<p>How much does it really help to be an underrepresented minority, ie. Peruvian?</p>
<p>It helps a lot, but don't expect it to make up for a poor or average application; Yale (as well as the other selective schools) receives plenty of applications from URMs and thus has the ability of selecting the best URMs.</p>
<p>But if you're a person of color, you better apply.</p>
<p>stele32 is quite incorrect. It helps more than people suspect on this board. You all need to read A is For Admssion. Quite frankly, it can be the determining factor. Anyway, Yale is a private school and can pick and choose as they want.</p>
<p>chancito, if your stats aren't bad, i.e.: have an old sat 1300+ and very good grades (top 5% of your class) then you should apply because you will probably get in.</p>
<p>It can be the determining factor is you happen to be, say, a Native American, because there are so few of them, but these schools receive thousands of applications. Merely being a minority isn't going to help unless you have the credentials that make you competitive in the first place.</p>
<p>Saying "you will probably get in" with 1300+ and top 5% is going a bit too far. While I agree the OP should apply if he or she has those numbers, in no way will those numbers be good enough to say that "you will probably get in."</p>
<p>yale it's just a lottery, when you are a Urm, you only have few tickets for the lottery more.</p>
<p>i agree with you stele32.</p>
<p>i am hispanic (it says mexican american, which is in a different category)</p>
<p>I have very very defining factors and really didn't think anything of my ethnic group until a few months ago when I started looking for colleges. until then, it was just a joke as 'little amigo'.</p>
<p>I have a great friend who is black. he is applying to PENN and Yale. He thinks that both of us will get in based on our ethnic group, even though we are just as American as other people.</p>
<p>But, that is the way the cookie crumbles I guess.</p>