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On November 05 2012 06:27 chenchen wrote:Show nested quote +On November 05 2012 06:02 Demonhunter04 wrote:On November 05 2012 03:57 chenchen wrote:
Asians don't get shafted in admissions at top top universities (Harvard, MIT, Princeton, then maybe Stanford, Yale, Chicago, Columbia) not because of their race but because not many of them are exceptional and they're all trying to squeeze into a few narrow fields.
Those universities want to maintain diversity in fields pursued. If they accepted all those Asian kids with "good stats," they'd be overflowing with biology, computer science, and engineering majors. Instead, they also want students with interests in literature, history, social sciences, mathematics, literally everything else, etc. Unfortunately, Asian students don't really pursue those fields.
Honestly Asians are already grossly over-represented at every top university relative to their low population in the US, and as a lot of them (certainly not all) end up being careerist, passionless drones, admitting less Asian students would benefit the reputation of these institutions as they would end up educating more students more likely to impact the world in significant ways and less likely to educate the next great family doctor or software engineer. For almost all people, being a doctor or software engineer is the most significant way they can contribute to the world (if they can even do that). So...I don't know if you really have an argument. Someone is more likely to impact the world from a scientific discipline than from literature, arts, history, or social sciences anyway. Top universities don't want to admit ordinary people. They want to educate people to become leaders in their fields. A lot of Asian students don't have the drive to reach that level. They just want ordinary careers and ordinary lives. There are millions of doctors and software engineers in the world. Your impact as a doctor is limited by how many patients you can serve. Educating a doctor who will go on to perform the same service as millions of other doctors who came from less rigorous educational backgrounds is "almost" a waste of a space. Educating an exceptional doctor on the other hand . . . . that can change the world.
There are only so many people who can do much better than a doctor or engineer (think >2 SD above IQ norm, which occurs in 1/50 people, combined with high creativity and discipline, which altogether is extremely rare). As it is, there is a shortage of people who are capable of being good doctors...if universities were to only admit the people who could do better, then they would have almost no students. Also, most people of all races, even if they are ambitious in college, settle for mediocrity eventually. Having reproductive success significantly dampens creativity and ambition.
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On November 05 2012 06:27 chenchen wrote:Show nested quote +On November 05 2012 06:02 Demonhunter04 wrote:On November 05 2012 03:57 chenchen wrote:
Asians don't get shafted in admissions at top top universities (Harvard, MIT, Princeton, then maybe Stanford, Yale, Chicago, Columbia) not because of their race but because not many of them are exceptional and they're all trying to squeeze into a few narrow fields.
Those universities want to maintain diversity in fields pursued. If they accepted all those Asian kids with "good stats," they'd be overflowing with biology, computer science, and engineering majors. Instead, they also want students with interests in literature, history, social sciences, mathematics, literally everything else, etc. Unfortunately, Asian students don't really pursue those fields.
Honestly Asians are already grossly over-represented at every top university relative to their low population in the US, and as a lot of them (certainly not all) end up being careerist, passionless drones, admitting less Asian students would benefit the reputation of these institutions as they would end up educating more students more likely to impact the world in significant ways and less likely to educate the next great family doctor or software engineer. For almost all people, being a doctor or software engineer is the most significant way they can contribute to the world (if they can even do that). So...I don't know if you really have an argument. Someone is more likely to impact the world from a scientific discipline than from literature, arts, history, or social sciences anyway. Top universities don't want to admit ordinary people. They want to educate people to become leaders in their fields. A lot of Asian students don't have the drive to reach that level. They just want ordinary careers and ordinary lives. There are millions of doctors and software engineers in the world. Your impact as a doctor is limited by how many patients you can serve. Educating a doctor who will go on to perform the same service as millions of other doctors who came from less rigorous educational backgrounds is "almost" a waste of a space. Educating an exceptional doctor on the other hand . . . . that can change the world.
i despite self-hating asians like you
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On November 05 2012 06:43 phosphorylation wrote:Show nested quote +On November 05 2012 06:27 chenchen wrote:On November 05 2012 06:02 Demonhunter04 wrote:On November 05 2012 03:57 chenchen wrote:
Asians don't get shafted in admissions at top top universities (Harvard, MIT, Princeton, then maybe Stanford, Yale, Chicago, Columbia) not because of their race but because not many of them are exceptional and they're all trying to squeeze into a few narrow fields.
Those universities want to maintain diversity in fields pursued. If they accepted all those Asian kids with "good stats," they'd be overflowing with biology, computer science, and engineering majors. Instead, they also want students with interests in literature, history, social sciences, mathematics, literally everything else, etc. Unfortunately, Asian students don't really pursue those fields.
