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08-29-2009, 12:51 PM
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#1 | | Super Moderator
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| "Race" in College Admissions FAQ & Discussion 5
Ethnic Self-Identification Is Optional
Students are often puzzled about how to respond to questions on college applications about race or ethnicity. The questions are required by a federal regulation, and a new version of that regulation just came into effect for the 2009-2010 application season. The regulation U.S. Department of Education; Office of the Secretary; Final Guidance on Maintaining, Collecting, and Reporting Racial and Ethnic Data to the U.S. Department of Education [OS]
makes clear that self-identifying ethnicity is OPTIONAL for students in higher education. That self-identifying by ethnicity is optional has long been clear on the Common Application, https://www.commonapp.org/CommonApp/...rForms2010.pdf
which more than 300 colleges (for example Harvard, Carleton, and the University of Virginia) use as their main or sole application form. The latest version of the Common Application includes a section titled Demographics with a subsection printed on a gray background with the heading "Optional The items with a gray background are optional. No information you provide will be used in a discriminatory manner."
The Common Application optional section includes the federally specified questions about ethnicity: Quote: |
Originally Posted by Common Application 2009-2010 1. Are you Hispanic/Latino?
O Yes, Hispanic or Latino (including Spain) O No
Please describe your background ________________________________________________
2. Regardless of your answer to the prior question, please select one or more of the
following ethnicities that best describe you:
O American Indian or Alaska Native (including all Original Peoples of the Americas)
Are you Enrolled? O Yes O No If yes, please enter Tribal Enrollment Number ________________
Please describe your background ________________________________________________
O Asian (including Indian subcontinent and Philippines)
Please describe your background ________________________________________________
O Black or African American (including Africa and Caribbean)
Please describe your background ________________________________________________
O Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander (Original Peoples)
Please describe your background ________________________________________________
O White (including Middle Eastern)
Please describe your background ________________________________________________ | Self-identifying ethnicity has also always clearly been optional on the Universal College Application, https://www.universalcollegeapp.com/...pplication.pdf
which 77 colleges, including Harvard, accept.
Columbia University has its own application form, http://www.studentaffairs.columbia.e...rstyearapp.pdf
including an optional section for ethnic self-identification: Quote: |
Originally Posted by Columbia application 2009-2010 ETHNICITY/RACE INFORMATION
The information below is optional. Please respond to questions 1 and 2, for governmental recordkeeping and reporting requirements.
1. Are you Hispanic or Latino (person of Cuban, Mexican, Puerto Rican, South or Central America, or other Spanish culture or origin, regardless of race.) Yes No
2. What is your race? (Select one or more of the following five categories.)
American Indian or Alaska Native
Asian
Black or African American
Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander
White
| Columbia asks additional optional questions to allow applicants to indicate affiliation with smaller groups that fit into the overall federally defined "race" categories, including asking for tribal affiliation and enrollment numbers for American Indian applicants.
MIT also has its own application form, which this year takes responses online but allows a .PDF download of how it looks as it is filled out. The online version of the form asks: Quote: |
Originally Posted by MIT online application Ethnicity (check all that apply):
1) Are you Hispanic or Latino?
Yes, Hispanic or Latino (Including Spain) No
Which best describes your background?
Central America
Cuba
Mexico
Puerto Rico
South America (Excluding Brazil)
Spain
Other
2) Regardless of your answer to the previous question, please check one or more of the following groups in which you consider yourself to be a member:
American Indian or Alaska Native (including all Original Peoples of the Americas)
Which best describes your background?
Alaska Native
Chippewa
Choctaw
Cherokee
Navajo
Sioux
Other
Are you Registered?
No Yes, please enter Registration number
Asian (including Indian subcontinent and Philippines)
Which best describes your background?
China
India
Japan
Korea
Pakistan
Philippines
Vietnam
Other East Asian
Other Indian Subcontinent
Other Southeast Asian
Black or African American (including Africa and Caribbean)
Which best describes your background?
African American
African
Caribbean
Other
Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander (Original Peoples)
Which best describes your background?
Guam
Hawaii
Samoa
Other Pacific Islands (excluding Philippines)
White (including Middle Eastern)
Which best describes your background?
Europe
Middle East
Other
| but the .PDF view of the form does not show all the detailed subgroups, and adds "(optional)" after the section heading.
Other colleges use their own application forms, but all must ask an ethnicity question as specified by the new federal regulation. But that question is optional in any case by law, whether the college notes that the question is optional or not.
