Indian-American father here, living in the Bay Area. My wife and I came to this country with a few hundred dollars between us and have worked hard to reach where we’re at. We're far from privileged.
I am 100% against affirmative action on the basis of race. I think there should be some measure of AA on the basis of economic status. It's quite personal for me this year.
My 17-year old is applying to universities to study CS for fall 2023. We live in a highly competitive school district. He's hardworking and studious, as reflected in his 4.0 GPA and perfect 1600 SAT score (thankfully, some schools like MIT have brought back the SAT.) He has always taken the hardest possible AP and college-level classes and has strong extracurriculars. In a normal world, his chances of getting into top-ranked CS programs (Stanford, Berkeley, MIT) would be decent, but we're Indian-American and are considered over-represented on elite college campuses.
Our school counselor and other parents we've have spoken with have flat-out advised us to: Apply to more lower-tier schools. Amongst the elites, target "hard STEM" schools like MIT, Caltech, Harvey Mudd, where he’s more likely to get a fair shot (Asians are 40+% of the incoming class at these places.) Forget the Ivies — the last thing they want is “another smart Indian male” (the counselor's words, not mine.) You see, that won’t help with “diversity.”
Also — we use a system called Collegevine to keep track of applications. Applicants can input their GPA, SAT scores, extracurriculars etc. to understand their acceptance rate at specific universities based on historical data. For my son, keeping everything else the same but simply changing his race from Asian to Black/Hispanic increases his chances of getting in at the above elite schools from 4-8% to 60+%. I am not making this up — you can test this yourself.
Is it fair to penalize my son for working hard and being an excellent student?
The post is this since he famously deletes all his Twitter posts:
If you are denying or justifying discrimination against Asian applicants for colleges or jobs, you know exactly how all the most oppressive racists of the past felt.
--
By the way did you ever consider having your child apply to schooling in other countries that are purely exam and test based and somehow produce the engineers that FAANG companies love to hire? The education in those countries are almost free compared to the US and they graduate with minimal or zero debt and get hired for very high salaries by FAANG companies. Just look at the number of foreigners at FAANG companies with undergraduate STEM degrees from the rest of the world. They often do a masters or PHD (for free usually with TA or RA responsibilities) to get acclimated to the US and its nuances which your child does not need.
What makes you think he’s only going to get a great CS education at the Ivies, Cal, Caltech, Stanford, etc.? Very few of the best graduates I’ve worked with in my ~30 year career studied at those schools - it was places like UW, UBC and Waterloo that stood out to me as producing a high number of high quality, socially adapted graduates.
[edit] and before anyone asks, no I’m not Canadian
> My wife and I came to this country with a few hundred dollars between us and have worked hard to reach where we’re at. We're far from privileged.
Define privileged. You came to the U.S. which means you had the means and impetus to do so. Doesn't that already put in the top 50th percentile of world population? 50 is wild speculation on my part and it could be higher or lower.
I'm almost positive you are more privileged than someone born into a modern indigenous South American or African community. But what does it even matter? "Privileged" is completely relative and irrelevant because anyone who makes it past about the age of 18 is in some sense fortunate.
> Is it fair to penalize my son for working hard and being an excellent student?
No. You're son will have to overcome unfair and unfortunate circumstances just like you did. Hopefully he has been prepared to do so.
If it makes you feel better, public California colleges cannot employ affirmative action as documented by https://ballotpedia.org/Affirmative_action_in_California, so your son's chances in the UC system should be unaffected by race based quotas. Best of luck to your son on college admissions. Having recently gone through that myself, it's a hell of an undertaking.
If I were a college application reviewer, I would filter for helicopter parents in an attempt to find kids genuinely seeking education as opposed to parents pushing their kids to unhappy places.
My father also came to this country with nothing and built himself up, but as someone else mentioned, my father was born in a high caste, he got an education to become an engineer when most people didn't even complete secondary school. There is something to be said about generations of cultural knowledge and success that makes you rise up from "temporary poverty". This is true of most of my family, due to a bad generation of parents they became poor but they used to be pretty wealth a couple generations ago, this is a stark difference in attitude from people who've always been in multi generational poverty, they don't know any succesful people, they don't have any role models, the color of their skin / caste makes them not confident in their abilities to succeed, realistically those people are the ones who need affirmative action. i'm sure your kid is smart enough to succeed in this world even if he went to berkeley instead of stanford.
> Is it fair to penalize my son for working hard and being an excellent student?
