What's going on with the College Admission this year?

[epiphany]

As others have said, this topic has been rehashed over & over on CC for a minimum of 3 yrs now -- about the time that the profound numerical effects of the echo boomer population interfaced with college application efforts. (The critical point of a gigantic overage of both Caucasian & Asian applicants supremely qualified for a LIMITED number of total freshman openings at the highly selective institutions.)

The so-called research has proven nothing 'discriminatory BY ETHNICITY. It has proven that
Asians as a whole restrict their college choices to a far smaller number than the non-Asian student population does, and that
Asians choose to focus on score efforts (thus resulting in higher scores upon submission of applications than, on average, other groups -- by choice, not by the demand of any University)
Only quantifiable elements were compared, not qualitative elements, such as essays, geography, and extracurriculars. In fact, admissions decisions hinge more on qualitative factors than quantitative factors.

The comment about the 100% acceptance rate, is that I've never heard an Asian parent on CC admit that maybe a S's or D's supposedly spectacular application could ever, ever have been considered less desirable than someone else's. What such parents also don't understand is that Asians get rejected in favor of *other* Asians EVERY YEAR by HYPSMC. Can you spell Denial?

[puzzledad]

Oh boy! epiphany, wha's wrong with you? Do uou have soemthing against these Asians? It almost sounds that way from your writing.

[mini]

WHICH Asians? Hmong people from Cambodia? Mien or upland Lao? Tuvans? Dalits from south India? Polynesians? East Timorese? Uzbheks? Kazakhs? Iranians? Nepalese? Fourth-generation Japanese-Americans? First-Generation Vietnamese?

Who has proven ANYTHING about "Asians as a Whole"? (Asians "as a whole" don't exist.)

[puzzledad]

Yes NCL. believe me. It has happened to my son. It's real. I guess most of the Posts are confirming my speculation here that the bar has been raised unfairly for Asian kids. Although my son wasn't into amth contest or Piano, I dont understand whats wrong with math contest and piano playing. Most of the Asian parents are well versed in both of these areas. Naturally they instill the love for these two things to their kids. Of course they develop their own interest as they grow up and pursue that.If the college admissions dont like the Asian kid to do Math Contets and Piano, then they should publicize their views.

[epiphany]

"Oh boy! epiphany, wha's wrong with you? Do uou have soemthing against these Asians? It almost sounds that way from your writing."

No, I have something against people capable of reading results thoroughly, & analyzing the differences (but choose not to), against people in denial about whether they are entitled to an Elite college admission, against people who scream 'discrimination' about their own group when their own group continues to be hugely overrepresented at all the 'top' schools, and most especially I have something against trolls who post with fictitious identities, first as "parent" of an Asian male, then as parent of an Asian female, in short succession, trying to "prove" discrimination.

[cgarrett101@aol.]

"against people in denial about whether they are entitled to an Elite college admission"

AMEN: NO ONE is ENTITLED to an Ivy league education.

[puzzledad]

Epi, Not sure what you are talking about. Asian male then Aisan female?
I dont think I started that although I noticed that some posters got confused over this!!
In any case, the story doesnt change for male or female.
"hugely overrepresented at all the 'top' schools" - yes it is true despite the fact that the bar has been raised unfairly for these kids.

[mini]

Which Asians? I don't know of single Mien or upland Lao student at ANY of these schools. Tiny numbers of Hmong. Almost no Dalit South Indians. I have no clue who you (or other posters talking about "Asians") are talking about.

(I have an adopted Indian daughter - she didn't even apply to "top schools" - they simply didn't have the programs she wants, so, for her, we could call them "bottom schools", and that would be just about as accurate.)

[epiphany]

""hugely overrepresented at all the 'top' schools" - yes it is true despite the fact that the bar has been raised unfairly for these kids."

My point exactly. You want 100%. Thirty something percent is not good enough. You want to DOMINATE in elite school enrollment & will not be satisfied until every East Asian applicant who happens to outscore any particular applicant of other ethnicity is admitted over that student. Again, what you refuse to believe is that East Asians of the middle & upper-middle class compete with other East Asians of the same economic classes, for admission. If you "lose" a spot, 9 chances out of 10 you've lost it to an East Asian very much like yourself WITH THE SAME HIGH SCORES, *not* with a "higher bar."

[ClassicRockerDad]

Puzzledad, I am very sorry that your son was caught up in all of this disappointment. He sounds extremely talented and deserving. Have no fear though; his efforts won't be wasted. If you picked the safety well, he will still shine through brightly and will still likely get into the highest level graduate schools. Also, his safety is also likely to have a much larger peer group of top students than you might otherwise think because what happened to your son seems to be very pervasive. Fortunately, graduate school admissions is ALL about how valuable he is to professors as a researcher. The professors usually choose who they want to support as a graduate student to maximize their own research interests, whereas undergraduate admissions is more like casting for American Idol, where the decision makers have nothing of their own at stake. Congraduations on the admission that he did get.

