Minorities?

Parents Forum
81

<p>"I don't think so, when you consider the fact that "The biggest little well-kept secret in this scenario is the fact that the richest and most affluent blacks with family incomes of over 100k/year and parents with college and graduate degrees, underperform and underachieve when compareed to the poorest Asian Ams and whites with family incomes of less than 30k/year and parents with less than a high diploma. Also, poor Asians even outperform affluent whites."</p>

<p>What? That has nothing to do with what I asked you. I asked you about the imbalance between african blacks and caribbean blacks at Ivies. You keep spitting back the same responses to various, unrelated dialogue. I can't even figure out how you made this connection (trying hard).</p>

<p>I also asked how many affluent blacks were at Harvard. (not a % - give a real number). </p>

<p>I think Vonronwe and Jamimom have made some excellent points given the data in their posession. It sounds like Asians are underperforming in ECs more than blacks are underperforming in academics. I guess both groups had better re-evaluate in order to become more attractive.</p>

82

<p>Who are these "Asians" we are talking about? First-generation Pakistanis? Hmong folks from Fresno? Mien and Laotians? Sixth generation Chinese? Filipinos? American citizens from Palau? Vietnamese? Sons and daughters of Asian Indian Silicon Valley executives?</p>

<p>The first-generation Pakistani may have as much or as little in common with the Pauluaian as I do to a western Mongolian.</p>

83

<p>Momsdream also said,</p>

<p>"What would you suggest black americans do about this?</p>

<p>That's a good question. I realy should ask you first, as a black American. What do you think you should do about this?</p>

<p>The problem with racial "quotas" is that they are illegal and unconstitutional. Period. Diversity requires de facto quotas, and is a synomyn for "quota".</p>

84

<p>"There are not "Asian quotas." There IS the expectation that a student from a privileged background who is white or Asian - since there are so many of them as compared with students who are Black, Native American, or Hispanic - will be held to a higher standard. So? That's life. It's supply and demand."</p>

<p>Not true because schools with AA considure race more important poverty. A rich African American would get bonus points. while a poor Vietnamese would get nothing. The fact is there are Asian quotas, if their wasn't more asians would be admited. In fact most schools with AA don't considure poverty due to many Asian sub groups having high poverty rates. I support giving a boost to someone due to over comming poverty but I do have a problem giving points to someone for being African American.</p>

85

<p>"I think Vonronwe and Jamimom have made some excellent points given the data in their posession. It sounds like Asians are underperforming in ECs more than blacks are underperforming in academics. I guess both groups had better re-evaluate in order to become more attractive."</p>

<p>This is untrue, statistics show that on average Asian canidates have more EC than African American ones.</p>

86

<p>Mini asked,</p>

<p>[Who are these "Asians" we are talking about? First-generation Pakistanis? Hmong folks from Fresno? Mien and Laotians? Sixth generation Chinese? Filipinos? American citizens from Palau? Vietnamese? Sons and daughters of Asian Indian Silicon Valley executives?...The first-generation Pakistani may have as much or as little in common with the Pauluaian as I do to a western Mongolian.]</p>

<p>Mini, you have made my point and you have made my day. The point is that appliclants should not be classidfied according racial groups such as Asian Americans, Blacks, Whites, etc.. That is the main point. Then you need not ask this question. WQell, the question was asked of the blacks at Harvard.</p>

<p>The same question can be ask of the blacks, whites, latinos, etc.. When they are admitted based on race, we may never know them as indididuals, since Harvard uses racial group classifications as a factor in preferential treatment in admissions based solely on RACE ALONE, diregarding the economic factors.</p>

<p>This is evidence by a study by Harvard Prof. Skip Gates finding that for blacks, 2/3 of mattriculated blacks are the underperforming and underacheiving middle and upper-middle children of immigrants of Africa and the Carribbean admitted with lowered standards, and not the descendants of Afro-American slaves who sufferred from the Jim Crow Laws. Cleary 2/3 of Harvard's blacks were not the intended benefiiciary of racial preferential treatment in Harvard's admissions. The beneficiciaries should have been the descendants of Afro-American slaves who sufferred. That's the demented perversity of race based AA for blacks.</p>