Honestly Asians are already grossly over-represented at every top university relative to their low population in the US, and as a lot of them (certainly not all) end up being careerist, passionless drones, admitting less Asian students would benefit the reputation of these institutions as they would end up educating more students more likely to impact the world in significant ways and less likely to educate the next great family doctor or software engineer. For almost all people, being a doctor or software engineer is the most significant way they can contribute to the world (if they can even do that). So...I don't know if you really have an argument. Someone is more likely to impact the world from a scientific discipline than from literature, arts, history, or social sciences anyway. Top universities don't want to admit ordinary people. They want to educate people to become leaders in their fields. A lot of Asian students don't have the drive to reach that level. They just want ordinary careers and ordinary lives. There are millions of doctors and software engineers in the world. Your impact as a doctor is limited by how many patients you can serve. Educating a doctor who will go on to perform the same service as millions of other doctors who came from less rigorous educational backgrounds is "almost" a waste of a space. Educating an exceptional doctor on the other hand . . . . that can change the world. i despite self-hating asians like you
I'm sorry that you "despite" me =(
I don't hate myself, but it's good to take a more objective stance rather than a biased stance when viewing a lot of Asian Americans' stance toward education and life.
My only real point was that Asian Americans tend to limit themselves to a few fields when they could do so much more than that.
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On November 05 2012 06:38 Demonhunter04 wrote:Show nested quote +On November 05 2012 06:27 chenchen wrote:On November 05 2012 06:02 Demonhunter04 wrote:On November 05 2012 03:57 chenchen wrote:
Asians don't get shafted in admissions at top top universities (Harvard, MIT, Princeton, then maybe Stanford, Yale, Chicago, Columbia) not because of their race but because not many of them are exceptional and they're all trying to squeeze into a few narrow fields.
Those universities want to maintain diversity in fields pursued. If they accepted all those Asian kids with "good stats," they'd be overflowing with biology, computer science, and engineering majors. Instead, they also want students with interests in literature, history, social sciences, mathematics, literally everything else, etc. Unfortunately, Asian students don't really pursue those fields.
Honestly Asians are already grossly over-represented at every top university relative to their low population in the US, and as a lot of them (certainly not all) end up being careerist, passionless drones, admitting less Asian students would benefit the reputation of these institutions as they would end up educating more students more likely to impact the world in significant ways and less likely to educate the next great family doctor or software engineer. For almost all people, being a doctor or software engineer is the most significant way they can contribute to the world (if they can even do that). So...I don't know if you really have an argument. Someone is more likely to impact the world from a scientific discipline than from literature, arts, history, or social sciences anyway. Top universities don't want to admit ordinary people. They want to educate people to become leaders in their fields. A lot of Asian students don't have the drive to reach that level. They just want ordinary careers and ordinary lives. There are millions of doctors and software engineers in the world. Your impact as a doctor is limited by how many patients you can serve. Educating a doctor who will go on to perform the same service as millions of other doctors who came from less rigorous educational backgrounds is "almost" a waste of a space. Educating an exceptional doctor on the other hand . . . . that can change the world. There are only so many people who can do much better than a doctor or engineer (think >2 SD above IQ norm, which occurs in 1/50 people, combined with high creativity and discipline, which altogether is extremely rare). As it is, there is a shortage of people who are capable of being good doctors...if universities were to only admit the people who could do better, then they would have almost no students. Also, most people of all races, even if they are ambitious in college, settle for mediocrity eventually. Having reproductive success significantly dampens creativity and ambition.
Out of three or four million high schoolers graduating every year in the US, from which top universities have *almost* free pickings, only a few thousand are admitted at these top top schools.
Compare that level of selectivity to the millions of engineers and doctors active in a country with less than two hundred million working people.
A lot of Asian kids in high school feel that they're entitled to these rare rare spots merely because they can work through standardized test review books.
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I am mixed on this subject.
I feel that the application process should be based on merit and grades alone, but at the same time I recognise that minority groups, the poor, and others won't advance their part of a society group unless they too are given the opportunity to higher education.
I guess the solution to that is scholarships (non athletic) to encourage those groups to obtain higher grades to guarantee acceptance and the scholarships to take care of the financials.
That being said, I am personally applying for post secondary education for next year, even in my ripe old age. At this time, I have no idea how I am going to pay for it outside of a loan. I was looking at the various grants etc etc, and a massive majority are specific for certain minority groups, disabled, etc etc, and I do not qualify even to apply for the grant or scholarship, though my grades are likely higher then those I would be competing with.
I guess, private funds and money, goes where it wants, when it wants. Nothing I can do about it though.
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By "self-hate," I refer to hating on your own race, not necessarily your individual self. At my university, what you say about Asians is simply not true; and in any case, affirmative action is a terrible and unjust way to generate diversity in the students pursuing different fields. If this were really the purpose of AA, why not have affirmative action based not on ethnicity but on what field the student has largely pursued/excelled in his high school years?
edit: AA is a terrible system because it doesn't directly address its purported goals. If you want to bridge the gap in terms of socioeconomic status, have it based on your family's net worth and income not your skin color. If you want to generate a class with a diversity in terms of majors/interests, have it based on your pursuits/strong performance in these areas, not your skin color.
Therefore, the only way you can really justify the current AA system is if you claim you want to maintain a certain, quasi-arbitrary distribution/quota of ethnicity (at my univ. it is maintained to be around 60 percent whites, 20 percent asians, and 20 percent blacks/hispanics) -- but I see neither fairness nor point in that....
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On November 05 2012 06:56 chenchen wrote:Show nested quote +On November 05 2012 06:38 Demonhunter04 wrote:On November 05 2012 06:27 chenchen wrote:On November 05 2012 06:02 Demonhunter04 wrote:On November 05 2012 03:57 chenchen wrote:
Asians don't get shafted in admissions at top top universities (Harvard, MIT, Princeton, then maybe Stanford, Yale, Chicago, Columbia) not because of their race but because not many of them are exceptional and they're all trying to squeeze into a few narrow fields.
