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That depends on what college it is. Is there such a college?</p>
<p>@Hunt Yes, Washington and Lee.</p>
<p>According to its 2012-2013 Fact Book.</p>
<p>Here is the admission breakdown in 2012 by ethnicity:</p>
<p>514 Asian Americans applied with 50 accepted. Acceptance rate is 9.7%
566 African Americans applied with 36 accepted. Acceptance rate is 6.4%
532 Hispanics applied with 40 accepted. Acceptance rate is 7.5%
2717 Whites applied with 937 accepted. Acceptance rate is 34.5%</p>
<p>Washington and Lee is an unusual case, so it’s hard to know what that means. It could be that the pool of white applicants was stronger, or it could be something else. It would also be interesting to know what W&L’s yield was among those different groups.</p>
<p>@Hunt 10% of all Johnson Scholars since its inception are Asian American but they represent only about 3% of total enrollment. The Johnson Scholarship is awarded to about the top 9% of all W&L students. In 2012 about 40% of Asian Americans that enrolled were Johnson Scholars but only 9.7% of Asian Americans were accepted.</p>
<p>Asian American yield was 32%
African American yield was 28%
Hispanic yield was 45%
White yield was 41%</p>
<p>@voiceofreason66 I saw your impassioned argument on the W&L thread and I agree that the questions you raised demand examination by any fair-minded reader. May I suggest that these fora may not be the best avenue for our energies? After all, what will you get other than some people argreeing and others not? </p>
<p>Are there activist groups at W&L? ACLU? Asian American anti-discrimination media or orgs? Mother Jones? HuffPost? Maybe target these?</p>
<p>@T26E4 I believe discussion is the first step. If enough people are made aware then perhaps institutions who consciously or unconsciously are biased/discriminatory in its admission practices might reverse course. There has been much discussion of the Asian bias in admissions for many years, but central to those who do not see a trend of Asian bias in acceptance rates at top universities or justify it with the need to have campus diversity, here we finally have an example of a university who lacks diversity but the Asian bias is clear in its admission practices.</p>
<p>But see, the Asian bias isn’t clear, because you don’t know the strength of the respective applicant pools. What you have is enough to ask the question, but it doesn’t give you the answer. This is the problem that I often have with this interminable discussion. Evidence is not the same as proof.</p>
<p>@Hunt last year an Asian American female who was accepted to Northwestern, Wellesley and other top schools was denied admission to W&L. She ranked 3 out of 411 in her class and 2210 SAT. BTW she showed a lot of interest in the school and interviewed. So at least in her case, she was a strong candidate for admission. Her high achievements are in the top quarter of admitted students and close to the average for Johnson Scholars.</p>
<p>“Evidence is not the same as proof” not sure how to take this, but there is a point where enough “evidence” becomes “proof.”</p>
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Right. But you’re not there yet, even with one questionable anecdote. On the face of it, there’s enough to be asking W&L some hard questions; but there’s not sufficient proof here to say that they are discriminating on the basis of race.</p>
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</p>
<p>"Circumstantial evidence is occasionally very convincing, as when you find a trout in the milk. " 
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<p>@Hunt What specific evidence would you need short of a confession? </p>
<p>@scholarme Very nice. Here like the trout in the milk, it smells just as fishy.</p>
<p>Well, at the very least, you’d need to have more data about the different applicant pools. But if you already know the answers, why bother asking questions?</p>
<p>@Hunt That I do not have the answer. But extrapolating from the number of Asians who received Johnson Scholarships, the average SAT score for enrolled Asian students is about 150-200 points higher than the average W&L student. My guess is that the average SAT of the Asian applicant is also higher than White applicants since this is the general trend at most top/elite colleges.</p>
<p>It could also mean that Washington and Lee can only get high-scoring Asian applicants by giving them free tuition.</p>
<p>As I said, Washington and Lee is an unusual case. It is a school with a long reputation for being a haven for rich, white, conservative students. My suspicion would be that it isn’t that easy to get highly qualified minority students to apply there. There are some news articles identifying steps the school has taken to try to diversity–such as the Johnson fellowships. Plus, it’s a private school, so it can apply holistic admissions criteria as it sees fit.</p>
<p>I certainly wouldn’t project the situation at W&L onto other schools.</p>
<p>@Hunt I am not following what you are saying about W&L being a private school so it can fashion its “holistic admissions criteria?” as it sees fit. Can it do so if it’s holistic criteria directly discriminates or is bias against Asian applicants? </p>
