Princeton answers to Jian Li claims

<p>Amid charge of bias, Rapelye stands firm</p>

<p><a href="http://www.dailyprincetonian.com/archives/2006/11/30/news/16798.shtml%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.dailyprincetonian.com/archives/2006/11/30/news/16798.shtml&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>"Anything that seems unfair is under scrutiny," Dean of Admission Janet Rapelye told students yesterday in a rare roundtable discussion that ranged from allegations of discrimination to the implications of the University's elimination of Early Decision.</p>

<p>Addressing the ongoing investigation into the University's admission policies for Asian-Americans, Rapelye told roughly 30 students in Frist 308 that "the numbers don't indicate [discrimination]," and "what we're doing is as fair as it can be."</p>

<p>As part of the investigation, the Admission Office examined its statistics from last year. Rapelye said that about 50 percent of students with perfect SAT scores were admitted, and that admissions officers look closely at extracurricular activities to piece together a holistic view of each candidate.</p>

<p>*"Many others had far better qualifications," Rapelye said of Li, breaking with the office's tradition of not commenting on specific applications. "His outside activities were not all that outstanding." *</p>

<p>Although I certainly understand why colleges would want some diversity on their campuses especially to equalize gender, The concept of "holistic admission" reeks of potential discrimination.</p>

<p>This is exactly what I don't like about "holistic admission." Colleges can do and say anything under the guise of "holistic admission." Frankly, if Asians have to have 50 points better than their non-Asian counterparts, it surely sounds like discrimination to me.</p>

<p>Think about it: what is to prevent any college from discriminating in any way under the guise of "holistic admission?" This policy hurt Jewish admission during the 1940's and 1950's.What is to prevent schools from instituting any form of discrimination if they can maintain some "holistic admission" standard?</p>

<p>What is to prevent the ivys from only taking kids whose parents are wealthy? What is to prevent any schools from either discriminating against or in favor of people of color or for or against a religion? </p>

<p>Doesn't anyone see the potential abuse that can be caused by having a "holistic admission" standard?</p>

<p>Rapelye was not discussing Asian-Americans. She was discussing Jian Li, specifically. Apparently some other colleges must have come to the same conclusion.</p>

<p>Ah, Taxguy, there is a reason why the most selective schools use a holistic system.</p>

<p>
[quote]
Doesn't anyone see the potential abuse that can be caused by having a "holistic admission" standard?

[/quote]
</p>

<p>Potential abuse? Pluzzzhe! Are you advocating the end of the right for private schools to set their own criteria of admissions?</p>

<p>Yup. Let's rate them SAT?SAT II 2400/2400 on down to 0/0. Maybe schools could institute a professional sports like draft. If you don't like your draft place you could wait an additional year betting on good Community College stats. I sincerely hope no one thinks test scores are that useful.</p>

<p>Sure holistic admissions leave room for potential abuse, but I'd rather have that than a strictly numbers driven admissions process. I can't imagine how you would design a numbers driven process that takes into account the variety of ECs, volunteer and paid jobs, economic adversity and any of the other factors that play into admissions decsions.</p>

<p>It's like that famous Winston Churchill quote about democracy. It's the worst form of government except for all the others that have been tried.</p>

<p>


I have tried to make the point several times that there are people out there that can't get it through their heads that kids with better stats are not better candidates. Stats just get you in the game. They don't establish a rank or scale of qualification but the Jian Li's of the world think so and just won't let it go. This is very frustrating.</p>

<p>It's like people arguing : </p>

<p>Speed is important in a football player. They judge and rank speed and strength and other physical feats at the NFL Pre-Draft combines to have as accurate a measure as possible with standardization of scoring and conditions. (Same equipment. Same tests. Same proctors. ) </p>

<p>Jian Li is a football player with 4.2 speed (exceptional). Therefore, the Cowboys should draft him higher than other candidates with 4.3 and 4.4 speed. It doesn't happen that way but some of you keep arguing it should. (But that 4.8 running back is going home, not to the Cowboys.) </p>

