My point is that even if you could prove that Harvard makes a point of getting a certain “critical mass” of URMs, that is not at all the same as proving that Harvard has a quota to limit the number of Asian students. The statistics might be suggestive, but unless you come up with some evidence of racial animus, or at least some kind of policy smoking gun, you aren’t going to win a case against Harvard. No such smoking gun has ever emerged from any selective school, as far as I know. The case against Princeton did not proceed. No disgruntled admissions officer has come forward to blow the whistle on such practices, and no documents have been leaked. The colleges categorically deny that they are discriminating against Asians on racial grounds. If they are, it’s going to be extremely difficult to prove.</p>
<p>Hunt It is if as the complaint states there are a fluid number of “qualified” Asian American applicants each year but the percentage of “qualified” Asian Americans admitted remains constant from year to year.</p>
<p>And when does “colleges categorically denying that they are discriminating against Asians on racial grounds” mean that there isn’t discrimination? </p>
Wow, u really have no problems perpetuating the racist stereotype that asian kids are a bunch of studious, nerdy drones.</p>
<p>As per the Duke admissions data released to Duke professor Peter Arcidiacono for his 2012 study, Duke gives the essays & EC/leadership a score. It was actually the asian kids who had better essays & EC/leadership scores, not just the high test scores.</p>
<p>So? Maybe Harvard disfavors students who spend a lot of time in cram schools, and this is more prevalent among Asian students. Even if your statistical analysis is correct, that’s a long way from proving deliberate discrimination against Asian students. Even if the case gets to the discovery phase, I predict there will be no policy documents indicating that Harvard should limit the number of Asians, and that all the admissions people will testify that there is no such policy. Then what?</p>
<p>Hunt, you predict “there will be no policy documents”, so you are saying that without a flat out admission to discriminating against Asian American students, Harvard cannot be found to have discriminatory practices. Glad you are so open minded.</p>
<p>What’s so hard about schools just keeping it simple and giving a blind assessment of an applicant’s entire application pkg: ECs, leadership, essay, test scores, GPA, plus bonus points for economic hardship, and letting the chips fall where they may.</p>
Strange to compare race to musical instruments. My kid went through 5 instruments until she found one that she really liked. Wouldn’t it be nice to try on several races before deciding on one?</p>
<p>I try not to judge students who are forced to go to hagwons. Just a lot of sympathy and respect for students who work so hard to achieve a goal, especially if the goal is put upon them by the parents.</p>
<p>“If getting into Harvard is not predicated on test scores, GPA, and EC then what is it predicated on? And why would anyone state that book smart people are real life dumb because they try to excel in Academics?”</p>
<p>Are you new here? Test scores and GPA provide the floor, but then they’re looking to find tomorrow’s leaders. That involves qualities that aren’t necessarily measured by test scores. (Duh.) Or is your argument that a 3.9, 2250 “deserves” the spot more than the 3.8, 2150? That’s not how we think here in America. It may be how people think other places, and that’s fine. </p>
<p>But part of being “book-smart and real-life dumb” is not understanding that different cultures have different cultural norms. Or put another way, assuming that the norms in your home country should apply in a new country.</p>
<p>GMT is an expat. She moves around the world interacting with people of different cultures. Part of what makes her <em>smart</em> is that she learns that the cultural norms in China are different from India are different from Germany are different from Singapore are different from whatever. It’s a big deal to hand your business card to someone in Japan. It’s not a big deal here in the US, at all. In some cultures, it’s rude to just get to the point and you ahve to socialize. In other cultures, it’s rude to socialize and waste time, just get to the point. Blah blah blah. People who are real-life smart get this, or they work hard to get this. People who are real-life dumb just extrapolate from what they know to everything else. </p>
<p>“What’s so hard about schools just keeping it simple and giving a blind assessment of an applicant’s entire application pkg: ECs, leadership, essay, test scores, GPA, plus bonus points for economic hardship, and letting the chips fall where they may.”</p>
<p>Because they don’t want to. They don’t want a class comprised of (let’s say) predominantly boarding school kids from Choate, Exeter and Andover; upper middle class Jewish kids from Long Island who teach Hebrew school and work for liberal causes; and Asian kids from San Francisco who play the violin and tennis and are interested mostly in STEM. They want a <em>mix.</em> Too much of ANY “one type” is undesirable. </p>
