Note that this suggests that Harvard is explicitly need-aware (in the narrow sense during review of individual applicants*), though in the opposite way that one normally would assume that need-aware colleges treat admissions for applicants with higher financial aid need.
*As opposed to the broader sense in designing admission processes and criteria to adjust the overall financial aid need of the admissions class. For example, whether or not to require and emphasize things like SAT subject tests, recommendations, CSS Profile, etc., which affect whether financially disadvantaged applicants apply and whether they will be admitted and offered financial aid. In this sense, Harvard and other highly selective private schools tend to have admission processes and criteria that tend to result in an admissions class with SES heavily skewed upward.
@UndeservingURM that’s ADMITTED stats, not ATTENDING stats. Harvard loses a lot of those to other schools, apparently.
I can’t read your WSJ link, it’s behind a paywall. Maybe you can quote the part where Harvard says they need race to keep a certain% of black and Hispanic students? Thanks.
Also, “there is nothing redeeming about these admitted URMs” is just not accurate. One aspect of what is “redeeming” may be achievement in the context of being black or Hispanic in the US and everything that goes with that.
@1NJParent “The lawsuit is about discrimination against certain ethnic/racial group.”
I thought the group was Asian American students. It seems it’s only some Asian American students who are being discriminated against - if any. Clearly some benefit.
Indeed it is, in that sense. Amherst goes a step further and calls its policy “need-affirmative” - being poor is a plus factor.
But both either struggle to find enough poor kids to fill the class or really do limit those spots in the ways you often outline here, because they really can’t afford to pay for everyone. Nor do they want to have a class full of poor kids when after all part of the attraction to these schools is studying alongside the children of presidents and princes.
Harvard is need blind in the sense that financial aid information and related numbers are not available to readers. And need aware in the sense that readers estimate need based on other information that is available like parents occupation, fee waiver, and neighborhood. That need estimate can lead to the "disadvantaged’ flag and related boost in chance of admission.
It’s a common technique. For example, the race percentages listed on Yale’s fact page at https://www.yale.edu/about-yale/yale-facts are below. Note that the sum of the percents in the listed groups is 118%, so there is obviously some double counting going on. I expect this sum of more than 100% relates to why Harvard does not list White percent on their website page.
White: 71%
Asian: 21%
Hispanic: 11%
Black: 10%
Other: 5%
Sum of Above: 118%
As noted, Harvard also is listing admitted students, rather than enrolled students. The lawsuit mentions Harvard had a 65.2% yield on URMs in the most recently listed year grouping and ~80% yield on non-URMs. A lower yield on URMs means listing admitted percentages on their website rather than enrolled also inflates the reported percentages. Listing admitting percentages also inflates numbers because you are not including groups that enter through processes besides standard freshman admission, such as Z-list admits, who are extremely White. It’s also common to do things with international students to inflate percentages reported on websites.
Looking at just first years from a single year introduces a greater source of noise due to the reduced sample size. For example, if you look at the CDS from 2 years before the one I sent, only 6.7% of freshman were Black, quite different from the 9.5% value you listed.
I do agree that it’s not a “tiny” percentage, like I mentioned in my earlier post.
“As an Asian American, I do not believe that Harvard’s race conscious admissions policy hurt me,”
It didn’t hurt him, but it has hurt a lot of people, that’ the point of the lawsuit, anecdotes are not going to outweigh more data showing things like races being compared to each other, soft quotas etc…
They may have been case during the time that the data you list occurred but I would hazard to guess that 1st Generation has become a bigger tip/hook at a number of elite institutions in the last 2-3 years. Princeton being one and I’ve read it mentioned in a few other schools blurbs after offers go out. Havard’s Institutional wants may mean it’s still not a big deal for them but I haven’t paid as much attention to Harvard.
If you want to see what Harvard thinks is important, look at their press release on the class admitted, it’s good indicator, though it is of course broad, from their release:
“First-generation college students make up 17.3 percent of this year’s admits, up from 15.1 percent for the admitted Class of 2021.”
"We’re really thrilled to see the jump in first-generation students,” Fitzsimmons said Wednesday. “This is one of those years where I think we had some breakthroughs.”
And of course, my favorite:
“Students admitted to the Class of 2022 hail from all 50 states, and 90 countries around the world. International students make up 12 percent of admitted students, up from 11.4 percent last year.”
If you’re an Asian from California going up against a white from North Dakota, good luck!
@Data10 Since this thread is about race in US students admissions it seems rather odd for you to put international and non-degree seeking population in the denominator, especially given your expertise in working with data. The real number of interest here is what percentage of URM admitted among domestic students, and Harvard’s own admission numbers and CDS are consistent: ie, single race and multi-race African American admitted 15.2% (class of 2022), single race African American matriculated (last year) 10.7% (=160/1493).
When I did that a few pages a back, another poster accused me of manipulating the data and not reporting as listed. It’s also not clear that this is what Harvard is doing when reporting about admitted students on their website, nor is it the standard used by other colleges when reporting.
I wouldn’t call 10.7% Black and 15.2% Black consistent with one another. I’m sure Harvard is not making up the number, but it’s not clear exactly what Harvard is doing to arrive at that percentage. Maybe they are removing international students from the denominator, which would be expected to increase by ~1% as you listed. Some website percentages do this. However, plenty of website percentages also do other things with international students when expressing percentages.
@Data10 To deliberately include international students and Extension School students to show a lower African American student percentage at Harvard College is clear data manipulation. Repeatedly doing after other posters pointed out just demonstrated your intention other than presenting the data.
“I wouldn’t call 10.7% Black and 15.2% Black consistent with one another.”