<p>They look at speed in the context of the whole package. </p>

<p>Add in strength as in bench press. Jian Li can bench press 300 pounds. The others 270 and 250. So therefore with speed and strength, Jian Li should be drafted prior to others with less speed and strength. Nope. Doesn't work that way. The best football players have something you can't measure on a scale or with a watch. Elusiveness. Shiftiness. Competitiveness. Will to win. Never say die. "4th quarter-so tired you can't lift your legs but I'm ready, coach-speed" is what's important. "Crarmping all game but I can still play another series, coach-strength" is what's important. Greatness. It is not easily definable in a ball player but it's certainly easier to define than a "top student". </p>

<p>The reality is the Cowboys will continue to look at Li's speed and strength and if they want to take a flyer those numbers will help. But alone, numbers won't get him drafted and they won't get him in to Princeton. They want to look at the film of who he is and what he's done and how he's done it in the context of where he's played before and with what coaching. Why is this so hard to understand?</p>

<p>A kid with an SAT 50 points higher is not a better student, more qualified, smarter, or more deserving. Well, most folks supporting Li would say he is. The answer is he's not. At least that is the answer at the most selective schools. </p>

<p>It is not a contest for the best stats. It is a selection by the college. Look at the results and modify your behavior. Jeez.</p>

<p>Xiggi notes, "
Potential abuse? Pluzzzhe! Are you advocating the end of the right for private schools to set their own criteria of admissions"</p>

<p>Response: Ah Xiggi, long time, no hear. No, I am not advocating the end of the right of private schools to set admission criteria. However, I am advocating some policy to measure whether a policy can be discriminatory. </p>

<p>I have no problem with schools trying to obtain a wide variety of students in both gender, geography and major interest. I do, however, question whether a school should be exempt from any and all discrimination, especially for public universities or private schools that accept any public funding.</p>

<p>Frankly, I would want to see some numerical test applied to college admission. If one racial, ethnic or religious group has to have much higher standards than other groups for admission, this should be a factor for futher investigation as to their policies. </p>

<p>Notice I am NOT saying that because one kid got 50 points more, he/she should be admitted. However, if it is a general trend among many applicants that one race or religion needs a lot higher admission scores and GPAs overall, I would find this troubling.</p>

<p>My father was a graduate of Bronx High School of Science, which is a magnet school in NY. He was one of the top kids in the school. He was told by a Columbia Admission's officer that due to the high number of qualified Jewish kids, he would have little chance for admission. Jews at the time were required to have higher grades and admission criteria for the same spots as their non-Jewish counterparts. Other top schools also had the same policy in order to reduce their Jewish enrollment.</p>

<p>Maybe his experience scarred me regarding any form of discrimination or affirmative action.</p>

<p>A kid with 50 points higher on his SAT might have had a better breakfast that day, taken the test three times more (and used his highest scores on each). At any rate, all it measured was a three-hour period in the kid's life. Hardly something that could be called "merit".</p>

<p>Send me in coach.</p>

<p>Send me in coach.</p>

<p>LOL. Well, I was completely incapable of using a music to prove my point, like an orchestra. So I went with team sports. Imagine that.;)</p>

<p>Someone will have to translate from sports to music for the non-sports crowd.;)</p>

<p>Oh, come on Mini. Of course, what you say is true (only partially true for schools, like Princeton I think, that use single-test-date scores). A 50-point difference between two individuals doesn't mean very much. But the factors that make it unmeaningful are equally likely to be true of ethnic Asians and ethnic whatevers; they don't favor one or the other. Across a big enough population, a 50-point average difference between ethnic groups seems significant.</p>

<p>Let's face it. Elite Colleges, including Princeton, bring these problems on themselves.</p>

<p>How?</p>

<p>By clouding the whole admissions process in secrecy. And by misleading statements regarding what does and does not matter.</p>

<p>And this is no accident.</p>

<p>IMHO, the perceptual problem with asian admissions is just a byproduct of their obsession with having the "right" people admitted in order to maintain their aura of exclusivity and having the "best". Harvard as much as said this in their recent article.</p>

