Quick Question About Diversity

Colleges and Universities A-Z University of California - Los Angeles
1

<p>Yeah, it's not going to be quick. Yeah, I know the answer to my inquiries before I even ask them. Even so, I have to know. </p>

<p>I'm black, From what I hear from friends (and have seen on my HS campus applicants and in Westwood), UCLA has a ****load of Asians, just as many whites as in any other school. But what about the other minorities? The campus used to be really diverse before Governor Davis killed AA in the UC system (I think the decision was fair). His move came at the same time that the surge of highly qualified Asian applicants to UCLA and Berkeley began, a surge that's here to stay.</p>

<p>Also, since I'm black, I'm going to ask about the black kids on campus. Someone I knew mentioned 4%, another friend 5% of the total undergrad population. ***?! By percentage, all of the Ivies trump those numbers! And a number I am sure of is the 300 incoming black freshmen from last year, and assuming UCLA accepts the usual 7000-8000 students every year, that means last year's class had anything from 3.5% to 5% African-Americans accepting. I'm not sure about the yield, or numbers for Latinos and other groups, but that's kinda intimidating.</p>

<p>Another set of probably-inaccurate-but-not-by-much statistics: alot of the black applicants are D1 athletes. Funny in the stereotypical sense, until a friend said it was a majority, another said 80%, another said 90%. I've met a few of them coming in for football (Milton Knox, Donovan Carter) and they're ok guys, if not the baddest straight A student-athletes around. However, is that any good for me if I get accepted? I'm not playing sports, and I highly doubt all of the black applicants are jock types. I'm just hoping I get mistaken for a basketball player by some sorority girls if I do end up there :D.</p>

<p>Anyone on CC who can sort out the fact from fiction in my claims and give me their two cents on the campus diversity?</p>

2

<p>Go to The</a> Daily Bruin and do a few searches on race and demographics.There are plenty of articles there to answer your questions. </p>

<p>The school is roughly 35-40% Asian and about 30-35%(?) white.</p>

3

<p>the 5% number of blacks is about right, but by a majority are not athletes. that is just an exaggerated rumor. plus most of the black kids here make friends with the other black kids, so its a tight group. you will find a place.</p>

4

<p>According to this:</p>

<p><a href="http://www.aim.ucla.edu/data/campus/general/CDS2006_2007.pdf%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.aim.ucla.edu/data/campus/general/CDS2006_2007.pdf&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>3% of undergraduates are black. I expect that with UCLA's switch to "holistic admissions," more and more black students will attend. A note on the 38% Asian: the term "Asian" includes many, many countries, from Japan to China to Laos to Egypt. So there's immense diversity even in "Asian."</p>

5

<p>Umm, since when did someone from Egypt count as "Asian"? Unless they're counting the Sinai Peninsula as part of Asia, Egyptians are geographically African, and ethnically, most Egyptians are caucasian. To be fair, Asia is already more of a cultural than geographical region(kind of like Europe), but Egypt is not in Asia.</p>

6

<p>when they say "Asians," they mean east, southeast, and south. just so that's clear.</p>

<p>Last year LA admitted more blacks and latinos than in previous years...that trend should continue. it'll be in the Daily Bruin somewhere.</p>

7

<p>
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but Egypt is not in Asia.

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<p>Asia</a> - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia</p>

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Egypt is generally considered a transcontinental country in Northern Africa and Western Asia; population and area figures are for Asian portion only, east of the Suez Canal (Sinai Peninsula).

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</p>

<p>
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when they say "Asians," they mean east, southeast, and south. just so that's clear.

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</p>

<p>How do we know what they mean? As far as I've seen, they don't differentiate. Asian is Asian, and that includes east, west, southeast, south, central, etc.</p>

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<p>gov davis? :rolleyes: try proposition 209 passed by california voters</p>

9

<p>Thanks for all the info.</p>

<p>toxic_waste, I'm aware of the surprisingly high increase in the rate last year. It's still kinda low, but a good start.</p>

<p>I just don't want to be in the same environment as in my high school, where I'm the only black kid in one of my AP classes and hardly any of my black friends have AP or Honors courses.</p>

<p>ohhowiwish, yeah 209 was passed by voters, but Davis was the one who gave the UC system a serious look after alot of lawsuits came forward claiming AA was the reason not-so-qualified students were being accepted into UCLA, Berkeley, UCSD and Irvine. The numbers that came out caused the proposition to be put forward.</p>

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<p>Question:</p>

<p>AA was banned</p>

<p>UCLA is more holistic, so therefore "more and more black students will be admitted"</p>

<p>Well if race cannot be used as a factor, how will they admit "more and more black students"?</p>

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<p>They use a proxy: adversity. That includes life circumstances, socioeconomic status, etc. "Holistic admissions" means that they look at the student in context, and if the student has a low income and is from a run-down area, well--that's adversity, and a good reason to accept them (given that they're accomplished) other than that they're URMs.</p>

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<p>wrong again. whatever davis would have done is minimal compared to what uc regent ward connerly who spearheaded the proposition did</p>

<p>and holistic admissions is just a loophole that sounds more appealing to the public to admit people who normally would not be admitted. its not hard to guess their race. the uc essay prompts are begging minorities to write their race and the demographics of where they're from also can give you hints</p>

13

<p>Did I forget Connerly? He's a smart guy, but he doesn't seem to get things straight about admissions with all his experience.</p>

<p>If UCLA went straight on merit, the students that all went there would represent the background of the surrounding (gated) neighborhoods. Yeah, Bel Air, Westwood, Brentwood, etc.</p>

<p>Look, if you're from a bad environment, you don't get the same chances, (SAT prep, AP courses, a school entrance without a metal detector persay) because you can't afford it/its not available. You hear about a kid from LA High that was being recruited by Stanford getting shot in front of his home by gang members for no reason. That's what some kids try to avoid daily.</p>

<p>The new approach wouldn't apply to me so much, I'm from a nice area. I was just bothered by the diversity of the campus when I was there for 3 days for a Model UN conference back in October.</p>

14

<p>"Look, if you're from a bad environment, you don't get the same chances, (SAT prep, AP courses, a school entrance without a metal detector persay"</p>

<p>Prep school? A lot of prep schools have really good financial aid that you don't have to pay back. My friend from Harlem is paying 500bucks for my school, and our tuition is 40k a year(boarding). We also have a good number of kids from the Bronx and West Philly.</p>

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<p>
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Prep school?

