Hi All,
I've read several forums, discussions, and arguments on WSO on getting into the target schools, what it takes to get in, affirmative action, diversity, equity et al, but here's an in-depth look at the admissions process and how American Asians are suppressed because they over-perform as a group. I know that you don't need yet another article on this - we all know what's up, but I thought this one was comprehensive, well-written, and would augment the discourse. The article is long but worth reading in it's entirety. [Note that the article references American nationals of Asian ethnicity for undergrad admissions, not foreign nationals or grad schools; and also, I'm not Asian]
You're 1/5 of the world population calm down.
What does that have to do with anything? And they're only ~5% of the US population - which is what the article talks about. And I'm not Asian.
3/5ths of the world's population just FYI...
This is the problem--people should not be categorized by their race. We are all individuals with diverse life experiences. I hate, detest, abhor the idea that individuals are being forcefully categorized by, frankly, genetically unimportant traits that constitute "race." Why is it so hard for our society to judge people on their own personal, individual qualities?
When liberals finally reveal their true, racist face.
Affirmative action, at its core, is a racist policy since it subjects applicants to different admission standards based purely on race. Asians are subjected to higher standards, no doubt about it. Of course, liberals don't care since Asians do not fall into their bucket of "victim minorities."
I think you're just using Asians as a weapon to fight the good fight of correcting the world according to your own perceptions. You don't want immigration so how can you be interested in Asians coming to America to attend Harvard?
I went to school with a large Asian population. I took two years of Chinese also, so I spent some time in the culture and made some Chinese friends. It's utterly depressing to see them on campuses. Most of their friends if not all of them are Asian, the games and interests they share are mostly things originating from their homes, they never really even eat anything outside of what they eat at home. As a large group, they represent their Asian homes, not America or ideas that American institutions were established to progress.
I hate it if this sounds racist or unsympathetic, but it's true. Kids that I met who are ethnically Eastern Asian but are natural born American citizens are much more identifiable in terms of American interests and diversity, especially if their parents took the time to involve their kids that way. We all liked the same things and could share the same meals, etc. But to act as though your position is that you care about Asians is bullshit. Yes, some Asians, if not a lot of them, should be granted with spots, but trying to expand the number to include every person that is simply good in math is just non-sense, especially when you're only goal is probably just to Bannon the shit out of the world.
The article is focused on American-born Asians, and for college admissions (as well as census and other aggregate data), Asians also includes East Indians, and other South Asians. Foreign nationals are another story and are significant proportion only in grad schools.
I don't see why 2nd and 3rd generation immigrants must be penalized for the success of their demographic groups. Similar things were said of a sub-set of Asians - Indians are "too insular, only good at taking orders and not leaders, not innovative, lack creativity" etc. but they have done and continue to do well in tech and sell-side capital markets.
@iBankedUp - do you have psychic powers or have you just assumed the intentions of others?
Wow! This post deserves the WSO award for asinine post of the year.
You either have not read my other posts or are deliberately misconstruing it. I am opposed to ILLEGAL immigration (look up the definition of "illegal") and want to see legal immigration reformed to prioritize the entry of educated and skilled foreign nationals. To say that this position is tantamount to not wanting immigration is pretty comical.
What's funny is the irony underlying your post. You accuse me of not wanting immigrants in America and then launch into a diatribe stereotyping Asians. This would be the equivalent of someone writing a paragraph talking about how the blacks he sees are dirty, criminal, and love watermelons. You see what I did there? Yeah, absurd stereotypes are just that.
You also misrepresent my position on affirmative action. At no point did I ever say that only those good at math should get into elite college (another Asian stereotype).
Thanks bro for making me laugh today.
Chinese are people too. They deserve just as much a shot as everyone else!
This times one thousand. No idea why my fellow Asian-Americans still vote for democrats at the rate they do.
I also think it puts the actual concept of accepting great students out of the window also these people accepted from affirmative action can be likely to drop out due to it being to hard rather than accepting somebody who can handle it
Forget where I read this but someone coined the term “Schrödinger’s minority.” Asian-Americans are technically minorities (who also were outright oppressed earlier in this country’s history [WW2 era]), but they don’t fit neatly into the minority narrative because they out-achieve every other race. So they’re weaponized as both minorities and not minorities depending on the situation.
white people are the biggest racists on earth right from native americans to discrimination of asians and black people just because Donald Trump is back they think they can show their true colors . this is why America sucks these days.
That's fucking bullshit. Everybody can be racist. I am Asian and some of the biggest racists are other Asians. There are many Asian parents would disown their children if they marry a black person. Go back to Huffpost.