<p>BTW, who are the "right" people? Kids of alums; athletes; prep school kids; wealthy etc. Throw in a few URMs in order to have pictures of color in the catalog...</p>

<p>yes, Xiggi, they can admit who they want, and do. I just wish they would not spend so much time covering up the nature of what they really DO want.</p>

<p>And curmudgeon: I'm not certain that it really works the way you say it does. My impression is that, apart from a very few top players at top programs, you have it backwards: teams look for a minimum acceptable skill level (which is pretty high), and then draft on the basis of speed, strength, and size. Canny football players drop to the late rounds or get try-out invitations (and are sometimes very successful).</p>

<p>The question is if an audit would show that in fact a higher % of Asians are rejected. Most applicants to Ivy Schools are "qualified candidates" so then you'd need to look at those that are at the high end of the pool knowing that within such a group a small variable or intriguing EC could tip the scale.</p>

<p>Anyone can show that an individual student might has been rejected over another fror any reason so the question is would an audit demonstate that this happens more frequently to one group over another. We know that schools that are top heavy with girls might give boys a slight edge with all things being equal. If there are 10 spots and 10 good candidates of similar attributes is it possible that if 5 are Asian and 5 are Caucasian one could find that over time it becomes clear that the trend shows a disadvantage to Asian American applicants.? I don't know the answer and it may not have been true in his specific case but that doesn't mean that the belief that Asians have to do more than others is wrong. If applications took out names as well as parents status for a year we might find out.</p>

<p>
[quote]
teams look for a minimum acceptable skill level (which is pretty high), and then draft on the basis of speed, strength, and size.

[/quote]

And end up with Tony Mandarich instead of Troy Aikman. ;) How'd that work out? LOL</p>

<p>There's always a better chance for the high stat kids. It's just that they ain't necessarily the TOP PICKS and that's who we are talking about. Not free agents.</p>

<p>It seems that many of your are in favor of a college's use of a secret formula for "holistic admission." I wonder if you would also be in favor of this for other endeavors. </p>

<p>For example, how about in hiring? I know a well- known sales trainer, who is also a published author, who only hires nice Baptist folks? He could argue that he does this for "holistic purposes" in order to have a congruance of thought with the other employees. How about a country club that will not take an Catholics for "holistic reasons." When does this stop!</p>

<p>As I said, I think the whole concept reeks of possible abuse.</p>

<p>Curmudgeon, I don't think that your sports analogy is correct. Sports teams want to win. Thus, they have a clear incentive to find the fastest, strongest and best players possible. The free market will probably preclude discrimination among teams. I don't know what precludes discrimination among non-profit universities.</p>

<p>As a Jew, I would like to say something about the repeated comparison of Asian admissions to historic discrimination against Jewish applicants, which began in the 1920's. At that time, some schools had fixed, official quotas about the maximum number of Jewish applicants; this was not presumed discrimination - it was an actual, written policy, with different rules in play for how Jewish applications would be measured. For example, at Harvard the rule was that the top 7th of students from suitable high schools would be deemed admissible; high schools with large Jewish admission were simply deemed unsuitable and not subject to this rule. See "College Admission and Jews", New Republic, <a href="http://www.tnr.com/doc.mhtml?i=20051226&s=glazer122605%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.tnr.com/doc.mhtml?i=20051226&s=glazer122605&lt;/a>
<a href="http://www.tnr.com/doc.mhtml?i=20051226&s=glazer122605&c=2%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.tnr.com/doc.mhtml?i=20051226&s=glazer122605&c=2&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>Students were required to state their religions - as well as race -- on applications, and to submit pictures. See: "Getting In", New Yorker, <a href="http://www.gladwell.com/2005/2005_10_10_a_admissions.html%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.gladwell.com/2005/2005_10_10_a_admissions.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>[Note: both of the articles are very well balanced look at the issue of Jewish discrimination vs. holistic admissions practices and I would highly recommend both.]</p>

