<p>Alchemy,</p>
<p>The author you cite raises some interesting points some of which are relevant to this discussion. Which ones would you like to take up? When you're in a college classroom no one will let you get away with pointing at a page in a book and saying I agree with him.</p>
<p>"It's easy to fill a room with an ethnically, racially and economically mixed group of people and have no intellectual diversity present."</p>
<p>Have you actually done it? (I'm 57, and it has never happened to me.)</p>
<p>Interested Dad,</p>
<p>No not at all. But it would help if faculties were not such knee jerk liberals.</p>
<p>Try the Democatic National Convention, Just joking!</p>
<p>Mini,</p>
<p>I have been in rooms that are racially, ethnically and economically homogeneous that are quite intellectually diverse.</p>
<p>But your point was the obverse.</p>
<p>
[quote]
No not at all. But it would help if faculties were not such knee jerk liberal.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Another Limbaugh red-herring. This whole spiel is so tired.</p>
<p>My daughter goes to one of the most "lib-er-ul" colleges in the country. The top Poli Sci professor there is a vocal evangelical Christian and frequent contributor to the American Conservative Magazine, the Weekly Standard, etc.</p>
<p>She had been assigned readings from Pat Buchanan in a Religion class. I could get up in arms about exposing her that "knee jerk" stuff, but my attitude is "good for her". The more exposure to different viewpoints, the better. She's smart enough to sort it out. These kids today are pretty sophisticated. They are capable of wrapping their arms around conflicting viewpoints. Global warming? Lib-er-ul right? You ought to hear her argue the economic hardships of the Kyoto protocols on India and China.</p>
<p>Her history professor believes that the best thing the West could do for Africa is to end all aid programs. That was the prof who got one of his his courses listed on the annual mindlessly superficial right wing lists because he titled the course "The Whole Enchilada". It was an advanced history course looking at efforts to write comprehensive world history books over the centuries. Apparently the Weekly Standard took one look at the course title and assumed it had something to do with illegal immigration and, therefore, must be bad. The irony is that the course started with many of the so-called Great Books, including the Bible and the ancient Greek historians.</p>
<p>It is true that college professors tend to vote Democratic. That's true for voters with advanced academic degrees across the board in this country.</p>
<p>I reread that, but I can't figure out whether you personally support giving a preference for legacy status.</p>
<p>I am not a college- it would depend on the colleges objectives
If they were in trouble financially as some colleges have been- and wanted to strengthen the base of support- particulary if those alums are financially able to increase their donations and involvement with the college- then I think it would be a good idea to openly advertise that legacies are welcomed.</p>
<p>If the college already had more applicants and money than they knew what to do with, including enough applicants who were legacies, that if they gave very much preference in admissions, they could likely end up with a class that was heavily weighted with multi-generational legacies, then giving a tip to legacies doesn't seem to fill the same niche as in the first college.</p>
<p>Especially if the numbers of legacies and those perceived as "legacy" types, outweigh more middle of the road students on campus anyway.</p>
<p>Private schools can make what ever sort of student body they want.</p>
<p>even private K-12 schools.
My Ds elementary school- I have heard, is more difficult for admittance than Yale ;)
If they decided that their criteria for admission was parents who are willing to spend 5 figures on grade school tuition and a kid who read Harry Potter when he was 5, they could do that.
But gad- would the teachers even want to teach a class like that?
