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Ugh, new Jack88 I am not playing your game. I didn't call anyone racist or implying so. Now you are twisting my words
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<p>Persecution syndrome. :)</p>
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Here is the Hispanic student Narcissa and many other CC'ers are asserting to be the normal URM applicant:
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<p>I wholeheartedly agree with you.
That applicant appeared to be exceptional. It's sad that the sole focus shifts, not on his stellar performance, but on his race. </p>
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Stop cyber bullying random people.
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Cyber bullying? You can't possibly be seriously.
It's a simple debate, that she willfully has participated in.</p>
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You guys have been real harsh on Narcissa period, twisting her words.
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I have not twisted her words. I've made inferences from what she's posted. She has strong opinions yet doesn't seem to know why she holds them. </p>
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In which case, let me be the first to thank you all for being so kind as to spend several pages' worth of posts trying to engage someone so "grossly uninformed" that you simply can't help but be rude and insulting in the process. Because, y'know... the Internets is serious business.
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If she has the right to express such strong opinions, why can't others challenge them? It's a learning process on both ends.
Secondly, she's rallied on the "rude and insulting" side as well or at least is not unfamiliar with snarky comments of her own.
Nonetheless, I don't feel anything I've said should be deemed as insulting.
I stated she's lacking reading comprehension skills. She has misinterpreted several users' posts on multiple occasions, when they were clearly expressed. Is that not poor comprehension?</p>
<p>Galoisien,
See I made some superficial assumptions about you from what I read. Sorry and I agree to my mistake. It is just easy to misinterpret what kind of person you are from a couple of internet posts and you gotta agree on that and don't tell me to you are so perspicacious that you never misjudge people down here! Everyone does that sometimes and you made this thread based on that same reasoning. But if I make a mistake I will say I am sorry.
My mom had to sell the car and I thought what is the use of getting a license!
My town is not that rural compared to yours it seems, and you can get part-time jobs down here if you want though. I use the bus and walk (cross-country built my stamina). And why I am telling my personal information on the Internet: guess I am an idiot! And as you may noted these latest posts so far are not connected to your thread question!</p>
<p>It is mid April everybody not going to complain about stats and college acceptance anymore. Probably more worried financial aid and stuff so good day!</p>
<p>I would do anything to get my town to adopt a decent public transport system.</p>
<p>(Well, not anything -- certainly not anything that sacrifices my education, but I would do a lot of things.)</p>
<p>Let it go. Some of the decisions were probably not "fair." Such is life. Time to move on.</p>
<p>My brother had his heart on going to UCLA, and did not get in. He had a high GPA and high sat scores...How does one go about petitioning? website? calling the school? any advice would be greatly appreicaited</p>
<p>^ If they accept it, write a letter of appeal.</p>
<p>As mom2three said, life is not always about fairness. Welcome to the real world where door will be close at you not because you deserve to bre treated that way.</p>
<p>I agree that life is not fair. Recognizing that is healthy. But I think a lot of the posters on this thread have preferred to pretend that it IS fair, and that any perceived unfairness must be explainable by some information we don't have.
Most people understand that colleges choose to accept some applicants who have lower academic achievements and qualifications than others because they want to maintain ethnic, racial, and gender diversity. Many colleges will even admit this. This means, obviously, that there are admittees at these colleges who would not be there if they had not been in an underrepresented group. They may have many fine qualities, and may, in general, be qualified to attend that school and do well there, but if the admissions process were entirely blinded to race, ethnicity, or gender,they wouldn't be there.
Is this fair? I would say it's not fair, but that it might be reasonable. It's not fair that some people are innately more intelligent than others, but nobody really complains when Harvard discriminates against the less intelligent. We think Harvard's reason for doing that is reasonable. Whether you think colleges are reasonable for valuing diversity is a different question.
Finally, it's not surprising that no individual likes it to be suggested that they were accepted just because they were a URM, or female, or a legacy, etc. (which may explain some of the furious attacks against people who make those kinds of suggestions about anybody). There certainly are URMs, for example, who would have gotten in even in a race-blind system, and it's too bad that their qualifications are questioned.
But honestly, the example Narcissa give is probably a person who would not have been accepted to MIT if she had been male. It's certainly possible that she had some other unknown great qualifications, but realistically, it's unlikely. I suppose it's admirable to give each individual the benefit of the doubt, but it's silly to suggest that there isn't anybody who was accepted "unfairly," if we define "unfair" as based on factors other than the person's academic achievements and qualifications.</p>
<p>The problem with your response, Hunt, is a couple of things:</p>
<p>The term "fairness" is entirely subjective.<br>
There are elements of an application OTHER THAN u.r.m. elements that can only be judged subjectively, because they are in fact non-quantifiable.
