"Race" in College Applications FAQ & Discussion 12

@exlibris97 so will most schools let you see your application?

Looking at pragmatic courses of action for Asian-Americans to deal with the difficulty of applying as an ORM, I think a few strategies could be put forth.

  1. Look at strong LACs. There are a lot of high-quality (and highly ranked...) LACs out there that would love to have more Asian-American students. Many LACs, especially those in the South and Midwest, might actually consider it a mild hook. Some LACs do offer CS and Engineering, though obviously they generally offer fewer pre-professional majors than universities. But they all offer STEM majors like Physics, Biology and Chemistry. // Also check for private universities outside the West Coast that have a seemingly low Asian-American presence. They may be looking to admit more.
  2. Look at public universities in states outside of California. If going OOS would pose cost issues, some OOS publics offer significant merit-based aid. Others are not much more expensive than an in-state UC education, if at all.
  3. Look at CSUs. They might not carry quite the prestige of some of the UCs, but a quality education can still be obtained at a significant discount.

Still apply to Berkeley, UCLA and some Ivies (and equivalents) if you like, but there are a lot of quality schools out there that would probably look upon an Asian-American applicant (more) kindly/fairly.

@prezbucky Good suggestions. Also, Honors Colleges with merit based scholarships.

Again why is a poor Muslim American of say Pakistani background or Syrian background will have to be reverse AA’d (statistics showing they have to get a higher SAT score than even whites) yet a white female or Nigerian American (no slavery or segeregation in their ancestry) get affirmative action? how do you justify that? Why is quota against Jews wrong but okay against Asians?

With the exception of some of the more techy/male dominated schools, what schools are giving Affirmative Action benefits to white females??? I am a white female and received NO bump 30 years ago and my two daughters (one in college, one going in the fall) had no advantage for being white females. I also would not be so sure that a poor Muslim of Pakistani background who was effectively able to communicate their hardships and cultural diversity in an essay or elsewhere in their application would not get some kind of benefit because they could bring something new to the college community. If this same Muslim of Pakistani background was up against a white female from NJ, I bet U Penn, for example, would accept the Muslim. This is just my opinion, of course.

What is your source on all that you say??

http://madamenoire.com/282653/studies-show-affirmative-action-helps-white-women-more-than-others/

Simple google search

TThat’s my proof for my claim

Your claim of a pakistani/indian muslim (affirmative action cannot LEGALLY discriminate by religion) getting AA is completely bonkers. No such case.

cite your source

I didn’t say as part of AA…I was saying that some schools might prefer that pakistani/indian/muslim over the white female regardless of AA or whatever policies in an attempt to diversify their campus. Which is a GOOD thing. Most of the top schools WANT the diversity and honestly, it HAS made it more difficult for white females. But the diversity is a good thing, so I’m not complaining, I was simply disagreeing with you that I think white females have an advantage. I was just telling you what my opinion is.

A few years ago Brown posted stats and females in general had a 7% admission rate and males had an 11% admission rate. I think this is the case at a lot of schools. I think there are just more strong female applicants.

I just googled “white females college admissions” and look what I found! By complete coincidence this has the Brown example I was talking about…and overall supports my “opinion” pretty strongly that it’s harder for women.

check it out:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2015/07/30/achieving-perfect-gender-balance-on-campus-isnt-that-important-ending-private-colleges-affirmative-action-for-men-is/?utm_term=.db1b01a9653e

For those of you that don’t want to open the link, I copied some of it below. And by the way, this article is more current than the other link posted in #489:

Getting accepted to an elite college has never been more difficult. So to all the young women who got in this year I say: Great job! You earned it.

To the young men I say: Congrats. But just be thankful you didn’t have to apply as a woman.

Why? Because one of academia’s little-known secrets is that private college admissions are exempt from Title IX’s ban on sex discrimination—a shameful loophole that allows some of the most supposedly progressive campuses in the nation to discriminate against female applicants.

Consider my own alma mater, Brown University. In 2014, 11 percent of men were accepted at Brown versus 7 percent of women, according to U.S. Department of Education data.