<p>Nonetheless, despite overt policies, I have one uncle who attended Columbia, two uncles who are Harvard law grads, and my father is a Yale grad. And a great-uncle who had a law degree from Penn. If there were any uncles who wanted to attend Ivies but couldn't get in, I am not aware of them. Somehow they all were accepted despite the practices designed to keep them out. However, neither my mother nor my aunts every attended an Ivy. Why? Because the discrimination against women was absolute. My mom and aunt went to Smith, because the doors to the Ivies were shut to them. So as a female, I have to say that I grew up keenly aware of a far more serious form of discrimination -- none of the Ivies went co-ed until it was too late for me to consider attending one. </p>

<p>In the climate of discrimination against Jews, Brandeis was established as a place that welcomed both Jews and women. </p>

<p>However, fast forward to 2005 and my daughter's college search. My daughter seriously considers Brandeis, then drops it from her list because she thinks it has "too many Jews." Wait a minute - we're Jewish. Well, daughter doesn't want to go to a college where everyone looks like her... she's used to hanging out with people from all races & religions. Then Brandeis offers a free, expedited application, so she goes ahead and applies. She is waitlisted, but we are now following the results on the CC thread, and it is quickly ascertained that a signficant number of Asians and hispanic students have been accepted by Brandeis and offered large merit scholarships, whereas Jewish students who have been accepted with better stats are not offered similar monetary inducements. What gives? Brandeis, that bastion of Jewish higher learning, is looking to create a more ethnically balanced student body.<br>
Who is the primary beneficiary? Asians. </p>

<p>Meanwhile, my Jewish daughter gets offered a rather nice little merit scholarship to attend Fordham, a Catholic school where her stats are good, but certainly not amazing. She declines, but not out of any discomfort witht the religion. </p>

<p>So what's my point? I think that overt discrimination is a bad thing, but a holistic admissions process designed to increase academic diversity is a good thing. I also think its a good thing that colleges like Barnard take in enough rich, full paying students so that they can afford to guarantee generous need-based aid to students like my daughter -- and if they have to favor a few legacies or development cases to do that, so be it. </p>

<p>Any selection process is going to "discriminate" against those who don't meet whatever criteria are used for selection. My son, who had high test scores, was at a disadvantage because he didn't play sports and had few EC's. My daughter, who had great EC's and mediocre test scores, was at a disadvantage at a different set of schools. But the thing is: it was pretty easy to get information on which schools these were, and to apply strategically to colleges where the advantage was greatest. Whatever the selection criteria was, we could be pretty sure that it would be applied evenly. Right now the name of the game is to play against type, and to seek out colleges where whatever one has to offer is something that is in short supply. </p>

<p>If my daughter had been a hispanic or black, I am sure that her admission to great colleges despite weak scores would have been attributed by many to affirmative action, the flip side of purported discrimination against Asians. But since that is not the case, she remains simply an example of a beneficiary of a holistic process. The holistic process is something that is susceptible to discrimination -- no one really knows why one applicant is selected over another -- but imbalances in results don't prove discrimination.</p>

<p>Calmom, your post was interesting. My mom was told not to apply to law school because she was female. She faced similar discrimination as you have experienced with your family.</p>

<p>As I noted above, I do see the benefit of holistic admission. I also see the gross potential for abuse if it is unchecked. Somehow, there should be some way to determine if there is an abuse among schools that take public funding.</p>

<p>Also Calmom, with the admission policies being so secretive, how do you know that there aren't quotas for selected racial groups in place at some schools as there were for Jews? In fact, if it is much harder to get into some schools as an Asian, there must be some form of quota regarding Asians.</p>

<p>Also, many college applications does ask for the prospective student's race. Even if they didn't ask this question, I would imagine certain names would be a big hint.</p>

<p>"Across a big enough population, a 50-point average difference between ethnic groups seems significant."</p>

<p>It may or may not be significant. But the SAT is a measure of one's ability to do the work (a predictor of first-year college performance.) This is all the test is designed to do, the only thing its creators claim for it.</p>

<p>But a measure of "merit"? You must be kidding. Why do we insist on claiming for it something that its creators deny?</p>