<p>Again, admissions should be race and ethnic group blind. ELIMINATE RACE AS A FACTOR IN ADMISSIONS.</p>

87

<p>VT said,</p>

<p>"Not true because schools with AA considure race more important poverty. A rich African American would get bonus points. while a poor Vietnamese would get nothing. The fact is there are Asian quotas, if their wasn't more asians would be admited. In fact most schools with AA don't considure poverty due to many Asian sub groups having high poverty rates. I support giving a boost to someone due to over comming poverty but I do have a problem giving points to someone for being African American."</p>

<p>["I think Vonronwe and Jamimom have made some excellent points given the data in their posession. It sounds like Asians are underperforming in ECs more than blacks are underperforming in academics. I guess both groups had better re-evaluate in order to become more attractive."</p>

<p>This is untrue, statistics show that on average Asian canidates have more EC than African American ones.]</p>

<p>I wholeheartedly agree with you. I think you understand my points clearly. Unforfunately, the others are in denial or refuse to accept reality.</p>

88

<p>Sheeprun, quoting a previous post is simply responding to what someone else said. If the conversation were two-way, it wouldn't be needed. But with many posters and points made in a post, it helps to define that to which one is replying. Messages often become confusing when people make general responses. </p>

<p>Quoting a previous post is an extremely well-known form of communication on internet forums and helps immensely to clarify who is saying what to whom. It occurs in every kind of post, not just hot debates.</p>

89

<p>Our wise moderator Sheeprun was right about quoting others --- Rattle's post #76 says "Voronwe says" and then proceeds to quote Momsdream, whom I quoted! And VTBoy misread the post HE answers - I NEVER said the Asian students I worked with didn't have ECs - some had dozens - but that the none of the them (OF THE ONES I WORKED WITH, again) had the "out of the box" ECs. In fact, my most memorable interview was with an Asian student with over three dozen ECs listed. I asked him why - since he couldn't possibly have given full attention even to a fraction of these -- and he said "Because my father said that joining a lot of organizations looks good on a college application!"</p>

<p>As I said before, the NY Times had to shut down an education board because of an Asian thread. I am done posting here. My last comment will be that I believe Rattle and VTBoy are students, and while they are welcome to assume that adults with Ivy degrees and decades of experience are too dumb to follow their logic, they can assume that without any more input from me.</p>

90

<p>I do not believe Asian Americans are underperforming in ECs. Nor do I believe that URMS are performing well in ECs. The URM pool in elite colleges are assessed differently from the rest of the applicant pool. Adcoms do not compare the ECs of an Asian/caucasian with an African American. It does not work that way. The way most elite colleges work is that they assign some sort of an assessment on the academic profile of a student. Once they do that, the differences between certain SAT scores disappear. The 1500 student can get the same assessment mark as the 1600 if the range is 100 points, for instance. Those students who have have a certain threshhold can be an automatic "in" if they pass muster on the rest of the files. For the rest of applicant pool, the ECs, essays, recs are studied, and an assessment is made on the total score. For URMs, usually an adcom is assigned to oversee minority admissions, and the files are examined with the different threshholds. This is also done for legacies, athletes, celebrities, developement and sometimes performing and visual arts candidates. Where the controversy lies is not in the quality of the ECs for URMs, but the fact that just being a URM is considered a major hook in itself. The fact that the URMs may be high income kids or of Caribbean descent is not the issue, so much as that this category is based solely on the fact that these kids are of Hispanic, Black or American Indian heritage. Disadvantaged kids do not get a pool of their own--the information is considered along with the rest of the application and applicants. So you do get cases of "color,for color's sake" in the process. No one is comparing the ECs or the academic profiles of URMS with Asians, Whites or anyone in the process. Each school has its own guidelines on how this pool should be assessed. The big question that becomes so inflammatory is whether this is "right". Legal, it is. The Supreme Court has ruled so despite Mr Goralnik's opinions and despite the many other who disagree and have written eloquent arguments about their disagreement. It is legal despite the dissenting opinions that some justices, including Justice Clarence Thomas has written. It is all in the record. Colleges are permitted to use race as a preference for admission when it comes to URMs. Justice Sandra Day O'Conner's opinion's are the prevailing ones despite who disagrees with them. The fact is that the Supreme Court has ruled colleges are permitted to use race as a "hook". We can collect 10 million opinions and arguments against this policy, but the decision as it currently stands makes this form of affirmative action legal. And the nation's elite colleges back the policy absolutely as you can see from their admission's policy. </p>