Brown is hardly the only, or the worst, offender. At Vassar College, the 34 percent acceptance rate for men was almost twice as high as the 19 percent rate for women. At Columbia University, the acceptance rate was 8 percent for men versus 6 percent for women. At Vanderbilt University, it was 15 percent versus 11 percent. Pomona College: 15 percent versus 10 percent. Williams College: 21 percent versus 18 percent. This bias in private-college admissions is blatant enough that it can’t be long before “gender-blind admissions” becomes the new campus rallying cry.

Interesting, I never thought about a bias against women to diversify the campus, not sure though that 8 vs 6 is that significant, unless the scores and gpa are much higher.

In stem focused schools the acceptance rate for women is sometimes twice as higher as men. MIT, Cal Tech and Harvey Mudd are featured here:

http://time.com/money/4147738/colleges-women-higher-acceptance-rate/

This doesn’t strongly support your opinion. To show women have a harder time getting in, you would need to show the average stats of admitted males are lower than those of admitted females. Far more women apply to Brown than males, based on their latest CDS. It could be unqualified females are more likely than unqualified males to apply, thus resulting in lower acceptance rates for females. Or maybe not, but the Washington Post article doesn’t resolve the issue.

@collegemomjam The author in the article condemn schools that tend to be more female-dominated for accepting less women to achieve 50:50 ratio yet has no problem with Rochester for admitting more women because STEM tend to be male-dominated. Talk about double standard.

Yes, there are exceptions as I originally said especially with STEM majors and schools. I think the reason that overall it’s slightly easier for men than women is the fact that overall, women do indeed have HIGHER stats. The article actually says that 70% of valedictorians are women. So if they are trying to balance classes, which I don’t blame them for doing, that would suggest a man can get in with lower stats, just like the Washington Post states. My original reason for even bringing this up was to challenge the statement that Affirmative Action actually helps white women. Any college advisor will tell you that OVERALL it is HARDER for women than men, just like the stats suggest.

I think the point is they are trying to balance classes and make sure there is more even representation. So if they are trying to get more women in STEM fields, then they will have to have a lower bar for women. This is all about the colleges attempting to balance their classes.

You don’t have to agree with the judgement or opinion of the author of the article, but the stats still suggest and support that fact that it is easier OVERALL for men than women to get into elite schools.

Saying 70% of valedictorians are women does not imply men can get in with lower stats, at least in the Ivy+MIT+Stanford tier. Those schools matriculate about 16k first time freshmen each year combined. There’s about 37k high schools in the US. That means the Ivies+MIT+Stanford could fill their slots entirely with valedictorians, while maintaining a 50/50 gender ratio.

But they don’t fill them all with Valedictorians and everyone knows that. Look, there are so many variables that impact admissions and there are so many different ways to look at selectivity. We can agree to disagree, but I can assure you the overall consensus is that it is OVERALL, and that is the operative word, OVERALL, WOMEN and NOT MEN have more competition (because they have created it for each other) when it comes to college admissions, with the exception of some programs (STEM, sometimes business, etc.). And I stand by the whole impetus behind my original post on this thread which was a reaction to someone saying that white women have the advantage because of affirmative action. That is just outright WRONG.

As it relates to Affirmative Action, I would like to make something clear. I could not be more of a proponent of it. And as it relates to college admissions, I think the colleges have the right to approach things they way they see best. I think the intentions of most schools, ESPECIALLY the elite, is to round out and diversify their classes to improve the education of their students. The intentions are good. Some ORM’s get hurt in the process and that does stink, but our top universities need to represent everyone for so many different reasons.

Here’s another data point. In 2014, 327 males scored perfect SAT scores and 256 females scored perfect SAT scores. It’s true that the top tier colleges look at a lot of factors, which is why you need to dig much deeper than just acceptance rates. Unless you’re a former adcom or have seen a study most robust than the sloppy Washington Post article, referenced earlier, I don’t know how you can assure me women overall are discriminated against in admissions at the top tier of US colleges.

I find the stats pretty straight forward as presented in that article, and I also see it in the advising and community that I live in. But as I said before, let’s just agree to disagree. Getting in to a top tier school is hard for everyone. We can at least agree on that.

@CU123 Schools will let students who are ATTENDING see their records. They won’t let applicants.