The colleges have to ask for ethnicity data, and have to report them to the federal government, but students don't have to self-identify with any ethnic or racial category. Colleges are NOT required to use self-identified race or ethnicity as an admission factor. Some colleges do and some do not. (Some state colleges and universities are prohibited by state law in their states from considering race as an admission factor.) The questions are asked for federal reporting requirements but may or may not be a significant admission factor at some college you like. At ALL United States colleges, with a sole exception*, it is permissible to decline to answer the questions during the admission process.
Don't worry about it. Self-identify or not as you wish. You are always free to self-identify with humankind as a whole by not self-identifying with any narrower subset of humankind. Recognize that students from a variety of ethnic groups--including whatever group or groups you would identify with, if any--are admitted to each of your favorite colleges each year. On the other hand, admission to some colleges (e.g., Yale or Amherst) is just plain competitive, so lots of outstanding students self-identified with each ethnic group you can imagine (or not self-identified with any group) are not admitted each year. Do your best on your application, apply to a safety, and relax. http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/...y-college.html
*The sole exception to the general statement that self-identifying ethnicity is optional in the college admission process is a federally administered college for American Indians (Native Americans), SIPI - Admissions and Records
which is a unique example, even among tribal colleges, Tribal College List -- White House Initiative on Tribal Colleges and Universities
of a college that is truly for students of one ethnic group, a college operated by the federal Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA). But even other BIA colleges appear to accept students from a variety of ethnicities, and that is definitely true of and reported by other tribal colleges. College Search - Leech Lake Tribal College - LLTC - At a Glance College Search - Little Priest Tribal College - LPTC - At a Glance
(scroll down for federal reported ethnicity of students)
Last edited by tokenadult; 08-29-2009 at 01:02 PM.
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08-29-2009, 12:59 PM
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#2 | | Super Moderator
Join Date: Aug 2004 Location: MN
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| Ethnic Categories Reported by Colleges Are Defined--Vaguely--by Federal Law
College reporting to the federal government is based on the U.S. Census bureau definitions for ethnic categories, which in turn are based on regulations from the Office of Management and Budget, because colleges are required to report by federal regulations, Revisions to the Standards for the Classification of Federal Data on Race and Ethnicity
and you can look the definitions up on the Web. As the Census Bureau itself notes, Quote: |
Originally Posted by Census Bureau These categories are sociopolitical constructs and should not be interpreted as being scientific or anthropological in nature. | Black or African American persons, percent, 2000 Quote: |
Originally Posted by Census Bureau White. A person having origins in any of the original peoples of Europe, the Middle East, or North Africa. It includes people who indicate their race as "White" or report entries such as Irish, German, Italian, Lebanese, Near Easterner, Arab, or Polish.
Black or African American. A person having origins in any of the Black racial groups of Africa. It includes people who indicate their race as "Black, African Am., or Negro," or provide written entries such as African American, Afro American, Kenyan, Nigerian, or Haitian.
American Indian and Alaska Native. A person having origins in any of the original peoples of North and South America (including Central America) and who maintain tribal affiliation or community attachment.
Asian. A person having origins in any of the original peoples of the Far East, Southeast Asia, or the Indian subcontinent including, for example, Cambodia, China, India, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Pakistan, the Philippine Islands, Thailand, and Vietnam. It includes "Asian Indian," "Chinese," "Filipino," "Korean," "Japanese," "Vietnamese," and "Other Asian."
Native Hawaiian and Other Pacific Islander. A person having origins in any of the original peoples of Hawaii, Guam, Samoa, or other Pacific Islands. It includes people who indicate their race as "Native Hawaiian," "Guamanian or Chamorro," "Samoan," and "Other Pacific Islander. | Persons of Hispanic or Latino origin, percent, 2000 Quote: |
Originally Posted by Census Bureau Hispanics or Latinos are those people who classified themselves in one of the specific Spanish, Hispanic, or Latino categories listed on the Census 2000 questionnaire -"Mexican, Mexican Am., Chicano," "Puerto Rican", or "Cuban" -as well as those who indicate that they are "other Spanish/Hispanic/Latino." Persons who indicated that they are "other Spanish/Hispanic/Latino" include those whose origins are from Spain, the Spanish-speaking countries of Central or South America, the Dominican Republic or people identifying themselves generally as Spanish, Spanish-American, Hispanic, Hispano, Latino, and so on.
