Should Asian applicants mark their race as Asian even if their name is not recognizably asian? Or would admissions officers dislike this?
Mark the race accurately if you are marking it at all. I forget if that question is optional but assume so. Noone expects race and name to match all the time.
I mean i put asian down and my last name is very White looking, so…if its accurate then do it.
Sorry, I meant is it preferable to not mark a race at all rather than marking Asian?
It’s optional. Put it down, don’t put it down, it’s up to you.
You are overestimating what AO’s do in the 12-15 minutes they spend reading your application. They will not “dislike” it. They will obviously not assume that you are URM, but they will not spend time scouring for clues elsewhere on your race.
Having said that, your HS info might indicate you are Asian, or you may have indicated it on your SAT/ACT tests.
Wouldn’t the AO immediately know ur race by looking at ur parents’ info?
I have a friend whose family is Russian jewish, she married a guy from Spain, they couldn’t have children due to fertility issues so they adopted a couple kids from China. The girls have Hispanic names, but culturally they’re very American and ethnically they’re Asian. They left the race question blank.
It’s very possible to have your race be different from your parents, @makemesmart
My son was adopted from Korea. He has an Irish first name and an Italian last name.
But one look at his face, and there’s no denying his Asian background.
He is who he is, and I can’t imagine his ever denying that part of himself.
This is not the big deal you’re making it out to be. Identify yourself as who you are.
Not necessarily. The adoption example has been given, but even if the OP is the biological child of the parents with whom s/he lives, the families could have been in the US for generations
And it’s also entirely possible that your mom is of Asian descent, but that you have your Dad’s Irish or Italian or Spanish or whatever last name.
If you’re for race-conscious admission, indicate your race on your applications by all means. However, if you’re against it, why not leave the race blank, regardless of your race, and let AO make a deliberate effort to find out if s/he so chooses?
I am talking about the cases where father is of non-Asian descents and mother is, the case for my DS, who identifies himself to be as both. There is no denying that being identified as an Asian student is not an “advantage” for the most selective schools, but try to “hide” it will not be helpful either. Be confident and be proud of who you are. Good luck.
^^ FWIW: When a student identifies as mixed-race (half Asian, half non-Asian, half African American, half white etc) Admissions Offices do NOT put them into the “Asian Basket” or “African American Basket” so to speak. Instead, they are categorized separately as mixed-race. And, it’s perfectly acceptable (even advisable) for mixed-race students to select both boxes, as it can work to their advantage. See: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/14/us/14admissions.html?_r=0
I would not check Asian if your last name is not Asian sounding. It may give you a slight edge for this or any school should they try to pigeon hole you when putting together a class. Just my two cents (from an Asian family.). Like all things on CC, take the advice with a grain of salt.
It’s not about surname.
And in the finer vagaries of qualitative reviews, it isnt “mixed” alone that offers anything. Its when a kid with that duality (or more) offers the campus community some unique perspective. As always, an applicant needs to show that, in his app, not just check some box or state it.
There’s less “pigeonholing” and more reliance on (or adherence to?) what a candidate actually shows in his app, that the college looks for, what comes across. Or not. The big Not. Put your mental efforts into the right aspects.
I imagine Not “Putting Asian race if name isn’t Asian” is probably common. A casual walk around Harvard College would give one the impression that a third of the students there may be Asian. Given Harvard’s official stats of 20% Asian I think there is under-reporting of Asian in Common App. The opposite is true for AA where the official figure is 15% and half of them are multi-racial. Until schools get rid off racial buckets in their admission I guess such gaming in box checking would be inevitable.
So many just assume “race” is a deciding factor. It’s not.
And “assuming” isn’t the level of thinking, to begin with, that a tippy top is looking for.
You’re reviewed as an individual, not as some type. You either supply a good app package (which is the resume facts plus your writing, LoRs) or not. This represents your thinking, how you take on challenges, your choices, what sort you are.
Fussing over the race box isn’t it.
Well, putting applicants in different pools based on various characteristics–some of them race/ethnicity–is just a fact of life in elite college admissions. There is no point of hiding it from applicants and their families, at least not on CC. Its only natural in this ultra-competitive landscape people are trying to find whatever advantage they can in the process. But to answer OP’s question, it probably doesn’t make any difference you check the Asian box or not if you are already in this not so big “unhooked” pool.