<p>And yes, they want a critical mix of enough African Americans, Hispanics, etc. to make it comfortable to attract the highest-scoring AA, Hispanics, etc. What’s wrong with that? It’s only wrong if you think that other people have pre-assigned seats that they are then “kicked out of”. But that’s not the case. No one is guaranteed anything. </p>
<p>“Believe it or not, intellect and leadership are not mutually exclusive. Although some will agree with you that “don’t personally think high test scores are proof of intellect”, I’m pretty sure low test scores are proof positive of low intellect. Many would say the same about GPA. Harvard uses test scores in its admission decision so it does have value for Harvard’s purposes. If the tests are so meaningless do away with them in the admission process but most colleges use them, yes, even those schools that are test optional.”</p>
<p>I think there are people who are absolutely incapable of making holistic, gut, intuitive decisions themselves, so they can’t understand how organizations like Harvard et al can do so. They truly cannot process any other way of dealing with people other than by racking and stacking test scores. You can bet they never hire anyone, because in the hiring process you look at a bunch of different factors, soft and hard, experience, schooling, and the ineffable “would they fit here and do I want to work with this person” and you evaluate it all together. It’s their own limitation that they can’t do so, of course. </p>
<p>"There will be a winner and a loser, much like in the college admission process. "</p>
<p>95% of applicants to Harvard “lose,” but that doesn’t make them losers.</p>
<p>Look, I get it - you’ve been spoon-fed all your life that The Only Possible Decent Schools out there are HYPSM, and everything else is yesterday’s oatmeal. And you dutifully did all the things you think would work, or pushed your kids to do the things you think would work. </p>
<p>Oh please! I was indeed sarcastic but my messages are never mixed. </p>
<p>To be clear, I am happy this lawsuit was filed after decades of futile rhetoric and hesitation. People who share your views needed a day in court, and so do the people who might be tired of the perennial complaining and innuendos. </p>
<p>Either way, is it not time to let factual evidence replace idle speculation? Time for actual facts to placed in their correct context? And time to abandon the endless spinning? </p>
<p>In the end what WE believe is irrelevant. I also wish the lawsuit had been better penned and more accurate. </p>
<p>Thousands of HYPSM applicants work just as hard, they just don’t have the luxury of having access to the cram schools that help boost SAT scores to near perfection. So should students who have had intense, almost life long test prep be given an automatic golden ticket of admission? Aren’t these life long test prep kids SUPPOSED to have perfect scores? </p>
<p>As well all know, HYPSM schools can fill their classes 10 times over with accomplished students. So what sets each applicant apart from one another? It’s the essays, LORs, ECs et al. Schools don’t want cookie cutter robots who have spent most of their childhoods training for the SAT Olympics. </p>
<p>A friend took her DD to visit an Ivy League school during spring break. She was given the opportunity to chat with the head of admissions and was told that often times, LORs tank an otherwise stellar application. Some LORs are down right shocking. The applicants are clueless. Her advice? Make sure your LOR writer is on your side and will write an LOR that compliments you. </p>
What I’m saying is that it will require more than statistical evidence alone to find that Harvard has discriminatory practices, and I very much doubt that any such evidence will be forthcoming. As I said, it hasn’t leaked from any highly selective schools in the years that this controversy has been active. I find that pretty suggestive.</p>
<p>And here’s something to consider about the statistical evidence: you say that there has been a fairly static number of Asian students admitted to Harvard each year, despite changes in the number of “qualified” Asian applicants. Why do you assume that the number of Asians is held artificially low–as opposed to artificially high? It’s because you think of qualified in terms of grades and scores. Well, what if a huge proportion of those Asian applicants are high-stats kids without impressive other achievements, and are the products of cram schools? It’s possible that Harvard is giving some of those relatively unimpressive kids a break because they are Asian. How, exactly, will you prove that this isn’t the case?</p>
<p>It’s harsh to say this, but a kid with good high school grades, and a 36 on the ACT, but whose most impressive other achievement is being the captain of the high school tennis team, just isn’t very impressive in terms of Harvard admissions. This is hard for people to understand if they come from countries where high-stakes testing is more important than it is here.</p>
