*official* An Honest And Orderly Discussion On Aa

Applying to College
1

<p>-----------Please everyone, as the admission time comes lets create a rant free, peaceful, and persuasive debate on AA----------</p>

<p>To begin these are my views on the situation </p>

<p>The affirmative action issue is an issue that has been in many peoples minds especially around admission time. </p>

<p>The underlying principal behind affirmative action is to provide a diverse, equitable, and compassionate offering to those ethnic and racial groups that have been traditionally disadvantaged. At the same time it seems as if this practice is almost exactly opposite from the pursuit of a color blind admission process, since undoubtedly race and ethnicity are indeed being used. </p>

<p>But the question is does the ends justify the means. Does more efficiently integrating our diverse America, constitute prefencial treatment. </p>

<p>My opinion is that hopefully by 2010 all preferential treatment solely on race will end, while those based on socioeconomic levels will thrive on. </p>

<p>But please, you must understand the situation of the colored man in America today. You saw Kanye West’s statement. DO YOU REALLY THINK ITS NOT REAL. Honestly. </p>

<p><a href="http://hosted.planetether.net/referral.jpg%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://hosted.planetether.net/referral.jpg&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>This is the situation. In America a stigma is attached with being black. An experience that other minorities can also relate with but not in the same manner. </p>

<p>Black, Latino, and Native American communities are examples of years of degradation, blight, pain, sorrow, and hurt. </p>

<p>Numbering more than 28% of the population, even white supremacist groups claim that with illegal immigration and the black undercount minorities make up almost 40% of America, Blacks and Latinos overwhelmingly live in poor conditions</p>

<p>In America, being born black means you have a 1 in 4 chance of serving time in jail compared with 1 in 113 for whites, and 1 in 17 for Hispanics. Being born Hispanic means that you will have a 1 in 7 chance of having both parents working under $10 and hour. Being born Native American means you will have 1 in 5 chance of having an critically addicted alcoholic parent. </p>

<p>The thing is that when you have been traditional disenfranchised, when you have never felt as though you can become anything, when you feel trapped in a society that forced your parents to go to segregated schools. </p>

<p>Life is just not fair to these people. Blacks and Latinos need an extra hand to bridge the gap of the stigma. Bridge the gap of disenfranchisement. </p>

<p>But don’t get me wrong I have said before, this is the case of all Blacks and Hispanics, but I understand that those that are wealthy have much more opportunites, and thus that extra push should not be so profound.</p>

<p>But if your anti AA you have to understand that by having more black professionals and more Hispanic public figures, those people lost in the ghettos of America can share the believe that they too can succeed. That they too can join mainstream America.</p>

<p>BUT I ALSO believe that this practice should definitely be limited after 2015, simply because it does do harm to race relations. It tells an individual who scored better then another individual that they didn’t make it to HYPS but that other kid did because he was colored. Also it brings up deep taboos in our society, which I don’t believe should be forgotten but I do believe should not be relived. </p>

<p>In the end I am a middle of the road supporter of AA, but I do hope that socioeconomic AA should definitely be more profound.</p>

<p>CAN EVERYONE AGREE THAT ANYONE WHO MAKES LESS THEN 30K A YEAR SHOULD BE ELIGBLE FOR SOCIOECONOMIC PREFRENTIAL TREATMENT.</p>

<p>NOW PLEASE ADD YOUR COMMENT, AND DON’T FEEL SCARED THIS IS A PEACEFUL DEBATE. NO RANTS. I UNDERSTAND YOUR POSTION, YOU MAY UNDERSTAND MINE, BUT LETS DISCUSS HOW THIS AFFECTS YOU AS AN ASIAN, BLACK , WHITE, HISPANIC, OR NATIVE AMERICAN. AND THANKS IN ADVANCE FOR THE FIRST OFFICIAL CONSTRUCTIVE AA DEBATE.</p>

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<p>whats an AA? i seriously donnt know</p>

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<p>Affirmative Action</p>

<p>A program design to give minorites, but blacks in particular preferential treatment in job hiring, contracts, and education.</p>

<p>Now used in connection with practices of many big name schools to increase diversity amongest other things by admitting minorites in a preferential manner. Example, An asian with a 2400 vs. a Hispanic with a 2300-2350, IF ALL THINGS ARE SIMILAR.</p>