Again, I specified that 10.7% was the percentage matriculating in 2017 while 15.2% was 2018 admission. I don’t know what the 2017 admission percentage was. If it was around 14.5%–because this year was the highest–the number of African American admitted was about 2000x14.5%=290, the yield from African American admits would be around 55%(=160/290). This number is consistent with what was disclosed in recent Harvard lawsuit. http://samv91khoyt2i553a2t1s05i-wpengine.netdna-ssl.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/06/Doc-421-134-February-2013-Report.pdf
On Page 8, it shows that blacks had a yield rate between 51.3% and 66.5% and it was trending lower every year.
One thing I am not sure about though is whether CDS uses data from admissions. If students can report their demographics to school after they arrive on campus and such data is included in CDS then it could also explain the difference between the numbers before and after matriculation.
My post quoted the percentage Harvard listed in their CDS – the same calculation all colleges that use federal definitions use on their website. For example, Princeton’s website at https://admission.princeton.edu/how-apply/admission-statistics says their class of 2022 is “8% Black” – nearly half of Harvard. A key reason why Princeton’s website reports such a lower percentage Black than Harvard’s website is Princeton uses federal racial definitions on their website. These federal racial definitions are the same ones in the CDS I quoted, with separate categories for International and multi-racial. If someone quotes Princeton’s website and says Princeton’s class of 2022 is “8% Black”, is that “clear data manipulation” because they didn’t modify the figure reported on Princeton’s website… that it’s data manipulation unless you modify the reported percentage by dividing by a different denominator, with various groups removed?
I think we are saying the same thing, but have different definitions of “consistent with one another.” As I previously stated in multiple posts, Harvard is not making up the number out of thin air. Instead they are reporting the racial percentage in a way that inflates the URM percentage above various other reporting methods, including federal/CDS/IPEDS racial definitions. This includes counting multi-racial students twice such that the sum is >100% and listing admitted rather than enrolled.
The fact that it did doesn’t mean it hurt others, though. Your claim is as-yet unproven.
As the New Yorker article posted upthread makes clear, this particular lawsuit isn’t about race-conscious admissions, it’s about possible discrimination against Asian-Americans, specifically.
Once again, this kid is an Asian from California. But I think what you mean is, “if you are one of many high achieving kids from a wealthy school district where tons of kids are applying, good luck!”. That’s probably Palo Alto Asian and white kids and northern NJ white and Asian kids, etc. Either one with an interesting story from rural South Dakota likely gets a bump.
I remember when Princeton was sued by the DOE they also had cases of Asian American students who were accepted despite lower stats than rejected applicants of that and other races. They were accepted for something other than straight stats - athletic ability, interesting story, whatever.
BS. If their press releases reflected what thy actually prioritized, they’d brag about the high number recruited athletes who need a special system to ensure their average academic qualifications aren’t too low, the legacies and the donor kids that their admission policies ACTUALLY prioritizes.
As far as admissions goes, @Data10 and @jzducol I think keeping international students out of the equation makes sense, as they are considered in a separate pool.
Harvard does NOT have 26% black/Hispanic students as claimed by @UndeservingURM earlier. I brought these numbers into the discussion to refute that assertion.
As of the 2018 CDS, Harvard’s undergrad student body is:
7% black (specifically non-Hispanic)
11% Hispanic/Latino
20% Asian
6% two or more races (non-Hispanic - so if you are two or more races but also Hispanic you go in the Hispanic box)
11% international students
0.2% Pacific Islander, Hawaiian or Native American
40% white (non-Hispanic)
There are a lot of reasons for Harvard to want a diverse campus, but one is likely because it benefits what you might call their main target market - white wealthy student leaders who need to grow up and work with (or lead, presumably) everyone else who isn’t a white wealthy student. It’s cynical and I said so then, but I think there is some truth there.
@OHMomof2 I don’t think it was cynical because like you said, there is some truth there. I am always disappointed with the narrative that students of color are assumed to not belong and even a majority of the White students in the poll feel that way. AA may help some some URMs, but it also hurts the perception of all URMs.
Talk of Internationals being in the number of students by race is okay with me. Since this is a discussion about race in college admissions, why would the race of international students be “out of bounds”? Both sides of this conflict use the numbers to fit there narritive. Using race as a primary admissions factor is wrong, but I see that there are agendas in play (getting a bigger piece of the elite college pie for a particular racial group) versus more altruistic goals (transparency in the admissions process/procedures for masses to see or because it is the right thing to do). The part of the lawsuit narrative that bothers me most is the sense of entitlement that oozes out when talking about the head plaintiff’s accomplishments and story. If that same smugness came through in his essays, I can see how he may have had some rejections, although part of how I feel could deal with the way the media is covering the lawsuit (mostly negative) and the head lawyer for the plaintiff (something about that guy bothers me).
I actually didn’t notice that the numbers included international students. For the purposes of discussions on affirmative action, it doesn’t make sense to include international students because they are assessed in an entirely different manner.
160 / 1493 + 195 / 1493 = 23.8%
I stand by using first time, first year student stats only. Only 86% of first time undergraduates complete their degree in 4 years. Recency is also important: student demographics continually change over the years as does the Harvard admissions process.
My mistake for using the official statistics posted on Harvard’s website. The exact numbers are a little pedantic though because they are significant either way. Going back to the first point of contention, black and Hispanic students do not constitute a “tiny” portion of the class. Affirmative action does have significant effects on the student population.
Harvard publishes both accepted and attending numbers. You used accepted, that’s the difference.
We can argue about tiny or not but 7% black is a small group and 11% Hispanic isn’t much either. It’s certainly not over a quarter of the class. And you assume most or all of those admits are just because of AA. I highly doubt it.
I’m curious - are you a URM you feel is undeserving or is that username your opinion of URM students?