection of “highly qualified” Asians has little to do with their race and all to do with their “statistically demonstrated unoriginality”. If the latter is the case, removal of race from the equation would generate an equally diverse class, of kids from a variety of backgrounds, talents, and interest. Which way is it?</p>
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<p>You saw the two phrases and missed the in-betweens :p? There are multiple levels of discrimination that we can talk about. There is discrimination at the institutional level that is difficult to quantify because of the ambiguous and subjective nature of holistic admissions. As outsiders we can look at SAT scores because it is one of the only objective factors available. </p>
<p>There is, also, implicit discrimination that happens to everyone, no matter what the conscious brain say otherwise, and it can be targeted towards any group. For evidence on that, you can check out any of the latest psychology studies on implicit stereotype or unconscious discrimination. </p>
<p>Btw, we can all debate about this all night, but then all of us wouldn’t be doing much of anything else :)</p>
<p>Oh okay. I can’t speak for them. If race-blind admissions results in a huge Asian admit rate, I’m all for that. My position is that there’s no evidence to suspect it will, nor is there a feasible way to achieve race-blind admissions that doesn’t result in a host of other problems.</p>
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<p>Okay but the burden is still on you to substantiate your claim, regardless of the level of ease of doing so.</p>
<p>EDIT: I just read every post in this topic. The only evidence put forth to support the argument that less qualified non-Asians are getting in over more qualified Asians is that A. Asian admits have higher SAT scores and B. SAT score is a measurable proxy of qualification. I don’t believe B is a sound statement for reasons given above, but let’s talk about A. Could someone find me the statistic of how SAT score among admits breaks down by race? </p>
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<p>Yes but how do you eliminate that? You have to have human admissions officers so the solution is then to be completely race-blind. I don’t see how you can do that in a way that doesn’t undermine the admissions process given that race is heavily tied to culture, and culture is a meaningful way in which a statistically significant number of students represent themselves in their application.</p>
<p>Both Berkeley and Texas have eliminated race enough from the process that no one is accusing them of discrimination, so it’s more than possible. While there are a number of “measurable proxy of qualification” SAT score is absolutely one of them, along with GPA and any other quantifiable numbers. </p>
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<p>I’ll leave that to the person actually filling the lawsuit. (Unless if you pay me by the hour, in which case I’ll go dig up all the old anecdotes.)</p>
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<p>Do you take Crimson Cash?</p>
<p>Is Crimson cash same as leprechaun’s gold?</p>
<p>Ok, I didn’t read the entire thread by any means, but there’s little question I had throughout reading this post.
Several people here talked about preserving diversity in universities, thus the affirmative action policies. I agree with the idea, after all university IS about meeting new people and new ideas. My question is, however, why having a lot of Asians necessarily means no diversity.
After all, the race composition shows that Caucasians account for more than fifty percent of university students. That doesn’t seem very heterogeneous to my eyes. So why do Asians have to be restricted to something like below ten percent?? Why can’t they be twenty or thirty, or whatever percent of the schools they aee qualified for?? Why is a Caucasian majority acceptable but an Asian majority not?? The Asian kids</p>
<p>who apply come from so many different countries. It’s really unfair to say they don’t contribute to diversity at all.
I’m not saying here that everyone should be judged on the same standard; I do agree that economic conditions should be considered. But I don’t think people should be categorized and suppressef based on their race alone.</p>
<p>For Harvard, a significantly number of students came from MA. It is disproportional comparing to other states. Is it unfair? Some of you may argue that Harvard is discriminating the whole nations and favoring MA. But, it is fair because Harvard is located in MA. Yale is doing the some thing for CT. Stanford is admitting more students from CA. Should we ban the use of the state of residency in admission?<br>
Fairness is always relative from one’s perspective. I would agree it is tougher for asian students to gain admission to Harvard, but it is not discrimination.</p>
<p>This article was published April 11, 2011.
[High-achieving</a> Asian-Americans are being shut out of top schools - The Boston Globe](<a href=“http://www.boston.com/news/education/higher/articles/2011/04/17/high_achieving_asian_americans_are_being_shut_out_of_top_schools/?s_campaign=8315]High-achieving”>http://www.boston.com/news/education/higher/articles/2011/04/17/high_achieving_asian_americans_are_being_shut_out_of_top_schools/?s_campaign=8315)</p>
<p>The Asian ceiling
“They just all sort of magically end up with under 20 percent Asian students”</p>
<p>^From that article:</p>
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<p>This is clearly irrelevant to Harvard, where no one is getting in with 550s period.</p>
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<p>I don’t see how that’s not discrimination. Nor do I know how you’ve come to the conclusion that it’s tougher for asian students to get into Harvard, when there’s no evidence of that.</p>
<p>@careld - Despite the lip service paid to diversity no one actually cares. You’ve cited a good piece of evidence.</p>
<p>I wish people would be clear about what “harder to get in” means. We’re talking about a conditional probability here but no one says what we are conditioning on. Is it conditional on just race? Race and applying? Race, SAT score, and applying? It turns out to matter a lot. Black people who apply are probably 3x as likely to get in than Asians who apply. Blacks with SATs 2100-2300 who apply are probably 5-10x as likely as similar Asians to get in. But Asians in general are something like 5-10x as likely to get in. Conditioning on what school you went to it’s probably Asians more likely if both went to a bad, average or good school while blacks are more likely if both went to an elite school (prep schools, TJ, Stuyvesant).</p>
<p>The evidence to prove that asians have a harder time to get into Harvard is locked in the vault in the Admission Office :-). Until the adcom releases the data on all applicants, no one can prove it. But the anecdotal evidence is quite clear and there is no point arguing about it.</p>
<p>However, it is not discrimination at least legally since the admission policy that results in a ceiling for asians did not single out any racial or ethnic groups for rejection. It is essentially a quota system in the name of diversity. There is a quota (some would argue that it is a soft one) for each geographic region, each income group, each racial group, to reach a predetermined demo for the incoming freshman class. This hollistic admission policy is designed based on the precedents set in previous court cases and it would be very difficult for any plaintiff to prove discrimination. The Crimson actually had articles from the last several decades to illiustrate the evolution of Harvard’s admission policy.</p>
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<p>Anecdotal evidence is invalid. I don’t know what your sample size is. I don’t know what selection bias it has. I don’t know if it’s true or not. I don’t even know if it exists. Let alone saying that “there is no point arguing about it.”</p>
<p>Jeesh. It is not exactly a minor deal to advocate that a 375 year old, $32 billion, world-renowned institution overhaul its admissions process. One would think that it would be fitting to rely on more than “conventional wisdom.”</p>
<p>@HarvardParent </p>
<p>A balance is important to ensure the School COMMUNITY thrives with kids having exposure to others from different races and economic background.</p>
<p>**Just a food for thought… **</p>
<p>Looking at it from another angle, why is there such a disproportionate number of African American basketball players (82%) in the NBA as compared to their numbers in the general population (12.6%)? 61% of NCAA Division I college basketball players are African Americans. Should we be some how limiting that to some arbitrary number like 30% or 40%? </p>
<p>Why is it that we care so much about excellence in sports, but don’t care about the diversity of including other races will bring? Why is it that when it comes to education there is a different standard? Don’t we want excellence in Academics as well?</p>