"Race" in College Admissions FAQ & Discussion 5

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<p>Your friend’s daughter needs to read the official definitions, linked to from this thread into which your question was merged: </p>

<p>[Black</a> or African American persons, percent, 2000](<a href=“http://quickfacts.census.gov/qfd/meta/long_68176.htm]Black”>http://quickfacts.census.gov/qfd/meta/long_68176.htm) </p>

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<p>A person with Egyptian parents would ordinarily indicate “white” as her race, but could also decline to mention any race at all, which is the legal right of all college applications. Her situation does not fit the definition of the Black or African American category. </p>

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<p>We can definitely agree that not all colleges will desire to place the same emphasis on the same admission criteria. (It bears repeating that the majority of colleges in the United States admit the majority of their applicants, and hundreds of colleges are explicitly open-admission colleges that admit anyone with the proverbial “heartbeat and a check.”) But colleges do have to follow today’s law </p>

<p>[Race/National</a> Discrimination Overview](<a href=“http://www.ed.gov/policy/rights/guid/ocr/raceoverview.html]Race/National”>Race, Color, or National Origin Discrimination Overview) </p>

<p>and reasonable minds can differ, while they continue discussion, about whether today’s law is adequately enforced or whether or not today’s law should be changed. </p>

<p>I can remember when people from India were officially “white.” (Their recategorization as “Asian” people occurred after I was aware of race issues in the United States.) I can also remember when there was no such category as “Hispanic.” And it has only been very recently that the “Pacific Islander” category was split off from the “Asian” category. As the Census Bureau says, </p>

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<p>So maybe politics will change again, and the categories will change again. And maybe we will finally start to believe the slogan carried on signs by civil rights marchers, "[I</a> am a man](<a href="http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/1063187909-post61.html]I"&gt;http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/1063187909-post61.html)," and the categories will fall into disuse.</p>

<p>[Levels</a> of Scrutiny Under the Equal Protection Clause](<a href=“http://www.law.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/conlaw/epcscrutiny.htm]Levels”>http://www.law.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/conlaw/epcscrutiny.htm) </p>

<p>[Strict</a> scrutiny - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia](<a href=“http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strict_scrutiny]Strict”>Strict scrutiny - Wikipedia) </p>

<p>[Strict</a> scrutiny: West’s Encyclopedia of American Law (Full Article) from Answers.com](<a href=“Answers - The Most Trusted Place for Answering Life's Questions”>Answers - The Most Trusted Place for Answering Life's Questions)</p>

<p>How does this ^^ square with the Michigan law school case (Grutter v. Bollinger) where the Supreme Court said that the subtler, more hidden quotas of the law school were permissible? It seems to this layperson like a bit of a contradiction.</p>

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<p>The Grutter decision seems that way to a lot of lawyers also. Strict scrutiny is still the correct standard for all state actions distinguishing citizens by race. The Grutter decision announces that currently the Court will find that multifactorial admission processes that consider race as one admission factor among several, for the goal of on-campus diversity, pass strict scrutiny. But there were dissents to that majority decision.</p>

<p>Re #218</p>

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<p>Are you familiar with what “strict scrutiny” and “suspect classification” mean? I mean, I find it interesting that someone who claims to have attended law school seems to not care one iota about the distinctions among rational basis, intermediate scrutiny, and strict scrutiny.</p>

<p>Please check the definitions tokenadult provided, and then come back and tell me that gender preferences, socioeconomic preferences, and first-generation preferences must also be analyzed under the same standard as racial preferences.</p>

<p>And, yes, you have misunderstood me. I list the essay, extracurriculars, and recommendations as examples of subjective criteria that when considered alongside numerical criteria form holistic admissions. You are unimpressed with my analysis because you do not seem to be aware that there is such a thing as strict scrutiny and it is different from rational basis.</p>

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<p>Just to clarify, Justice O’Connor did not say that “…the subtler, more hidden quotas of the law school were permissible.” That is how [url=<a href=“http://www.adversity.net%5DAdversity.net%5B/url”>http://www.adversity.net]Adversity.net[/url</a>] characterized the decision. For anyone who thinks I espouse radical views, read some of their stuff.</p>

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It is. US colleges must remain just that; US colleges.

Males and females have stats that essentially have the effect of canceling out each other - in other words, they are basically equals. Very few schools will ever actually have to favor applicants of a certain gender.

Glad to hear that they are. Discontent to know that they aren’t doing as much as they should be.

One that bewilders me just a bit, but children whose parents did not pursue a college degree probably lack the knowledge that even poor children of college graduates may have.

All of these other preferences, aside from perhaps the first-generation preference (which, at that, is only a tip and not a hook) have obvious and reasonable merits or are not even preferences (unlike, say racial affirmative action). Oh and yeah, we are on the thread discussing race specifically.

