"Race" in College Applications FAQ & Discussion 12

Applying to College
581

I am a biracial student who is half African-American and half Caucasian. On administered and official tests, I either mark off Black and White or Other in that delegated section. However, my parents are awfully insistent that I only check off African-American for reasons that I can assume, but none in which they have disclosed to me, and have often argued with my parents over what should be a trivial matter. Therefore, there will be a conflict between the records my school holds compared to what I’ve marked down

While I believe they assume me only checking off African-American will greatly improve my chances compared to identifying as biracial, I cannot fathom what is wrong with being honest or identifying as multicultural. Because of this, I want to get a clearer picture about the importance of race in college admissions and whether it truly makes a difference. Does it actually matter what I check off ina box, and will they ultimately base their decision on my qualifications?

582

to be fair, a lot more people questioned George W. Bush’s acceptance into Yale and Harvard Business School. Obama was known as a constitutional scholar, even hard core critics (imo) didn’t question his Occidental-Columbia-Yale pedigree. I actually didn’t know where Malia was going till I just googled it, don’t think people are really even interested in where the kids go, they all go somewhere elite.

583

The issue of race of college application is a constant one and will never change until the system admits its problems. The problem largely existed in the top 20-30 schools, but there are signs of spreading towards the 31-50 schools in recent cycles. It is a problem when top schools have some grps are routinely rejected at SAT 1500s, ACT34+… and some grps are admitted with 100-200 fewer pts in SAT and with ACT in upper 20s-low 30s. Would be nice the system has a level playing field based on social-economic status instead of race. I can not tell my middle-class white/Asian students (working their arse off for 4-6 yrs, with parents working like heck, and then come to the finish line and being discriminated against) life is Not Fair. It is especially acute when other kids in the class, being URM, despite from a better income status, get a 150 SAT bonus points in college admissions. I see this fact, cycle after cycle, with kids being tolerant and open in the 8th grade turning bitter after what they’ve experienced. Why work hard, some asked? Why even bother, some challenge? It is a broken system. A system that breeds stereotypes, resentments. I don’t expect 2018 cycle to change, in fact, probably get worse if I have to make a bet. JMHO

584

Hasn’t it been noted, repeatedly, that even the top 50 schools could fill entire classes with those SAT 1500s, ACT34+ students and still leave out kids who fall in that category? So then what? And of course a bajillion cascading questions fall from that premise: is there enough diversity in those students to fill up all the majors, the athletic teams, for each instrument in the music groups, to fill the theatre troupe…

From my point of view, the problem is much more about us as parents and a society than the schools themselves. When we stop feeding the storyline that only certain schools are worthy and only those students who hit perfection/near perfection from an academic perspective, deserve to get in, the resentment and stigma will ease.

585

@crimsonmom2019 I completely agree with your last paragraph. When society and the parents of the kids not being treated “fairly” stop making it seem like, as you put it “only certain schools are worthy”, we might actually start to get somewhere in this debate.

I have so much to comment on based on the last 15 posts or so.

@yalewhale first of all, if Yale accepted you, you deserve it. Don’t look back. They don’t want students to fail and if they thought you were not Yale material, they would not have accepted you. Did being black help? I would say yes, but so what?? I’m not sure exactly how it works in Yale admissions (and all of those other great schools), but you may have only been competing with other URM’s or perhaps only other blacks. Your score was good enough, and I bet there are some blacks that had a 32 that did not get in. Your accomplishments are phenomenal. Just promise us one thing…when you graduate, please try to make this world a better place, OK?