<p>I have not seen statistics rating students' ECs. So I do not know how "on average Asian candidates have more ECs than African American ones". Not that it matters because of the the way admissions works as I described above. But having more ECs is not helpful anyways. It is the type of ECs that count. A school does not need 50 quarterbacks, or 25 oboisits. So if you happen to be a quarterback the year that admissions is inundated with them, you are out of luck. There are always too many pianists--more than the pianos availble on a campus, and you can always find one to hire within the neighborhood any ways, so that is not necessarily a highly valued EC except in certain contexts. I happen to be of the opinion (my opinion only) that Asians have great ECs. I love classical music, go to concerts regularly and feel that a music education is very important. All of my kids were immersed in classical music. So if I were assessing ECs based on my opinions, playing in an elite orchestra and sending a wonderful tape of the Mendelsohn concerto would certainly rank very highly for me. But it may not be on the wish list of a college. They may have thousands of kids with this very same ability, so it would not be hook in this case. If they need that quarter back or that distance swimmer, he would certainly be given more consideration and the fact that I hate football and never even bother to look at swim team stats is not the issue. So it is not the quality of the ECs so much as the how they dovetail with what the school wants and needs. </p>

<p>I want to make it clear that I too have concerns in how the process of admissions to elite colleges work. One area of concern to me, is the "quota" issue. I believe quotas are specifically prohibited. I am not sure if that is being enforced. It's smudging things a bit to say a range versus a quota, but it seems to me that someone is keeping an eye on the body counts for various categories and that smacks an awful lot like quota to me. Also there is that suspicion that some of the desired ECs are deliberately chosen to bring down the number of kids from certain ethnic groups. I don't agree with this simply because I feel that a vibrant community is important and the things a college seems to deem important do help form that sort of community. But there are many who disagree with this and they have some pretty good arguments.</p>

91

<p>Voronwe said,</p>

<p>" In fact, my most memorable interview was with an Asian student with over three dozen ECs listed. I asked him why - since he couldn't possibly have given full attention even to a fraction of these -- and he said "Because my father said that joining a lot of organizations looks good on a college application!"</p>

<p>I think now you infer that Asian students are peripheraly in invoved in multiple ECs with your one example. Correct me if I am wrong. Again, this has no basis in fact. This does not address any of my points and is anecdotal in nature, contributing to the racist stereotyping of Asian American applicants. Please refer to the studies at Brown and Standord ( I gave you the exact source) about Asian Americans in the full pariticipation of all ECs and are passionate about their participation. You could also walk onto any high school campus in the nation and find Asian Americans totally involved in every aspect of high school life. Just walk into Stuyvesant HS in NYC, which is the pre-eminent public magnet hs and 51% Asian American and this will will debunk your stereotypical views of Asian American hs students as a group. Walk on the campus of Andover or Exeter (21% Asian) and you will find Asians in full participation of all the ECS available to them. Walk into any inner city hs or suburban hs, and you will find likewise. They are paricipants in varsity sports to editors of literary criticism and art journals published in their high school. They are involved in nationally and international recognized competitions from the International Physics and Math Olympiads, to gymnastics, tennis, fencing, and ice hockey (one of the members of the Women's Ice Hockey Olympic Team which won the Gold Medal was a Chinese American who played for Choate-Rosemary Hall and is at Harvard today), where Asian Americans are recognized as the best in the nation and the world</p>