No its not fair which is why its controversial. The real problem is that famous schools are too prestigious right now and there aren't enough of them. Perhaps over time the newer schools who accept all the smart, hardworking students will become recognized for having the best grads.
Vote accordingly. I know many Indian-Americans who do not jive with the Democratic party even in progressive places like California. The system is stacked against them and hard-work / perseverence can only go so far when you need to dodge systemic racism (literally, that's what AA is) that benefits one group over the other based on skin pigmentation.
Asian immigrant class of US is probably the most inspiring story of the American Dream.
I have mixed feelings about this. The issue is that there aren't enough elite seats, maybe applying to those schools is a good idea because it starts to create more elite seats. I seriously doubt there would be a serious detriment to your son's education for going to Harvey Mudd for example. I think that the subtext here is the brand name of Stanford and MIT and the Ivies is very desirable and this is less about education.
The brand is real though. Those top tier schools are gateways to power and money. I read through the law suit made against Harvard and other schools and it blames white people, not affirmative action in general. It compares the test scores of white people against Asians and argues that there should be fewer white people. The % of Harvard that is white is 33%. The % of the US is 57.5%. Whites are being shut out of the premier gateways to power in the US. I think AA based on race makes sense in some way because of what these schools mean in reality. It's not just about education.
The test score gap between Asians and whites is not even very broad. So on the one hand, I think all this focus on race is detrimental to life if we use it to judge the most elite people in the country. On the other hand, I think this lawsuit is just more squabbling between races to be the #1. This is a fight about prestige and power and not education, at least in my opinion.
It's not fair, and it's messed up in my opinion. But then I'm an engineer and I highly value meritocracy over everything else. Other people have different values, like racial diversity, whatever they think that means. I think they're idiots, but they think I'm racist. Unfortunately for you and me, the "idiots" are currently running the show.
Ostensibly to you it isn’t “fair” in the way you have described it. But from a different view, your son is very privileged to be in the position he is, I’m sure he will do well wherever he goes for school. You’re in the South Bay bubble that has put so much hype and pressure on these things. Of course, education is important to you as a cultural value and practical matter; but consider that students who are capable can even flourish better in, for example, the community college setting for a few years before transferring (also more financially savvy).
Anyways affirmative action for mostly white people (“legacy admits”) already exists. Removing AA based on race may not result in great outcomes for the underrepresented minorities. Huge disparities exist that cannot be corrected at the university level in entirely; but AA gives the opportunity for URMs to enter these spaces at higher rates than they would at a so called “level” playing field (it is never is the problem).
It’s time to start considering that there is far more to life than what “elite” colleges will have people believe.
I can't tell if these counselors are giving bad advice or the college admissions landscape really is that competitive now compared to 15 years ago. 4.0 and 1600 are perfect scores and trivially, higher than the average scores of admitted students, let alone all applicants.
Every applicant needs stuff on their application besides academics as well, so try to stand out there. They look for unique talents. If they believe that someone is the best X at Y niche that the admissions team likes them they're getting in no matter what.
Also... these schools admit a number of Indian-American males every year. Your son does have a chance. Unfortunately the competition is higher for him due to these unfair rules.
As long as we're talking about fair, is it fair that your son, who was given every possible advantage by his well-educated and affluent parents, is graded on the same blind rubric as a kid whose father is a felon for possessing a couple ounces of marijuana and whose mother has to work 3 shitty retail jobs? Wouldn't it be reasonable to argue that the second kid getting, say, a nearly (but not quite) perfect SAT score and a 3.9 GPA is at least as impressive, or arguably more impressive, than your little darling keeping his train on the tracks that you and your wife have laid out for him?
You came to the US from India. You are probably upper caste. You almost certainly got a good quality education in India for cheap. Your parents probably had servants.
Setting aside an obvious problem with AA, if your son is really interested in CS, MIT or Caltech will serve him better than any Ivy League establishment nursery.
> In a normal world, his chances of getting into top-ranked CS programs (Stanford, Berkeley, MIT) would be decent, but we're Indian-American and are considered over-represented on elite college campuses.
Let me help put your concerns to rest.
If Harvard et al changed their admissions policies to race blind tomorrow, your son still would not get in.
How do I know this? You are talking about his prospects as an applicant in a way that does not reflect a successful applicant (“another smart Indian male” or otherwise).
I assure you that Harvard and Stanford reject approximately zero “strong admit” applicants. Your son, based on what you have stated here, is not a strong admit applicant.