I would be stunned to hear anyone say that they didn’t believe that these factors, along with grades, shouldn’t contribute to the overwhelming majority of the college admission decisions, even (or, perhaps, especially) at top schools.</p>

<p>I know about strict scrutiny. I just wanted to hear fab explain his claimed support for “holistic” admissions (sans race), when there are many factors used that are discriminatory, not just race. (At least a rational basis is required for Gender, SES and nationality). I want to hear how he rationalizes supporting all of these other discriminating factors, but not race.</p>

<p>The Cts have already held that race can be used as a factor in admissions. The compelling reason being the benefit of learning in a racially diverse environment.</p>

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Are you more curious in the response itself or fabrizio’s response? I clearly already answered how it’s very rational.

Cool. Now tell me why Southeast Asians are disadvantaged by affirmative action.</p>

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<p>To clarify, I don’t support gender preferences for women or men.</p>

<p>I don’t really have a problem with socioeconomic preferences or first-generation preferences. I believe that poverty is colorblind and that poverty does make it more difficult to attend postsecondary education. I suspect that socioeconomics and first-generation status are positively correlated, and I would support efforts to attract people who come from poor backgrounds and do not have a family history of attending higher education.</p>

<p>To say it once more, race is simply not the same as these factors. I hope you’re not trying to convince anyone that it is the same when it is not.</p>

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<p>No, they actually will have to. It’s less desirable to go to a college that’s 60% female.</p>

<p>^ Very few top schools have to maintain strict gender quotas. The exceptions I can think of are the top engineering schools and a few very artsy LACs like Vassar and Sarah Lawrence. Otherwise, there is essentially no advantage of being a male applicant over a female applicant, or vice versa. Perhaps on a whole, there is a minimally disproportionate number of qualified female applicants vs. male applicants, but if you’re not making it into Harvard as a female you’re probably not making it in even if you were a male.</p>

<p>Kenyon openly favors males over females:</p>

<p><a href=“http://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/23/opinion/23britz.html[/url]”>http://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/23/opinion/23britz.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>Perhaps it is a more significant margin than I had initially perceived. Nevertheless, the difference is still not comparable to the 280-point advantage (on a 1600 scale) given to URMs over Asians. And even if it were, while racial groups are essentially an artificial byproduct of geographical differences, male-female attraction is the driving force behind, well, life itself and thus maintaining a close to 1:1 male-to-female ratio is legitimized.</p>

<p>^ Again with the phony “advantage” argument, contrived & fabricated by two people who glorify their work as ‘research’ despite insufficient data and manufactured premises.</p>

<p>There is no minimum standardized test score qualification for Ivies. None. If you study your brains out and decide to get a 2400, even though the college does not request that or demand that, it’s your choice. It doesn’t qualify you “more” than a student who gets 200+ points less than that.</p>

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Puh-lease.
[News:</a> Testing for ‘Mismatch’ - Inside Higher Ed](<a href=“http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2009/04/20/mismatch]News:”>http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2009/04/20/mismatch)
Not damning enough for you? From the adcoms themselves. Enough with the lack of standards at top schools. There are general boundaries.</p>

<p>And epiphany, I am VERY curious to hear your stance on Southeast Asians.</p>

<p>^ I already read, some time ago, the link you provided. It has some serious flaws in it, some of which are addressed in the comments that follow that article. Secondly, Duke is not HYP. Different admission pool. Each institution sets its own standards – and in addition (more importantly) its own policy as to how AA will figure into admissions decisions – what those standards will be, etc.</p>

<p>The bottom line is still that those who are supposedly given an “advantage” via AA, despite test performance, are far fewer in number than either Asians or whites who are rejected from those very same institutions for reasons having to do with a conglomeration of factors. There is no stand-alone rejection for race.</p>

<p>What’s your concern about Southeast Asians?</p>

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We are arguing about all top institutions, not just HYP. Besides, it’s a silly claim that top schools evaluate candidates in drastically different ways from each other.</p>

<p>Oh, and no thank you. I’ll trust the admissions officers over the anonymous internet poster.</p>

<p>Regarding Southeast Asians:

  1. Socioeconomic stature
    The SE Asian demographic is amongst the poorest in the US
  2. Representation at top universities
    SE Asians are underrepresented at top universities, perhaps as much as more popularized URMs.
  3. Cultural values/motivations
    Whether a legitimate reason for AA or not, SE Asians hold drastically different values from the Chinese/Japanese/Korean/Indian. They are not driven by parents the same way those 4 racial groups are and do not hold education as highly as those 4 groups do.
  4. Diversity
    SE Asian culture is very unique; slight derivations from more traditional Asian elements and a multitude of elements from indigenous peoples. It has developed in varied forms partly due to the geographic formation of SE Asia (peninsula/archipelago of the Philippines).
  5. Historical context
    And I’ll put this nicely: the world, especially the US, has taken a collective crap on SE Asia. Immigrant harassment, the US’ struggles with dominating Philippines, the Vietnam War; the Khmer Rouge which was probably facilitated by some of these.
  6. Test scores/grades
    They do poor as a whole compared to essentially every ethnic group in the US.</p>

<p>And yet, despite being essentially as disadvantaged as African-Americans on practically all conceivable levels (heck I would argue even more so), they face additional adversity in the admissions process because of the group they are clumped into.</p>

<p>Tell me why.</p>

<p>^ If it’s true, it might be because of the group they are clumped into. But is it true? Do we have stats supporting this?</p>