<p>Note: Another possibility I’ve mentioned elsewhere is that it is possible that Harvard and other schools are discounting the SAT/ACT scores of Asian applicants (or at least some of them) based on a belief that those high scores are the result of intense cramming. Whether this is a fair assumption or not is debatable, but there may be clues in the application package to suggest this–such as the absence of very many extracurricular activities.</p>
<p>voiceofreason: I NEVER said that. See post #40. It was someone else. And it’s pretty obnoxious of you to both accuse me of saying something I didn’t, and also of having magical powers to cover it up.</p>
<p>NewHavenCTmom Can we stop with this racial stereotyping of Asian Americans. </p>
<p>Hunt You can play the what if game all you want, I had that discussion on the Washington and Lee thread about its URM vs White admission data. Not one person could provide data that showed that White applicants had any better ECs, LOR, accomplishments vs URM. This is just a common diversion tactic to get away from the hard actual data.</p>
<p>How many times have we heard that Asian American applicants must have lower ECs, LOR, bad essays or some other aspect that would counter their high test scores and grades without a single source of information to support such a charge? No evidence is ever provided, only speculation as to why the known stats like GPA and test scores are not so telling about “applicant quality.” Why is this speculation negative against Asian Americans and positive for all other races?</p>
<p>sally305, my apologies. I mixed you up with another poster. For the record sally305 did not state the tennis statement it was CCDD14</p>
<p>In a nutshell, that has been the basic problem of claiming discrimination. In the end, even cases that made the news ended up being reversed after the schools provided additional insights into their admissions’ practices. While it did not stop Golden to use only the preliminary findings in his book, in the end establishing discrimination in the context of selection processes is extremely hard when the appraisal is both holistic and … subjective. </p>
<p>Discrimination is easier to establish if the practices are exclusionary at the application level. For instance, if a school would rely on regional quotas or minimum qualifications to APPLY, one might bring a case of not being allowed to participate. Faulting the results of a selection process is a much taller order. Simply stated, there is a world of difference between what might appear as unfair and what IS discriminatory. </p>
<p>Again, and at the risk of offending the person who has issues with mixed signals, one can find this lawsuit to be lacking in precision and relevance and also applaud the fact that is has been brought forward into the limelight of a court of justice. Of course, in terms of “information” one has to wonder if Blum’s money was well spent if his hired guns include gems such as intimating that the early admission at Harvard is binding! For all the efforts to locate a Jian Li facsimile, Blum might have added a legal editor who is worth its salt! </p>
<p>All in all, it would have been nice to see an actual filing with “newer” information as opposed to stretched “evidence” and, accordingly, a higher chance of prompting a discovery process into the arcane word of admissions at Harvard. </p>
<p>As it stands, I am afraid that this will not happen and that it will be one more opportunity lost. </p>
Well, maybe it’s anecdotal, but some of us know a lot of Asian students like this, and lots of them post here on CC. If you look at the chances/results threads, you will see scads of them (by “them” I mean Asian students with high stats, but nothing else except violin and tennis.) The Asian kids who don’t fit the stereotype do better in admissions. We know some of them, too.</p>
<p>xiggi you really believe requiring “minimum qualifications to APPLY” is a better determiner of discrimination than wildly variant SAT and GPA requirements for different ethnicity?</p>
<p>Hunt you seriously take your data of Asian Americans from the likes of those who post on CC? So this makes you comfortable about your claim that Asian American students with high stats have “nothing else except violin and tennis.” Then you have the audacity to state “the Asian kids who don’t fit the stereotype do better in admissions.” Have any data for this proposition? </p>
<p>This is the same unsupported argument as the Asian Americans don’t have anything other than high test scores and gpa argument because it had to be that EC, LOR, bad essays etc that is the culprit in why these Asian Americans did not get the nod over a lower scoring, lower gpa non Asian American student without a single bit of data to support such a conclusion. </p>
<p>If I’m wrong, please direct me to such data. I don’t have any reservations about apologizing if I am wrong and admitting my mistake.</p>