Origin can be viewed as the heritage, nationality group, lineage, or country of birth of the person or the person's parents or ancestors before their arrival in the United States.
People who identify their origin as Spanish, Hispanic, or Latino may be of any race. | The federal Department of Education National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) has posted guidance to colleges about how they are to ask about student ethnicity and race according to the federally defined categories. Standard 1-5 - NCES Statistical Standards
You'll see that footnote 2 at the bottom of the NCES webpage says, Quote: |
Originally Posted by National Center for Education Statistics The categories are presented in order of numerical frequency in the population, rather than alphabetically. Previous research studies have found that following alphabetical order in the question categories creates difficulties. That is, having "American Indian or Alaska Native" as the first category results in substantial over reporting of this category. | So the preferred order for listing racial categories to gather data for federal reporting is to first ask about Hispanic ethnicity, as defined by federal law and self-identified by the student, and then to ask about "race," again as defined by federal law and self-identified by the student, with the preferred order of listing race categories being
White
Black or African American
Asian
American Indian or Alaska Native
Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander
in that order. But in actual practice most colleges do not list the categories in that preferred order on their application forms, but rather in alphabetical order.
The Department of Education has more recently updated its guidance to colleges on how to ask ethnicity and race questions U.S. Department of Education; Office of the Secretary; Final Guidance on Maintaining, Collecting, and Reporting Racial and Ethnic Data to the U.S. Department of Education [OS]
or http://www.ed.gov/legislation/FedReg...-4/101907c.pdf
and has requested colleges change their forms by the high school class of 2010 application year to ask a two-part question, first inquiring about Hispanic ethnicity and then about race, for each student. The student will still be free to decline to answer either part of the question. Quote: |
Originally Posted by Department of Education Unlike elementary and secondary institutions, generally, postsecondary institutions and Rehabilitation Services Administration (RSA) grantees use self-identification only and do not use observer identification. As discussed elsewhere in this notice, postsecondary institutions and RSA grantees will also be permitted to continue to include a 'race and ethnicity unknown' category when reporting data to the Department. This category is being continued in the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS) because the National Center for Education Statistics’ experience has shown that (1) a substantial number of college students have refused to identify a race and (2) there is often not a convenient mechanism for college administrators to use observer identification. | See the National Center for Education Statistics Race/Ethnicity FAQ http://surveys.nces.ed.gov/ipeds/visFaq_re.aspx
and the Association for Institutional Research Race/Ethnicity Information webpage Race/Ethnicity Information
and its subpages for more information about the current and planned practices of colleges as they prepare to implement the new federal regulations for high school class of 2010 applicants to college.
Students of higher education (and applicants to schools of postsecondary education) are treated as adults, and are explicitly permitted to decline to identify their ethnic or racial category.
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08-29-2009, 01:04 PM
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#3 | | Junior Member
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Tokenadult, why don't these applications include a "multiracial" or "biracial" box? For those of us who are multiracial, wouldn't it be easier to check one box than a bunch of different boxes? Am I paranoid when I conclude that colleges really, really, really want to know exactly what ethnicity runs through my veins, so they intentionally opt not to include a "multiracial" or "biracial" box? It seems to me that if such information is optional, and colleges really don't care that much, a a "multiracial" or "biracial" box would be appropriate. The fact that these boxes aren't included leads me to believe that do care -- alot. Do you disagree?
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08-29-2009, 01:04 PM
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#4 | | Super Moderator
Join Date: Aug 2004 Location: MN
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| You Can Decline to Self-Identify with Any "Race" or Ethnic Group
It would be dishonest, and possibly grounds for revoking an offer of admission, to self-report according to a category that doesn't fit you at all. On the other hand, all of the categories named in federal law are based on self-identification and colleges have no means to double-check every student's self-identifying.
I find it interesting, and full of good hope for this country's future, that more and more college applicants are declining to self-report their ethnicity to colleges, http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2005/02/15/race2_15
which is everyone's right under law and something that someone of any ethnic self-identification might choose to do. People can decide this issue for themselves, but I like to emphasize in my own life, as a member of a "biracial" family, the common humanity my children, my wife, and I share with all our neighbors and compatriots.
The latest version of the Minorities in Higher Education Report http://www.acenet.edu/AM/Template.cf...ontentID=23716
has a lot of detailed numbers (all based on reports colleges make to the federal government) about the growth in college enrollment in all the reported ethnic groups, and the growth of the group "race unknown."