1. In academics, has your son done anything impressive at a national or international level? Think Westinghouse award, international science fair, or something similar. If not, has he published any academic papers (co-author ok)?
2. In sports, is your son a recruited athlete? Is he a HS varsity athlete who is competitive enough to compete at the university level? If so, has he expressed interest to the school and in the application?
3. In arts, has your son won a spot in a regional or national arts group (like youth symphony), or has he won a regional, national, or international arts competition?
4. In leadership/community, has your son started a successful business or group that has accomplished something meaningful?
5. In terms of non-racial diversity, is your son in a state and school that is under-represented in elite schools? We know that this answer is “no”, and quite the contrary, his school is probably highly-represented, so the school has a ballpark quota (range, not an absolute number). This is probably why his counselors have a good idea where he is in the school pecking order for school references.
> but simply changing his race from Asian to Black/Hispanic increases his chances of getting in at the above elite schools from 4-8% to 60+%
Well, I am guessing that those numbers are correct, but I think that some of the story is being left out.
Some (many?) black or Hispanic students with your son’s profile will be actively courted by organizations that will give them the experience they need to stand out (their “hook”).
This may exist for Indian-Americans as well (I have no idea), but that wasn’t really reflected in anything you wrote.
Anyway, most if not all of the black and hispanic undergrads I’ve met at ivies have had a very compelling hook, typically in leadership or sports (iirc, 20% of Harvard’s entering class are varsity athletes, and maybe half of those are recruited, so sports being their “hook” is not rare).
> Is it fair to penalize my son for working hard and being an excellent student?
He is being “penalized” for having too narrow of a focus. That focus may work in some elite schools that have an all or nothing admissions exam (like some schools in India, Japan, China, etc.), but that type of focus is too narrow for many elite US universities.
The Ivies plus Stanford could fill their classes many times over with students who are very comparable to your son in terms of grades and SAT scores. They are looking for something more (the hook).
If the guidance counselors at your son’s school didn’t share that with him or you early in his high school career, then that’s really on them. They should know better assuming that they knew he had ambitions for an elite school.
One of the most pernicious consequences of this fixation on race is the definition of a person by an arbitrary social construct. Although they all check the same box, they have very different experiences and cultural backgrounds:
* Black descendents of slaves vs African immigrants [1]
* Chinese Americans vs Hmong Americans (a higher poverty rate than Black Americans! [2])
* A Korean who grew up in Koreatown LA vs one who grew up in Utah
* A Boston Brahmin vs an impoverished White Virginian whose family members were targeted by eugenic boards
That said, Affirmative Action can reasonably make those from marginalized groups feel more welcome. In elementary school for example, I felt very out place among the largely affluent members of my accelerated math class. By contrast, I related much more to the mischievous truants who would later go on to be low-level criminals.
Different waves of immigration also makes a huge difference. I’m part of the wave of people from the subcontinent who came here from 1970-1995, largely before H1B was created. Most Indians I knew growing up were doctors or business owners who moved to southern states. Like most Asians until 2000, they voted Republican. Indians who came to Silicon Valley or NYC after 2000, by contrast, are a very different group who assimilated into a different domestic culture and had a different experience.
Eight years ago I was accepted to do a PhD in either economics or mathematics at a local state school, no where near any ranking list. However, I had just separated from the military a year prior after 11 years as enlisted member. I was the first one in my family to graduate college, let alone be accepted for a PhD program.
During the orientation process I had to speak with a young woman about grants and scholarships. She was showing me what was available pulling up a grant or scholarship, each one she selected was for women, people of color, or women of color. After seeing these for ten minutes in a row without one I could I apply for, I made the joke, there doesn't seem to be a lot here for white males. She said I can just apply and let them know I was a white male and I would get like we do for everything else. I ended the process there with a sour taste left in my mouth.
She was unaware of my background, growing up on an island in Alaska in housing built during WWII that was eventually condemned in our last year. Moving to rural NC for my last two years of high school, then spending time in the military, separating from Turkey literally months before the attempted coup.
She saw my race not the diversity I would bring from my experiences.
"If you can convince the lowest white man he's better than the best colored man, he won't notice you're picking his pocket. Hell, give him somebody to look down on, and he'll empty his pockets for you."
Everyone should read Robert Caro’s biographies of LBJ.
The destitution and most importantly shame that he experienced as a boy shaped him, both in the amazing way he was able to seize control of the Senate and defeat the racist reactionaries who mentored him, and in the negative way that he embraced and wielded unbridled power and corruption.