It's been a long time since most colleges had very many guilt complexes about admitted u.r.m's just for the sake of bumping up those numbers. Ditto for legacies, & even athletes. I'm talking about the more sought-after colleges now -- the ones that can afford to be picky.</p>
<p>Such colleges have choices in spades. I don't know all the other terms a card-player would use, but take your pick: multiple royal flushes? Chances are extremely high that they will have highly qualified candidates (not "perfect" but definitely highly qualified, not just barely qualified) from many many groups -- regionally, ethnically, racially. They are so in the driver's seat. From the college's perspective, they are not contorting their standards in some Byzantine way to admit certain groups. They are looking at an array of talent from a broad range of the young population, some with a 680 score on one SAT section but with high academic promise, proven ability in a variety of other measures, as well as the 800 X 3 candidate who is gifted in a special field with no particular special talent outside of academics, as well as a number of high 700's-score ranges (& high grades) all applying from the exact same dense region of the Northeast -- sometimes 30 people from one high school, & all those 30 with highly advantaged backgrounds educationally & socioeconomically, as well as an excited, impressive candidate from TX or AZ or Kansas who is an accomplished student & athlete, wrote a particularly fine essay, & has pinpointed precisely why he wants to attend X college & what he will contribute there.</p>
<p>ALL those decisions are subjective, and any one of them could be considered "unfair." The college does NOT believe it is choosing between qualified & unqualified, period.</p>
<p>So the two terms that are NOT in agreement are the terms "fair" and "qualified." Some people on CC see "qualified" as grades + scores. Colleges see ACADEMICALLY qualified as going beyond grades & scores, but including the content of the recommendations, any academic promise shown outside of the high school program but concurrent with high school, and even some academically transferable traits which are evident in the very e.c.'s of the candidate.</p>
<p>I understand what you're saying, epiphany. I just don't think it's true. I think it's pretty clear that there are students at every highly selective school who would not be there without one particular hook or tip factor--that includes URMs, athletes, legacies, etc. While all other things are never truly equal, they are equal enough that it's just ignoring reality to say that the makeup of those schools would be the same if they were blind to race, gender, legacy status, etc.
It would be nice to think that there was always some other factor, like a fine essay, that made the difference, but I just don't believe that to be true.
Again, I'm not saying that the students who are admitted in this way are not qualified academically--they are (well, maybe not all the athletes), but some people get in over others because of characteristics that have nothing to do with their personal accomplishments. I should add that I actually support this, but we should tell the truth about it.</p>
<p>Colleges do tell the truth about the fact that things like whether you're first generation college, full pay (a factor at many colleges), poor (can keep one out of many colleges, can tip one in to a relatively few colleges), a legacy, star athlete as well as things like your race, ethnicity, citizenship, gender -- can influence whether you're accepted.</p>
<p>None of these are secrets. Probably the people who are most hurt by the above are the excellent international applicants who have to be head and shoulders above even the top U.S. applicants in order to gain admission to the many colleges, including Ivies, that restrict international admissions. Funny: Such students don't whine that much on CC.</p>
<p>To put it in plainer terms: Many -- if not most -- U.S. students wouldn't have gotten into their colleges if they had been internationals. Many -- if not most -- students who get into their in state flagships (especially those that are among the nation's most competitive colleges) wouldn't have been accepted if they had been from out of state.</p>
<p>Northstarmom, I agree wtih that last paragraph of yours.</p>
<p>Hunt, I don't disagree with your basic statement. I merely disagree that there is some significant portion of hooked-but-underqualified candidates in the categories you name, such that large numbers of academically impressive candidates are being turned away for "special category" reasons alone. Even if there were NO hook-advantage considerations in the decision process (including among the extremely qualified hooked candidates), there would STILL be thousands of highly qualified candidates "unfairly" turned away. It's just room, that's all. They don't have room for them all. They would need maybe 4 campuses, in some cases. And the group from which any candidate is being selected is a group much like himself or herself.</p>
<p>Epiphany, I think the point of disagreement between us is the term "hooked-but-underqualified." I don't think the top schools take anybody who is genuinely underqualified to succeed there. However, I do think that there are a substantial number of persons admitted at those schools who would not have been admitted but for a single characteristic that does not relate to personal achievement. They do occupy places that would otherwise be occupied by persons with superior personal achievements. As you say, of course, there are plenty of people with superior personal achievements who would still not get in even if you eliminated those preferences--but the preferences are there because, without them, there would be fewer URMs, legacies, etc., than there are now. Again, that's OK by me.</p>