@Teslalaland I agree with a lot of what you said, that AA is often helping the wrong URM’s, especially when we are talking about the top 20 or so universities, But as you said, the achievement gap between the URM’s in the “right” communities (the ones that AA should be targeting) would be too large, generally speaking. BUT, and I think @yalewhale was kind of getting at this, there is a less tangible disadvantage for URM’s, particularly blacks in my opinion (and I am white, as are my three children) and that is the fact that many URM’s will face discrimination throughout their lives simply because they are black. We’ve all seen it and we cannot deny it. Again, especially with blacks in my opinion. So yes, there are blacks getting in to U of Chicago and the Ivies that may have gone to prep schools and they may have been held to a bit of a lower standard than their white and Asian peers, but HOPEFULLY these “advantaged” blacks will graduate and become the role models the African American community so desperately needs. IMO, more role models in these communities or even just in the media would create more hope for the URM youth. So while yes, it would be best if AA helped the URM’s that were also economically disadvantaged (and it often does), it still helps society, IMO, if we can get more URM’s through the elite school system in the hope that this will benefit society also.

And I do think the really elite schools can sniff out the difference between the URM’s that really need the bump, and the ones that have led very privileged lives. I don’t know much about Questbridge, but doesn’t that target URM’s in poorer communities???

Like any system, AA is not perfect. But we need it. Otherwise, our top schools would not properly represent our increasingly diverse nation. Assuming our top schools are creating the leaders of tomorrow, we need to have all communities’ voices heard. So while a black that grew up in Scarsdale, NY and went to a fancy NYC prep school (probably aren’t many of those) may not truly represent the voice of the more typical African American, they might still have a connection that the rest of us cannot identify with because we are not black. And if that African American grows up to be president, or CEO of Goldman Sachs, or a host on NBC News, well then, we have shown the world that it can be done. I’m hoping that Barack and Michelle have proven this point (especially Michelle who really did it all the hard way, she is one amazing human). It’s going to take some time…but we cannot give up.

@theloniusmonk I know I certainly questioned Bush’s acceptances to college more than I did Obama’s…but I’m sure there are many misinformed people out there that see it the other way around. Unfortunately. But very good point.

586

@crimsonmom2019 to your point again, as parents, we do need to let our kids know that they do not have to go to the tippy top schools to feel like they have achieved success. If you think about it, AA is helping the, let’s call them “second tier” schools get stronger because all of those whites and Asians that were treated “unfairly” are ending up there…and these are incredibly brilliant and amazing students that will certainly enhance these “second tier” schools…I would like to think that the gap between the second tier and first tier schools is shrinking, and I personally think this is a good thing. We are talking about amazingly talented students still getting in to amazing schools…let’s celebrate that and let these kids know they can still be whatever they want to be. Not getting in to HYPS is NOT the end of the world.

587

One last point. AA of course is NOT enough on it’s own. College admissions is only one prong of the many needed to help create the social justice society lacks. Without the right social and economic policies in place, it’s going to be really really hard to bring certain communities out of poverty and to create opportunities for their youth.

1 Like
588

@collegemomjam

It targets low income kids, period. Any race or ethnicity. Often but not always first-gen.

https://www.questbridge.org/educators/who-are-we-looking-for

589

Thanks @OHMomof2 for the link. Good that it targets any low income student.

590

This is a myth. There are roughly 3.5 million HS graduates each year. The College Board sets the threshold such that less than 1% of a nationally representative sample would score a 1500. So if all HS seniors took the SAT, less than 1% or 35k would score a 1500. I’m sure the top 50 universities have more than 35k slots.

591

Our top schools do not properly represent the US low to middle income white population either, yet they have no advocates and get shafted. You would be hard pressed to explain why they have to face a hurdle relative to URMs with higher SES.

And before someone invariably says it, I am neither white, nor middle income, and my child was not rejected by top schools.

592

@collegemomjam wrote “One last point. AA of course is NOT enough on it’s own. College admissions is only one prong of the many needed to help create the social justice society lacks. Without the right social and economic policies in place, it’s going to be really really hard to bring certain communities out of poverty and to create opportunities for their youth.”

