<p>Maybe this will help you philo <a href=“http://www.princeton.edu/~tje/files/Opportunity%20Cost%20of%20Admission%20Preferences%20Espenshade%20Chung%20June%202005.pdf[/url]”>http://www.princeton.edu/~tje/files/Opportunity%20Cost%20of%20Admission%20Preferences%20Espenshade%20Chung%20June%202005.pdf</a></p>
<p>That reference uses the same 15 year old Espenshade data.( “Using data from the NationalStudy of College Experience on 124,374 applications for admission during the 1980s and the fall semesters of 1993 and 1997”) </p>
<p>And the OP specifically asked about schools 11 - 20. I believe Espenshade says it didn’t matter elsewhere, during that 1997 admission period. </p>
<p>Further, I was intrigued by THIS apart of the original work</p>
<p>“The penalty for scoring less than 1200 on the SAT is significantly greater for African-American and Hispanic students than the penalty for white students who score less than 1200 (Model 2). Similarly,the reward (i.e., increased likelihood of admission) that is produced by scoring more than 1300 is significantly smaller for African-American and especially for Hispanic students than the reward for white students who score more than 1300. Thus, we find that the underrepresented minority advantage is greatest for African-American and Hispanic applicants with SAT scores in the 1200–1300 range”…so …it depends…or depended. Back then he said “Admission advantages for African Americans and Hispanics fell during the decade and a half,”, so who knows WHAT’S happening today?</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.princeton.edu/~tje/files/webAdmission%20Preferences%20Espenshade%20Chung%20Walling%20Dec%202004.pdf[/url]”>http://www.princeton.edu/~tje/files/webAdmission%20Preferences%20Espenshade%20Chung%20Walling%20Dec%202004.pdf</a></p>
<p>Philovitist, if I were you, I’d apologize for the “African American” vs “normal” applicants, tout de suite. That’s pretty offensive.</p>
<p>An interesting thing to play around with is to change race on Parchment when viewing chances at the most elite schools, holding other info constant. Watch D’s chances at Princeton jump from 18% to 50%. Raising the SAT score from 2280 to 2400 and ACT from 35 to 36 only increased it to 19%, so that was pretty dramatic. I don’t know if they have a big enough sample size to be accurate. And in any case, they don’t have the holistic stuff, like essays, just stats. Fun anyway.</p>
<p>All other things being equal, being URM helps a lot. No college is going to tell you just how much it helps, for obvious reasons, and all other things are never quite equal. But let’s face it, high-stats URMs are in short supply. All you have to do is look at College Board testing info to see that.</p>
<p>But what are you going to do with this information? Putting politics aside, if you are a URM, this means that you might want to look at schools for which your stats place you in the bottom 50% of matriculants–maybe even in the bottom 25% of matriculants. If you are not a URM, this information is useless to you, except to perhaps help you understand that if you are unhooked (not a legacy, not a URM, not a recruited athlete), your chances of getting into a highly selective school aren’t that great if your stats are in the bottom 50%. That’s about it.</p>
<p>Honestly this is an age old question. The answer is a blatant yes, even if affirmative action is made illegal, top colleges will continue to use it to create “diverse” campuses. We can’t do anything about it so if you are a URM, take the opportunity that has been given and if you are an ORM or white, work that much harder.</p>
<p>Depends on the school.</p>
<p>The University of California system has outlawed race as a criterion in evaluating admissions applications. Instead, they use SocioEconomic Status, and “Hardships overcome”. UCSD and UC Davis used to publish their metrics… not sure if they still do. e.g. 300 points for single parent home, 150 points for 1st child in college, 150 pts. for working to help support the household budget, 300 points for participating in an Academic Advancement Program (typically offered at lesser performing schools), etc. This is out of about 7600 points for entry.</p>
<p>Private Us can do as they please to construct the type of campus they want. We call them “Hooks”. URM hook, Athletic Recruit Hook (as opposed to the KEY ATHLETE who isn’t hooked, but simply straight out admitted), Legacy hook.</p>
<p>Each hook is of a different size. I will say URM Black/Male is the largest hook, with URM Black/Female next in line, then Hispanic and American Indian.</p>
<p>How to quantify this? I don’t think it is possible to say something like SAT 2100 Black Male is viewed the same as SAT 2300 White Female. Each Admissions office will have a different amount of latitude in relaxing the usual SAT/GPA-Class Rank/Course Rigor/EC/Leadership/ areass of evaluation. Each college/U differs because each is unique in how it wants to meet its diversity goals. I don’t think it is possible to quantify the size of the hook b/c the Admissions Office itself does not normally admit by a strict point formula, as they did/do? at UCSD.</p>
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I think you have hit upon something important. It is not enough for an applicant, especially to smaller schools, to simply look up the median stats of admitted students and draw conclusions. Take Williams or Amherst. The recruited Athletes can represent up to 10% of the admitted class. Other hooks can total to another 20%, meaning 30% of the class is admitted under different criteria than an unhooked applicant.</p>