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08-29-2009, 01:07 PM
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#5 | | Super Moderator
Join Date: Aug 2004 Location: MN
Posts: 14,891
| Quote: |
Tokenadult, why don't these applications include a "multiracial" or "biracial" box?
| By decision of the Department of Education, the regulators of this matter, after notice and comment in the federal regulatory process. See the link to the federal regulations in the FAQ posts here (both the thread-opening post and post #2 have the link). It is possible for an applicant to "select one or more" race category among the federally defined categories, and it is equally possible for an applicant to mark no category at all. Each applicant may decide how to respond to such a situation.
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08-29-2009, 01:36 PM
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#6 | | Senior Member
Join Date: May 2009
Posts: 1,444
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I'd like to bring up another issue that was brought up in previous threads: Why does the Common App forgo the inclusion of an "other" category? There are other racial groups in the world that are not covered by the racial categories offered on the Common App; one that comes to mind is Indigenous Australian (often known as Aborigines). Would an applicant of this descent be forced to leave the race section unmarked, and thus be subjected to the still ambiguous potential disadvantages of that situation?
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08-29-2009, 01:53 PM
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#7 | | Super Moderator
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| Quote: |
Originally Posted by monstor344 I'd like to bring up another issue that was brought up in previous threads: Why does the Common App forgo the inclusion of an "other" category? | For the same reason that was mentioned in the last thread, and in the last reply that I posted to another question here: that's what the federal regulations U.S. Department of Education; Office of the Secretary; Final Guidance on Maintaining, Collecting, and Reporting Racial and Ethnic Data to the U.S. Department of Education [OS]
say. As the Census Bureau notes, Black or African American persons, percent, 2000
all the categories are arbitrary, and the absence of a category called "other" is simply a decision of the regulatory authority (in this case, the federal Department of Education) after notice was given providing opportunity to comment on the regulation.
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08-29-2009, 01:55 PM
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#8 | | Super Moderator
Join Date: Aug 2004 Location: MN
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| Many Colleges Admit Many Students Who Don't Self-Report Ethnicity
Here are some selective colleges with high percentages of students reported as "race unknown." These figures are based on Item B2, enrollment by racial/ethnic category, reported in the Common Data Set reports for each college (which in turn is based on IPEDS reporting to the federal government).
FALL 2008 ENTERING CLASS
32 percent 1st-year, 26 percent undergrad at Bryn Mawr http://www.brynmawr.edu/institutiona...S2008_2009.pdf
29 percent 1st-year, 24 percent undergrad at Scripps College Scripps College : Common Data Set
24 percent 1st-year at Colby College College Search - Colby College - At a Glance
23 percent 1st-year, 16 percent undergrad at William and Mary http://web.wm.edu/ir/CDS/cds0809.xls
22 percent 1st-year, 14 percent undergrad at Yale http://www.yale.edu/oir/cds.pdf
22 percent 1st-year, 18 percent undergrad at Reed College Reed College 2008-09 Common Data Set SecB
22 percent 1st-year, 21 percent undergrad at Amherst College https://www.amherst.edu/media/view/9...ersistence.pdf
20 percent 1st-year, 15 percent undergrad at Vanderbilt CDS B
20 percent 1st-year at University of Rochester College Search - University of Rochester - U of R - At a Glance
18 percent 1st-year at Penn College Search - University of Pennsylvania - Penn - At a Glance
18 percent 1st-year, 15 percent undergrad at Case Western Reserve http://www.case.edu/president/cir/20...s/enroll08.pdf
17 percent 1st-year, 14 percent undergrad at Brown http://www.brown.edu/Administration/...llment2008.pdf
16 percent 1st-year at Carnegie Mellon College Search - Carnegie Mellon University - At a Glance
16 percent 1st-year, 15 percent undergrad at Cornell http://dpb.cornell.edu/documents/100...mode=bookmarks
16 percent 1st-year at Tufts University College Search - Tufts University - At a Glance
16 percent 1st-year, 11 percent undergrad at University of Richmond http://oir.richmond.edu/CommonDataSets/CDS0809_B.pdf
15 percent 1st-year, 14 percent undergrad at Harvard http://www.provost.harvard.edu/insti..._Web_Clean.pdf
15 percent 1st-year at Chicago College Search - University of Chicago - At a Glance
14 percent 1st-year at Pomona College Search - Pomona College - At a Glance
14 percent 1st-year, 8 percent undergrad at Wesleyan University http://www.wesleyan.edu/ir/cds/cds2008-09.pdf
13 percent 1st-year, 7 percent undergrad at Stanford Stanford University: Common Data Set 2008-2009
13 percent 1st-year at Cooper Union College Search - Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art - Cooper - At a Glance | |
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08-29-2009, 02:00 PM
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#9 | | Super Moderator
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Here are some other selective colleges with moderately high percentages of students reported as "race unknown." These figures are based on Item B2, enrollment by racial/ethnic category, reported in the Common Data Set reports for each college (which in turn is based on IPEDS reporting to the federal government).