I was going to point out that class blindness is an intentional ploy but probably wkuld have been downvoted for being a conspiracist. You (or LBJ rather) said it much better.
LBJ notably makes no distinction between looking down with sympathy or looking down with disdain. And as much as I hate him (actually, I really hate Kennedy more, LBJ got dealt a shit hand) I think that so long as the discussion is constrained to the purposes of getting people to empty their wallets that detail can safely be omitted.
Part of the American dream is that the feeling that there is no rigid social class. Everyone is a millionaire down on their luck. You only need to work harder or be more clever—ideally both.
To some extent, it is true. Realistically, however, it is rare to move more than one or two income brackets from where your parents were when they were your age.
Race in America, however, is fraught. The history of racism is recent, overt, and systemic. It is impossible to deny the history of racism unless you are an idiot. The question is what, if anything, can be done about it that actually improves things. The answer is probably very little. Affirmative action is problematic and has some negative side effects, but it has probably been a net positive for society. It will also probably be struck down as it is now negatively and unfairly impacting another minority group.
Here in Texas, any student from the top 10% of their high school is guaranteed a place at the flagship University of Texas at Austin.
This is widely understood to be a form of affirmative action. Naturally, high schools in underprivileged areas - rural or urban - will produce students who are nowhere nearly as prepared as students from elite or wealthy schools. We ignore that difference as a policy matter. Top 10% is top 10%.
Maybe the Ivies will move to a similar system in the wake of the current SCOTUS case.
> Nothing the Supreme Court says about the consideration of race in college admissions will affect the more basic problem, that too few Americans from poorer families are sufficiently prepared to apply to college.
About sums it up. Though if there are any visible disparities in the populations that produce poor children who are prepared, I expect a loud argument.
Class can be a big part of racism--often what appears to be racism is really more about class. There are many people who look down on anyone they perceive to be "low class", regardless of race, and who will accept people of other races if they perceive them to be "high class". In areas where the lower classes are over-represented by racial minorities, this can look like racism, when classism is much more the culprit.
Controlling for income doesn't work well, because whites at the same income level tend to have much more wealth than blacks at the same income level. Controlling for wealth, blacks still tend to poorer access to resources (clean water, prenatal care, etc...).
It would be a great achievement if we could simply say that poor blacks were finally as well off as poor whites, but we're still quite a ways away from that.
That said, I don't think the country has the stomach to realistically try to fix that problem any longer.
If 50% of the nation's wealth was mine, I'd talk about race, skin color, eye color, haircut styles - I'd talk about anything to distract attention from the only fact that matters.
Because historically race was used systemically to limit opportunities for people of color. The last school to be desegregated was in 1963. Think about that.
For some of us (me included) living in a racist society is like a fish swiming who does not notice water. I only noticed when I became intimate with a person from a minority race and saw how they were treated. That is when I noticed I live in a racist society.
I love the economist. Their writing is so good, they are biased but know it, and acknowledge it. Biased, but not bigoted. nYet this article misses the point, IMO, or racial quotas in professional schools. They have the liberal individualistic bias, and have not noticed that one. It is their water (I am a liberal myself, but I have had that particular bias removed by my experiences.)
Here (Aotearoa) the point of quotas is not to allow some groups the same access to the privilege of the profession, but it is to help the consumers of professional services get what they need.
For doctors, lawyers, architects, accountants (yes) etcetera being from a similar community as your clients is very helpful for your clients. This is not a benefit to the individual professional, it is a benefit to the community.
There is a secondary benefit to the professions themselves. A cultural milieu helps bring new ideas forward.
Whether or not the system in the USA is fit for purpose or not, I do not know. But when deciding I hope the American judges think not, only, of benefit to the individuals but the wider effects on our communities.
These sorts of quotas generally do nothing but paper over the fundamental problems and truths that affect various groups. It's a way of concealing failures of education and culture. By making admissions blind to anything but merit (we can talk about how to define merit, of course), it forces people earlier in the chain of causes to confront failure close to home. By keeping responsible parties in the hot seat, you stand a better chance of fixing bad schools and bad cultural norms and accepting truths that those lacking in humility have a hard time swallowing. (Politicians get elected by flattering their base, of course...)