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<p>It's too late for that kid now, isn't it?</p>

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<p>
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If UCLA went straight on merit, the students that all went there would represent the background of the surrounding (gated) neighborhoods. Yeah, Bel Air, Westwood, Brentwood, etc.</p>

<p>Look, if you're from a bad environment, you don't get the same chances, (SAT prep, AP courses, a school entrance without a metal detector persay) because you can't afford it/its not available.

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</p>

<p>Not true. University admissions in Taiwan and Japan are based on an entrance exam. My mother was really really poor (like eating other people's trash poor) and she still got into to First Girl's HS (北一女) and NTU (and graduated and came to Texas for grad school). Merit based admissions do not filter out the poor. Those who truly want an education will find a way.</p>

<p>Also, just because you weren't given the same opportunities doesn't mean that same individual would have blossomed into the world's most beautiful flower given those opportunities. Some people succeed even without those extra programs, they are the ones who deserve to get in. You can't blame someone's stupidity on his lack of opportunities.</p>

<p>You know, I never see other people complaining about anything other than lack of racial diversity. There really is a lot of other kinds of diversity - religious, cultural, economic, sexual, age, etc. Should race even matter? How does someone's skin color bring anything different? Don't tell me that blacks and Latinos have been unfairly treated by whites in the past; so have asians - wikipedia Vincent Chin.</p>

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<p>In other news, the percentage of UCLA applicants whose race is "Decline to state" / "Other" is steadily increasing... :rolleyes:</p>

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<p>davis was only doing his JOB. connerly is the man behind prop 209. if you think otherwise then you dont know anything about prop 209.</p>

<p>amen moldau</p>

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<p>
[quote]
There really is a lot of other kinds of diversity - religious, cultural, economic, sexual, age, etc. Should race even matter?

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Yes, there are of course other types of diversity. Can you actually say that you witness it at UCLA? The issue is not whether we increase racial diversity for the sake of racial diversity - it's the socioeconomic underpinnings with race that will impede further progress, will develop a second-class citizen system based not on merit but on race as its identifying factor, and more importantly, will stratify society if not even more. The issue, then, is the degree to which merit (within the context of socioeconomic factors) is hidden under the blanket of the most cynical view of admitting based solely on race. Do you have information, moldau, about the economic diversity of say, Southeast Asian students? They are Asian, aren't they? I'd like to see that from the incoming class rather than pre-judge. People have extenuating circumstances - it's not just based on your status as an URM.
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Also, just because you weren't given the same opportunities doesn't mean that same individual would have blossomed into the world's most beautiful flower given those opportunities.

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Yes, but how would you know that? Tell me moldau. Those kids at Monta Vista with parents who are engineers, doctors, and attorneys... do you think their work ethics and linear view of success would have been as developed? Lets say we threw those kids in the East Side Union High School District at UCLA where schools are known to serve poor students (often, correlated with URM status). Do you think they'd still have the same boot-strap mentality? The purpose of holistic admissions is to encourage those who would not dream of succeeding, to provide some hope for the same social mobility, and to change what is inherent in the public school system and impoverished communities. To what degree are people destined for a certain route because they're born into it? How will they get out... is the question.
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Some people succeed even without those extra programs, they are the ones who deserve to get in.

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Someone much like myself. I'm not an URM - heck I'm one of those too many Asians at our school. Listen, I took the bus nightly to a community college because I lack the opportunities to take APs at my school. 50% of high school students were on free lunch (not reduced price lunch). The 'top' students at my school came from government-subsidized housing. They cracked 4.0's because our school was ridiculously grade-inflated and the majority of the school didn't give a damn. Yet, they managed to slip into our flagship state school. They were bright and their parents were uneducated. My school lacked the opportunities. Compared to my peers, who managed to slip into college, I was an anomaly. You can say that I managed to get in just because of my character - what you don't understand, however, is the amount of times I wanted to give up. Or how many times I wanted to say - just **** it. It's not worth it. Or how many times I had to persevere to get out of the Hell hole. Yet, with something like holistic admissions or the consideration of extenuating circumstances, at least my situation would be considered and put into context... you can't compare this to someone at Exter or Andover who has their education handed them to onto a silver platter. </p>

<p>For instance, You can't compare my situation to someone who went to Troy High School. If I had gone to Monta Vista - I wonder, where I would've been if I had the opportunities to seek NASA SHARP, Intel Science Talent Search, and others.</p>

<p>I'm not going to subscribe to the boot-strap mentality - not everyone, even within say Southside Chicago - can always pursue opportuntiies not within their area... can go beyond what's typical around them... and to subscribe to an idea of success that they're not used to.</p>

<p>Take me for example. I almost gave up.</p>

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<p>
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wikipedia Vincent Chin.

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<p>I just heard about him in class YESTERDAY.</p>