PLEASE STOP referring to URMs as hooks!

@DonFefe, well said!

We all have to watch our own underlying attitudes and how even some explanation can be dicey. Eg, when you say, ‘academics isn’t everything,’ can you see it? Do you see how it says some get in- women, URMs, athletes, faculty kids, some locals- but don’t “really” have the academic chops? And there has to be something else to explain why-oh-why her instead of him.

And building up that something-else, if we’re not cautious, (and when we use labels- athlete, female stem, legacy, etc,) just perpetuates assumptions. Susie isn’t really as strong as Billy, it must be something else. Some day, maybe we can let all this go. All top schools pick the kids they believe can stick, thrive, and add to their communities.

http://www.collegeconfidential.com/dean/defines-hook-one/ Sally Rubenstone, here on cc, acknowledges that being a URM IS a hook. It doesn’t mean the student should not be otherwise qualified- of course they should. But a URM, whether it is a geographic or other demographic minority, is a hook- and that is ok.

Thank you @lookingforward for raising your concerns. While I would agree that “all top schools pick the kids they believe can stick, thrive, and add to their communities,” that very broad dictum doesn’t really address the nitty-gritty of creating that community, of finding and enrolling a fully diverse student body. Whether we choose to acknowledge the categorization schemes that admissions people use doesn’t really matter–such schemes are a reality and I am merely acknowledging that reality.

Similarly, I found your comment that “even some explanation can be dicey” to be ambiguous. You seem to be dealing in subtleties here that are well beyond me. But to answer your question, I don’t see how what I related about Khan’s take on elite schools says anything that you suggested. Perhaps you will be so kind to more fully explicate this observation.

Thank you, as well, @jym626. Of course, I stand by my first post. Please understand that I’m not talking about admissions decisions that are made strictly according to numbers, but rather of the holistic approach that elite boarding schools use. If a school does not use the holistic approach, and essentially says, "were going to use a certain numerical cut-off and any applicant who falls below that cut-off will be admitted only if that applicant is from one of the “hooked” groups, then fine–that’s a hook. But that’s not how holistic admissions works.

When a school goes out to create a diverse community, it does so not solely to privilege certain groups. Rather, it believes that having a diverse community enriches the educational experience for all. We only learn to be capably cosmopolitan through experience. When a student encounters individuals with a different background–in whatever way–that student grows by gaining important knowledge about the world.

Thus, diversity strengthens a community. Everyone has assets–but whatever the particular asset, the assumption is that it is something that lends value to the educational experience of the community as a whole. And that applies even to legacies and fac brats–indeed, I’m sure that any admissions person could provide good reason for viewing those statuses as assets that enrich the community.

I believe we have to give schools the benefit of the doubt, as they are in the best position to see how all of the admissions decisions they makes combine to realize institutional goals. It’s not just that schools admit legacies and fac brats as a courtesy to the people they know and like–rather, it takes them because they add something valuable to the overall educational experience.

A school wants to provide the best possible education to its students–and that includes what takes place outside of the classroom. Casual interactions among individuals are an important part of the sort of educational experience that residential communities provide. Homogenous communities shortchange everyone, as they don’t allow for the breadth of experience that go into making students worldly-wise and hence, better-prepared for the future. Moreover, homogenous communities can incline it’s members to see people who are different as “the other”–and the figurative demarcations (and, often, walls) that arise in the minds of those individuals are detrimental to our society.

@DonFefe all of your points are valid and well thought out but it doesn’t change the fact that being an URM is a very clear advantage aka a hook, just like being an athlete, legacy, trombone player or hailing from a distant state. It is what it is.

I have three kids, all of whom were hooked as athletes. Being an athlete on a selective college campus can have its stigma too. All three of my kids were well within shooting distance of their schools (well, the last one probably benefitted the most).

anyway, they’re still hooked. it’s a fact.

lots of URM could have gained admission to their school if they’d lied on their app and said they were Caucasian.

but being an URM is still a hook. just a fact. some URM may not have needed nor benefitted from it, but a hook it is.

Being a URM is a hook. Like all hooks it comes with the patina that the student couldn’t cut it with academics and standard ECs alone. So I don’t agree that that is a reason to stop affirmative action any more than that being a reason to stop admitting legacies. And no matter what anyone says, I don’t think we want a society that admits on the basis of numbers alone. It does not suit our American way of doing things and America never, ever takes that position when discussing international competition because it would always lose. I don’t believe that most people on this site would agree that Indian students are better because they score better in math than American students do. Can’t have it both ways. Preferential admissions is here to stay and it should be. So stop it with the " should be a meritocracy" crap. It never is and never was.