FALL 2008 ENTERING CLASS
12 percent 1st-year at University of Miami College Search - University of Miami - UM - At a Glance
11 percent 1st-year at Washington U in St. Louis College Search - Washington University in St. Louis - Washington U. - At a Glance
11 percent 1st-year at NYU College Search - New York University - NYU - At a Glance
11 percent 1st-year at Lehigh College Search - Lehigh University - At a Glance
11 percent 1st-year at Whitman College Search - Whitman College - At a Glance
11 percent 1st-year, 8 percent undergrad at Hamilton College https://my.hamilton.edu/college/inst...S2008_2009.pdf
10 percent 1st-year, 11 percent undergrad at Swarthmore College http://www.swarthmore.edu/Documents/...ir/cds2008.pdf
10 percent undergrad at Johns Hopkins University U-CAN: Johns Hopkins University
9 percent 1st-year, 8 percent undergrad at Columbia College Search - Columbia University - At a Glance http://www.columbia.edu/cu/opir/abst..._ethnicity.htm
9 percent 1st-year, 7 percent undergrad at Virginia UVa CDS: B. Enrollment
9 percent 1st-year at Tulane University College Search - Tulane University - At a Glance
9 percent 1st-year at Davidson College College Search - Davidson College - At a Glance
8 percent 1st-year, 7 percent undergrad at Princeton http://registrar.princeton.edu/unive...on_cds2008.pdf
8 percent 1st-year at United States Naval Academy College Search - United States Naval Academy - Navy - At a Glance
7 percent 1st-year at Rice University College Search - Rice University - Rice - At a Glance
7 percent 1st-year at Boston College College Search - Boston College - BC - At a Glance
7 percent 1st-year at Berkeley College Search - University of California: Berkeley - At a Glance
7 percent 1st-year at Northwestern University College Search - Northwestern University - NU - At a Glance
7 percent 1st-year, 16 percent undergrad at Claremont McKenna College College Search - Claremont McKenna College - CMC - At a Glance U-CAN: Claremont McKenna College
7 percent 1st-year, 7 percent undergrad at Emory University http://www.emory.edu/PROVOST/IPR/doc..._2008_2009.pdf
6 percent 1st-year at MIT College Search - Massachusetts Institute of Technology - MIT - At a Glance
6 percent 1st-year, 5 percent undergrad at Middlebury http://www.middlebury.edu/NR/rdonlyr...S2008_2009.pdf
5 percent 1st-year, 5 percent undergrad at Dartmouth http://www.dartmouth.edu/~oir/pdfs/CDS2008_2009.pdf
5 percent 1st-year, 5 percent undergrad at Duke College Search - Duke University - Duke - At a Glance U-CAN: Duke University | |
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08-29-2009, 02:06 PM
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#10 | | Super Moderator
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08-29-2009, 02:06 PM
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#11 | | Super Moderator
Join Date: Aug 2004 Location: MN
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08-29-2009, 02:13 PM
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#12 | | Super Moderator
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| Colleges Really, Truly Aren't Expected to Guess Student Ethnicity
A lot of applicants wonder if colleges will guess their ethnicity from their family name, or from their parents' birthplaces, or from something else that appears on the application form. (Such a guess would be a wild guess, and likely to be wrong, in my own children's case.) But it should be clear that when Harvard has been reporting to the federal government for years that about one out of every seven enrolled students at Harvard is "race unknown" that Harvard isn't bothering to do this. Colleges don't bother to guess what they don't know. They aren't required to, and they aren't expected to, and they don't make any particular inference about students who exercise their right not to self-report ethnicity.
From the Association for Institutional Research FAQ: FAQ Race/Ethnicity Topics Quote: |
Originally Posted by Association for Institutional Research Q: Can I require students/employees to complete the race/ethnicity questions?
