"How did HE Get In?"

Parent Cafe
1201

<p>Just to provide clarification on a few points:

  1. MITChris is currently taking a leave of absence from the admissions office to complete a master’s degree, and is not participating in admissions this cycle. He has dropped by CC a few times this year, but much more rarely than he has in the past, and I do not know if he is responding to PMs.
  2. Mikalye is an EC (educational counselor) for MIT, not an admissions officer. His function is to interview students and provide an interview report, and he interviews in England. (I believe I am sharing public information here, although I have had backchannel contact with him in the past.)</p>

<p>While I do not condone labeling any applicant (or person) as “barely human”, I am certain that Mikalye was being purposely outlandish when he wrote that phrase three years ago, and I am sure he would be horrified to be taken literally. </p>

<p>In addition to taking the time to read the thread on the MIT board, I am sure all interested parties have also taken the time to read his post history – nearly a thousand posts over the past several years, giving information and advice about the MIT interview, about the arts at MIT, and about international applicant issues. I defend Michael personally in the most vehement terms, and I consider him a valuable member of the CC community.</p>

<p>Please understand that, in addition to my role as not-the-internet’s-official-apologist-for-the-MIT-admissions-office, I am also trying to balance my role as a moderator of this site when judging how to respond to this thread. It is not always an easy balancing act.</p>

1202

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<p>With technology being the way it is? it is easy to scan the books and articles, the blind and dyslexics take care of this in large volume, and those who are dyslexic frequently invest in read technology to read these to them.</p>

<p>Is reading and writing, in light of the advances of dragon and read and write, as much of a measure of academic aptitude as we want it to be? I don’t think so. But, still, unless there was a wildly compelling reason to admit a nonreader, I wonder if most of us would support it? </p>

<p>(full disclosure: I had a gifted dyslexic child who could not read until 12 years old, but does A work in college. So, I’m genuinely not biased against dyslexics or dysgraphics.)</p>

<p>So, is it more important to be able to read and write than to be able to speak and collaborate? In math, in science? In the humanities?</p>

<p>It’s an interesting question.</p>

<p>(QM, I called you out. So what? Mollie wasn’t posting on this thread to begin with. We generally confine our “call outs” to the thread in question. Just saying.)</p>

1203

<p>I’m imagining a person who just isn’t interested in reading words. He can discuss math, and can write math equations on the blackboard. If they’re brilliant enough…?</p>

<p>By the way, I’d like to call out everybody on this thread, and all other threads, for not genuflecting to me sufficiently.</p>

1204

<p>Hunt, I’ll stop lurking long enough to say how fabulous you are.</p>

<p>Thread, I wish I could quit you.</p>

1205

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<p>Such a person would have a tough time meeting the MIT[Undergraduate General Institute Requirements](<a href=“Welcome! < MIT”>Welcome! < MIT), so no, he should not be admitted.</p>

1206

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How do you know I’m not genuflecting? It’s pretty uncomfortable actually.</p>

1207

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<p>There was a bit of a controversy over how a Stanford adcom stereotyped Asian/Asian-Americans as “grinds” that I read about several years ago. </p>

<p>Some Asian-American activist groups were up in arms though to those of us who grew up being picked on and even physically assaulted*, it wasn’t anything new. </p>

<p>*First & Second grade in my old NYC neighborhood Catholic school for me before I fought back and almost got suspended for my trouble until the Principal who knew what was really happening had my back. Was one of only two Asian-Americans in the entire school with a blue-collar White/Hispanic majority in the '80s.</p>

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<p>I’ve read that as the classmates should have been more open-minded and understanding of his being different due to his being different on those basis. </p>

<p>There’s also the tragic matter that students like him are often socially ostracized at best and often targets of vicious bullying in most mainstream US K-12 schools.* I myself and most HS classmates at my STEM-centered public magnet had some/much taste of this in elementary/middle school. It was also a reason why several neighbors and older kids specifically warned any kids with above-average academic performance and interest to avoid attending our crime-ridden neighborhood high school where “smart kids” were one favored target for bullying and physical assaults…including being knifed as happened to a couple of those older neighborhood kids who were warning us. </p>

