<p>I agree with this. When I was growing up, some women benefitted from AA, because women were under-represented in educational institutions and certain workplaces. As a woman educated and employed in a male-dominated profession at that time, I was cognizant of a (real or imagined) stigma perpetuated by sexist men that I was accomodated as a result of AA. Now, that attitude would be absolutely laughable, considering the fact that females have generally equalled or surpassed males in academic and professional achievement.</p>
<p>“What would it be like with no affirmative action?”</p>
<p>all applicants would be given a number. names would not be put on the application, nor would race/gender/area of residence/socioeconomic status/any other identifying marks (yes this would include “personal statements”)</p>
<p>in other words, you would be your test scores, gpa, and activities (unless that activity happened to be a cultural/ethnic one, in that case, forget about it).</p>
<p>sounds great, doesn’t it?</p>
<p>as flawed as the system is (and believe me, i have an extreme dislike for the system), there is no way to remove AA and/or human bias from it, unless it becomes a purely quantitative comparison.</p>
<p>Sigh. I am really getting tired of this “no affirmative action = quantitative judgment” business. Affirmative action != human bias. I will leave it to someone else with more patience to expound.</p>
<p>Personally I think a lot could be solved by banning numerical % comparisons of racial minorities; that also causes issues of its own, though, in complicating the college search for those who value racial diversity.</p>
<p>^ ^ ^ Filipino persons are “Asian” by the federal classifications, just as are Taiwanese and Japanese persons. </p>
<p>After edit: Of course, it is always the right of any college applicant not to mark any ethnic or racial category on a college application form. The colleges have to ask, by federal law, but also by federal law the students do not have to tell.</p>
<p>You know what happens when you remove Affirmative Action? You get situations as with the UCs. All of them are between 40-70% Asian. Imagine if you’re not Asian and you see that. Would you want to go?</p>
<p>No other state in the contiguous United States has quite the percentage of in-state “Asian” students that California has. There are states where the state’s law prohibits the state university system from practicing racial consideration of applicants, and yet the state university ends up with a much lower percentage of Asian enrolled students.</p>
<p>California’s Asian population is approx 12% (versus 4% nationwide), according to latest Census figures.</p>
<p>tokenadult,
With your depth of knowledge on this subject, do you know or would you care to conjecture why the Asian population at UC campuses is disproportionately large?</p>
<p>Admissions based on melanin are inherently unfair.
URM’s/AA squeeze out poor white males from impoverished areas of Appalachia who have superior admissions qualifications.</p>
<p>It’s because the vast majority of Asians apply to college, while blacks and Hispanics normally go into the workforce and don’t go to college. There are way more qualified Asians than blacks or Hispanics or even Caucasians, thus disproportionating the amount of Asians in the UC’s.</p>
<p>The reason it’s happening in CA is because CA has the most amount of Asians among any state in the U.S.</p>
<p>fabrizio, I’d be creeped out. But then again, I’ve never came upon a group of African-Americans and felt “Ah yes, my brothas.”</p>
<p>And yes there’s a huge problem with that. Whether or not you strongly identify with your culture, no matter if you are black, white, Asian, Hispanic, whatever, chances are that it is good to have diversity, people who identify with your same culture. Many people identify with ethnic culture, so they look for other people that look like them. It may be hard for you to understand if you grew up in a multi-ethnic society, but believe it or not, many people in America grow up only around people that look like them. </p>
<p>Here’s another scenario:
Say we have two applicants (race doesn’t matter here), both with very similar stats. This is a very liberal Northeastern school that is well-known for having a left-leaning population.
Here we have Applicant A. He’s completely radical, very concerned with the environment, identifies with the 1960s counter-culture movement, etc. He’s from Pennsylvania.
Then here we have Applicant B, a conservative Republican from the rural South. He’s hugely into Ron Paul, loves debate, and lives on a farm. </p>
<p>The school decides to accept Applicant B and reject Applicant A.
Basically identical stats, but they wanted more geographic diversity and diversity of thought.</p>
<p>I’m not sure I accept the premise embedded in the question. To describe something as “disproportionately large” implies that there is a correct size. But what is the case for saying that one percentage or another of one or another ethnic group is the correct percentage?</p>
<p>I disagree with this premise. And I LIVE the difference. I literally live beneath the same roof as persons from several other “race” and “ethnicity” categories as defined on the federal forms used in the United States. (My family and several other families live in contiguous townhouse units, in an integrated neighborhood.) We are all neighbors here, and we are all fellow human beings, and we are all more than a little bit naturally multicultural. We get along, and I sure don’t spend most of my day categorizing my fellow human beings by “race” or “ethnicity,” especially because my experience living overseas has taught me that all the United States categories are wholly arbitrary and not observed in other countries.</p>
<p>When I say culture, I don’t mean strictly ethnic. Culture is shared interests really, from music to clothing and so much more in between. </p>
<p>Yes, there is black culture and Mexican culture and things of that sort, but there are also other cultures, such as Hippies, Punks, Hipsters, Geek, etc. People gravitate to shared interests; they feel most comfortable with. </p>
<p>I mean, of course people branch out, but that’s exactly what it is; BRANCHING out. One can’t completely uproot that tree without any solid foundation to plant it in!</p>
<p>This cannot be the correct answer, unless colleges with high percentages of Asian students had a tremendous number of empty seats prior to the influx of Asian immigration into the state/country.</p>
<p>Obstinate: I agree that the UCs are undiverse. The reasons for that are many, in part because California’s admittance system is highly stats-based, which favors Asian students (and tokenadult’s chart is enlightening as well). Still, my question is: why does it matter? Why should a public college be permitted to violate the Civil Rights Act of 1964, discriminating on the basis of race, in order to ensure diversity? A diverse population is ideal, of course, but it is hardly worth the price of deliberate and unfair racial discrimination.</p>
<p>I’ve also yet to see many affirmative action proponents arguing for the forced diversification of historically black colleges/universities, which are equally undiverse.</p>
<p>Personally, I feel that a college should pick kids from all sorts of niches and backgrounds to bring them up to top standards. A college education is essential in America. There should be a certain quota so that they’re serving the needs of the communities that they are serving. </p>
<p>And they most likely have Affirmative action for the non-blacks that apply to HBCUs also.</p>
<p>If a college uses a process to admit students that favors one or two races over others, would that not constitute “deliberate and unfair racial discrimination?”</p>