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<p>AA (Affirmative Action), essentially is (and please correct me if I'm wrong, or add some more information!) giving (under represented) minorities a boost. It can be in college admissions, job applications, etc. It works under the assumption that minorities have less opportunities, and/or face more hardships due to their ethnic background. (Note: I don't think it's practiced in Canada, but I'm not entirely sure)</p>

<p>I'm in the middle when it comes to AA. On one hand, I don't think things such as ethnic background should be a factor in the admissions process. We as applicants have no control over it, unlike GPA, SATs, and ECs, which we can work to improve and change. On the other hand, visible minorities can face more challenges; even an affluent minority may face peer pressure/resentment from their peers (ie "African American acting white")</p>

<p>Some people are saying "Oh Person B took my spot in X school because he/she was ___" But the thing is, no two applicants are alike. Person A might have had extremely high stats, but Person B might have lower stats, but amazing ECs.</p>

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<p>blah i don't really care, considering i'll be in the class of 2010, and i can't really do anything about this even if i did care (which i don't)</p>

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<p>Exactley, That is how i feel. I am in the middle of the road. Its such a complex issue, that really must be dealt with. We dont want people turning in to Fanatical racists, or ultra libral maniacs. But both sides have a comparable arguement. But the thing that traps me is when i see just how hard it is to be black in america. Its so confusing really. I really want to see how other people look at it. How do people who worked so hard to get a 2400 and a 4.0 feel when they didnt make it to HYPS, but someone else did who was hispanic or black. True every applicant is not the same but i can imagine when you are a polo and flip flops kid who sees another polo and flip flops kid that is a little darker kid get preferential treatment you can basically figure out the deciding factor was race. But then again you cant understand the struggle that that kid has to go through. </p>

<p>Its so complex.</p>

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<p>Yes it is but according to The Hidden History of Admission and Exclusion at Harvard, Yale and Princeton, by Jerome Karabel it shows that although diversity has increased at HYP social diversity has not changed.
Read this article
<a href="http://www.boston.com/news/globe/magazine/articles/2005/09/04/the_chosen_few/%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.boston.com/news/globe/magazine/articles/2005/09/04/the_chosen_few/&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>I feel that AA is not wrong but flawed. Yes there are racial minorities undergoing adversities but aren't there asian or white students living under poverty? I will cite the average income of the individual states as proof if anyone wants but it shows that heavily white populated areas still have one of the lowest incomes. </p>

<p><a href="http://www.census.gov/hhes/income/4person.html%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.census.gov/hhes/income/4person.html&lt;/a>
<a href="http://www.bea.gov/bea/newsrelarchive/2005/mpi0405.htm%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.bea.gov/bea/newsrelarchive/2005/mpi0405.htm&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>This shows that states that have a heavy white population has less income than rest of the nation as well. Also most of the URMs are actually economicall/socially disadvantaged thus if the system changes to SES action then it will include most of the minorities while including all the non-minority poor students. I doubt that a a minority with a high SES has had less opportunity than a non-minority with a low SES. The AA does not ensure a SES diverse campus which is providing true diversity.</p>

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<p>But honestly do you believe that black people are richer on average than white people. I mean i really cant see that since in every city the ghetto is black and in every city the best parts are white. I mean 40% of poor are black but only 13% of america is black. But i see your point and do understand where your coming from.</p>

<p>So do you believe that we should do SEAA, SocioEconomic Affirmative Action then, that is everyone classified poor or near poor regardless of race.</p>

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<p>Haven't you guys had enough of this yet? Check out the Princeton Review article on AA, it's pretty honest and orderly.</p>

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<p>Yes but that is stereotyping a race(i do not mean this in a racist way). However, are u only going to salvage the minorities when the obvious fact is that a LOT of non-minorities are still disadvantaged. Yes i agree that blacks in general have less priviledges but a lot of asian immigrants face that plight too. I have worked as a janitor this summer and EVERY SINGLE of them were koreans who had immigrated to the US. They are not rich or even middle class. They are poor. Also I believe averaging things is wrong in this perspective because u don't know the difference between the data sets so it can be severely biased judging based on average. YOu need more info than that. </p>

