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<p>YAY! Passive-aggressive smilies! :)</p>
<p>And it’s way too much to ask anyone where exactly they did their research at, right?</p>
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<p>While we don’t exactly live in the same town or the same county, the richest and some of the poorest areas in my state are about thirty minutes away from each other. Most people in the rich area I live in will never ever have to deal with the poor people.</p>
<p>“would do the job”</p>
<p>Would do what job? Increasing racial diversity, economic diversity, or some other job?</p>
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<p>Let’s take a look at the complete statement as opposed to an out-of-context snippet, shall we?</p>
<p>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<a href=“emphasis%20added”>/i</a>.</p>
<p>While I always criticize myself first, reading comprehension is a two-way street. It’s up to me to write clear sentences, but it’s up to you to read them in context.</p>
<p>^ Very good point, thanks.</p>
<p>Again, fab, you are mixing two different dynamics in college admissions. One is the aspect of opportunity. The elite U’s have acknowledged that until quite recently, they have neglected the important factor of socioeconomic origin (vs. race/ethnicty/nat’lity) as a stand-alone element of opportunity. Beginning at least in the last 5 years minimum, they have indeed begun to address that, so that in addition to continuing to provide admission to qualified URM’s of all economic groups, they are also examining economic roots among qualified, high-achieving applicants. Between two very similarly qualified applicants of the same origin (including majority, including ORMs), it is a tip to be from a lower economic rung. </p>
<p>The other aspect of admissions decisions involves balance overall. Even among similarly qualified applicants, all of whom theoretically could be of identical economic background, regionality, academic emphasis, extracuricular category (not achievement level, but the activity itself), and ethnic/nat’l background apart from the URM factor but merely in relation to overall offers of admission, additionally factor in as elements considered in creating a balanced class.</p>
<p>fab,
The problem with your socio-economic argument is that it is irrelevant to the issue of representation of different races on campus. The Grutter court made it clear that using race as a factor is not to be used as a way to correct past wrongs or rectify some inequality, but to create a critical mass of minority/different opinion which serves to benefit the student body as a whole.</p>
<p>That is why I said that in order for you to have a case, I think you need to come up with an argument and evidence that proves that a racially diverse student body serves no compelling interest. Until this happens, I see no reason for the Supreme Court to overturn its holding.</p>
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That is because the poor still have the basic means to survive without bothering anybody. By the time they are poor to the point that they can’t survive, they’ll be up in arm and you have to deal with them even if you don’t want to.</p>
<p>On the AA issue, I am not against it, but I think that helping the URM doesn’t have to be at the expense of the OMR. Both ORM and WHITE should make sacrifices to help the URM, not ORM alone. The fact that in many schools, Asian students have the highest admission stats indicates that they are discriminated against. They should have the same stats as white.</p>
<p>“The fact that in many schools, Asian students have the highest admission stats indicates that they are discriminated against.”</p>
<p>Where are the admission stats by race collected or available? My quick Google search produced lots of discussion on the subject, but I didn’t find any school’s or a collection of schools’ data. Does anyone have a link? Thanks.</p>
<p>Perhaps the comment should be “… indicates that they are discriminated against if the only consideration were test scores, GPA and/or class rank.” At our D’s LAC (not necessarily representative), these three combined stats make up no more than 20% of admission criteria.</p>
<p>^^ Check the University of Florida. I just read it on CC not long ago. Someone posted a link on it.</p>
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Test scores, GPA and/or class rank are the only things that people can put a figure on. That’s why almost every school and College Board publish them. I am sure that if they publish EC stats (like how many club presidents, how many volunteer hours) the Asians would be right up there too.</p>
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<p>I don’t need to come up with any novel argument; the argument is already well-presented by Justices Scalia and Thomas in their dissents for Grutter.</p>
<p>At least on paper, Grutter can be easily overturned. Justices Kennedy, Scalia, and Thomas all dissented in Grutter, and there is no evidence whatsoever that Chief Justice Roberts and Justice Alito wouldn’t have dissented had they been on the Court at the time. There’s your five votes right there.</p>
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<p>This is the reasoning espoused by law professors Frank Wu and Jerry Kang as well as legal analyst William Kidder.</p>
<p>All three are staunchly in favor of affirmative action and staunchly against “negative action,” which they define as treating Asian applicants worse than equally qualified white applicants. They would agree that Asian students should have roughly the same stats as their white peers, not higher stats.</p>
<p>No offense, epiphany, but your post #285 left me more confused, not less.</p>
<p>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>As far as I could tell, you seemed to be telling me that “not balancing…” is bad, mmkay. I didn’t find any mention of what the impact would be or why it’s more significant than not balancing “URM” representation.</p>
<p>“Test scores, GPA and/or class rank are the only things that people can put a figure on.”</p>
<p>Other admission criteria can be positive or negative for other groups. E.g., some (many?) in the Latino culture are taught to look down (no eye contact) when addressing elders, potentially detrimental at colleges that consider interviews. It seems unlikely (to me) that all the various ethnicities and races are treated identically, on average, in recommendations, and unlikely that all groups participate in the same level of ECs.</p>
<p>I just mean that specifying one particular admission criterion as an example of negative discrimination for one group can miss the bigger picture for that and other groups.</p>
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<p>Here’s a numerical score for different aspects of applications by racial group, as rated by Duke admission officers:</p>
<p>[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)</p>
<p>^^ Probably that is the kind of data Vossron was looking for.</p>
<p>Yes, thanks, that’s it, but more schools would be better, not just one elite.</p>
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<p>This is the same old invalid premise: that extracurriculars, including “positions” in those, are evaluated quantitatively by colleges. They are not. They are evaluated qualitatively, both in and of themselves, and in relation to who else of similar academic stature has possibly awards, positions, achievements far more outstanding, varied, and with more longevity.</p>
<p>Once again this is trying to re-make college admissions with your own yardsticks, quite literally.</p>
<p>National and international awards in creative endeavors are just way more interesting than campus club president of fill-in-the-blank. That is not, obviously, attached to race or ethnicity, but these kinds of differences drive decisions among otherwise similar applicants. Throw in economic adversity and regional interest between two academically comparative candidates, and it is not even a contest any more.</p>
<p>The link in post 295 has been repeatedly published, on this and other CC threads.</p>
<p>epiphany,</p>
<p>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>So far, you’ve told me that not balancing A is a bad thing, but you haven’t told me what the impact would be and why it’s worse than not balancing B.</p>