The second order effects of affirmative action's repeal are going to be very entertaining. You can get a sneak peek by taking a look at the student body at a school like UT Austin where, by law, 75% of students must be in-state and automatically admitted according to class rank (GPA).
https://admissions.utexas.edu/explore/freshman-profile
You'll notice that when comparing Harvard and UT's student bodies to the US and Texas' demographics, respectively, Harvard's system was closer to the mark in terms of black and white representation.
https://college.harvard.edu/admissions/admissions-statistics
Most interesting is UT's 40/60 M/F gender ratio. Remember: that 40% of males is almost certainly being boosted by the 25% of admits UT has any real control over. Once AA is overturned, that's it—hands off the scale. I think half the population suddenly realizing they were beneficiaries of affirmative action this whole time—and subsequently understanding the nuances of discrimination in this country—will ultimately be a good thing.
Race is very easy to focus on without making any structural changes in society. A black man was president. So long as it's the right black man, it doesn't change much.
For the entire history of this country the elites have pitted the working class against itself along racial lines. The failure of Reconstruction to enable Black agency or punish slaveholders deeply scarred the country and it may never heal from it.
The media and political class continually manufactures the racial divide. We see this now with the culture war about crime narratives.
A
Americans lack class consciousness in part because a plurality of Americans do not have the lived experience of the "working class". The decimation of the labor movement over the past 50 years didn't help either. And those who experience class divide the most, the very poor and homeless, are totally politically disenfranchised.
IMO, this is by design and why politicians and media types play to race instead of class. Because if middle/lower class Hispanic, Black and White people figure out they have a lot more in common with each other than their rich counterparts, it would not be good for the current status quo.
Race, class, gender, age, intelligence, wealth... there are infinite
partitions on humankind, used to divide us. But the future is not
split between the "have" and the "have nots." It will be between the
"will" and the "will nots". Those who submit to domination and those
who choose to remain human.
I’ve heard it said on some podcast that race cropped up as an intentional structure to obfuscate class distinctions:
- post slavery, many formerly enslaved people had better skills than poor white people
- to prevent poor white people from joining forces with these formerly enslaved people as a large class of “the poor” vs. small class of “the wealthy” racial distinctions began to be used more frequently
- this had the effect of basically allowing the “poor white man” to side with “wealthy whites” (regardless of if something was in their best interests or not) because he could console himself with “I may be poor but at least I’m white” — even though the rich whites often advanced laws and regulations that were generally detrimental to the poor as a “class group”.
Is there any hard data on this or is it just heresay/opinion?
[+] [-] Meekro|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] RigelKentaurus|3 years ago|reply
I am 100% against affirmative action on the basis of race. I think there should be some measure of AA on the basis of economic status. It's quite personal for me this year.
My 17-year old is applying to universities to study CS for fall 2023. We live in a highly competitive school district. He's hardworking and studious, as reflected in his 4.0 GPA and perfect 1600 SAT score (thankfully, some schools like MIT have brought back the SAT.) He has always taken the hardest possible AP and college-level classes and has strong extracurriculars. In a normal world, his chances of getting into top-ranked CS programs (Stanford, Berkeley, MIT) would be decent, but we're Indian-American and are considered over-represented on elite college campuses.
Our school counselor and other parents we've have spoken with have flat-out advised us to: Apply to more lower-tier schools. Amongst the elites, target "hard STEM" schools like MIT, Caltech, Harvey Mudd, where he’s more likely to get a fair shot (Asians are 40+% of the incoming class at these places.) Forget the Ivies — the last thing they want is “another smart Indian male” (the counselor's words, not mine.) You see, that won’t help with “diversity.”
Also — we use a system called Collegevine to keep track of applications. Applicants can input their GPA, SAT scores, extracurriculars etc. to understand their acceptance rate at specific universities based on historical data. For my son, keeping everything else the same but simply changing his race from Asian to Black/Hispanic increases his chances of getting in at the above elite schools from 4-8% to 60+%. I am not making this up — you can test this yourself.
Is it fair to penalize my son for working hard and being an excellent student?
[+] [-] notlukesky|3 years ago|reply
https://twitter.com/michaeljburry/status/1587420720644214799
The post is this since he famously deletes all his Twitter posts:
If you are denying or justifying discrimination against Asian applicants for colleges or jobs, you know exactly how all the most oppressive racists of the past felt.
--
By the way did you ever consider having your child apply to schooling in other countries that are purely exam and test based and somehow produce the engineers that FAANG companies love to hire? The education in those countries are almost free compared to the US and they graduate with minimal or zero debt and get hired for very high salaries by FAANG companies. Just look at the number of foreigners at FAANG companies with undergraduate STEM degrees from the rest of the world. They often do a masters or PHD (for free usually with TA or RA responsibilities) to get acclimated to the US and its nuances which your child does not need.
