<p>The 'problem' with this is that is assumes that the Ivy (or whichever competitive college it is you're talking about) is the "best". It is ONLY the hardest to get into - that's easy to demonstrate with admissions numbers (they accept the lowest percentage of students). I can't think of any way to demonstrate that a particular college is the 'best'. Rejection almost always hurts - but that feeling does not last. It's hard to see your kid disappointed, but that feeling goes away when you see them enjoying/thriving in the opportunities they do have. </p>
<p>My kids aren't URM. I guess this isn't an issue for me because I can think of lots of reasons why any particular college would reject my kids, just as I know they are incredibly talented, intelligent, wonderfully compassionate individuals. I would object more to not knowing what the rules of the game are. We know the rules are that colleges look for certain attributes/skills that our own kids may or may not possess. It is not about the highest scores - that's been demonstrated over and over by anecdotes. (I do think the day will come when low IQ might be the new diversity - is it right that all those students at Harvard aren't exposed to slow thinkers? What kind of graduate is produced in a hothouse environment like that? Certainly doesn't make a person more likely to get along in the real world).</p>
<p>I think you are one of the first people on CC that I have seen say that he might know what the rules of the game were. It seems that the common lament is that nobody really knows the rules of the game at elite schools.</p>
<p>Maybe you are saying (and I'm not understanding) that the rules are the following - there are no discernable rules.</p>
<p>I am still laughing about admitting kids with low IQ's - and how about a few violent felons while we're at it just to spice things up. Duke thought it was a good idea - oops, bad taste, over the line.</p>
<p>Now THAT is exactly what I'm talking about.</p>
<p>You cannot have a legitimate discussion about this, because people are sooo touchy. And heaven forbid there should be any humor. </p>
<p>And if I really need to say it, I was not relating low IQ and felons to URM's. I don't really carry that stereotype around. And I believe you will find that all the members of the Duke lacross team are white.</p>
<p>Maybe you would care to explain why you made the connection between low IQ, felons and URM's. I would be sincerely interested to know.</p>
<p>It's a moral certainty that my D had better scores/grade than some of the students--including, but not limited to, URM's--that were admitted to schools where she was rejected and it never inclined me towards any sour thoughts about URM's, affirmative action, or the admissions process.</p>
<p>As a couple of posters have said in so many ways, if you want to get upset about non-uniform admissions policies, there are things to get more upset about than any advantage accruing to URM's. </p>
<p>The <em>absolute</em> numbers are a drop in the bucket. Statistically, if your non-URM student didn't get in, they lost the spot to another non-URM. I once worked with the actual applied/admitted numbers for an indignant parent of a UCLA rejectee and they had to go find something else to be indignant about, though I think they <em>still</em> muttered about URM's afterwards.</p>
<p>Finally, as an acid test, I think very few complaining about the advantages accruing to URM's in the admissions policy would volunteer to permanently become URM if such were possible. One could probe underlying mindset to some profit, I'm sure.</p>
<p>It really grinds me that you can't have a discussion about URM's without subtle ("probe underlying mindset") and not so subtle (see magusxxl) accusations of racial discrimination. Just because someone may not believe in the societal value of affirmative action - which, by the way, I do - does not make them a bigot.</p>
<p>And with regard to statistics thedad, I think if you read Gratz v Bollinger, the Supreme Court would beg to differ. But you're talking UCLA and the SC was talking Michigan, a whole different kettle of fish. And speaking of fish, the whole "wouldn't trade places" discussion is such a red herring.</p>
<p>The problem is of going from the collective to the particular. I believe that on the whole, URMs do have--as a group--somewhat lower stats than non-URMs. But, many URMs are also recruited athletes, and some schools recruit athletes solely on the basis of their athletic skills, not their academic preparation. The stats of these recruited athletes lower the collective stats of URMS as a group. That does not mean, however, that URMs at Ivies, which are Division III, are necessarily less well prepared than non-URMs.<br>
Some applicants to Harvard got admitted there but rejected at Yale and Columbia; the reverse has also been true. It would be tempting to construct a scenario for why they were rejected at Yale and Columbia that would be based on ethnicity, but how then to explain the Harvard admission? A good student will be admitted <em>somewhere</em> unless s/he applies only to crapshoot schools. And which "somewhere" depends on a variety of factors. It may indeed be ethnicity or it may not. Isolated NE LACs such as Bowdoin and Bates are trying very hard to attract non-Caucasian students, so that Asian-Americans have an edge in applying there. At some other schools, though, being Asian-American does not confer the same advantage. I imagine that at HYP, someone from Montana or North Dakota would have an edge over someone from Long Island. The bottom line is that ethnic diversity is only one kind of diversity that is taken into account by adcoms.</p>
<p>SBDad - yes, I'm saying it's unpredictable. You can try to cover all the bases but in the end it's beyond an individual's control. What a relief (it seems to me) to know that. </p>
<p>My 9th grade d. just applied for something very important to her and has been waitlisted. I realized that the only thing she could have done differently was to be someone else. Maybe it will work out for her (and I'm tuning my thought-laser in that direction really hard) but if it doesn't - we'll all survive.</p>
<p><<<< It really grinds me that you can't have a discussion about URM's without subtle ("probe underlying mindset") and not so subtle (see magusxxl) accusations of racial discrimination. Just because someone may not believe in the societal value of affirmative action - which, by the way, I do - does not make them a bigot. >>></p>
<p>This is not the only subject that gets a paranoid response when it is brought up for discussion. There are many which are just "taboo" because of the PC police. Try discussing whether young children/babies are negatively affected by full-time daycare and see what kind of response you'll get. You'll be accused of wanting all women to be tied to their kitchen sinks, barefoot & pregnant. </p>
<p>It doesn't matter whether there are any reasonable statistics that challenge a PC belief, one needs to just get those thoughts out of one's mind.</p>
<p>I so agree with jlauer95 on this and it especially bothers me that the place where people are most firmly squelched when bringing up something that goes against the PC police is on our college campuses. Speakers are regularly shouted down or are disrupted simply because they dare to challenge the beliefs of a vocal minority. If you aren't free to think for yourself and ask questions in colleges, where are you?</p>
<p>How about the fact that boys get admitted at higher rates because there are fewer boys applying?