Those universities want to maintain diversity in fields pursued. If they accepted all those Asian kids with "good stats," they'd be overflowing with biology, computer science, and engineering majors. Instead, they also want students with interests in literature, history, social sciences, mathematics, literally everything else, etc. Unfortunately, Asian students don't really pursue those fields.
Honestly Asians are already grossly over-represented at every top university relative to their low population in the US, and as a lot of them (certainly not all) end up being careerist, passionless drones, admitting less Asian students would benefit the reputation of these institutions as they would end up educating more students more likely to impact the world in significant ways and less likely to educate the next great family doctor or software engineer. For almost all people, being a doctor or software engineer is the most significant way they can contribute to the world (if they can even do that). So...I don't know if you really have an argument. Someone is more likely to impact the world from a scientific discipline than from literature, arts, history, or social sciences anyway. Top universities don't want to admit ordinary people. They want to educate people to become leaders in their fields. A lot of Asian students don't have the drive to reach that level. They just want ordinary careers and ordinary lives. There are millions of doctors and software engineers in the world. Your impact as a doctor is limited by how many patients you can serve. Educating a doctor who will go on to perform the same service as millions of other doctors who came from less rigorous educational backgrounds is "almost" a waste of a space. Educating an exceptional doctor on the other hand . . . . that can change the world. There are only so many people who can do much better than a doctor or engineer (think >2 SD above IQ norm, which occurs in 1/50 people, combined with high creativity and discipline, which altogether is extremely rare). As it is, there is a shortage of people who are capable of being good doctors...if universities were to only admit the people who could do better, then they would have almost no students. Also, most people of all races, even if they are ambitious in college, settle for mediocrity eventually. Having reproductive success significantly dampens creativity and ambition. Out of three or four million high schoolers graduating every year in the US, from which top universities have *almost* free pickings, only a few thousand are admitted at these top top schools. Compare that level of selectivity to the millions of engineers and doctors active in a country with less than two hundred million working people. A lot of Asian kids in high school feel that they're entitled to these rare rare spots merely because they can work through standardized test review books.
lol
Well yes, I would also feel "entitled" if I worked hard for it. The school system doesn't necessarily select the most qualified people, just those who are the most regular with doing their assignments and how well they can memorize information. So your issue is with the education system, not with Asians, who happen to be good at doing what the education system emphasizes.
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On November 05 2012 07:00 phosphorylation wrote:
By "self-hate," I refer to hating on your own race, not necessarily your individual self. At my university, what you say about Asians is simply not true; and in any case, affirmative action is a terrible and unjust way to generate diversity in the students pursuing different fields. If this were really the purpose of AA, why not have affirmative action based not on ethnicity but on what field the student has largely pursued/excelled in his high school years?
I don't "hate" my "own race" either. I'm not particularly in favour of dividing people into races and ethnic groups. I enjoy learning about many different cultures
I'm glad that you've met many Asians at your universities who are very self motivated and not afraid to sacrifice financial security to pursue their interests.
Affirmative action based on ethnicity and only ethnicity seems very silly.
However, I am only trying to explain why Asian students face lower acceptance rates at top schools and I don't believe that it is primarily due to racist admissions policies.
Imagine 20,000 kids applying to a school with 1,000 spots and around 50% predicted yield rate. 2,000 kids will be accepted.
Let's say that the university shoots for 500 kids accepted into biology, computer science, and engineering. The university will end up with around 250 students in its incoming class studying those things.
This seems fair enough, as there are many different fields of study. Let's say that out of those 20,000 kids applying, there are 10,000 Asian kids applying, but 8,000 of them are trying to squeeze into the 500 spots set off for biology, computer science, and engineering. Even if 400 out of those 8,000 are accepted, filling up 80% of the spots set off for biology, computer science, and engineering, that's still only a 5% acceptance rate compared to 10% overall.
This scenario is actually pretty spot on when you look at Asian students trying to apply to Harvard, MIT, Princeton, and then Yale or Stanford.
The low acceptance rate that Asian students face may not be a consequence of institutionalized racism, but simply . . . what I've outlined.
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On November 05 2012 07:05 Demonhunter04 wrote:Show nested quote +On November 05 2012 06:56 chenchen wrote:On November 05 2012 06:38 Demonhunter04 wrote:On November 05 2012 06:27 chenchen wrote:On November 05 2012 06:02 Demonhunter04 wrote:On November 05 2012 03:57 chenchen wrote:
Asians don't get shafted in admissions at top top universities (Harvard, MIT, Princeton, then maybe Stanford, Yale, Chicago, Columbia) not because of their race but because not many of them are exceptional and they're all trying to squeeze into a few narrow fields.
Those universities want to maintain diversity in fields pursued. If they accepted all those Asian kids with "good stats," they'd be overflowing with biology, computer science, and engineering majors. Instead, they also want students with interests in literature, history, social sciences, mathematics, literally everything else, etc. Unfortunately, Asian students don't really pursue those fields.