[+] [-] pmonks|3 years ago|reply
[edit] and before anyone asks, no I’m not Canadian
[+] [-] grog454|3 years ago|reply
Define privileged. You came to the U.S. which means you had the means and impetus to do so. Doesn't that already put in the top 50th percentile of world population? 50 is wild speculation on my part and it could be higher or lower.
I'm almost positive you are more privileged than someone born into a modern indigenous South American or African community. But what does it even matter? "Privileged" is completely relative and irrelevant because anyone who makes it past about the age of 18 is in some sense fortunate.
> Is it fair to penalize my son for working hard and being an excellent student?
No. You're son will have to overcome unfair and unfortunate circumstances just like you did. Hopefully he has been prepared to do so.
[+] [-] ro_bit|3 years ago|reply
If it makes you feel better, public California colleges cannot employ affirmative action as documented by https://ballotpedia.org/Affirmative_action_in_California, so your son's chances in the UC system should be unaffected by race based quotas. Best of luck to your son on college admissions. Having recently gone through that myself, it's a hell of an undertaking.
[+] [-] nanidin|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] strikelaserclaw|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rr808|3 years ago|reply
No its not fair which is why its controversial. The real problem is that famous schools are too prestigious right now and there aren't enough of them. Perhaps over time the newer schools who accept all the smart, hardworking students will become recognized for having the best grads.
[+] [-] systemvoltage|3 years ago|reply
Asian immigrant class of US is probably the most inspiring story of the American Dream.
[+] [-] onetimeusename|3 years ago|reply
The brand is real though. Those top tier schools are gateways to power and money. I read through the law suit made against Harvard and other schools and it blames white people, not affirmative action in general. It compares the test scores of white people against Asians and argues that there should be fewer white people. The % of Harvard that is white is 33%. The % of the US is 57.5%. Whites are being shut out of the premier gateways to power in the US. I think AA based on race makes sense in some way because of what these schools mean in reality. It's not just about education.
The test score gap between Asians and whites is not even very broad. So on the one hand, I think all this focus on race is detrimental to life if we use it to judge the most elite people in the country. On the other hand, I think this lawsuit is just more squabbling between races to be the #1. This is a fight about prestige and power and not education, at least in my opinion.
[+] [-] eloff|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] erenyeager|3 years ago|reply
Anyways affirmative action for mostly white people (“legacy admits”) already exists. Removing AA based on race may not result in great outcomes for the underrepresented minorities. Huge disparities exist that cannot be corrected at the university level in entirely; but AA gives the opportunity for URMs to enter these spaces at higher rates than they would at a so called “level” playing field (it is never is the problem).
It’s time to start considering that there is far more to life than what “elite” colleges will have people believe.
[+] [-] RickJWagner|3 years ago|reply
Thank you for coming to America and for raising your family here. We are collectively richer for it.
[+] [-] smcg|3 years ago|reply
Every applicant needs stuff on their application besides academics as well, so try to stand out there. They look for unique talents. If they believe that someone is the best X at Y niche that the admissions team likes them they're getting in no matter what.
Also... these schools admit a number of Indian-American males every year. Your son does have a chance. Unfortunately the competition is higher for him due to these unfair rules.
[+] [-] felix_n|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] chengiz|3 years ago|reply
Indian-American father here as well.
You came to the US from India. You are probably upper caste. You almost certainly got a good quality education in India for cheap. Your parents probably had servants.
You are privileged.
End of story.
[+] [-] pauljurczak|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|3 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] csa|3 years ago|reply
Let me help put your concerns to rest.
If Harvard et al changed their admissions policies to race blind tomorrow, your son still would not get in.
How do I know this? You are talking about his prospects as an applicant in a way that does not reflect a successful applicant (“another smart Indian male” or otherwise).
I assure you that Harvard and Stanford reject approximately zero “strong admit” applicants. Your son, based on what you have stated here, is not a strong admit applicant.
1. In academics, has your son done anything impressive at a national or international level? Think Westinghouse award, international science fair, or something similar. If not, has he published any academic papers (co-author ok)?
2. In sports, is your son a recruited athlete? Is he a HS varsity athlete who is competitive enough to compete at the university level? If so, has he expressed interest to the school and in the application?