A: No. You may only ask.
Q: How do I know if a student or employee refused to answer the questions or just overlooked them?
A: You don't.
Q: What is the level of effort needed to collect the new information?
A: Presenting the data collection form to students/employees is sufficient to ensure that individuals have had an opportunity to respond. Postsecondary institutions can report unknown when the respondent doesn’t reply—there is no need to use third-party observation to supply race/ethnicity. | | |
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08-29-2009, 02:27 PM
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#13 | | Senior Member
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Posts: 1,444
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So would the response to my other question: Quote: |
Would an applicant of this [indigenous Australian) descent be forced to leave the race section unmarked, and thus be subjected to the still ambiguous potential disadvantages of that situation?
| Simply be yes? Quote: |
But it should be clear that when Harvard has been reporting to the federal government for years that about one out of every seven enrolled students at Harvard is "race unknown" that Harvard isn't bothering to do this. Colleges don't bother to guess what they don't know. They aren't required to, and they aren't expected to, and they don't make any particular inference about students who exercise their right not to self-report ethnicity.
| But I think colleges can approximate percentage distributions and can do with that what they wish, no? Even if technically they might not hold restrictions, isn't possible that there might be a psychological effect when an adcom sees that the applicant has opted to not list his/her race? And doesn't it seem kind of suspicious that an Asian applicant can avoid some serious admissions disadvantages simply by not listing his/her race? It doesn't seem that easy to me, and I could be entirely wrong but those 1 in 7 racially unidentified might be those who Harvard would have admitted regardless of the ethnicity they put down (hooked applicants or applicants at the very top of the pool).
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08-29-2009, 02:29 PM
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#14 | | Super Moderator
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FAQ section on "Race": Quote: |
I'm white but my ancestors are from South Africa. Can I put down that I am African American?
| The answer to this question is always the same, by the United States federal definitions. Black or African American persons, percent, 2000
"White. A person having origins in any of the original peoples of Europe, the Middle East, or North Africa. It includes people who indicate their race as 'White' or report entries such as Irish, German, Italian, Lebanese, Near Easterner, Arab, or Polish.
"Black or African American. A person having origins in any of the Black racial groups of Africa. It includes people who indicate their race as 'Black, African Am., or Negro,' or provide written entries such as African American, Afro American, Kenyan, Nigerian, or Haitian."
Here's a simple rule of thumb: if no one in South Africa would have called you "black" or "coloured," especially during the days of apartheid, Apartheid -- Africana
you have no basis in America for calling yourself "African American," the official synonym of which is "black." A person who checks "Black or African American" is asserting that he or she has "origins in any of the Black racial groups of Africa." Not all people who live on the continent of Africa have origins in a black racial group, and that is the official definition--you are only "African American" if you are black. If you call yourself white, and your friends do too, it doesn't matter where your parents were born, or what countries they lived in. You also have the choice of not indicating any ethnicity or race at all. What a college does with what it sees on your form varies from college to college.
Good luck in your applications, and good luck to everyone else applying in the coming application season. Quote: |
My parents came from Somalia [Ghana, etc.]. Am I African American?
| By the federal definitions, Black or African American persons, percent, 2000
Somali students who grew up in the United States are definitely black, and the terms "black" and "African American" are synonyms in the federal definitions of "race" categories. The same applies to young people whose parents came from other tropical African countries where black people live. (North African people are categorized as white by the federal definitions.) You also have the choice of not indicating any ethnicity or race at all. What a college does with what it sees on your form varies from college to college.
Good luck in your applications, and good luck to everyone else applying in the coming application season. Quote: |
My parents were born in Pakistan. I was born in the United States.
| By the federal definitions, Black or African American persons, percent, 2000
you are Asian.
"Asian. A person having origins in any of the original peoples of the Far East, Southeast Asia, or the Indian subcontinent including, for example, Cambodia, China, India, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Pakistan, the Philippine Islands, Thailand, and Vietnam. It includes 'Asian Indian,' 'Chinese,' 'Filipino,' 'Korean,' 'Japanese,' 'Vietnamese,' and 'Other Asian.'"
You also have the choice of not indicating any ethnicity or race at all. What a college does with what it sees on your form varies from college to college.