Honestly Asians are already grossly over-represented at every top university relative to their low population in the US, and as a lot of them (certainly not all) end up being careerist, passionless drones, admitting less Asian students would benefit the reputation of these institutions as they would end up educating more students more likely to impact the world in significant ways and less likely to educate the next great family doctor or software engineer. For almost all people, being a doctor or software engineer is the most significant way they can contribute to the world (if they can even do that). So...I don't know if you really have an argument. Someone is more likely to impact the world from a scientific discipline than from literature, arts, history, or social sciences anyway. Top universities don't want to admit ordinary people. They want to educate people to become leaders in their fields. A lot of Asian students don't have the drive to reach that level. They just want ordinary careers and ordinary lives. There are millions of doctors and software engineers in the world. Your impact as a doctor is limited by how many patients you can serve. Educating a doctor who will go on to perform the same service as millions of other doctors who came from less rigorous educational backgrounds is "almost" a waste of a space. Educating an exceptional doctor on the other hand . . . . that can change the world. There are only so many people who can do much better than a doctor or engineer (think >2 SD above IQ norm, which occurs in 1/50 people, combined with high creativity and discipline, which altogether is extremely rare). As it is, there is a shortage of people who are capable of being good doctors...if universities were to only admit the people who could do better, then they would have almost no students. Also, most people of all races, even if they are ambitious in college, settle for mediocrity eventually. Having reproductive success significantly dampens creativity and ambition. Out of three or four million high schoolers graduating every year in the US, from which top universities have *almost* free pickings, only a few thousand are admitted at these top top schools. Compare that level of selectivity to the millions of engineers and doctors active in a country with less than two hundred million working people. A lot of Asian kids in high school feel that they're entitled to these rare rare spots merely because they can work through standardized test review books. lol Well yes, I would also feel "entitled" if I worked hard for it. The school system doesn't necessarily select the most qualified people, just those who are the most regular with doing their assignments and how well they can memorize information. So your issue is with the education system, not with Asians, who happen to be good at doing what the education system emphasizes.
Too bad a lot of those Asian kids seem to be shocked when undergraduate admissions at top universities aren't always looking for what they perceive to be "success" with the "education system."
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On November 05 2012 07:10 chenchen wrote:Show nested quote +On November 05 2012 07:00 phosphorylation wrote:
By "self-hate," I refer to hating on your own race, not necessarily your individual self. At my university, what you say about Asians is simply not true; and in any case, affirmative action is a terrible and unjust way to generate diversity in the students pursuing different fields. If this were really the purpose of AA, why not have affirmative action based not on ethnicity but on what field the student has largely pursued/excelled in his high school years? I don't "hate" my "own race" either. I'm not particularly in favour of dividing people into races and ethnic groups. I enjoy learning about many different cultures I'm glad that you've met many Asians at your universities who are very self motivated and not afraid to sacrifice financial security to pursue their interests. Affirmative action based on ethnicity and only ethnicity seems very silly. However, I am only trying to explain why Asian students face lower acceptance rates at top schools and I don't believe that it is primarily due to racist admissions policies. Imagine 20,000 kids applying to a school with 1,000 spots and around 50% predicted yield rate. 2,000 kids will be accepted. Let's say that the university shoots for 500 kids accepted into biology, computer science, and engineering. The university will end up with around 250 students in its incoming class studying those things. This seems fair enough, as there are many different fields of study. Let's say that out of those 20,000 kids applying, there are 10,000 Asian kids applying, but 8,000 of them are trying to squeeze into the 500 spots set off for biology, computer science, and engineering. Even if 400 out of those 8,000 are accepted, filling up 80% of the spots set off for biology, computer science, and engineering, that's still only a 5% acceptance rate compared to 10% overall. This scenario is actually pretty spot on when you look at Asian students trying to apply to Harvard, MIT, Princeton, and then Yale or Stanford. The low acceptance rate that Asian students face may not be a consequence of institutionalized racism, but simply . . . what I've outlined.
Your hypothesis is flawed because at schools like Harvard, Princeton, and Stanford, you do not declare your intended major. At my school, you do not have declare your major until your junior year and even then, many people switch their majors/fields halfway through their UG career. There's no reliable way of predicting what the accepted student will ultimately pursue in college. Perhaps as a result, biology is indeed the most popular major at my school -- and biology majors probably outnumber certain humanities majors by more than ten-to-one.
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I applied to Harvard, Yale, Stanford and UChicago as an English or Journalism major. I was rejected from Harvard, waitlisted (then rejected) at Yale and Stanford and accepted at Chicago.
Calling Asians people who "won't excel" and "just want a normal life"... there's some problem with that logic. Can you really have the motivation to stay at the front of the curve for your whole life and expect to just settle down with that? I think most of these stereotyped Asians (including myself) expect to be among the best at what they do. I don't want to be some general practitioner, I want to manage a fucking hospital or be a surgeon.
@Chenchen... you're buying into the stereotype that Asians are some kind of test-taking robot-- maybe that's what you thought you needed. That's exactly fucking over Asian students. Not only do they need a really good SAT/ACT, they have to prove that they can do more than that more than students of other ethnicities.