This is unfair to girls!
My point is - the colleges have their reasons. They don't have to be fair and they aren't fair.
They'd like to have a 50/50 gender split and they'd like to do some social engineering.
The elite private schools can do pretty much whatever they want when assembling their classes and we continue to chase after them in a frenzy, so they can keep on doing it.</p>
<p>jlauer95 & logosprincipal - has it ever occurred to you that your use of the term "PC" is itself a means of denigrating a point of view without addressing its merits? You are the "PC police" of what I call the "new PC" of the right.
Probing the underlying mindset is exactly the point. As has been painfully explained (to little or no avail) anyone who thinks their darling child was denied entry into Dream U. because an unworthy URM "took their place" is both overwhelmingly likely to be wrong and also suffering from an underlying mindset - encouraged by the new PC of the right. - that all disappointments in life are due to liberal policies which irrationally favor unworthy people over us good, honest, hardworking Americans. Encouraging - or even coddling - that erroneous belief of victimhood is dishonest.</p>
<p>Actually if a school is not taking any gov't funds, they probably don't have to be fair at all. However, once a school agrees to accept any gov't funds then there are usually some fairness rules to follow.</p>
<p>PC stands for a belief that no one dare challenge certain sacrosanct views that hold sway over much of society, and I will denigrate that view. There are several threads on this board discussing Affirmative Action and for the most part I think that the discussion has been civil, though I would be surprised if many minds have been changed. Where I think it crosses the line is when it is suggested, subtly or otherwise, that anyone who would bring up any negative ramifications of AA is racist and holds to a belief that "all disappointments in life are due to liberal policies which irrationally favor unworthy people over us good, honest, hardworking Americans". Talk about erecting a straw man! I'm not suggesting that you have to encourage anyone else's opinion about AA, and I hope you and others feel free to vigorously defend your own positions; this makes for an engaging and possibly enlightening discussion. If you think that anyone who doesn't agree with you needs to be personally attacked, I do have a problem with that.</p>
<p>Fine, SBDad, my D. was just admitted to Barnard, with SATs under 2000. The good news is that we are NOT URMs. Does that make you feel better?</p>
<p>I am going to tell you WHY my SAT-challenged daughter got into Barnard: Barnard welcomes submission of supplemental materials, and my daughter made the most of the admission process. She also traveled on her own to the school to interview, and she has some really great recs. She also has an excellent high school record, near the very top of her class - but not a whole lot in the way of APs. It wasn't about "stats" it was about the person. It was about showing the college who she was and what she would add to their campus. </p>
<p>URM's also offer much-needed diversity to elite colleges, so of course they have an extra boost -- but the point is that it is not nearly as much about the test scores as you think. My son put it very well: he said it's not that elite colleges care that much about the test scores, its just that having extremely high scores is one very good way to make an application stand out. But there are other ways as well. </p>
<p>The idea that the lower end of the median score range for SATs is made up entirely of URM's, legacies and athletes is a myth that has circulated for a long time on this board, but I've never seen stats to back that up. The problem when you feel resentment at the good fortunes of that URM with the lower score is simply that you missed the point entirely about the admissions process. Some of the time kids spend studying for and retaking SATs might be better put to use with effort devoted to some activity or undertaking that might simply make the kid seem more interesting. </p>
<p>If you are disappointed with results at the end of this admission season, then you have my sympathy. My daughter took some risks academically during high school and applied to a set of colleges that seemed to me to be big reaches. I insisted that she apply to the state U. system so she would have safeties to fall back on, because it could have very well gone the other way. But the ad coms at the elites don't decide things by the numbers, and they don't "reject" applicants so much as they select the ones who they like the best. And that "like" part is very subjective, and definitely influenced by the fact that they want variety.</p>