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<p>ECs are a soft factor that gets converted into a hard number and used to determine your overall application strength. Again, read her book - it is very eye opening.</p>
<p>"welcome back shrinkrap. i cant believe you post two messages and you are already depressed!</p>
<p>I would have thought you were out celebrating a win in Michigan."</p>
<p>I (try to) post rarely but I have read every single post. And I do not feel strongly enough about AA to celebrate. I mr too depressed (sad face emoticon)</p>
<p>I am depressed by the thought of how bad things are, and have this ominous feeling that there are plenty more bad things down the road. There are so many potential “tipping points”. I have a bad feeling about how even a few percentage points can potentially shift things. </p>
<p>Looking at that into about URM men at UC’s; it’s not just VC’s. So a shift of 3 percent for blacks overall, could mean 6 percent for black men. And only a small percent even make it to the pool. What are we going to do without our men? Our husbands? Our fathers? Somebody upthread said once you leave money and degrees you get to pick you mate. SMH (that means shaking my head to black people…)</p>
<p>I totally get how “Asians” feel about protecting their own; I feel very protective. Maybe we both feel as if or children lives depend on it. I can believe and respect that. But don’t tell me race doesn’t matter.</p>
<p>So shrinkrap, let me ask you this. Why can’t URMs improve their application folio instead with higher scores, higher grades, better ECs? What’s the barrier? It cannot be the socioeconomic status, as many, many Asians are dirt poor.</p>
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<p>But just upthread I pointed out that Asians have the highest median income of any group. I bet if you looked at the ‘dirt poor Asians’, they would have academic profiles similar to other ‘dirt poor’ students.</p>
<p>^^Sigh. I am already depressed. Must you kick me when I’m down?</p>
<p>I don’t know why. Some can, some don’t, some can’t. I make it my life’s work to help each individual child, while I try to learn from the big picture.</p>
<p>And for the record, while I have lived i’n NYC, DC, and LA, I live in N.Cal, and have a hard time with the concept of Asian". I know plenty of “Asian” kids . I get it.</p>
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<p>They don’t. Again, pound for pound, a poor Asian kid on average will have better scores than a poor URM kid. This is because of the tiger moms (and dads, lest we forget). It is the relentless pressure that they put on the kids to do well academically. Frankly I find such pressure to be nonsensical, but it is there, and it yields dividends in academic scores.</p>
<p>The more well off Asians actually don’t push their kids so damn hard when it comes to academics. They have figured out that academics is only part of the game. The other part is ECs. They push their kids very hard on ECs. Unfortunately they often choose the wrong ECs, which makes it easy for admissions officers to then reject their kids.</p>
<p>Here’s the trick (for any Asian parents who are reading this). Just as there is a stereotype about Asian kids - the so-called Asian Robot Syndrome - there is a very real stereotype for Caucasian kids. You can either call it the Caucasian XYZ Syndrome, or you can follow it. Following is better. Look at the ECs of the Caucasian kid who is competing with your kid academically (a little higher or lower, either way). Then duplicate the ECs of that kid. Since your kid is Asian, (s)he will get higher points for doing “Caucasian” stuff instead of Asian stuff, than the Caucasian kid who does the exact same thing. </p>
<p>So what does this mean in practice? Stop piano and violin, immediately. Start a guitar, encourage your kid to start a rock band, or if you must follow piano, go for jazz piano. Go for theater, an EC Asians don’t usually do. Go for poetry and writing and politics and economics - et cetra. For heavens sake, don’t go for math or physics or engineering. They are the kiss of death. You can teach your kid to be a top-notch mathematician, but hide that in the applications. </p>
<p>Play some sports. Play lacrosse. Fence. Whatever. Just avoid whatever the other Asian kids are doing. </p>
<p>Basically make your kid a Caucasian Robot. The adcoms will eat that up.</p>
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<p>I was genuinely curious, but please accept my apologies.</p>
<p>“I was genuinely curious”</p>
<p>Me too.</p>
<p>Indian Parent, I know that the Academic Index exists. But how do you know that the index for denied Asians is higher than that of the accepted students? How much higher is it? Does every Asian who is not accepted have a higher index than every minority who is accepted?</p>
<p>The Academic Index, as I’ve seen it, relies on GPA, SAT scores and class rank. So when you talk about AI, and Asians having a higher one than minorities, you must be talking about GPA, SAT scores and class rank.</p>
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<p>While I don’t have any hard evidence to support my claim, you don’t have any evidence to support yours either, other than an appeal to an (admittedly racist) stereotype of Asian families.</p>
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<p>I am not talking of the academic index. I am talking of the academic index + the EC index. Third time I am saying this.</p>
<p>" Somebody upthread said once you leave money and degrees you get to pick you mate."</p>
<p>shrinkrap - i was the one asking you up the thread about finding your mate once you have money after going to a great school.</p>