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Cayman Islands24199 Posts
i'll say that chenchen takes things a bit too far, but the general rationale for admission decision is sound in that they want people who will pursue grad school/research a bit more than lower tier unis.
also the generalist tests that are used for college admissions is too easy to separate out the best of the best. with enough prep you can do well on these tests, but they do not show ability required to be a successful phd level student.
there are plenty of asian kids who are good at humanities stuff too. there are lazy and unfocused ones too. :D
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On November 05 2012 07:13 phosphorylation wrote:Show nested quote +On November 05 2012 07:10 chenchen wrote:On November 05 2012 07:00 phosphorylation wrote:
By "self-hate," I refer to hating on your own race, not necessarily your individual self. At my university, what you say about Asians is simply not true; and in any case, affirmative action is a terrible and unjust way to generate diversity in the students pursuing different fields. If this were really the purpose of AA, why not have affirmative action based not on ethnicity but on what field the student has largely pursued/excelled in his high school years? I don't "hate" my "own race" either. I'm not particularly in favour of dividing people into races and ethnic groups. I enjoy learning about many different cultures I'm glad that you've met many Asians at your universities who are very self motivated and not afraid to sacrifice financial security to pursue their interests. Affirmative action based on ethnicity and only ethnicity seems very silly. However, I am only trying to explain why Asian students face lower acceptance rates at top schools and I don't believe that it is primarily due to racist admissions policies. Imagine 20,000 kids applying to a school with 1,000 spots and around 50% predicted yield rate. 2,000 kids will be accepted. Let's say that the university shoots for 500 kids accepted into biology, computer science, and engineering. The university will end up with around 250 students in its incoming class studying those things. This seems fair enough, as there are many different fields of study. Let's say that out of those 20,000 kids applying, there are 10,000 Asian kids applying, but 8,000 of them are trying to squeeze into the 500 spots set off for biology, computer science, and engineering. Even if 400 out of those 8,000 are accepted, filling up 80% of the spots set off for biology, computer science, and engineering, that's still only a 5% acceptance rate compared to 10% overall. This scenario is actually pretty spot on when you look at Asian students trying to apply to Harvard, MIT, Princeton, and then Yale or Stanford. The low acceptance rate that Asian students face may not be a consequence of institutionalized racism, but simply . . . what I've outlined. Your hypothesis is flawed because at schools like Harvard, Princeton, and Stanford, you do not declare your intended major. At my school, you do not have declare your major until your junior year and even then, many people switch their majors/fields halfway through their UG career.
Applicants definitely check off what you intend to study, and life goals are usually fairly clear from the application package, even though life goals are never static.
Yes, not all people major in what they intended to in high school. but I'm sure that even at your school, Asian students disproportionately prefer fields with greater job security such as biology, computer science, and engineering. If your school were selective, which it may or may not be, the Asian kids that made it into those spots studying those things made it over a large amount of less qualified Asian students trying to get to those spots, who may have looked much better on paper in high school compared to people, regardless of race, studying sociology or anthropology.
Again, I will emphasize once again, this phenomenon of perceived institutionalized racism against Asians only really occurs in top top top universities, and I am merely offering an alternate explanation.
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On November 05 2012 07:13 ticklishmusic wrote:
I applied to Harvard, Yale, Stanford and UChicago as an English or Journalism major. I was rejected from Harvard, waitlisted (then rejected) at Yale and Stanford and accepted at Chicago.
Calling Asians people who "won't excel" and "just want a normal life"... there's some problem with that logic. Can you really have the motivation to stay at the front of the curve for your whole life and expect to just settle down with that? I think most of these stereotyped Asians (including myself) expect to be among the best at what they do. I don't want to be some general practitioner, I want to manage a fucking hospital or be a surgeon.
@Chenchen... you're buying into the stereotype that Asians are some kind of test-taking robot-- maybe that's what you thought you needed. That's exactly fucking over Asian students. Not only do they need a really good SAT/ACT, they have to prove that they can do more than that more than students of other ethnicities.
I'm not buying into anything.
Many Asian students, capable or incapable, limit themselves to a handful of fields solely because of perceived job security. Universities want students pursuing all sorts of different fields, like English and Journalism, which many Asian student shun away from.
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On November 05 2012 07:18 chenchen wrote:Show nested quote +On November 05 2012 07:13 phosphorylation wrote:On November 05 2012 07:10 chenchen wrote:On November 05 2012 07:00 phosphorylation wrote:
By "self-hate," I refer to hating on your own race, not necessarily your individual self. At my university, what you say about Asians is simply not true; and in any case, affirmative action is a terrible and unjust way to generate diversity in the students pursuing different fields. If this were really the purpose of AA, why not have affirmative action based not on ethnicity but on what field the student has largely pursued/excelled in his high school years? I don't "hate" my "own race" either. I'm not particularly in favour of dividing people into races and ethnic groups. I enjoy learning about many different cultures I'm glad that you've met many Asians at your universities who are very self motivated and not afraid to sacrifice financial security to pursue their interests. Affirmative action based on ethnicity and only ethnicity seems very silly. However, I am only trying to explain why Asian students face lower acceptance rates at top schools and I don't believe that it is primarily due to racist admissions policies. Imagine 20,000 kids applying to a school with 1,000 spots and around 50% predicted yield rate. 2,000 kids will be accepted. Let's say that the university shoots for 500 kids accepted into biology, computer science, and engineering. The university will end up with around 250 students in its incoming class studying those things. This seems fair enough, as there are many different fields of study. Let's say that out of those 20,000 kids applying, there are 10,000 Asian kids applying, but 8,000 of them are trying to squeeze into the 500 spots set off for biology, computer science, and engineering. Even if 400 out of those 8,000 are accepted, filling up 80% of the spots set off for biology, computer science, and engineering, that's still only a 5% acceptance rate compared to 10% overall. This scenario is actually pretty spot on when you look at Asian students trying to apply to Harvard, MIT, Princeton, and then Yale or Stanford. The low acceptance rate that Asian students face may not be a consequence of institutionalized racism, but simply . . . what I've outlined. Your hypothesis is flawed because at schools like Harvard, Princeton, and Stanford, you do not declare your intended major. At my school, you do not have declare your major until your junior year and even then, many people switch their majors/fields halfway through their UG career. Applicants definitely check off what you intend to study, and life goals are usually fairly clear from the application package, even though life goals are never static.