<p>Many private schools including HYSP have higher admission standards for Asian applicants, but each of them has a relatively high enrollment of Asian students in the 15-20%. How does W&L get to be viewed similarly if its enrollment is only 3% and White enrollment is over 85%? W&L claims to embrace diversity and is working to diversify its campus with minority students but the URM enrollment has not changed in at least the past 5 years?</p>
<p>deleted</p>
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Probably, especially if you can’t prove that they have any intent to discriminate against Asians. I note, in passing, that nobody has successfully proven that HYSP has any bias against Asians either, although many have tried.</p>
<p>If you don’t like W&L’s admissions policies, then by all means don’t apply there. I, personally, would not be interested in attending a school with so little diversity. However, if they really are trying to increase their diversity, that might actually help an individual minority student who is trying to gain admission.</p>
<p>@Hunt “It could also mean that Washington and Lee can only get high-scoring Asian applicants by giving them free tuition.”</p>
<p>Asian enrollment since 2005. Johnson Scholarship first awarded in fall 2008.</p>
<p>2005 16 students
2006 18 students
2007 19 students
2008 12 students Number of applicants 419 Acceptance rate 10.3%
2009 19 students Number of applicants 426 Acceptance rate 14.3%
2010 10 students Number of applicants 525 Acceptance rate 9.3%
2011 14 students Number of applicants 537 Acceptance rate 10.8%
2012 16 students Number of applicants 524 Acceptance rate 9.5%</p>
<p>The number of Asian students should have gone up after 2008 with advent of Johnson Scholarship but it did not if your above statement could explain the acceptance rate discrepancy. The number of Asian student before and after the Johnson Scholarship is about the same. BTW in 2011, over 60% of W&L Asian American students were Johnson Scholars but the Asian applicant acceptance rate was only 10.8%. </p>
<p>Like @scholarme circumstantial evidence of the fish in the milk analogy, the data stinks whatever way it’s cut.</p>
<p>I understand that colleges and universities have a great deal of leeway in selecting its students, but W&L’s admission practices of Asian American students shouts of discrimination and bias like no other school. The other elite schools generally can hide behind a high percentage of Asian students to mask the seemingly otherwise higher admission requirements of Asian students but W&L does not have this cover since its enrollment of Asians is only 3%.</p>
<p>I do not agree with you that a lack of diversity would be a reason not to attend a school. I think a school should be judged on its merits. If a school lacks diversity because there are few students of color that apply then a school cannot be faulted for having a lack of diversity. However, if a school has a substantial applicants of color, but the school chooses to not accept them then that is another matter. </p>
<p>Here, W&L is not lacking in Asian applicants. W&L Admissions has chosen to limit Asian American students from entering its university. </p>
<p>If W&L wants to be discriminatory/bias against Asian Americans, I guess it is its right, but state and federal funds should not be given to W&L to support such discriminatory/bias action. </p>
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So W&L was only able to convince 16 out of 50 admits to attend, even with generous merit aid? You might look into what is the yield among Asian applicants to peer schools–this would be part of the investigation somebody who actually wanted the truth would do.</p>
<p>For 2014, W&L enrolled 24 Asian students, according to the common data set: <a href=“Washington and Lee”>Washington and Lee;
This constitutes about 5% of the freshman class. It would be interesting to know how many admits there were in order to yield that number.</p>
<p>@Hunt What information would knowing the yield at other peer schools provide as it relates to W&L?</p>
<p>As to your question about low yield at W&L even with generous merit aid, I think you answered that by stating " I, personally, would not be interested in attending a school with so little diversity." Given that W&L seems to only accept the highest quality Asian American applicant, those students might choose other top schools versus going to W&L even with generous merit scholarships because on these students second look at the school, they might prefer a more “diverse” school. </p>
<p>As to this year’s Asian students, I, too, would be interested in knowing the accept rate and yield, but unfortunately this data broken down by ethnicity is no longer provided by W&L and the Fact Book that was once available online has now been password protected.</p>
<p>Having read most of this thread, it seems that the data I have provided would be sufficient for the likes of @fabrizio @rhandco @theanaconda @awcntdb and others to view W&L’s admission practices as it relates to Asian American applicants to be less than honorable and even discriminatory.</p>
<p>What more specific information would you need to other than yield at other peer schools to find that W&L was discriminatory/bias against Asian American student applicants or not? </p>