| Socio-economic status (SES) consideration would be a much better "equalizer" than any type of racial identity. When SES is used in evaluating SAT scores there is an incredible correlation between SES and SAT score; wealthy black, white, asian or latino students typically do much better than middle class and working class students who cannot afford to flee into expensive school districts and private schools or take expensive SAT prep courses. There isn't much difference, if any at all, between races/ethnic groups in the various economic categories.
My mother has helped lots of community college students where she teaches. It is amazing how little they understand about the college application game. Most did not even bother to apply to four year colleges when they were in high school and did not know that the SAT was something that could be studied for. With support, many of these students go on to the University of North Carolina (yes, Chapel Hill) and do as well as their wealthy counterparts. Wealthy kids will be taken care of for college, regardless of their intellect.
The real problem is social class in this country. Colleges need to find a better way to identify deserving kids from modest backgrounds. Originally, that is what the SAT was supposed to do. That method of finding the "diamond in the rough" has been destroyed by all the prep courses and time to take prep courses that only the wealthy can afford to do. |