Good luck in your applications, and good luck to everyone else applying in the coming application season. Quote: |
Is it safe to leave the "race" part on Common Application blank? I heard people saying that it's better for people to leave it blank than to fill in a race that might get looked down on?
| The answer to this frequently asked question makes up the first few posts in this FAQ thread.
You have and everyone has the legal right to leave the form blank ([url=http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/1063172286-post1.html[/url]).
The recent national trend has been for an increasing number of college applicants to decline to self-identify any ethnic group ([url=http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/1063172342-post4.html[/url]).
Many colleges admit many students each year for whom they do not know of any ethnic affiliation ([url=http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/1063172559-post8.html[/url]).
You don't need to worry about this. If you choose not to self-report any race or ethnicity, for whatever reason you have, the college won't hold that against you, because for all the college knows you are just a student who is very aware of your legal rights and chooses to exercise those rights. See
[url=http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/1063172622-post12.html[/url]
for evidence that colleges don't care about a blank response, because they can't infer anything from it, and aren't required to do anything about it. Quote: |
If I have an Asian last name, should I still indicate my race?
| The Census Bureau has done a study of the most common family names in the United States and what "race" or ethnicity is reported by people with those last names. A lot of family names are characteristic of (that is, highly correlated with) one federally defined "race" group or another, or of Hispanic ethnicity, but there are always exceptions. Wang is a family name in Norway as well as in China. "Leroy Johnson" could be a black man or a white man. And so on. People marry people of other "races," and adopt children from other "races," and thus family names are not an unerring guide to anyone's "race," especially if you look closely at the federal definitions.
What you decide about how to fill out your application form is up to you. But notice that many, many colleges report lots of applicants as "race/ethnicity unknown," so not every admission committee guesses about every applicant. Quote: |
So I am a middle class white guy, but my grandfather was full Mexican (this makes me a quarter).
| The definition of Hispanic ethnicity used by the federal government Persons of Hispanic or Latino origin, percent, 2000
"Hispanics or Latinos are those people who classified themselves in one of the specific Spanish, Hispanic, or Latino categories listed on the Census 2000 questionnaire -'Mexican, Mexican Am., Chicano,' 'Puerto Rican', or 'Cuban' -as well as those who indicate that they are 'other Spanish/Hispanic/Latino.' Persons who indicated that they are 'other Spanish/Hispanic/Latino' include those whose origins are from Spain, the Spanish-speaking countries of Central or South America, the Dominican Republic or people identifying themselves generally as Spanish, Spanish-American, Hispanic, Hispano, Latino, and so on.
"Origin can be viewed as the heritage, nationality group, lineage, or country of birth of the person or the person's parents or ancestors before their arrival in the United States.
"People who identify their origin as Spanish, Hispanic, or Latino may be of any race."
makes clear that a great variety of people of varying ancestry or "heritage" or "country of birth" can categorize themselves as Hispanic. You have the choice to indicate Hispanic ethnicity, by that definition, and to indicate white "race" after indicating Hispanic ethnicity. (The forms used in this application season first ask a Hispanic ethnicity yes-no question, and then suggest "select one or more" for the "race" question.) You also have the choice of not indicating any ethnicity or race at all. What a college does with what it sees on your form varies from college to college.
It's always a good idea to let a college know about any diversity factor you might bring to a new enrolled class at the college. It's unclear how weighty different kinds of ethnic heritages are in college admission decisions at which colleges.
Good luck in your applications, and good luck to everyone else applying in the coming application season. Quote: |
I am half Black/half Korean
| For this year's (2009-2010) admission season, all college application forms are required by federal regulation to have an optional ethnicity question that is in two parts, first asking about Hispanic ethnicity (yes or no) and then asking about the federal defined "race" categories, with the instruction "select one or more" or some language very similar to that meaning that you can choose one or more category. (You can choose no category at all by not answering the question.) You also have the choice of not indicating any ethnicity or race at all. What a college does with what it sees on your form varies from college to college.
Good luck in your applications, and good luck to everyone else applying in the coming application season. You are white by the federal definitions, Black or African American persons, percent, 2000
as are various people of Middle Eastern origin.
"White. A person having origins in any of the original peoples of Europe, the Middle East, or North Africa. It includes people who indicate their race as 'White' or report entries such as Irish, German, Italian, Lebanese, Near Easterner, Arab, or Polish."
You also have the choice of not indicating any ethnicity or race at all. What a college does with what it sees on your form varies from college to college.
Good luck in your applications, and good luck to everyone else applying in the coming application season.
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