So they use other criteria as well.</p>
<p>Point:</p>
<p>(1) In most academic departments, most of the time, "intellectual diversity," understood as balance in political identification, is simply irrelevant. As Brian Leiter observes, "in the overwhelming majority of academic disciplines political identification barely matters, as compared to technical skill and ability. Consider: classics, philosophy, physical anthropology, chemistry, computer sciences, mathematics, archaeology, physics, astronomy, engineering, linguistics, biology, psychology, sociology, even (in large part) economics." While I would question at least four of the entries on Leiter's list, his basic point is right. Political identification simply doesn't (or shouldn't) matter in mathematics and the hard sciences (at least). Of course, neither does (nor should) sexual, racial or ethnic identity - but that's another story.</p>
<p>I disagree about whether intellectual diversity matters as far as classics, philosophy, archaeology, and physical anthropology--intellectual diversity would be more important in those classes-- but I feel that the author's point is valid. More or less, intellectual diversity doesn't even matter much. How many ways are there for an engineer to approach a problem? Now how more likely is he to use a certain thinking pattern just because he's a liberal? Exactly. Of course the same can be said for other sorts of identity but so what? Are conservatives underrepresented in college? Not really. Conservative students attend majority conservative schools; liberal students attend liberal schools. If you want a mixture of both attend a large university. The same applies for anyone looking for any sort of "intellectual diversity". The answer lies in the big university. You're bound to find someone that thinks differently than you do.</p>
<p>And the most important point, perhaps is this...</p>
<p>2) In such departments and at such times as "intellectual diversity" is relevant, it is also relative to the eye of the beholder. In a discussion of political philosophy, for example, my idea of "diversity" might be to include a Christian natural law theorist, a secular traditionalist, a libertarian anarcho-capitalist, a Rawlsian liberal and a left communitarian. But to someone whose idea of "diversity" was a Leninist, a Trotskyite, a Maoist, a Frankfurt Schooler and a feminist psychoanalyst, my list would no doubt look impossibly narrow - and the feeling would be mutual. Moreover, neither of us might feel any need to include a fascist, a numerologist or an interspecific egalitarian simply to make things more "diverse." There are limits, after all. But what limits? Anyone familiar with the way philosophical arguments go will immediately recognize that there is no hope whatsoever of achieving any consensus at all on how to measure "intellectual diversity" or how to decide which forms of such "diversity" are within reasonable limits and which are not. </p>
<p>Intellectual diversity is relative.</p>
<p>I guess I'm just dense, but could someone help me out with some of these pop-culture terms?</p>
<p>Is fiscal responsibility and avoiding government deficit spending "liberal" or "conservative"?</p>
<p>Is a foreign policy that favors staying out of every problem spot around the globe "liberal" or "conservative"?</p>
<p>I'm just so confused.</p>
<p>Emeraldkity,</p>
<p>So you personally are ok with colleges chaarging full tuition to everyone and admitting only 1500/2250+ students if it suits thier purposes? Why am I arguing with a person who has no opinions?</p>
<p>Interested Dad,</p>
<p>Liberal and conservative labels are a convenience but let's not pretend that universities are not dominated by the political left and look nothing like america in that respect. I happen to be on that side on a number of issues myself. The point is not whether that is right or wrong but whether it's diverse which it certainly isn't. That lack of diversity does not seem to bother the dirvesity police.</p>
<p>Alchemy,</p>
<p>My point isn't that we need more conservative people on campus but that diversity should be defined along some kind of intellectual dimension inorder to be important to a university. In each of the fields you mention there is controversy, trust me. I know of it in some, others are beyond my area of knowledge but controversies exist. I am certian that adding a black, white, hispanic, jewish, muslim, christian, female, or transgenedered person has virtually no chance, except by accident, of capturing the diversity that exists in those fields. Adding someone who actually holds a different opinion than the current faculty might. The attention is all on the wrong stuff. Thats my point.</p>
<p>NO, mini, my point is that intellectual diversity and racial, ethnic and socio- economic diversity have nothing in common.</p>
<p>Give it a rest Interested Dad, while I believe that the profs at your daughter's college only assign these readings in order to attack them and find that your daughter's defense of China and India on Kyoto is classic left wing stuff, that is all beside the point. The point is, as I said to Mini, that there may be a lot of definitions and dimensions to intellectual diversity but few if any of them have to do with the objects of fascination of the diverstiy police: race, ethnicity, and socio economic status.</p>
<p>Alchemy, </p>
<p>It may be hard to measure intellectual diversity but it is real and a it is a good thing for univeristies to try to achive it. Thowing up your hands and saying let's just make sure we have a proportional number of red heads, brunettes, blondes and black haired people is hardly a good solution. You can be sure if these groups were politically organized that is exactly what we would have.</p>