[Dad II]

ref # 159. If I read it right, you are saying asians are competing with asians; whites are competing with whites etc. If an asain kid did not get in, it is because he compares less favorable than the asian in front of him.

I see two problems with that. One, who decise the make up of the student body? i.e. what is the % of asian, % of white, % of others etc? Why there is a cap on any particular race?

Two, this implys race is a deciding factor in admission. because you said asian is only compared to asian.

I think elite schools are taking students they think wil be the best fit for them regardless of race. A lot of Chinese kids are getting intop top schools.

Recently, I was invited to one of my classmates home for dinner. We were just one out of 1000s classes in China. Out of 5 of our families, one kid is going to princeton, one got in stanford but is going to UCB, one goes to UCSD, one is deciding between Harvard and Yale, and my DD got in Stanford. I am totally surprised that within such a small sample of people, we got PHYS covered. multiple our distribution across all Chinese came to US, I coudl see there will be a huge number of kids in all the top elite schools.

[epiphany]

Of course it's a "factor," but only a factor in terms of balance. If there were not an overpopulation of accomplished East Asians from the same regions with the same income levels & quite similar interests (& sometimes similar e.c.'s), this would not be as much an issue as it is among the few schools that this population especially seeks, in larger numbers, proportionally, than other groups.

If there were not such an overpopulation of students of all groups, period, who were so qualified, then the issue of balance would not be so prominent. The Elites can have balance (given that generous supply from the country & the globe), so they seek it.

Anglo Caucasians compete with each other all the time in admissions, yet mostly they don't assume they're being denied for "racial" reasons, because they are also not. They do apply in plentiful numbers to the Elites, but they also apply, in more plentiful percentages than East Asians do, to non-Elites.

[katliamom]

DadII, to answer your question "who gets to decide the make up of the student body" -- Harvard, Yale, Princeton get to decide the make up of their repsective student bodies. These are private institutions created by a specific group of people in general FOR a specific group of people. (Ever wonder why certain schools -- Exeter or Choate for example -- send so many kids to HYP?) It's not supposed to be fair, never was and never will be. If you want a fair, strict meritocracy you need to look elsewhere besides the Ivy League.

PS. I know two kids who just got into Harvard . While good students, they were not elite students. They got in because they had the right last names. They and their families are not surprised Harvard accepted these kids - it was the expected result, as it had been for these kids' parents and in one case, grand parents.

[cgarrett101@aol.]

Agree with Dad II: "I think elite schools are taking students they think wil be the best fit for them regardless of race. A lot of Chinese kids are getting intop top schools."

Still, some prefer to think there is a huge conspiracy to reject certain students due to their race, name, sex, high school, etc. I guess that makes it easier to accept rejection, since it OBVIOUSLY had nothing to do with the rejected student, according to these people.

Sorry, I don't buy it. All I see is Adcoms trying to put together a class as best they can. Yes, some might be legacies, athletes, URMs, Asians, or whatever. But it is not because the Adcom decides to exclude someone; it is because they just don't have enough room for everyone who is eligible, and so one gets accepted and the next gets rejected.

[epiphany]

Let me clarify, DadII. The comparisons are not side-by-side, directly like that in most cases, although they can be when one high school, for example, has a significant number of East Asian students graduating, all wanting to go to Elites, most of them hoping to major in one or more sciences, and all of them in approximately the same income range. This is quite a common occurrence. I'm not saying there's a quota by school: there isn't something like that built in or arbitrary. However, if that admission round there is an oversupply of quite similar students from many other regions, the first region or school is no more likely to "sweep" the elites than a corresponding region, with an oversupply of very similar candidates. They will take some of whatever the school considers most desirable (most excellent, most achieving) among many regions, seeking overall a balance geographically, by ethnicity/nationality, by e.c. interests, by academic interests.

And let me say I'm happy about your last paragraph in that post above, but I am not surprised, myself.

And yes, I do think (know, actually) that schools are choosing not "regardless" of race, but with excellence in mind at the first level, tempered by *some* balance racially. It's because there is indeed so much excellence among East Asian families that top schools admit them in large numbers. But they will not admit 100% of the qualified Asians, just as they don't do so for qualified Caucasians, either, and haven't -- long before Asians began applying to Elites in the numbers that have shown up in the last 8 years or more.

It's only a problem to understand this if one does not believe that the qualified numbers of students of all backgrounds exceeds by a factor of 3 to 4 the number of available spots.

And as someone indicated, the admissions policies are set by the private colleges, not by the American public or by the government.