<p>It is good for the unhooked applicant to understand that the unhooked median on the stats might be at the 65% of 70% of the reported admissions stats to smaller Us and Colleges, and plan their list with those odds in mind.</p>
<p>This information might not be valuable to the general population, but could be very valuable to a URM student compiling a list of colleges to which she plans to apply. We can generally look at the common data set to see where we fit, and determine whether a school is a reach, match, or safety. But if the chance of admission is higher for the URM student, those categories shift a bit. Top 20 schools are still going to be a reach for everybody, but perhaps not as much of a reach.</p>
<p>I would agree that URM status doesn’t give a specific set bonus. Instead, the pool or URM candidates are most likely considered as a separate pool, to some degree. Like the rest of the general pool, if a student’s stats are too low, they are automatically disqualified. If they are an absolute top candidate, they get in (though there won’t be many from either pool). Once that’s done, candidates are compared among their “pool.” If there is a large group of highly qualified URM candidates, the “benefit” from being URM will be small. But if the pool of candidates is smaller, the chance of admission may be better.</p>
<p>Perhaps a similar situation might be at a college like Barnard, as compared to Columbia. For all intents and purposes, they are the same school. But only women can apply to Barnard, and the applicant pool is smaller. Thus the selectivity will be lower. There is some self-selection, but overall, the averages are also lower.</p>
<p>The data the OP wants does exist, but not in the public domain. When I look up information on scores from our State testing at our public schools, I can disagregate the data if there are enough students, but the same cannot be said of common data set information. Too bad, because if it was made available, it could be used to encourage more URM applicants to some of these schools, and perheps drive those numbers up closet to the general average. Ues, it might encourage more applicants with lower scores as well, but a larger applicant pool in general would be good.</p>
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<p>I have actually looked for info like that (since my son is a URM) but it really is not helpful because not all URMs are created equal. I believe Pizzagirl, correctly hinted to this already. </p>
<p>I think the URMs who get the “score/ stat advantage” have a “poor school disadavantage”. The URMs who have the “rich school advantage” do not get the “score advantage”. There is no way to fudge the numbers on this because your school transcript shows where you attended school. I am pretty sure no wealthy URM or White guy will deliberately put his kids in those “poor schools” to earn that “score advantage”. So, if one thinks that some rich URM is earning a score advantage over whites and ORMs, then I think one is misinformed about the realities of what it takes to attend these poor schools. I believe this is why admissions officers can look and find the best talent.</p>
<p>CTScoutmom: I think the data that would be most useful to a high achieving URM applicant would be admit rates of the same URM sub group and not necessarily the stats of that URM sub group of applicants or admittees. Why?</p>
<p>Among the very tip top schools, it appears unofficial quotas exist historically. These goals aren’t fixed in stone but the schools tend to have certain numeric goals – and the # of admittees is used to meet that goal. This tells me that applicants from within a subgroup are being compared to one another as you surmise. Therefore, the most useful information to one of these applicants is the admit rate of that URM subgroup. </p>
<p>For instance, let’s say hypothetically, PENN and Columbia both have a goal of 8% Latino/Hispanic freshmen. Let’s assume this equates to 200 actual admissions offers for both schools (I know the number is actually different – but this is for illustration only). </p>
<p>Let’s say for some reason CU markets itself better, reaches out to the Latino community better or maybe has a few recent hi-profile Latino alums. This upcoming season 1500 applications from this subgroup go to Penn. But Columbia receives 2500 applications. The admit rate for Penn will be 13% but for Columbia will be 8%.</p>
<p>Remember, Columbia wants to make 200 offers – regardless of where the metrics of that year’s pool. Same with Penn. The metrics can even shift year to year. But it’s the institutional goal (in our scenario, 200 slots in both) and ability (or inability) to attract applicants (more or less competition within that sub category) that most affects any single individual’s chances – not some across the board analysis of each school’s metrics for a sub-group.</p>
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I don’t believe that this is true. URMs with very high scores are so few that I think all URMs get a significant score advantage at the most selective schools. Those from poor schools may get a somewhat greater advantage. But the simple fact is that the numbers of URMs attending highly selective schools are much greater than the numbers of URMs with very high stats.</p>
<p>See todays article regarding supreme court’s review of affirmative action in early 2013.</p>
<p>[Justices</a> to re-examine use of race in college admissions - CNN.com](<a href=“http://www.cnn.com/2012/10/08/us/scotus-college-admissions-race/index.html?hpt=hp_t3]Justices”>http://www.cnn.com/2012/10/08/us/scotus-college-admissions-race/index.html?hpt=hp_t3)</p>