HUFFINGTON POST is the only LEGITIMATE news source. Take all of the other FAKE NEWS and shove it up your ass!
This. Think Americans hate muslims? Talk to any Hindu that live in a state that borders Pakistan and you'll hear a lot worse.
you're just an Asian uncle tom. they call you gooks, and whatnot. the incessant jokes about asian driving skills.
Ok. You're obviously a troll because this is what you wrote in a thread I started.
"Somewhere far away from a) illegal immigrants b) black people enamored with hip hop culture c) blue collar workers d)anybody who drives a pick-up truck e)people without a college degree or any sort of history of achievement f) white trash g) people who've never been outside the USA i)deeply religious people j) anyone with a tattoo visible when casual clothes"
https://www.wallstreetoasis.com/forums/hypo-youre-single-and-rich-what-…
LOL race riots in USA who are you kidding go back to history classes and read the news lil boi
There is so much to talk about and this topic is not the first time it has been discussed.
If we talk about test scores and performance, anything involving a test, I can strongly agree that asians are waaay better.
In terms of cramming, memorizing information in a certain amount of time, yeah, asians are good at that.
Actually, I think asians focus a lot in improving their ability to learn but tend to forget about all the other qualities. Now, lets look at one of the example's provided in this article.
Henry Park’s immigrant parents scrimped to send him to prep school at Groton, where he graduated 14th in his class, with a 1,560 SAT score, ran cross-country, and coauthored a published paper in an academic journal—but Harvard, Yale, Columbia, Brown, Stanford, and MIT rejected him. Jamie Lee had perfect SAT scores, a 162 IQ, and composed musical pieces, but he was turned down by Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Stanford, and MIT, and wait-listed at Columbia and Dartmouth.
Look at the schools he applied, those are very selective schools and their admission rates are low, i'm pretty confident that he would have been able to handle the course load, i'm pretty sure that all applicants are capable of that since they tend to self-select themselves into these schools.
But he coauthored a paper that was published in an academic journal!
Hmm, yes, that is somewhat impressive but in what and how did he contribute? what is the rank of that journal? what can a boy with high school knowledge actually contribute with? I wouldn't argue it's not possible but it would mean that the boy would have to teach himself college level material maybe even master's level material.
But he has composed musical pieces!
Ok, that does prove originality and other interests other than science & math but the schools he applied and most likely his major wouldn't have been an artsy major, so being able to do that wouldn't have helped much with his profile.
Now, this individual has a decent profile but at the same time, i'm inclined that there are many with the same profile as him. What was his desired major? why did he apply to those schools?
If it was engineering or computer science, i'm pretty sure that MIT and Stanford would have met his standards. There are plenty of excellent engineering & CS schools in the states that aren't in the Ivy league.
Why did he apply to so many Ivy league schools? there are all very different to each other, it's usually recommended to apply to only 1 or at most 2. This would make me believe that he applied because of prestige or because his parents made him to.
In conclusion, he could be a good academic or student but he didn't flesh out other qualities that he had, i'm pretty confident if he 2 - 3 hobbies that he really enjoyed or invested time in he would've got in, in at least one of those schools.
You've only re-hashed the same old tired tropes about Asians being one-dimensional prestige whores egged on by their Tiger parents. And what do you have to say to the aggregate data and all the other evidence provided besides those 2 anecdotes? The info in Park's and Lee's anecdotes can't have their full biographies, and I don't understand how you can say "this would make me believe, and "i'm pretty confident" - how do you know they didn't really want those things for themselves? Do you have some special Professor Charles Xavier powers or some special vantage point from Eastern Europe?
I don't know man, what kind of answer do you expect from me?
it's just an opinion of mine based on what I know and what the article is telling me. The same re-hashed tropes are also mentioned in the article.
Also, the student applied to multiple ivies, nothing wrong with that but all the ivies are different from each other with different campus culture. I actually specify this in my initial reply - that applying to more than 2 ivies leads me to believe that he's mostly applying for the prestige of those schools.
I've read articles about students who got in all the ivies but they were all black .
I will end this by saying that he had chances of getting in because he had the grades, he just didn't have the extra curriculars to separate him from his peers.
Let's be quite frank. If a black or latino applicant had the exact same credentials, they would have gotten into every college and been featured in newspapers as stories of minority excellence.
What is especially pernicious is that Asian applicants have fallen victims of success. So the argument you guys are making is essentially the following: "Well, Asians work too hard and do well academically but are not original and creative, so it makes sense they don't get in to top colleges." Let's take a step back and realize how absurd this point is. You're using standard stereotypes of Asians and basically going through each of his achievements to justify why it's not really that impressive. Now, I'm not saying that this kid deserved to get into every college he applied to, but let's not pretend that Asian applicants are not held to far higher admission standards. If applicants of all races were judged on equal footing, then it would be a different story.