<p>You are dealing with the typical Asian student stereotype as a "one-demensional stellar student with no other qualities other than music." This is absolutely false and Asian Americans have participated fully in ECs, if not more than the other applicant groups, yet they are admitted at the lowest rates than any other group. How do you explain this. Well, in the Brown study of its total applicant group, Brown ADMITTED there was an unfavorable "stereotyping" of Asians Ams and that their was a "cutural bias" against Asian Ams applicants in the admsions process. They found that they they were admitting whites with the same characteristics (ECs, holistic factors,etc.) while rejecting Asian Americans with the same characteristics the whites were admitted with. Sure sounds like bias to me, racial or otherwise. Brown admitted to "sterotyping" and cultural bias against on the part of the adcom.</p>

92

<p>Jamimom said,</p>

<p>[For URMs, usually an adcom is assigned to oversee minority admissions, and the files are examined with the different threshholds. This is also done for legacies, athletes, celebrities, developement and sometimes performing and visual arts candidates. Where the controversy lies is not in the quality of the ECs for URMs, but the fact that just being a URM is considered a major hook in itself. The fact that the URMs may be high income kids or of Caribbean descent is not the issue, so much as that this category is based solely on the fact that these kids are of Hispanic, Black or American Indian heritage.]</p>

<p>You are correct. I agree with your assessment, but not with the outcome of your assessment. What you are saying is that Asian Ams are competing with the Asian Am group, which hapeens to more stellar according to all criteria used. Whites are competing against whites, blacks are competing against blacks and latinos against latinos for spots, creating different standards of admissions for different groups resulting in racial quotas for diversity. This is the use of DOUBLE STANDARDS, TRIPLE STANDARDS, etc.. for admission and that's the inequity of a race and ethnic group based admissions process. Double standards reeks of unfairness and they were never accepted in a democractic fair process. The use of double standards wont last long and can never be never justified. Asians Ams are not competing against the toital applicant group for admission, but only against their own applicant group with double standards for admission, requiring Asian Ams to have a higher level of achievement to be admitted. This is unjust and it is what it is, but it wont last long, when fair-minded Americans see the the big picture. This is exactly what happen the Jews with their quotas. Now these quotas are abolished for Jews. They should be abolished for Asian Americans.</p>

93

<p>Our dear friend Jay should have spent more time checking the credibility of Dr, Chin, a well known "contributor" at the NY TImes Education forum, as well at the NY State Board for Professional Medical Conduct. </p>

<p>Dr. Chin's opinions have as much value as his reputation.</p>

94

<p>Jamimom said,</p>

<p>[I want to make it clear that I too have concerns in how the process of admissions to elite colleges work. One area of concern to me, is the "quota" issue. I believe quotas are specifically prohibited. I am not sure if that is being enforced. It's smudging things a bit to say a range versus a quota, but it seems to me that someone is keeping an eye on the body counts for various categories and that smacks an awful lot like quota to me. Also there is that suspicion that some of the desired ECs are deliberately chosen to bring down the number of kids from certain ethnic groups. I don't agree with this simply because I feel that a vibrant community is important and the things a college seems to deem important do help form that sort of community. But there are many who disagree with this and they have some pretty good arguments.]</p>

<p>Again, I gree with the above, but a vibrant community and a diverse community TRANSCENDS RACE. That's my point. Eliminate racial preferences or de facto racial preferences and admit student according to any criteria these schools wishes to even without test scores, but most certainly without race as a factor and the resultant class will TRULY DIVERSE in every sense.</p>

95

<p>Wow, there have been a lot of generalizations made on this board...careful there, rattle....
AA---while it has a lot of flaws--is instituted so that colleges are more or less a microcosm of society as a whole. It does need many changes (and I can understand your frustration), but I agree with a few of the motivations behind it.</p>

96

<p>No, Rattle, I am not saying that. I am saying that special categories such as URMs, athletes, legacies, there are a few others compete within themselves which lends itself to some controversy. Everyone else is in the general pool. As I mentioned before, most kids I know do not fill in the ethnic secton of the app and there are many mixed race kids so it would be rather difficult to separate out all the different groups. The only racial category is that of URMs which are comprised of blacks, Hispanics and American Indians--that receives this treatment. And the supreme court has ruled that this is legal. The question arises whether Asians are also considered URM and the answer is NO. I believe that was the original question of this post. They are not compared against each other according to every adcom I have ever known but are assessed in the general pool with all other applicants. </p>