<p>In that light, isn’t assuming that he’s not fulfilling his end of the 2-way “social thing” a form of victim blaming??</p>

<ul>
<li>This phenomenon is especially bad in high schools where the administration/town prioritize school sports at the expense of basics like teachers, textbooks, and maintaining the academic buildings/physical plant.</li>
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1208

<p>Seriously, we’re talking college. Elites, at that. Not whether we should kindly invite someone to lunch with the rest of us. Not whether someday he might come out of his shell, hire a reader or be a good family guy. Or win a Nobel Prize. This is about the four years, first. </p>

<p>Anyway, upthread, someone asked how we would react to an applicant who referred to peers in not-nice terms. A few answered, in essence, axe him, pronto. I said, I would continue reading. The point got lost, I guess.</p>

<p>See, we really do read them completely. We don’t make an instant assumption and act on that. We read the whole darned thing, get a bead on academic, social and personal strengths, before commenting. In fact, one reason we have the additional reads is to be sure some important detail, pro or con, wasn’t missed, that one’s perspective has some checks and balances. The final decisions are made by committees. I’d refer back to this: “correct in the context of the overall applicant pool, and that no one individual’s bias or preferences or familiarity with a given case has any chance of swaying a decision unfairly.”</p>

<p>Some of you know students, all of us know our own kids and, presumably, their friends. We get a sense of which we like, respect, and are awed by. Now imagine sitting down to aassess more than 10,000 of them- none of them (or rarely) known to us personally. All we get is the application. It asks for more than transcript, awards and recommendations. The kid is in charge of his presentation, he makes choices in hs and in crafting his app.</p>

<p>And, in the end, like it or not, there just isn’t space for every great kid.</p>

<p>Cobrat, fwiw, I have never seen any kid labelled robotic or a grind by adcoms. This year, considering all the rough and tumble on CC about prejudice against Asians, I took a hard look at senior comments and found nothing that reflected any labelling of kids as Asian or prejudices or assumptions. There is one other group I have seen comments about (re: whether their ethnic backgrounds played any role in their lives.) I believe no one would guess which, not sure I’d even say.</p>

1209

<p>Mollie- I think this thread has outlived its usefulness. I think the attacks on Pizzagirl have been egregious even if she’s been gracious enough to overlook them, and the newly invigorated racial undertones strike me as being overt enough to warrant locking down the thread.</p>

<p>I don’t enjoy citations to articles claiming that since Jews control the media, the quota’s in college admissions excluding Jews got vigorous airing in the media-- but since Asians don’t control the media, their exclusion is not newsworthy. The internet is big enough for every crack theory but I’m pretty sure CC does not want to be disseminating these types of stories.</p>

1210

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<p>Endorsing them, no. However, the better way to debunk such theories is to discuss them…not to discourage such discussions or worse, try to suppress them. The latter only feeds into the idea that such theories have merit and those trying to suppress them are too afraid to acknowledge them.</p>

1211

<p>Hunt - i would genuflect to you if I thought you were old enough to have been in classes when professors asked the women to leave the class at Yale because what was going to be said was not appropriate for their ears. :D</p>

1212

<p>When I see an offensive story on Fox I write to the station manager. When I hear Ann Coulter call the President of the United States a " ■■■■■■" I write to the three sponsors of her show and tell them why I have stopped buying their products.</p>

<p>I don’t think debating with Ann Coulter about how egregious her views are is a helpful exercise. And I don’t think CC is the place for citations on how the Jews run the media industry. Comcast, Newscorp, et al are public corporations and anyone who wishes to purchase a share of stock may do so. You don’t like what Rupert Murdoch has to say- buy a share on the Nasdaq and show up at the annual meeting and throw a tantrum.</p>

1213

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<p>I agree that alluding to one’s ethnicity was beyond the pale. However, pizzagirl has in the past made unflattering generalizations about Asians, and defended it by saying stereotypes have a grain of truth to them.</p>

<p>Secondly, in general, I am really taken aback that you think the “attacks” on Pizzagirl are “egregious.” Really? Though careful to straddle the line crossing the TOS, she has said about CC posters that they are “shallow,” “losers,” “dorky”, “pathetic”, or will just mock them by saying their posts boil down to screaming, “waaaah!” like a baby. She won’t say, “You are a dork”, she’ll say that is a “dorky” attitude as she did to QM. Or she’ll respond to a post, and then say people with such attitude are losers. So I suppose this does not violate the TOS because it was not directly insulting another poster. </p>