3. In arts, has your son won a spot in a regional or national arts group (like youth symphony), or has he won a regional, national, or international arts competition?
4. In leadership/community, has your son started a successful business or group that has accomplished something meaningful?
5. In terms of non-racial diversity, is your son in a state and school that is under-represented in elite schools? We know that this answer is “no”, and quite the contrary, his school is probably highly-represented, so the school has a ballpark quota (range, not an absolute number). This is probably why his counselors have a good idea where he is in the school pecking order for school references.
Check out this article:
https://www.hispanicoutlook.com/articles/15-tips-minority-st...
Focus on #3. What is your son’s hook?
> but simply changing his race from Asian to Black/Hispanic increases his chances of getting in at the above elite schools from 4-8% to 60+%
Well, I am guessing that those numbers are correct, but I think that some of the story is being left out.
Some (many?) black or Hispanic students with your son’s profile will be actively courted by organizations that will give them the experience they need to stand out (their “hook”).
This may exist for Indian-Americans as well (I have no idea), but that wasn’t really reflected in anything you wrote.
Anyway, most if not all of the black and hispanic undergrads I’ve met at ivies have had a very compelling hook, typically in leadership or sports (iirc, 20% of Harvard’s entering class are varsity athletes, and maybe half of those are recruited, so sports being their “hook” is not rare).
> Is it fair to penalize my son for working hard and being an excellent student?
He is being “penalized” for having too narrow of a focus. That focus may work in some elite schools that have an all or nothing admissions exam (like some schools in India, Japan, China, etc.), but that type of focus is too narrow for many elite US universities.
The Ivies plus Stanford could fill their classes many times over with students who are very comparable to your son in terms of grades and SAT scores. They are looking for something more (the hook).
If the guidance counselors at your son’s school didn’t share that with him or you early in his high school career, then that’s really on them. They should know better assuming that they knew he had ambitions for an elite school.
[+] [-] kvathupo|3 years ago|reply
* Black descendents of slaves vs African immigrants [1]
* Chinese Americans vs Hmong Americans (a higher poverty rate than Black Americans! [2])
* A Korean who grew up in Koreatown LA vs one who grew up in Utah
* A Boston Brahmin vs an impoverished White Virginian whose family members were targeted by eugenic boards
That said, Affirmative Action can reasonably make those from marginalized groups feel more welcome. In elementary school for example, I felt very out place among the largely affluent members of my accelerated math class. By contrast, I related much more to the mischievous truants who would later go on to be low-level criminals.
[1] - https://www.nytimes.com/2004/06/24/us/top-colleges-take-more...
[2] - https://tcf.org/content/commentary/misleading-data-policies-...
[+] [-] rayiner|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nanidin|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jriot|3 years ago|reply
During the orientation process I had to speak with a young woman about grants and scholarships. She was showing me what was available pulling up a grant or scholarship, each one she selected was for women, people of color, or women of color. After seeing these for ten minutes in a row without one I could I apply for, I made the joke, there doesn't seem to be a lot here for white males. She said I can just apply and let them know I was a white male and I would get like we do for everything else. I ended the process there with a sour taste left in my mouth.
She was unaware of my background, growing up on an island in Alaska in housing built during WWII that was eventually condemned in our last year. Moving to rural NC for my last two years of high school, then spending time in the military, separating from Turkey literally months before the attempted coup.
She saw my race not the diversity I would bring from my experiences.
[+] [-] az226|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] geraldyo|3 years ago|reply
Why do you need a grant or scholarship?
[+] [-] favorited|3 years ago|reply
"If you can convince the lowest white man he's better than the best colored man, he won't notice you're picking his pocket. Hell, give him somebody to look down on, and he'll empty his pockets for you."
[+] [-] Spooky23|3 years ago|reply
The destitution and most importantly shame that he experienced as a boy shaped him, both in the amazing way he was able to seize control of the Senate and defeat the racist reactionaries who mentored him, and in the negative way that he embraced and wielded unbridled power and corruption.
[+] [-] colordrops|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dsfyu404ed|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jimmygrapes|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] etempleton|3 years ago|reply
To some extent, it is true. Realistically, however, it is rare to move more than one or two income brackets from where your parents were when they were your age.
Race in America, however, is fraught. The history of racism is recent, overt, and systemic. It is impossible to deny the history of racism unless you are an idiot. The question is what, if anything, can be done about it that actually improves things. The answer is probably very little. Affirmative action is problematic and has some negative side effects, but it has probably been a net positive for society. It will also probably be struck down as it is now negatively and unfairly impacting another minority group.