<p>Quotas are illegal. That too was made clear, I believe by the Supreme Court along with a point system for race. I do not know how clear the borders are on that issue and you may know much more about this as this seems to be an area of great interest to you and you have many facts and stats in this area. If a school is using a quota or point system on race, they can be called for this. UMich Law School, among others, were doing this, and are now supposed to be using a holistic system. </p>

<p>When I worked in an admissions office at a top 25 college, I did hear some very unfortunate remarks that could have cost some people their jobs and really caused some scandal if they got out. I am sure the same does occur at times in all admissions office when things get a bit mean spirited. It should not happen or be tolerated. When I read some of the books written by some former adcoms, it was very disappointing how some applicant where viewed by some adcoms. I would have hoped for a more professional and compassionate attitude. However, I never heard anything about an Asian quota, or an slurs about Asians. If anything, Asian applicants were held in high regard as they generally had legible, complete apps and were truly outstanding academically. The categories that were often scornfully discussed were kids who were wealthy, advantaged and spoiled with apps that reaked of the advantages, athletes whose admissions were often done behind the scenes, development kids who were also admitted without imput from admissions, and, yes, URMs. Everyone in admissions does not agree with this particular pool and many adcoms are not comfortable with this situation of making race a "hook". Many are, like you, downright against it, particularly when an applicant is from an advantaged, educated household, sometimes downright rich, and has simply not made much out of his advantages. No one breathed a word about giving the Hispanic kid from Spanish Harlem from a single family home eligible for the Pell grant a break. They were all for that. But seriously, as Mini often brings up (and I do not agree entirely with Mini either--we have ad our tiffs as our posts will indicate), elite colleges do not have great numbers in accepting poor students. More often, as you rightfully brought up, the URM kids tended to be from middle/upper socio economic families who are getting a heads up purely for racial reasons. It is not a secret at all to any of us working in this field and none of us like the situation, any more than you do. Even URM families benefitting from the situation do not like it and are not proud of the situation. But without this URM designation, the number of URMs in our elite colleges would be very small--I really do not know how small, as I do not have any idea how strong the EC/experience/recommendation/essay part of the URM app is. I have never seen data giving any kind of rating for any group on this part of the appraisal,and I doubt that it will be given out as the ratings change in accordance to the needs and wants of the college. What colleges have done is considered that being URM is part of what they want in the community. And they consider this important enough to form its own applicant pool much the way athletes are treated with different criteria for the academci review as well as the EC review. They are the only group where race is considered or even counted. Adcoms do not waste their time trying to decide if Susan Lee is Asian since her parents are American born and she did not fill in the ethic info. There are no quotas per se for Asians since there is not even an accurate count of Asians. I have never heard an adcom say that there is an Asian quota--and you can call and ask every elite college admissions office and ask. Where the discrimination comes into play is indirectly, partly when seats are taken by URMs with possible "inferior" stats all around once the URM hook is removed, and again when you review the college wish list and find that the ECs that Asians tend to have are not on there. Both of these practices do end up treating Asian applicants to a disadvantage. Adcoms have out and out said in print, that certain words in the references such as "polite", "quiet", "diligent", "modest" are not good for getting high points and they do tend to be used a lot for kids who are Asian. Asian kids do not tend to get high points for leadership by the teachers who recommend them either. These are all directly from a number of well known adcom books. So the quality and number of ECs that Asian kids have are not the issue. I am in total agreement that they are of the highest quality, and there are at least an adequate number. They just do not jive with what the college wants. There are a heck of alot of URM football players that can play D-1 ivy level and not many Asians in that category, for example. Though URMs with higher test/grade scores do not even need that leverage. This has been my direct experience with adcoms in the elite schools. I have never seen them segregate out the Asian apps into a category of their own, compare them with each other--they are assessed with the entire applicant pool. It is the URMs that are segregated out and assessed against each other, and much to their benefit. So you cannot be disagreeing with the outcome of my assessment as it is not as you say. </p>