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<p>Certainly, URMs from poor schools bring down stats for the general class, URM. However, that does not make it easier for wealthy URMs to get into top schools. </p>
<p>I do not think statistics exist on this subject, so all I can do is anecdotally share my son’s story: </p>
<p>He attended Elementary & Middle at poor schools. He had an SAT math 320 in TIPs. The middle school had no Duke TIP recognized (state or Grand) students in a class of 450. The high school has no NMSF. Has not in five years.</p>
<p>Then, he attends a mainstream suburban high school in a wealthy neighborhood~ full of Duke TIP state and Grand recognized students with about 35 to 40 NMSFs in his AP classes. </p>
<p>SAT Math jumps to 620 in the beginning of sophomore year. It goes to 690 in the beginning of junior year. Then jumps to 750 on SAT Math II Subject Test at the end of junior year. He is also a NMSF. Currently waiting to take the SAT. His anticipated SAT math score is 750+. (Based on three timed Blue Book practice Test on which he scored 800s each time).</p>
<p>So, there are a couple of ways to look at the above results, the way I see it. </p>
<ol>
<li><p>Son seemed like a regualar young Hispanic boy with a 320 in math. Puberty turned him into what would have made him a one in 5,000 or 10,000 who scored NMSF level scores in a school system that has not had any in five years. The fact that he attended this high school played no major role in his achievements. </p></li>
<li><p>Son was a normal kid who attended a high school with the resources to turn his life around. He worked extremely hard, used the resources that became available to him and scored as well as the top students in his high school. If he had not attended this high school, he would have been like the 5,000 to 10,000 students who preceeded him at the old high schools and would not have had these high stats.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>The point is that there are two types of URMs. Those who attend regular schools and those who do not. Those who attend inner city schools bring down the URM stats. However, the individual URMs who attend regular schools have stats that exceed the averages.Those who think 1 is true believe that URM have an advantage those who believe 2 is true do not think there is a URM advantage.</p>
<p>I’m just looking at the numbers. There are so few URMs (especially black students) with high scores that there would be very, very few at highly selective schools without an advantage. (There still aren’t that many compared to the population.) While there certainly are URMs with top scores, I have to think that even those at good schools and those who come from professional families get some advantage–indeed, this seems to be the case even for those who are the children of recent immigrants who are very well educated.</p>
<p>It’s a moving target in that the way URMs are generally selected at these schools is that they are put in a flagged pool and holistic considerations are made. Though no true quota that I’ve yet to see any school admit to, there is some general idea as to how many URMs a school feels it needs to have. So it would depend on how many like URMS are in that pool with you that year and what their profiles look like.</p>
<p>Re: #34</p>
<p>The jump in SAT math from 320 in middle school to 800 in current practice tests as a high school senior is easily explainable by the fact that the SAT math uses math commonly taught in high school (though advanced middle school students may start that math in middle school). Going to a better high school with better math instruction may help in that the final result is more likely to be 750+ instead of 500-600, but a 320 in middle school would not be wholly unexpected.</p>
<p>Also, a school loaded with award winning students and NMSFs is not a “regular” school – it is likely significantly better than the average “regular” school.</p>
<p>From what I’ve read, the whole diversity game involves “quotas that aren’t quotas”. Admissions counselors balk at having too many people who play the flute, for example.</p>
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<p>I am an African American, myself, and I didn’t feel offended. The fact is that African Americans are different treated differently from most applicants when comes to college admissions. In this sense, they are different from normal. </p>
<p>I personally don’t like the fact that being “different from normal” can be taken as offensive. Abnormality is not a bad thing. In fact, our embrace of abnormality is why diversity interests exist in college admissions in the first place.</p>
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<p>I agree completely. Therefore, my point that don’t think that the 650 from schools such as these does not have the potential to develop and perform like the 750s from the top high schools. </p>
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<p>The 35 - 40 is twice the number of NMSFs in his graduating class. As you know, an AP class usually has NMSF level kids from both junior and senior year. Son has academically benefitted from his exchanges with NMSFs who were as much as two years ahead of him in high school. It is a regular school in that it is public and open to anyone living in the area. It so happens that most of the people living in this area are very wealthy (less than 10% economically disadvantaged).</p>