<p>I am seriously interested in your view on why a black woman must find a mate while in college. I know statistics point to highly educated black women not finding suitable mates but what I did nt understand is why people have to find their mates in college.</p>
<p>^They don’t. I don’t believe that is what I said. Fab said that you can’t create a black middle class in college, or something to that effect. I gave an example of how you could. It’s probably not mostly about college. It’s about college being one of a few opportunities to meet “someone like us.”</p>
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<p>If you wanted the most academically prepared students, you could likely just draw from Andover, Choate, Taft, Harvard-Westlake, Horace Mann,insert your own rigorous private high school of choice and maybe throw in some (very affluent) public high schools. Is that what colleges want? Merely the most academically prepared? It may be what you WANT them to want, but that’s different. </p>
<p>And if the system isn’t admitting the very best of the best like you seem to think - and compromising academic quality because of their soft hearts towards underprepared / not ready students – then why would you want to go there in the first place? It’s odd to dislike how they compose their student body at the same time you want passionately, oh so desperately to be a member of it.</p>
<p>Sorry if this disappoints you …</p>
<p>“I understand the worry of Asian students, but do I have a smoking gun? No,” he said.</p>
<p>People may read this and want to say, “Oh, because I’m Asian American, my SAT scores have been downgraded.” That is not really the way to interpret these data. Many times people will ask me, “Do your results prove that there is discrimination against Asian applicants?” And I say, “No, they don’t.” Even though in our data we have much information about the students and what they present in their application folders, most of what we have are quantifiable data. We don’t have the “softer” variables – the personal statements that the students wrote, their teacher recommendations, a full list of extracurricular activities. Because we don’t have access to all of the information that the admission office has access to, it is possible that the influence of one applicant characteristic or another might appear in a different light if we had the full range of materials.</p>
<p>Source: [Princeton</a> University - Perspective on: Affirmative action and the racial achievement gap](<a href=“Perspective on: Affirmative action and the racial achievement gap”>Perspective on: Affirmative action and the racial achievement gap)</p>
<p>“Second-tier Ivies”? Oh, really, gag. What IS with you people who keep drawing eensy-weensy distinctions of no significance between the top universities in this country? </p>
<p>I found it to be of significance throughout my career. "</p>
<p>I’ve found it of significance only in landing the first job; after that, it’s what you do. I routinely work with Harvard, U Chicago, and other elite graduates, as well as graduates of good state flagships, and at this stage in the game it really doesn’t matter. I stand in front of big-company client CEO’s all the time and amazingly they’ve never asked where I went to school, and I know they come from all different backgrounds as well.</p>
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<p>I’m not a Constitutional scholar, but that decision will be appealed. </p>
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<p>I’ve been suggesting “(1.5)” as a compromise. That is, use unique identifiers but modify the box so that it’s just “(Optional) Are you a ‘URM’? If yes, please check one or more of the following:” Ideally, I’d go for (1), but I am not against compromise. soomoo, sewhappy, Hunt, epiphany and several others have said they have no issues with “(1.5).”</p>
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<p>To clarify, I said racial preferences cannot create a black middle class. Now, I think if blacks pursue careers that require higher education (i.e. college), they can certainly “move on up.” But it has NEVER been my position that without racial preferences, blacks will flounder. They might not attend the super duper private elites, but that just means they’ll be with all those Asians and whites who didn’t get in. If it’s fine for Asians and whites, why is it not fine for blacks? Again, because of what Dale and Krueger found?</p>
<p>I have consistently expressed how nonsensical it is to tell Asians that they’ll be fine wherever they go but to tell blacks that it is important that they attend super duper private elites. If you are willing to fight tooth and nail so that "URM"s can continue to be “adequately represented” at super duper private elites, then stop saying stuff like “This ain’t Asia where your alma mater matters.”</p>
<p>johnwesley might read my post and insist that I’m prejudiced against middle class blacks or that I think they should know their “place.” That’s his right, but neither is true.</p>
<p>“If it’s fine for Asians and whites, why is it not fine for blacks?”</p>
<p>Not sure who said it isn’t. Nobody I know. You know me; I want at least 3 percent black, 7 percent would be great( shout out to LMU!). That’s pretty much all I ask (also not a community college in someone else’s community), and I’m willing to put my “full pay” money where my mouth is. </p>
<p>I am not fighting “tooth and nail” for anything on college confidential. </p>
<p>Please.</p>
<p>If you want to “cut me out” because I’m full pay, I’m not sure where this will go. One of the “tipping points.” And I’ll want to know why “full pay” folks who are NOT URM get an alleged advantage.</p>
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<p>My apologies. That was meant as a general “you”; as I recall, you have never said stuff like “This ain’t Asia where your alma mater matters,” though plenty of others have.</p>