<p>There are two entirely separate issues here, Rattler. One is the existance and assessment of the URM pool. Though I did not check your statistics, I do agree with your view on what is being done here though I do not agree with your feeling that it should be abolished. This is a hot, hot issue that went to the Supreme Court, and though colleges are permitted to use race as a favorable factor in admissions as decided by the US Supreme Court, it is one that make a lot of people angry and you can find all kinds of disagreement about it. People think it is wrong. They want it abolished. But it is legal and it is happening right now in the open. Colleges are doing this with absolute impunity. But if you want an inflammatory debate on this forum, this is certainly the subject. Gets so hot that the moderators have to close it down. And that is how people feel. But it is legal, it is happening and no college is denying it.</p>

<p>The other issue is the Asian issue, and this has not been taken to the courts because there has been no definitive proof of discrimination, and/or no one has gotten hot enough about this to bring it to the courts. Doubt if it could get anywhere because there is not enough hard evidence--I have given some examples. This does not mean I am right--that there is no Asian discrimination. Perhaps you will be the one to collect enough info to challege how Asian applicants are being treated at the elite schools. </p>

<p>I will caveat all of my statements to exclude happenings in California in particular, as I have heard things about the UC system there that I have not confirmed or know that much about. I do work with a number of east coast colleges that are highly selective and the ivies and am familiar with how admissions works at a number of these schools, but am totally oblivious of the westcoast admissions scene..</p>

97

<p>African Americans are about 12% of the overall national population, and are a higher percentage than that of the population of college-age students. Thus, their being 5-7% of GW's population would not be that impressive. </p>

<p>GW even has special scholarships to attract top black and Hispanic students (as well as National Merit Scholars):
"Students with outstanding academic credentials are automatically considered for our Presidential Academic Scholarships. In addition, selected Finalists in the National Merit and National Achievement programs and Scholars in the National Hispanic Program are considered for these scholarships."</p>

98

<p>NSM, the only very selective school where I have seen blacks represented in proportion the the national population is at Stanford.</p>

99

<p>Will any school be full of kids who only have 800 #s -NO </p>

<p>Even if the criteria was to accept only students who got 1600's there would still be more students than there would be spots to accomodate them. What then would be the next criteria.</p>

<p>There are constant cries from VT & Rattle that URMS are being admitted with lower test scores. It seems that no matter how many times has it been said that you must look beyond the SAT scores, they seem to be stuck on this one criteria in the admissions process. The sad thing is that it so easy to scapegoat and say that some black or hispanic kid has taken a spot that should go to a 'higher scoring Asian kid' but guess what- who said that you were assured a spot. </p>

<p>Answer me this:
What does it do for an IVY or Elite School to admit students who cannot be successful? No school is so hard pressed for diversity that it must accept students who will not be able to hold thier own.</p>

<p>According to the 2003 Graduation rates for Div I schools @
<a href="http://www.ncaa.org/grad_rates/2003/d1/index.html%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.ncaa.org/grad_rates/2003/d1/index.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>The graduation rates for blacks from the Ivy League Schools were as follows
(I used the freshmen numbers) </p>

<p>School Students Rate Graduates
Harvard 138 93 128
Yale 90 84 76
Princeton 81 94 76
Columbia 101 87 88
Penn 114 82 93
Brown 97 92 89
Dartmouth 56 88 56
Cornell 100 88 88</p>

<p>Total number of African American Freshmen in Ivy League schools in 2003= 765 694 or 90.17% have graduated so those who were admitted must be doing something right (or will you assume that they got 4 years of passing grades simply because of the color of their skin?)</p>

<p>Howard University freshman enrollment of 855 African American students during that time period was more than the entire Ivy League combined.</p>

<p>So even if this small number were removed from the equation, not only would it be detrimental to ones college experience giving them a skewed perspective of the world, it still would not provide enough seats for all of those high schoring Asians who beleive that their spot was taken.</p>

100

<p>Momsdream,
And to get AAs represented similarly to their representation in the general population, Stanford had to do an excellent recruiting job. That's why they spend so much money to fly in accepted students who are African American.</p>

<p>Many colleges would love to have URMs in proportion to their percentage in the overall population. However, that's virtually impossible to do because of the disproportionately low numbers of URMs with the grades, scores and coursework to do well in college.</p>