I was wondering what happens if you do not specify your race on your application. Will the admissions office try to “guess” your race based on your name or other factors? I ask this because I, as well as others I know, have a Hispanic sounding name but are Asian.
Some colleges do not consider race/ethnicity at all. See the college’s common data set section C7, or its admissions entry on collegedata.com to find out if it considers it.
If it does consider it, it is unlikely to say publicly how it is considered, including the answer to your question.
If colleges guess, which I doubt they do, I can’t imagine they’d put an app in their URM pile if the student didn’t check a race or ethnicity that qualifies as an URM. Logically, if they were URM they’d have checked the box, so if nothing was checked I think the assumption would be that the student is an ORM.
I don’t they are allowed to enter it into the census unless it’s is self reported by the individual.
And to think they are looking at last names of applicants and making personal decisions as to someone’s race is actually never going to happen. For a multitude of good reasons.
@mathisfun888 when you were in 11th grade (after your PSAT) did colleges contact you about diversity programs?
I understand they can’t “enter it into the census” as privatebanker states but I wonder if you mark “Asian” and have a Spanish last name if one might assume you are Filipino.
I am not Filipino, but yes, I have been contacted about diversity programs. Also, I am in 11th grade right now, so I haven’t applied yet.
@privatebanker I agree with you, and I hope you are correct. I really want to be judged based on my merit rather than a peculiar circumstance. I was just wondering if anyone else was/has been in this situation.
“And to think they are looking at last names of applicants and making personal decisions as to someone’s race is actually never going to happen.”
It happens all the time, which is why kids from bi-racial couples mark the race that gives an admissions advantage. And why Asian applicants try to disguise their Asian roots. The OP has already gotten email or mail because of his or her last name for diversity programs.
“I ask this because I, as well as others I know, have a Hispanic sounding name but are Asian.”
I’d put the Hispanic name down and see what happens.
This is a good sign. Please don’t mark down that you are Asian.
It’s really no sign. Adcoms who give the admit thumbs up or down aren’t the ones looking at psat and triggering mass mailings. OP needs to look at the application forms and see what fuller info you give.
Also, viewing someone as a urm applicant is more than the check box. Don’t so over worry about hiding something that you miss what matters, on the whole. Be wise.
@theloniusmonk Sorry. But no way are the adcoms saying Joe x must be AA or Asian or Hispanic so we will just count them in this pile. Just no way. If someone says they are x they are counted and considered as x. No way an adcom does this unilaterally.
A - how would they know. The Lee’s in my town are Irish and judges. In another town something else. This just isn’t a thing. The Rodriguez family is from Portugal via. France. They considered themselves French.
b. Every school would do it to the most favorable benefits for their statistics. The federal government would be up in arms if they learned about this. Diversity would be in perfect percentages based on the name guess process.
There’s typically an admissions officer at most selective colleges assigned to look at the diversity of the class, they’re call diversity or inclusion officers, and they do, in addition to standard adcom work, analyze the class exactly as you describe, what the racial makeup of the class, the income demographics, now first-gen is looked at. They don’t have unilateral power, I agree, decisions are made by a committee or sub-committees. Harvard has a class of 2000, and lawsuit aside, have very good grasp of who they’re admitting.
“A - how would they know”
They know, it’s not hard, if the Lee plays violin and take a whole bunch of math and science APs, a 35 ACT on the first try, tutors kids in Chinese, they know. And this would be even if the applicant did not reveal any of the parent info. Recall the Princeton adcom that wrote on an Asian application, typical pre-med, what do you think that means?
“b. Every school would do it to the most favorable benefits for their statistics. The federal government would be up in arms if they learned about this.”
Of course schools do this, and how exactly is the federal government going to enforce this? Show up to every campus that claims 10% AA (to attract AA to apply) when it’s close to 5%?
“Adcoms who give the admit thumbs up or down aren’t the ones looking at psat and triggering mass mailings.”
Diversity fly-in invites are not mass mailings if that’s what the OP received. Agree that if it’s a generic email or mail triggered by PSAT, yes that’s not indicative of anything.
Anyway this is getting into the race thread area, my point is simple, if the OP has a Hispanic sounding name, don’t check the Asian box. May it won’t hurt, it definitely won’t help.
There are people of Asian Indian heritage in the US with Spanish sounding last names (actually Portuguese, from the Indian region of Goa) like Fernandes etc. If one doesn’t check the box, it goes in as “not reported” . If the EC’s indicate ethnicity,then I dont see anything to gain by unchecking the box.
The real question is whether there is anything to lose by checking the “Asian” box. My vote is don’t check the box.
Unless you’re certain your race helps you in your application, why help the college identify you racially, perhaps to your detriment?
Diversity adcoms are not culling through the hordes of 10th and 11th graders taking the psat. They’re out there in their areas looking for the best kids at various hs. Once apps are actually in, their role can get more specific to diversity candidates, actual applicants.
“Typical premed” isn’t code for Asian. It refers to, in fact, a very typical pattern of focusing on stem and missing rounding, etc. And often not showing any personality outside that.
Please don’t omit violin from your app. It’s a wonderful focus, reflects commitment, many kids continue to play in college orchestras, which are both collaborative and good for the campus community. Same for being involved in your own culture- for several reasons, it’s good to include (though tutoring youger kids isn’t exactly an “it.”)
And that points us to trying to pass for Hispanic, when nothing you’ve done relates to that culture or environment.
Diversity fly-ins are not based on the psat and your last name. There’s a process and a vetting. Just getting some mailing about diversity, in general, is no indiction you will actively be considered urm. Plus, the fact that this is not just about being some race or ethnicity, but how you engage, the perpective(s) you can offer. That comes from your record and your app- or not.
I don’t see why this OP would be treated as Hispanic.
This perhaps purposely misrepresents the OP’s position. She is not trying to pass for Hispanic. She is asking whether - with a Hispanic surname - she should go ahead and check “Asian” or leave the box blank.
I say leave it blank. There is no guarantee that they won’t be able to ferret out that the applicant is actually Asian from the ECs of course. But why make it easier for them? They may assume bi-racial. Who knows?
Unfortunately, this is where race preference and discrimination in admissions have left us.
It’s where the paranoia about being Asian has gotten us. The certainty, among some, that there’s “preference” or discrimination.
They don’t “ferret out” Asian based on ECs. As If. You think an alarm goes off every time they see violin? They freak because an Asian kid is involved in his/her culture? (Actually, it’s a good thing.) Worth looking at more deeply, move away from the simplistic. OP’s time would be better spent in seeing how he/she truly matches what the college wants, learning what makes an interesting and compelling applicant. Not just tops in their own hs.
To be a real contender is a whole lot more than race/ethnicity, stats, and ECs. Learn what it is. And is not.
My only point — which may have been misunderstood.
If the OP does not check the box, the admissions team will not assume or attempt to secretly interpret they are Hispanic because of the last name.
And give the URM hook and count as a Hispanic student unless self reported.
In doing so, negate the Asian ORM issue and gain a URM advantage.
I stand by this 100 percent, that is simply not going to happen.
“Please don’t omit violin from your app. It’s a wonderful focus, reflects commitment, many kids continue to play in college orchestras, which are both collaborative and good for the campus community.”
I’m not advocating removing anything like violin, but adcoms do not see some of these instruments as collaborative, they’re seen as more individualistic .
“Diversity fly-ins are not based on the psat and your last name.”
I don’t think anyone said they were, no one is saying anything about psat, in fact you are the only one that brought up psats and also the only one to shoot them down.