<p>
[quote]
...while I believe that the profs at your daughter's college only assign these readings in order to attack them
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Doubt it. It's a course on Religious Ethics and examines the entire gamut of contemporary hot button ethical issues (abortion, stem cell research, death penalty, etc, etc.) from the perspective of Christian and Judaic religious beliefs. I ran the syllabus by my friend, the ultra-right wing publisher -- who is no fan of my daughter's school. He was far more familiar with the readings and authors than I am. He said that the course looked quite balanced. These authors are hardly left wing zealots:</p>
<p>George Weigel
Stephen L. Carter
Leon Kass
Mark Souder
David Brooks
Rowan Douglas Williams, Archbishop of Canterbury</p>
<p>
[quote]
...and find that your daughter's defense of China and India on Kyoto is classic left wing stuff, that is all beside the point.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Really. I'll have to check with mini for some background on what's "left wing" or "right wing" in India (or China, where I'm guessing such definitions are quite complex). Her points stemmed from discussions with Indian government officials about the problems of pollution in developing countries. Specifically the resentment of the US and Western Europe polluting the heck out of the environment during their industrial revolutions, but demanding that countries like India jump immediately from an agrarian economy to a high-cost low-pollution industrial economy with no intermediate stages.</p>
<p>Right wing? Left wing? Beats me. Sounds to me like kids who are able to grasp the complexities of major challenges and that truly dealing with an issue like the environment requires more than simple edict. Give these kids some credit. They are exposed to issues in way that makes the Counterpoint or Bill O'Reilly shouting matches irrelevant.</p>
<p>Interested Dad,</p>
<p>We are so far of topic that it's not worth trying to pull it back, besides this is kind of interesting. OK the course sounds fine. But I stand by my comment on your daughter's Kyoto arguments. The principal conservative and Republican (they overlap here) argument against adopting the Kyoto Accords (which the left in the US and Europe continues to push), is that they are expensive for us and at best irrelevant and possibly counterproductive because they let countries like India and China off the hook. I agree with some of the ethical arguments raised by India and China but that does not mean the Kyoto accords will do a lick of good (in terms of stopping global warming) if they are adopted. Your daughters arguments on this issue are the arguments of the left in the US and Europe. Now tell me, Interested Dad, why does any of this suggest that we should provide admissions preferences for those with low socio-economic status?</p>
<p>
[quote]
Now tell me, Interested Dad, why does any of this suggest that we should provide admissions preferences for those with low socio-economic status?
[/quote]
time to wade into this one ... I can give you three reasons why 3togo U will provide preferences to low socio-econimic status applciants</p>
<p>1) While a system based on "pure academic merit" sounds like it would be the fairest I do not believe that is the case. If I, as founder of 3togo U, could devise a system to truly measure intellectual potential and a student's desire and effort to maximize their potential I might be talked into relying on such measures for admissions. That said, the current proxies for these SATs, SAT IIs, GPAs, correlate somewhat to what I consider to the true academic measures but do not correlate well enough and, in fact, show a bias. The bias, those from less affluent backgrounds score worse than kids with similar ability and drive but from more affluent backgrounds. My school is going to try to counter this bias ... will we do it perfectly? ... absolutely not ... but I believe compensating imperfectly is better than leaving the bias unaddressed.</p>
<p>2) Even if I could find all the highest ranked academically ranked kids (which I can't) I still wouldn't admit strictly using that criteria. Why? It probably does not create the best learning environment. I do not know the specifics about classroom settings but I do know the results about high performing teams in a work setting. Grouping the brightest high performers together consistantly DOES NOT create the highest performing teams ... the team members tend to be too much alike and the team is not nearly as dynamic or perform as well as teams that have a broader spectrum of styles and experiences. I want 3togo U to not be tons of individual learners but a dynamic learning environment where students learning from each other is a major driving force of the learning.</p>
<p>3) "Until you have walked in my shoes" ... for my school having a diversity of life experiences will provide a richer, more animated, and more engaging learning environment. I'm a middle class white guy ... I have opinions on every social issue under the sun (typically a pretty liberal view) ... my view on, for example, welfare reform is abstract at best ... who I really want to hear from are people who have worked in that system or, better yet, lived under that system. When this topic comes up in Government 101 at 3togo U I would prefer the classroom discussions include kids across the spectrum of life experiences even if I give up 100 points of SAT points to achieve this goal.</p>
<p>Those are the big reasons 3togo U will always include economic considerations in its' admission process.</p>
<p>It seems that your U will give double 'pass' to poor kids. 1. give up 100 points of SAT and 2. Give free ride.</p>