Once again, this just isn't true for a large majority of students at my school. There was an informal survey done which indicated that 70 percent of freshmen weren't sure about what they would pursue as their career. So if even you don't know what you will pursue, how should the school?
This is, btw, at a very selective school and I understand that the story is slightly different at UCs where what you indicate as major does matter a bit more. But AA really comes into play more in admission for top institutions.
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On November 05 2012 07:24 phosphorylation wrote:Show nested quote +On November 05 2012 07:18 chenchen wrote:On November 05 2012 07:13 phosphorylation wrote:On November 05 2012 07:10 chenchen wrote:On November 05 2012 07:00 phosphorylation wrote:
By "self-hate," I refer to hating on your own race, not necessarily your individual self. At my university, what you say about Asians is simply not true; and in any case, affirmative action is a terrible and unjust way to generate diversity in the students pursuing different fields. If this were really the purpose of AA, why not have affirmative action based not on ethnicity but on what field the student has largely pursued/excelled in his high school years? I don't "hate" my "own race" either. I'm not particularly in favour of dividing people into races and ethnic groups. I enjoy learning about many different cultures I'm glad that you've met many Asians at your universities who are very self motivated and not afraid to sacrifice financial security to pursue their interests. Affirmative action based on ethnicity and only ethnicity seems very silly. However, I am only trying to explain why Asian students face lower acceptance rates at top schools and I don't believe that it is primarily due to racist admissions policies. Imagine 20,000 kids applying to a school with 1,000 spots and around 50% predicted yield rate. 2,000 kids will be accepted. Let's say that the university shoots for 500 kids accepted into biology, computer science, and engineering. The university will end up with around 250 students in its incoming class studying those things. This seems fair enough, as there are many different fields of study. Let's say that out of those 20,000 kids applying, there are 10,000 Asian kids applying, but 8,000 of them are trying to squeeze into the 500 spots set off for biology, computer science, and engineering. Even if 400 out of those 8,000 are accepted, filling up 80% of the spots set off for biology, computer science, and engineering, that's still only a 5% acceptance rate compared to 10% overall. This scenario is actually pretty spot on when you look at Asian students trying to apply to Harvard, MIT, Princeton, and then Yale or Stanford. The low acceptance rate that Asian students face may not be a consequence of institutionalized racism, but simply . . . what I've outlined. Your hypothesis is flawed because at schools like Harvard, Princeton, and Stanford, you do not declare your intended major. At my school, you do not have declare your major until your junior year and even then, many people switch their majors/fields halfway through their UG career. Applicants definitely check off what you intend to study, and life goals are usually fairly clear from the application package, even though life goals are never static. Once again, this just isn't true for a large majority of students at my school. There was an informal survey done which indicated that 70 percent of freshmen weren't sure about what they would pursue as their career. So if even you don't know what you will pursue, how should the school? This is, btw, at a very selective school and I understand that the story is slightly different at UCs where what you indicate as major does matter a bit more. But AA really comes into play more in admission for top institutions.
"Yes, not all people major in what they intended to in high school. but I'm sure that even at your school, Asian students disproportionately prefer fields with greater job security such as biology, computer science, and engineering. If your school were selective, which it may or may not be, the Asian kids that made it into those spots studying those things made it over a large amount of less qualified Asian students trying to get to those spots, who may have looked much better on paper in high school compared to people, regardless of race, studying sociology or anthropology.
Again, I will emphasize once again, this phenomenon of perceived institutionalized racism against Asians only really occurs in top top top universities, and I am merely offering an alternate explanation."
Do you not observe this at your "very selective" school? Is this merely a coincidence? Do all those Asian students gravitate toward those fields magically after they start college from a state of being "unsure about what to study?"
Look at the Asian kid studying anthropology. I guarantee his "high school stats," or whatever those terms have come to mean look much much worse than most of the rejected kids who wanted to study computer science or biology.