<p>Hunt, I think it's a matter of degree only that we differ in. Yes, there is a portion of not-as-impressively-qualified candidates who get in for "special category" reasons. But from all my reading & listening, I believe it's smaller than many people assume. Legacies as a hook has been seriously undermined in the high-profile colleges unless large donations have accompanied that legacy (consistently), and in many cases recently even that has not been enough to leap over academic qualifications. In non-highly endowed institutions (those with heavy Enrollment Management priorities), legacy is sometimes being passed over when not accompanied by previous significant donation levels. And as URM's become increasingly qualified & as academically mainstream in many cases as non-URM's, that gap is also closing. Many recruited athletes now have 3.7-3.8 UW GPA's, accompanied by laudable scores. Etc.</p>
<p>If anything, a category that gets more of a bump would be the celebrity category, but how huge is this? Tiny! And overwhelmingly, those celebrities have huge e.c. accomplishment confirming a level of success.</p>
<p>"And as URM's become increasingly qualified & as academically mainstream in many cases as non-URM's, that gap is also closing."</p>
<p>I hope this is true--it's certainly what everybody wants to happen.
It's a little funny that this thread began over a situation in which it appeared that a girl may have been advantaged in getting into MIT. I think a bigger looming issue is that girls, on the average, have better academic credentials than boys, and many schools are trying to maintain gender balance.</p>
<p>" I think a bigger looming issue is that girls, on the average, have better academic credentials than boys, and many schools are trying to maintain gender balance."</p>
<p>I don't think this is true in the highest quartile of college applicants, which is what is most relevant for top 15-20 schools.</p>
<p>"" I think a bigger looming issue is that girls, on the average, have better academic credentials than boys, and many schools are trying to maintain gender balance.""</p>
<p>It's well known that LACs -- including top ones -- favor male candidates over female because the LACs know that having an overabundance of females would cause their yield and applications to decrease. Consequently, at most LAC, males are accepted ahead of females with stronger stats.</p>
<p>A NY Times column by a woman who is dean of admission at Kenyon College.</p>
<p>"The reality is that because young men are rarer, they're more valued applicants. Today, two-thirds of colleges and universities report that they get more female than male applicants, and more than 56 percent of undergraduates nationwide are women. Demographers predict that by 2009, only 42 percent of all baccalaureate degrees awarded in the United States will be given to men.</p>
<p>We have told today's young women that the world is their oyster; the problem is, so many of them believed us that the standards for admission to today's most selective colleges are stiffer for women than men. How's that for an unintended consequence of the women's liberation movement?</p>
<p>The elephant that looms large in the middle of the room is the importance of gender balance. Should it trump the qualifications of talented young female applicants? At those colleges that have reached what the experts call a "tipping point," where 60 percent or more of their enrolled students are female, you'll hear a hint of desperation in the voices of admissions officers.</p>
<p>Beyond the availability of dance partners for the winter formal, gender balance matters in ways both large and small on a residential college campus. Once you become decidedly female in enrollment, fewer males and, as it turns out, fewer females find your campus attractive."
<a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/23/opinion/23britz.html%5B/url%5D">http://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/23/opinion/23britz.html</a></p>
<p>Well, I don't know what is the case at small LAC's, but I know it's not the case for places like the ivies, duke, uchicago, and state schools. I doubt if the number of national merit finalists or scholars is skewed toward one gender. It would seem surprising that there would be a paucity of males applying to places like Amherst unless they are unpopular with males. There are certainly plenty of qualified males for HYP; it would seem that there should be enough to get into a less-selective place like Amherst on their merits. </p>
<p>Regardless, I disagree with this practice of favoring one gender over the other. There are creative ways to insure that there will be male-female interaction. If schools are lopside gender-wise, they can just make an effort to socialize with schools that are lopsided the other way. There was a lot of MIT-Wellesley social mixers, for instance. So instead of Tufts and Lehigh (an engineering school that I think is male-dominated) trying to balance their own enrollment gender-wise individually, they could just increase the social interaction between them. This is obviously more feasible if a college is located in an area that has a lot of colleges.</p>