It's funny how easily liberal admissions professionals can so easily fall into stereotypical, racist thinking to justify their worldview.
Then the solution is pretty clear, these universities should enroll more students but since they're private universities then they get to decide who and how many to accept.
They're private universities and I think applicants can't do anything about that, unless they prove that these schools are actively discriminating, and if they manage to prove that. It's up to the appropriate authorities to take measures.
That or sue the University. But how will they prove they would have gotten in if the decision is holistic and they don't make all applicant profiles public?
This exactly.
Name of Profit's post itself highlights exactly the underlying racist part of the process.
Why is it that this site always harps on affirmative action (which I think needs to be reformed to become more economic based) but ignores legacy admissions? Its difficult to get hard numbers but from reading I get the general sense that these admits are less qualified than the AA admits and make up a bigger percentage of top schools....
https://www.washingtonpost.com/amphtml/news/grade-point/wp/2017/04/07/w…
100% agreed. Victimization is the problem, and it is a huge problem in the U.S. right now. The majority of the time, the only person to blame for our failures, is ourselves. Instead of thinking the system is rigged, or there is some barrier holding them back they should focus delve deeper into why they were rejected. Competition for new generations is only getting tougher. And among asians, the competition is even stiffer. Every single one of my cousins from India scored almost perfect SAT’s/ACT’s, played multiple instruments, etc. I mean the list goes on. The sad truth is that this kind of profile is becoming common, and I believe there in lies the problem.
But the system IS rigged against Asian applicants. That's demonstrable in admissions numbers where Asian applicants need better grades and higher tests scores to get in. It's one thing to be paranoid or to blame others for your own failure; but it's another thing to actually look at the numbers and draw the proper conclusion that Asians face actual, real institutional racism, the kind that BLM, et al allege that blacks, Hispanics, etc. endure (and actually don't).
I agree that affirmative action should only move towards helping those who come from low-income backgrounds rather than superficial demographic differences.
I think having a small number of legacies helps the whole group from an economic point of view i.e. the small number of past, current and future donors help subsidize the education of a large number of middle- and lower-income but meritorious kids, and thus this helps keeps the lights on. Though this is only in theory, not sure about how it actually is. It would be great if anyone who works at a university endowment could shed some light here.
Because legacy admissions is a rational economic play by the schools. This is one of the reasons these schools have $30-40 billion endowments that allow them to give financial aid to half of students.
I there any evidence that Alumni who donate their whole lives stop donating or won't donate if their kids don't get into their alma mater? Can you present that? I see both AA and legacy admits as a circumvention of meritocracy except legacy admits mostly benefit those who need no help and start life on 2nd/3rd base to begin with, rich white people. I think a conversation needs to be had about both, AA can easily be reformed to be economically based while I think legacy admits should be entirely abolished or else limited to a smaller number of the student body (maybe the richest few if you want to think purely economically, to be clear these are the legacy kids that aren't qualified on their own merit).
Top schools, top companies, top anything, it is not 100% based on skill and ability, but also who someone is a person. That's probably the PC way to put it.
What these schools/companies are looking for is people who can get things done, and who contribute money back/bring in money. If you can't go out and be people friendly, and make connections, you're worthless to these people.
Compare it to dating and relationships. Would you rather date someone really hot (9/10) with no personality or someone whose maybe 7.5/10 but is really fun.
I can see what you mean - but you rather have a 10/10 competent neurosurgeon with 3/10 personality, or a 6.5/10 competent and 10/10 uber-charismatic surgeon? There are several jobs that don't require too much client interaction or people skills such as those in certain areas of tech, buy-side, and medical & biotech research. Also, maybe some Asians foreign nationals are more introverted, but for those who grew up in the West, that's surely an outdated stereotype.
I agree 100%, I would rather have the competent neurosurgeon. But as I stated before, it's not entirely, 100%, based on skill.
Take the NBA for example. Whose considered the best player currently in the NBA---Lebron would probably win the consensus. Is he the #1 three point shooter, the #1 defensive player, the fastest, the strongest. No, there is someone in the league better than in each of those stats, but not together. You could probably go to a court in Chicago or NYC or Cally and find someone with more physical ability than most of the guys in the NBA, but at the same time those guys in CHI/NYC/Cally might not have the mental strength to do it day in and day out at the highest level.