According to Phillips Andover:

**The admissions team also looks for a “hook,” as they call it. A “hook” is an area in which a student has succeeded before and should continue to succeed once at Andover. **

The article is from 2006, but I would doubt a significant change in their “hook” philosophy. So using this logic, you can’t support that being a URM is a hook.

http://phillipian.net/2006/03/30/andover-receives-record-high-number-of-2250-applications-acceptance-rate-drops-1-to-20/

Actually, I don’t think there’s evidence to prove that students accepted based on academic merits only are “worse” than otherwise. Whether the academic merits are measured mainly by stats (like china and India) or by a combination of stats and academics focused interviews (like in UK) is another matter, but taking legacies, athletes and other hooks into consideration for admission decisions is not mandatory to produce “better” students. Why do you think American students are the best? Many American colleges are super rich compared with other parts of the world, but do you know how much of their quality is relying on the “nerds” they admitted before or educated in foreign countries? @myyalieboy

If you truly want to “earn it” without race in the equation, then don’t list race on your applications and documentation. Until colleges truly stop discriminating based on race, those URM’s who really “earned it” will be harmed. Just look at medical school admission statistics for URM if you want to see what a hook looks like.

How are colleges discriminating based on race? Do you really think a school looks at an application and identify the race before they do anything else? You think they sort applications strictly by race You don’t think they read an application and identify the race after they have determined an interest? You really believe that URM have not earned a right to be at that particular school? If so, you must also believe that they do not earn the grades to graduate and the teacher assign grades base on race as well. Once a student is admitted, their efforts in school is what allows them to be successful. Schools are well aware of the fact that the playing field is not even for all applicants and they take that into consideration when offering admission.

I work in higher ed and while I’m not at a selective institution, I can tell you we certainly do slice and dice the data in every way, shape, and form imaginable. In my state, our performance with underrepresented populations can figure into better funding. Currently we are looking to improve enrollment and success with Hispanic students and specifically African American males.

So, as soon as an application is submitted it is automatically sorted into a pile based on race and gender?

“Do you really think a school looks at an application and identify the race before they do anything else?”

Yes, unfortunately I think they do. Now, that doesn’t mean that the students in any particular group are not “qualified” to be at the school (whatever that means). But it does mean that students within a particular racial categorization are largely being compared against one another, not against all candidates across groups.

Think of it like boys versus girls, or day students versus boarding. If boarding schools were truly “holistic” in their approach to admission, do you really think that they would arrive at stable numbers for these categories year after year (with of course a little tiny variation probably having to do with imperfect yield projections).

It strains credulity to believe that year to year boarding schools would have roughly stable percentages of varying URM and ORM populations, if they weren’t creating “buckets” of students based on race classification. Again, there is no reason for everyone to get their hacks up over this. As someone above wisely said, it’s not a pure meritocracy; never has been and never will be. Just like society.

It remains that in whatever “bucket” or “buckets” a student is placed (race, athletic hook, boy, girl, full pay, legacy, etc.), he or she will need to meet admissions cutoff for that bucket (or combination of buckets). I imagine that the criteria the admissions offices use to judge candidates vary in substance and in weighting depending upon the bucket being examined. But I for one do not believe the hype of a “holistic” process.

BTW, this is going back some time ago, but when I was an undergraduate I had a work study job in the admissions office of the university’s very prestigious school of social work and we in fact did identify the race of the applicant prominently on the front of the admissions file (back then it was not very computerized and these were yellow hanging folders). In fact, there was not too much other information highlighted other than name, race and undergraduate institution right on the front.

Not at my institution because of its mission but yes absolutely. The systems used for recruiting are designed this way and with predictive data analytics, AOs can better zero in on applicants that will be successful.

There are a lot of categories that get marked for special consideration and get a closer read depending on the schools - coach’s pull, sibling, legacy, etc.

“The existence of affirmative action ultimately winds up stigmatizing many qualified URM students who may well have been accepted on their academic statistics and accomplishments alone. But suspicion will always remain…”

My response to these types of comments/thoughts/sentiments is…suspicion will always remain until my kid opens his/her mouth and the people within earshot get a taste of the dynamic yet understated intellectual in their midst. And they tell two friends. And they tell two friends…

You can’t have your cake and eat it too. There are reasons to keep admission criteria different for different races as it is there to creat a homogenous society and there is no need to feel ashamed for affirmative action. It’s there to make up for opportunities that were not offered to URM.

As long as statistics keep proving that URM doesn’t need scores that ORMs do, we can’t deny facts. This is going to change but until then merit URM admits have to live with the stigma that they got in on quota. That doesn’t mean that ANYONE who isn’t racist and ignorant thinks that URM aren’t as intelligent as ORM. However, no matter how politically correct one is, it would be a lie to say that admission statistics are same for ORM and URM. Look at data for medical schools and it becomes even harder to be PC, though we all know that URM communities need more doctors.

It’s not just URMs anyway. For colleges lately, the emphasis has been on first generation and lower socio-economic, regardless of race. Look at all the colleges that have connections with the Questbridge program. It’s not like many factors aren’t considered.

Why does affirmative action not stigmatize the many qualified women/girls who are admitted? Why only URM? Why do we believe that affirmative action policies are only for URM and not for women as well?