<p>^ There won’t be any proof acceptable to all. We just learn things after a few years of recruiting.</p>
<p>“As tokenadult has repeatedly mentioned, admissions officers are discouraged from inferring origin from surnames.”</p>
<p>:rolleyes: :)</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>No, in my opinion, you should change your views to suit the circumstances, because at least one of your views - racial balancing - is not Constitutional.</p>
<p>And, I’d still like an answer to my earlier question. Does ending affirmative action result in a “tiny” negative impact on diversity, or does it result in “severe unbalance”?</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Do your research. You’ll find it’s true if you do the work to uncover what actually happens, instead of relying on other CC posters to do your work for you. This is not my issue; it’s obviously yours. I have long ago researched this; it’s not necessary for me to unearth it all simply because you have an agenda to believe that all Asians are supposedly so discriminated against. Asians with compromised socioeconomic status, as well as those of URM status, are acknowledged in the “need” pool (for the U) of those applicants which should be looked at especially carefully. SE Asians qualify for URM status, and often the other as well.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>These are two different dynamics that you keep on mixing together, when they are separate issues. One is URM representation, which is indeed tiny overall. The other is overall racial/ethnic/nat’l diversity, which extends beyond URM: to ORM, to majority, etc. The impact of not balancing the latter is more significant. But it’s also not just the “race” aspect: it’s also regionality, academic majors (schools within colleges; colleges within U’s), e.c.'s and more. Overall balance. Not balance on one measure alone.</p>
<p>When the elites did not do this, what resulted was homogeneous campuses with extreme dominance of a single group and a single region and a single economic class.</p>
<p>Edit after #264</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>What’s the impact of not balancing the latter, and why is it more significant? I don’t want to put words in your mouth.</p>
<p>I remind you that racial balancing is patently unconstitutional, and that you should avoid using the term “balance” unless you believe Justice O’Connor was wrong in issuing that particular statement in the Court’s opinion for Grutter.</p>
<p>fab,
The Ct has already held that using race as a factor in admissions is Constitutional. Do you have any arguments against the “compelling interest” finding by the Ct? Otherwise, I don’t think you have a case.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Any college applicant can say anything he or she likes about individual personal circumstances to any college that inquires about “what else should we know about you?” or that asks for student-submitted essays, which is almost a defining characteristic of a “holistic” admission procession. You can say whatever you think will best help your cause. All members of the Common Application group </p>
<p><a href=“https://www.commonapp.org/CommonApp/Members.aspx[/url]”>https://www.commonapp.org/CommonApp/Members.aspx</a> </p>
<p>have holistic admission in this sense, because every college that participates in the Common Application is required to have such a process to join the group. Other, non-Common Application colleges (notably MIT and Columbia) are holistic in the same sense with their own in-house application forms.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>In light of previous cases, that holding is narrow. Both the previous process of the UC Davis Medical School and the previous process of the undergraduate colleges of the University of Michigan were found unconstitutional. And the dissents (and some of the language in the majority opinion) in Grutter suggest that the Grutter holding cannot be broadly construed.</p>
<p>Bay,</p>
<p>tokenadult brings up an important point. Race as a factor in admissions is Constitutional when it is done like Grutter instead of Gratz.</p>
<p>As far as arguments against the compelling interest finding, I accept that Grutter is the current law, but I strongly agree with the scathing dissents from Justices Scalia and Thomas:</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Okay. I agree, that the holding applies only so far as the colleges in question utilize admissions procedures that are in conformance those upheld in Grutter. I would be surprised if there are any (upper-tier, at least) colleges who do not follow those same procedures, but it is possible.</p>
<p>Fab is arguing from the dissent’s view. That is fine, but it is not the current law.</p>
<p>Yes, part of the discussion here is about whether current law is optimal, what a lawyer argues about when making “a good-faith argument for modification of existing law,” as lawyers are permitted to do. And part of the discussion here is about what the law currently is. I was surprised upthread to find how many college-educated participants here thought that privately operated colleges can do whatever they want in regard to treating people from different “race” groups differently. That is not current 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 it hasn’t been current law for most of my lifetime. But evidently many possible complaints that could be made </p>
<p>[OCR</a> Complaint Process](<a href=“http://www.ed.gov/about/offices/list/ocr/complaintprocess.html]OCR”>OCR Complaint Process) </p>
<p>haven’t been made over the years, because students or other observers of possibly illegal practices haven’t been sure what they can complain about.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>That has never been my own position.</p>
<p>epiphany,</p>
<p>I repeat my earlier question. What’s the impact of not balancing [overall racial/ethnic/nat’l diversity], and why is it more significant [than not balancing "URM representation]?</p>
<p>
I was indeed one who thought that private schools tend to consider race to a greater degree than state schools do, to the extent that private schools do what they want; I was not aware of the federal funds tie-in. Live and learn.</p>
<p>“I repeat my earlier question.”</p>
<p>You can research your own question as well as any of us.</p>
<p>vossron,
CA state schools are prohibited by Prop 209 from considering race in admissions. (I see you are from CA, so this may be the source of your confusion). Private schools are not subject to the prohibition, so they are free to use race as a factor in admissions, in order to achieve a racially diverse learning environment, so long as they comply with the current law on the subject, which includes the Grutter decision.</p>
<p>Thank you, Bay, I’ll try to remember these details. ;)</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>If everyone thought this way, we wouldn’t have this thread, now would we?</p>
<p>I asked epiphany, for she was the one who made the comment-in-question that I didn’t fully understand. If you have an answer, I’d welcome that, too.</p>
<p>In such threads we do the research, report back and discuss it. You can do it! :)</p>
<p>
First Fab, I think that the arguments that you made in this thread are pretty convincing.
On this particular point about balancing, however, an argument can be made that it is in the general interests of the society that we don’t leave a particular group of people too far behind. Imaging that you live in a town with all the educated/rich people surrounded by the extremely poor/uneducated, do you think the rich/educated can feel secure and enjoy themselves? I don’t think so. Extreme gap between the rich and poor could be a source of instability and upheaval.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Thank you, Professor101.</p>
<p>While I reiterate my belief that the Supreme Court has correctly labeled racial balancing as patently unconstitutional, I agree that “[e]xtreme gap between the rich and poor could be a source of instability and upheaval.” </p>
<p>I do not deny that racial discrimination still exists; as a minority, albeit an “overrepresented” one, I have experienced prejudice and discrimination. For example, in sixth grade, as I was walking to class, an older student who I had never met came up to me and said, “Hi, from now on, I will call you Chinese boy.” That same year, one of the school’s staff initially refused to issue me a student ID card because I didn’t know my Social Security Number. When I asked my friends - white and black - whether they also had to tell their SSNs, none of them said yes.</p>
<p>I am not part of the crowd that claims racism is extinct. Rather, my position is that racial preferences are not the best way to address the inequality you’ve described. Socioeconomic preferences would do the job in a much more focused way, by directly applying preference based on poverty as opposed to using race as a proxy and ending up with wealthy “underrepresented” minorities for whom the term “disadvantaged” is an insult to the thousands of truly poor individuals in our country.</p>