<p>In conclusion yes i agree with SEAA and firmly support it. I am middle-class asian btw. I know that poor minorities have less advantages than poor whites or asians. AA somewhat ensures that the poor minority get some attention. HOWEVER this is at the expense of MANY MORE destitute non-minorities. Every one of these people deserve attention although some need more than others.
Legally there is the famous
Bakke v. Regents of Berkeley which vaguely concluded that race should NOT be the basis of admission however it could be used as a factor.
There was another AA related decision in TX i believe. It was Hopewood v. Texas. UT law school is somewhat famous however they added some points to the AI according to race. Hopewood was a white female but i forgot but i think she had a crippled child or something. She went through MAJOR disadvantages. However in the admissions pool she received no special attention. Do you think that it is just? I do not believe so. Generalizing always brings problems since generalization is often inaccurate. This is the same when u generalize a race. Yes I know that SESAA is also generalizing but this is a more accurate system that reflects those in our society who need special attention.</p>

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<p>i see your point and duely note it. </p>

<p>My point is that, Asian immigrants and immigrants in general are a self selected group, a group that has come here for a better life.</p>

<p>But blacks, and hispanics to some extent, have been here for years and are products of years of blatant racism, segregation, poverty, degradation, and disenfrachisement.</p>

<p>Also the stigma associated with seeing your people in africa or the carribean struggle so hard, and then looking back at yourself and trying to understand how your ancestors were enslaved and why. Trying to understand 3,000+ lynchings, trying to understand 1 mill+ hate crime, trying to understand why you have never seen real black leadership, why you have to speak a dialect of american english and dress in certain way and not experience the things that mainstream americans can is quite frustating. </p>

<p>For hispanics, seeing "DAY LABORER PICK UP" and "No habla espanol", seeing your people forced to wash toilets to make whatever living they can, after fighting to come here is very painful. Its like a modern form of slavery for people to get paid 30 dollars for a day's labor, and not be able to complain since they dont have legal documents. </p>

<p>Also that example of a korean worker is not really that good, since korea is a developed and prospering nation, and that that person if north korean had south korea to rely on.</p>

<p>BUT I UNDERSTAND your point. I understand that a lot of people struggle.</p>

<p>The white people living in Trailer Parks, the chinese immigrants forced to work 13 or more hours a day. I understand and feel there pain.</p>

<p>That is why i am becoming more and more for SEAA, but there is still that part of me that cant get over the condition of certain minorities. </p>

<p>Your points are excellent, and your inclusion of court cases does prove that race based AA should not be an end all be all is also impeccable. </p>

<p>Thats my view, but i understand yours.</p>

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<p>well i'm gonna say that Korea isn't all that bright. Hey i'm korean and people think that we are going well. However we are not. There's a big class difference and too many are unemployed. The mood is really bad and many immigrate to the US in hopes of a better life. I agree that it is more obvious in hispanic countries. BUT i think you need to know that MANY koreans who come over do manual labor here. I know this b/c i've seem numerous. Heck there are bunch of Seoul National University grads doing a laundromat. I understand that hispanics and blacks face those things but on the general level those that u mentioned i think r less flagrant. I don't think there is blatant segregation or discrination these days. I think they are implicit or subtle things. However yes i understand ur point.</p>

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<p>thanks for your comment but please i ask you to look at this.</p>

<p><a href="http://hosted.planetether.net/referral.jpg%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://hosted.planetether.net/referral.jpg&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>Even in times of turmoil, if your black, or hispanic, life is just tougher. </p>

<p>But i do see that koreans along with all immigrants have to work hard to get to where they want to. But i must inform you that although that is a beutiful struggle and the epitome of the american dream, some people are just so disenfranchised that an educational atmosphere is completely gone. </p>

<p><a href="http://www.americanpatrol.com/04-FEATURES/041119-DAY-LABOR-PLAGUE/jupiteraliens.gif%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.americanpatrol.com/04-FEATURES/041119-DAY-LABOR-PLAGUE/jupiteraliens.gif&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p><a href="http://www.wirednewyork.com/harlem/images/harlem_lenox_15may04.jpg%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.wirednewyork.com/harlem/images/harlem_lenox_15may04.jpg&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>But it seems that more and more, we are agreeing that SEAA is the only compromise that can allow all doors to open.</p>