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On November 05 2012 07:34 chenchen wrote:Show nested quote +On November 05 2012 07:24 phosphorylation wrote:On November 05 2012 07:18 chenchen wrote:On November 05 2012 07:13 phosphorylation wrote:On November 05 2012 07:10 chenchen wrote:On November 05 2012 07:00 phosphorylation wrote:
By "self-hate," I refer to hating on your own race, not necessarily your individual self. At my university, what you say about Asians is simply not true; and in any case, affirmative action is a terrible and unjust way to generate diversity in the students pursuing different fields. If this were really the purpose of AA, why not have affirmative action based not on ethnicity but on what field the student has largely pursued/excelled in his high school years? I don't "hate" my "own race" either. I'm not particularly in favour of dividing people into races and ethnic groups. I enjoy learning about many different cultures I'm glad that you've met many Asians at your universities who are very self motivated and not afraid to sacrifice financial security to pursue their interests. Affirmative action based on ethnicity and only ethnicity seems very silly. However, I am only trying to explain why Asian students face lower acceptance rates at top schools and I don't believe that it is primarily due to racist admissions policies. Imagine 20,000 kids applying to a school with 1,000 spots and around 50% predicted yield rate. 2,000 kids will be accepted. Let's say that the university shoots for 500 kids accepted into biology, computer science, and engineering. The university will end up with around 250 students in its incoming class studying those things. This seems fair enough, as there are many different fields of study. Let's say that out of those 20,000 kids applying, there are 10,000 Asian kids applying, but 8,000 of them are trying to squeeze into the 500 spots set off for biology, computer science, and engineering. Even if 400 out of those 8,000 are accepted, filling up 80% of the spots set off for biology, computer science, and engineering, that's still only a 5% acceptance rate compared to 10% overall. This scenario is actually pretty spot on when you look at Asian students trying to apply to Harvard, MIT, Princeton, and then Yale or Stanford. The low acceptance rate that Asian students face may not be a consequence of institutionalized racism, but simply . . . what I've outlined. Your hypothesis is flawed because at schools like Harvard, Princeton, and Stanford, you do not declare your intended major. At my school, you do not have declare your major until your junior year and even then, many people switch their majors/fields halfway through their UG career. Applicants definitely check off what you intend to study, and life goals are usually fairly clear from the application package, even though life goals are never static. Once again, this just isn't true for a large majority of students at my school. There was an informal survey done which indicated that 70 percent of freshmen weren't sure about what they would pursue as their career. So if even you don't know what you will pursue, how should the school? This is, btw, at a very selective school and I understand that the story is slightly different at UCs where what you indicate as major does matter a bit more. But AA really comes into play more in admission for top institutions. "Yes, not all people major in what they intended to in high school. but I'm sure that even at your school, Asian students disproportionately prefer fields with greater job security such as biology, computer science, and engineering. If your school were selective, which it may or may not be, the Asian kids that made it into those spots studying those things made it over a large amount of less qualified Asian students trying to get to those spots, who may have looked much better on paper in high school compared to people, regardless of race, studying sociology or anthropology. Again, I will emphasize once again, this phenomenon of perceived institutionalized racism against Asians only really occurs in top top top universities, and I am merely offering an alternate explanation." Do you not observe this at your "very selective" school? Is this merely a coincidence? Do all those Asian students gravitate toward those fields magically after they start college from a state of being "unsure about what to study?" Look at the Asian kid studying anthropology. I guarantee his "high school stats," or whatever those terms have come to mean look much much worse than most of the rejected kids who wanted to study computer science or biology.
If you take out the international students (who do indeed tend to gravitate more strongly to tech-y fields due to language barrier, cultural expectations back at home etc.), I genuinely don't see observe the trend that you claim exists. There are exceptions for a very small number of majors: I'd say asians are probably slightly overrepresented in CS and EE (but this could largely because of the number of int. students pursuing these fields). But that's really about it -- and the larger trend is that ... there is none.
BTW, to give a little credence to this, I am active in both music and biology departments, and I see about the same proportion of Asians active in these departments. I might even venture to say there is larger proportion of asians in music than in bio.
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Racial discrimination is wrong, period. Questioning which race in general is better off than another has no bearing at all on this distinction. To even bring up the question of which race is better off is racist in my opinion. Who cares what a person's race is except people with a fundamentally racist world view? I thought prejudice was a bad thing? I thought the problem wasn't a fundamental physical difference between races, but simply poverty? So why not focus purely on poverty instead of race?
And so you see the hypocrisy of...