[+] [-] coyotespike|3 years ago|reply
This is widely understood to be a form of affirmative action. Naturally, high schools in underprivileged areas - rural or urban - will produce students who are nowhere nearly as prepared as students from elite or wealthy schools. We ignore that difference as a policy matter. Top 10% is top 10%.
Maybe the Ivies will move to a similar system in the wake of the current SCOTUS case.
[+] [-] quantified|3 years ago|reply
About sums it up. Though if there are any visible disparities in the populations that produce poor children who are prepared, I expect a loud argument.
[+] [-] danenania|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] kube-system|3 years ago|reply
But, why do we need to use race as a proxy? Presuming something about someone based on their skin color is prejudice regardless of your intentions.
If people are disadvantaged, let's measure those disadvantages directly and adjust for those factors.
[+] [-] kenjackson|3 years ago|reply
Controlling for income doesn't work well, because whites at the same income level tend to have much more wealth than blacks at the same income level. Controlling for wealth, blacks still tend to poorer access to resources (clean water, prenatal care, etc...).
It would be a great achievement if we could simply say that poor blacks were finally as well off as poor whites, but we're still quite a ways away from that.
That said, I don't think the country has the stomach to realistically try to fix that problem any longer.
[+] [-] akomtu|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nonethewiser|3 years ago|reply
>But, why do we need to use race as a proxy?
There are two possibilites:
1. They dont see the logical fallacy, perhaps because they are clouded by empathy.
2. They fully understand that they are discriminating by race and think its good.
[+] [-] juve1996|3 years ago|reply
Because historically race was used systemically to limit opportunities for people of color. The last school to be desegregated was in 1963. Think about that.
[+] [-] worik|3 years ago|reply
I love the economist. Their writing is so good, they are biased but know it, and acknowledge it. Biased, but not bigoted. nYet this article misses the point, IMO, or racial quotas in professional schools. They have the liberal individualistic bias, and have not noticed that one. It is their water (I am a liberal myself, but I have had that particular bias removed by my experiences.)
Here (Aotearoa) the point of quotas is not to allow some groups the same access to the privilege of the profession, but it is to help the consumers of professional services get what they need.
For doctors, lawyers, architects, accountants (yes) etcetera being from a similar community as your clients is very helpful for your clients. This is not a benefit to the individual professional, it is a benefit to the community.
There is a secondary benefit to the professions themselves. A cultural milieu helps bring new ideas forward.
Whether or not the system in the USA is fit for purpose or not, I do not know. But when deciding I hope the American judges think not, only, of benefit to the individuals but the wider effects on our communities.
[+] [-] lo_zamoyski|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] okwubodu|3 years ago|reply
You'll notice that when comparing Harvard and UT's student bodies to the US and Texas' demographics, respectively, Harvard's system was closer to the mark in terms of black and white representation. https://college.harvard.edu/admissions/admissions-statistics
Most interesting is UT's 40/60 M/F gender ratio. Remember: that 40% of males is almost certainly being boosted by the 25% of admits UT has any real control over. Once AA is overturned, that's it—hands off the scale. I think half the population suddenly realizing they were beneficiaries of affirmative action this whole time—and subsequently understanding the nuances of discrimination in this country—will ultimately be a good thing.
[+] [-] defterGoose|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] kareemsabri|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] smcg|3 years ago|reply
The media and political class continually manufactures the racial divide. We see this now with the culture war about crime narratives.
A Americans lack class consciousness in part because a plurality of Americans do not have the lived experience of the "working class". The decimation of the labor movement over the past 50 years didn't help either. And those who experience class divide the most, the very poor and homeless, are totally politically disenfranchised.
[+] [-] daxfohl|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] partiallypro|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nonrandomstring|3 years ago|reply
[+] [-] laomai|3 years ago|reply
- post slavery, many formerly enslaved people had better skills than poor white people
- to prevent poor white people from joining forces with these formerly enslaved people as a large class of “the poor” vs. small class of “the wealthy” racial distinctions began to be used more frequently
- this had the effect of basically allowing the “poor white man” to side with “wealthy whites” (regardless of if something was in their best interests or not) because he could console himself with “I may be poor but at least I’m white” — even though the rich whites often advanced laws and regulations that were generally detrimental to the poor as a “class group”.
Is there any hard data on this or is it just heresay/opinion?