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<p>yeah i saw the first one. i agree there is bias left but it is significantly less than the days of the civil rights movement. however i agree that black people are disadvantaged. but i have a strange dilemma. It just seems hard approaching black/hispanic people who live in the ghetto. they just look scary and i'm intimidated although that is my bias. I would liek to help but i'm afraid they r gonna do sth to me. It is my bias but it just lives inside of me. any suggestions?</p>

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<p>Another example of disadvantages for blacks and latinos:
(had to dig it out on a search engine)
<a href="http://www.jessejacksonjr.com/query/creadpr.cgi?id=%22006186%22%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.jessejacksonjr.com/query/creadpr.cgi?id=%22006186%22&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>-Blacks in Chicago are five times more likely than whites to be turned down for mortgages, while Latinos are nearly three times as likely to be refused a loan, according to a new study.
Yet the same federal data shows that whites, blacks and Latinos all have an easier time obtaining mortgages in the Chicago area than their counterparts nationwide</p>

<p>-"In work we have done, its clear that if you are black, no matter what your income group, you are much more likely to get a subprime loan than if you are white," Bush (NOT GEORGE) said.</p>

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<p>This belongs in the more general discussion cafe, not on the Admissions forum--</p>

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<p>The picture you posted about "looting" and "finding" is idiotic. Give me a break. I HIGHLY HIGHLY doubt that there was any racial motivation behind that comment; merely a varied vocabulary. The reason people like that still believe that mass racism exists today is because they actively LOOK for it. They go into every sitatuation automatically assuming they are being somehow unfairly treated. If you'd just chill out you'd realize everyone's not out to get you.</p>

<p>Also, I agree 100% with SEAA. The education disadvantages that minorities face nearly all stem from socioeconomic distress. Changing the preferential treatment to those in low-income families would STILL aid minorities while at the same time aiding other disadvantaged families who traditionally would be ignored.</p>

<p>On the subject of AA, consider this:</p>

<p>Students admitted under AA are often underqualified and unprepared to handle the workload of the school to which they've been accepted. As a result, they fail and drop out at a much higher rate than their non-AA'd classmates.</p>

<p>The real problem that needs to be fixed are the high schools in poor areas. If the quality of the high schools improved and they began to truly prepare students for further education, AA wouldn't be necessary.</p>

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<p>One last quote I found interesting:</p>

<p>
[quote]
But where is it written that different racial or ethnic groups must appear proportionately in all institutions and activities? In American higher education, gross disproportions are already quite common. Jews, for example, at less than 3 percent of the population, make up about 40 percent of most law faculties, and Asians have come to dominate Ph.D.'s in math and science. Blacks, at 12 percent of the population, account for two-thirds of the players in professional football and four-fifths in basketball. These disproportions may conflict with some abstract egalitarian ideal, but rarely are they seen as constituting so serious a problem as to require double standards in order to produce better racial or ethnic 'balances'.

[/quote]
</p>

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<p>that is an important quote. But everyone knows the power strings attached with graduating from Harvard or Yale. By doing so you become leaders in industry or in society. Without an egalitarian approach we would be left with a continued unequal distribution of wealth that falls roughly on racial lines. </p>

<p>Diversity is also a key factor. If in your math phd level situation you only come across asian or white candidates, then your preception and experience in the world is heavily skewed, and the ability for you to see that streotypes are not always true, or the ability to see that blacks and hispanics are hard workers, or the ability to learn in an environment where many colors and ideas are the norm. It is a situation that begs egalitarian ideals. Jews and Asian, to there credit, work hard and are overrepresented in higher education, but that shouldnt mean that that should be the norm. Hopefully after several years black and hispanic students can have someone to look up to, someone who they can follow just as the jews (in no derogatory sense) have einstein and the like. Then one day we can look past race, but still today its such a razor sharp divide.</p>

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<p>I'm all for promoting diversity, since college really is about expanding your horizons, but attaching an admissions decision to race is ony perpetuating the divisions that cause racism in the first place. If the modern, un-racist ideal is that skin color has no bearing on the person, why are we still differentiating between black and white?</p>