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On November 05 2012 07:42 phosphorylation wrote:Show nested quote +On November 05 2012 07:34 chenchen wrote:On November 05 2012 07:24 phosphorylation wrote:On November 05 2012 07:18 chenchen wrote:On November 05 2012 07:13 phosphorylation wrote:On November 05 2012 07:10 chenchen wrote:On November 05 2012 07:00 phosphorylation wrote:
By "self-hate," I refer to hating on your own race, not necessarily your individual self. At my university, what you say about Asians is simply not true; and in any case, affirmative action is a terrible and unjust way to generate diversity in the students pursuing different fields. If this were really the purpose of AA, why not have affirmative action based not on ethnicity but on what field the student has largely pursued/excelled in his high school years? I don't "hate" my "own race" either. I'm not particularly in favour of dividing people into races and ethnic groups. I enjoy learning about many different cultures I'm glad that you've met many Asians at your universities who are very self motivated and not afraid to sacrifice financial security to pursue their interests. Affirmative action based on ethnicity and only ethnicity seems very silly. However, I am only trying to explain why Asian students face lower acceptance rates at top schools and I don't believe that it is primarily due to racist admissions policies. Imagine 20,000 kids applying to a school with 1,000 spots and around 50% predicted yield rate. 2,000 kids will be accepted. Let's say that the university shoots for 500 kids accepted into biology, computer science, and engineering. The university will end up with around 250 students in its incoming class studying those things. This seems fair enough, as there are many different fields of study. Let's say that out of those 20,000 kids applying, there are 10,000 Asian kids applying, but 8,000 of them are trying to squeeze into the 500 spots set off for biology, computer science, and engineering. Even if 400 out of those 8,000 are accepted, filling up 80% of the spots set off for biology, computer science, and engineering, that's still only a 5% acceptance rate compared to 10% overall. This scenario is actually pretty spot on when you look at Asian students trying to apply to Harvard, MIT, Princeton, and then Yale or Stanford. The low acceptance rate that Asian students face may not be a consequence of institutionalized racism, but simply . . . what I've outlined. Your hypothesis is flawed because at schools like Harvard, Princeton, and Stanford, you do not declare your intended major. At my school, you do not have declare your major until your junior year and even then, many people switch their majors/fields halfway through their UG career. Applicants definitely check off what you intend to study, and life goals are usually fairly clear from the application package, even though life goals are never static. Once again, this just isn't true for a large majority of students at my school. There was an informal survey done which indicated that 70 percent of freshmen weren't sure about what they would pursue as their career. So if even you don't know what you will pursue, how should the school? This is, btw, at a very selective school and I understand that the story is slightly different at UCs where what you indicate as major does matter a bit more. But AA really comes into play more in admission for top institutions. "Yes, not all people major in what they intended to in high school. but I'm sure that even at your school, Asian students disproportionately prefer fields with greater job security such as biology, computer science, and engineering. If your school were selective, which it may or may not be, the Asian kids that made it into those spots studying those things made it over a large amount of less qualified Asian students trying to get to those spots, who may have looked much better on paper in high school compared to people, regardless of race, studying sociology or anthropology. Again, I will emphasize once again, this phenomenon of perceived institutionalized racism against Asians only really occurs in top top top universities, and I am merely offering an alternate explanation." Do you not observe this at your "very selective" school? Is this merely a coincidence? Do all those Asian students gravitate toward those fields magically after they start college from a state of being "unsure about what to study?" Look at the Asian kid studying anthropology. I guarantee his "high school stats," or whatever those terms have come to mean look much much worse than most of the rejected kids who wanted to study computer science or biology. If you take out the international students (who do indeed tend to gravitate more strongly to tech-y fields due to language barrier, cultural expectations back at home etc.), I genuinely don't see observe the trend that you claim exists. There are exceptions for a very small number of majors: I'd say asians are probably slightly overrepresented in CS and EE (but this could largely because of the number of int. students pursuing these fields). But that's really about it -- and the larger trend is that ... there is none. BTW, to give a little credence to this, I am active in both music and biology departments, and I see about the same proportion of Asians active in these departments. I might even venture to say there is larger proportion of asians in music than in bio.
That's cool. If this were truly the case, Asians shouldn't face lower acceptance rates at your university. I'd be willing to bet then that acceptance rates for Asian students are even with overall acceptance rates.
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Philadelphia, PA10406 Posts
I too feel that this case will result in Grutter being overturned.
It's amazing to think about. This is a nine year precedent. To have a case contradicted so swiftly is fairly unprecedented, and from my perspective a good indication of how ideological the current court majority is. What's somewhat likely is that Grutter will survive in some form, but that restrictions on affirmative action will become even tighter to the point where they are impractical. But make no mistake, the University of Texas at Austin developed their affirmative action program specifically in response to Grutter, if they lose this case it'll be the deathblow for affirmative action in the US.
I have a tiny shred of hope that a 4-4 decision will salvage this case and save the precedent. Or perhaps that the justices will rule that Fisher has no grounds to sue as in injured party, because the university has said she would not have been admitted regardless of race. But I don't expect either of these results.
Losing affirmative action will be a big blow to opportunity in the US. It's a hugely important practice that in some way works to counteract the pernicious impact of residential segregation on test scores and grades. Cities and neighborhoods in the US are deeply divided based on race, even more so than by poverty in many many areas. (Although one is often a proxy for the other). This residential segregation traps minority students in substandard schools, and severely restricts their ability to compete in the college admissions process. Minority-heavy, poverty-stricken schools don't just produce worse test scores, they are often unable to provide adequate college counseling or information. The supreme court and the court system as a whole has a mixed record on endorsing busing as a solution, and busing has a mixed record on actually being the solution.
All of that said, hopefully the demise of affirmative action will force the federal, state, and local governments to be more creative in finding ways to promote minority access to quality schooling and higher education. Doing away with property taxes as a method for school funding would be a bold first step. Smarter zoning laws and aggressive laws that spread affordable housing out evenly in cities would tackle the problem at the root. If there is a silver lining to the looming cloud of this decision, its that without affirmative action as a crutch to tackle the symptoms of residential segregation, we might start to address the actual disease.
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EPT