You may be the best neurosurgeon, the best whatever, net/net, but life isn't net/net, no one operates in bubble. Princeton/MIT/UPenn are looking for the best and smartest, but also the ones who can get their names in the paper. Most students at these school will never been known by the public, but you don't have to be known by the public to make money. My mother used to work at Princeton, you know what of the biggest problems on campus? Depression. Take all smartest kid at every high school, and throw them together, most go from being the smartest to middle of the pack. How do they handle that?
I can keep going with examples. Think Steve Jobs. Did he invent the MP3 player, no he invented the most "creative" MP3 players. Was the absolute smartest and well read; no, but still smart on school standards, brilliant on other standards.
My biggest problem is that admissions officers come to these conclusions about personality based on the Asian race of the applicant.
For real. If a black person submitted the same application as that Asian person, they would not be classified as introverted, etc.
The opening sentence of the linked article:
"He’s quiet and, of course, wants to be a doctor,” read the reviewer’s note on one application.
Ugh, this is so depressing that an applicant reviewer would see another prospective doctor as a bad thing. As an admissions professional, once you've become this jaded it's time to switch careers.
A kid from a wealthy high school in New Jersey wrote a Stanford essay with the words "BLACK LIVES MATTER" written a hundred times. He got in. No, this is not from the Onion. It's real.
Stuff like this is why Trump got elected.
http://www.mercurynews.com/2017/04/04/black-lives-matter-essay-stanford…
That was Ziad Ahmed. Search him up. He was already a pretty accomplished person, but I agree that is bullshit for him to get in with that essay while others are struggling to get in.
It is funny because in the Middle East they would burn those rioters alive if they would try to do it over there.
If we ignore foreign nationals, do these statistics hold? What are all the criteria admissions use to select? For example, a disproportionate amount of Asians live in California or New York. Many schools seek geographic diversity. Is this playing a role?
I don't believe in federally mandated affirmative action. However, each school has the right to choose the make up of its campus and school culture. Most of the Ivies target those who drastically outperform their peers. That's harder to do when Asians, as a whole, are maxing out everything and can't be differentiated. Also, what is the alum giving like for Asians? I know schools track that.
Finally, I KNOW of two occasions where a high SAT scoring Asian retook the test for his friends. Never EVER heard this about not Asians. We also know how badly many Chinese foreign nationals cheat. Perhaps admissions is giving a haircut to their apps. Asians may also benefit from Americanizing their last names, like our overlords do. That seems to work ;)
My post was deleted by a system error, so sorry if repost.
I was saying that I'm vampire white but paid my Russian friend to take the SAT for me. He got cold feet and did not move forward on the deal, but this happens w/all races, I'm sure.
As silly as this is, most ID checkers are non-asian and can't / don't care to differentiate other races. I grew up in a blue collar neighborhood and am black. But, I can see where it may happen.
The amount of accepted stereotyping against Asian-Americans, even by liberal whites, is pretty astounding. If they said anything comparable about blacks, they would go nuts and cry racism
I agree with this 100% and this is probably the most reasonable comment on this thread.
How is this a reasonable comment at all? He insinuates that colleges should make decisions about an individual Asian applicant based on perceived stereotypes of the whole Asian population ("Also, what is the alum giving like for Asians?").
And idk where he got the idea that foreign nationals are skewing the statistics. Asian Americans who have been born and raised in America are surely the most targeted.
All the stats and studies are on Americans, and the stats like parents' income, education, etc. is gleaned from self-reported and census data. But how come the geographic data doesn't apply to Hispanics who are also disproportionate in those states? Foreign nationals are small percentage of the undergrad body, Asian foreign nationals fewer still. Different story for grad schools.
Life sucks. Play the cards you're dealt and move on.
Disagree. You're dealt a shitty hand? Change the game, cheat, bluff, refuse to play, pull out the ace in your sleeve, complain to change the rules. Lot of options rather than bending over backwards in life as in cards
I think everyone should be given a fair chance.
I'm not supportive of lower test scores being good enough for acceptance because of the color of one's skin.
Sure, it's great to have scholarships for people in the same group/race. That helps greatly. But, admissions?
Why are there so many Asian racists, or are they all conspiracy theories?
There is definitely rampant discrimination against Asian men, especially by women with true blond hair. What should be done about this?
That's why there's an app called "East Meet East" for Asians to date other Asians in the US lol
Don't fall for the troll.
Ok so here's the real simple, no-nonsense, 15 second explanation that provides full clarity in the issue with zero offensiveness.
"You have some majors/schools with something like 50% asian. No American company is going to have half their floor be asians."
End of discussion, moving on.
Try working in tech.
End of the discussion, dumb argument.
Besides, did anyone think liberals would stop at white men? It'll be Asian men after them, then white women, then Asian women, then definitely Jews to appease Muslims.
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