Agree, and this points to a bigger issue I think which is that it’s graduate school that has a much higher correlation with success (however you want to define it) than undergraduate. And grad schools, outside of b-school don’t have a preference for URMs that undergrads do. Even if you’re not going to grad school, you would need some sort of certification like a CPA or CFA say, to do well in finance. And unless you have a Phd scholarship, there’s not much financial aid in grad schools, making it prohibitively expensive. I’d like to more URM programs the have for undergrad for grad, but not sure how feasible that is.

593

The official purpose of considering race in admissions is not to equalize inequality from discrimination, at least not directly. It’s to reap the educational benefits of having a diverse student body. Read the Fisher opinions.

594

The low and middle income students of any race or ethnicity, actually. Relatively few can achieve the academic level required.

595

Having blacks only compete against other blacks would be illegal.

596

@roethlisburger who knows how they make their piles in admissions…so are you saying all URM’s get the same “bump”? I’m not sure but we may never know.

@hebegebe wrote:

“Our top schools do not properly represent the US low to middle income white population either, yet they have no advocates and get shafted. You would be hard pressed to explain why they have to face a hurdle relative to URMs with higher SES.”

But white people have more role models and there are MANY more wealthy white communities, more white people in government and corporate leadership roles, and definitely LESS discrimination for whites. And I’m white. And I was first gen before it was a box to check (30 years ago). I was “shafted” big time in college admissions, but I turned out OK.

I think Barack Obama once said (if it wasn’t him, he quoted the person that said it) “You can’t pull yourself up by your bootstraps if you don’t have boots”. Let’s just stop pretending there isn’t social inequality in this country and a lot of it has to do with race/ethnicity (but not all of it). Yes, there are many poor white communities and I’m sure many of those people are disadvantaged because of their socio-economic status and lack of access to opportunity, but that doesn’t change the fact that we have work to do for our poor minority communities. And AA helps a little.

And I completely agree that it should NOT just be race/ethnicity. SES should absolutely be a factor. AA should address both. The tricky part might be how people report income, if tax returns are utilized. People might start to play games so that they can appear to be “poor” but really aren’t. Broad policies like AA have a lot of holes in them that we need to try to plug in an attempt to make it a more perfect system. It may never be perfect though because there will always be people that benefit that shouldn’t and vice versa. But that doesn’t mean we should get rid of the program.

597

People on CC love to rail against Charles Murray because of the Bell Curve, and because of that they tend to either ignore or dismiss the very valuable work he did in Coming Apart, where he showed that low-to-middle income (and generally Republican) whites have almost nothing in common with upper income whites. They don’t have the same family structure, or emphasis on education, or activities.

The implications of this are very important, but again tend to be ignored or dismissed on CC, which skews both upper-income and left-leaning. For this lower/middle income white demographic it is rather irrelevant that there are successful whites, because they are not their role models. If you want a measure of their disaffection, consider who they helped propel to the White House during the last election, rejecting the recommendations of the white elites that dominate both parties.

598

**…he showed that low-to-middle income PEOPLE have almost nothing in common with upper income PEOPLE. They don’t have the same family structure, or emphasis on education, or activities.

For this lower/middle income demographic it is rather irrelevant that there are successful PEOPLE, because they are not their role models**

Fixed that for you.

599

Actually in the case of Coming Apart, he focused exclusively on white communities so that he would not again be accused of racism, which is why I used the term white in my sentences. I think your point is equally correct.

600

So we have two issues here…one is discrimination based on race/ethnicity which AA is supposed to address. The other is the SES issue, which I agree is also important and very valid. I have always thought that AA should be based more on SES and it would still help URM’s but also many whites that are also stuck in poverty (but still argue there are differences in how the different groups are discriminated against). But I do think being a person of color carries some extra burden, all things being equal…

Trump is definitely NOT going to help these people that voted for him. Many of us believe that the people you speak of that elected him mostly voted against their own interests. As it specifically relates to AA, I suppose if somehow his administration got rid of it it MIGHT makes things slightly easier for the, let’s call them poor whites to get in to college. But I doubt it. They still aren’t going to be able to afford it.