<p>Granted, people are more sensitive to perceived insults and less sensitive to insults by those they disagree with. (Perhaps we are both guilty of this, Blossom?) But I think objectively, the inflammatory language pizzagirl has used is at least as offensive as the ones directed at herself. At the very least, she is a big girl and can defend herself. There is no need to shut down the thread, assuming of course, that insulting people’s ethnicity does not continue.</p>

1214

<p>Cobrat, but no one is addressing them with any authority. Some “think” this or that, some have childhood recollections or the proverbial “my neighbor told me.” There’s a certain mob mentality that overcomes folks. Someone shouts. “Fire!”</p>

<p>If this thread is closed, I would hope some mod will watch the similar ones that come up, the rush to promote stands without substance behind the comments.</p>

<p>Some comments are dorky. Some do make me wonder who has processing issues. Just sayin’.</p>

1215

<p>^Really? How many of QM’s comments are “dorky.” I haven’t seen one yet.</p>

<p>And besides, if people are going to say the “call it like you see it” attitude, then they shouldn’t be horrified by supposedly “egregious attacks” against pizzagirl.</p>

1216

<p>Here’s what I see, CA: PG makes consistent comments that no one U or set of them should be deified, that if one doesn’t like perceived policies or minds lack of transparency, he is free to choose a different set of U’s to apply to. That there are no magical guarantees associated with the very top tier. That smart kids can get good educations at a variety of schools.</p>

<p>Then someone accuses her of protecting her own kids’ interests, having some affinity id that makes it all a breeze for her and her kids- and that she is secretly trying to protect her own affinity-based advantages or whatever nonsense arises. Folks have attacked her own alma mater, even the fact that her daughter attends a mighty fine college. Suggested she “betrayed” her stand. That she is unacceptably pro status quo. Ad infinitum. And, she responds.</p>

<p>Sorry to speak for you, PG. But I feel I do get what you say. And, I think I do see the race to devalue your position.</p>

1217

<p>Before this thread gets shut down, I would like to respond to one comment by poetgrl:

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<p>I was horrified if I had done this, and went back to check the history of the thread, to see whether it seemed correct to me. I don’t think it is, though perhaps I am being insufficiently sensitive and if so, I apologize very sincerely. </p>

<p>Detailed history to follow.</p>

1218

<p>Hopefully, the thread won’t be locked, QM, so that we can see your detailed history! There does not seem to be any widespread sentiment that this thread needs to be locked from what I can tell.</p>

1219

<p>Rather than providing a precis of most of the posts, I will just list the numbers, and those who care can look back:</p>

<h1>893: texaspg states that it is an “urban myth” that MIT admits students with B’s in math or science</h1>

<h1>899: I counter, stupidly and inaccurately! I have apologized for this, and apologize again now.</h1>

<h1>919: Complimentary reference</h1>

<h1>988: molliebatmit shows up</h1>

<h1>1008: Said I was glad to have her in the discussion, started to pose questions, in the posts listed below:</h1>

<h1>1011</h1>

<h1>1013</h1>

<h1>1022</h1>

<h1>1036: molliebatmit points out my erroneous interpretation of a post on a different thread</h1>

<h1>1039: dumb joke by me (not even rising to the level of “dorky”)</h1>

<h1>1051: I apologize</h1>

<h1>1132: molliebatmit for the first time says that she is uncomfortable.</h1>

<h1>1133: I apologize</h1>

<h1>1134: I explain that I was asking a question of fact, based on another poster’s level of experience, exceeding mine</h1>

<h1>1178: poetgrl objects</h1>

<h1>1189: poetgrl objects</h1>

<h1>1196: I mention my reiterated apology</h1>

<p>I hope that this is not a violation of the Terms of Service. I do not mean to violate them. I would like for people to reconsider some of their positions, but I do not mean to make people uncomfortable.</p>

1220

<p>Detailed history? WHY?</p>

<p>Texaspg’s urban myth comment was in respose to something you already wrote.</p>