@reid799 I’m also not 100% how I feel about Affirmative Action as well and also agree with your point about this could potentially cause reverse discrimination against Whites and Asians.
@Lbelle43 Your story was very informative. And it brings up a good point about how Affirmative Action is meant to make up for opportunities not given to the student. I believe that both socioeconomic and location of a student should matter. If the student lives in a area where the education is poor, say D.C., and they are able to get a very good score compared to others in his area, that means they were able to break their socioeconomic barrier (they didn’t go through prep classes).
Consider this. You have two students who take the SAT. Student #! is from a urban neighborhood where people are just barely above the poverty line and struggle to make end’s meat. The education at Student #1’s school is poor. Student #2 is from a pretty good neighborhood where people are not struggling to make end’s meat. The education at Student #1’s school is considered great. They both take the SAT the first time, without prep or studying of any kind, and Student #2 scores a lot higher than Student #1. They are then told they will take the SAT a second time, in one month, and will each be given the same prep books from which they must study from for at least two hours a day. They will not be allowed any help from anyone in the form of tutoring of studying. The students were allowed to study at anytime. The students then come back one month later and take the test again. Student #2’s score is still higher than Student #1’s, but the difference between the scores is lower than the first time they took the test. While each student’s score improved, Student #1’s score improved the most. The reason being that since Student #1 was given a poor education, they might have trouble with some of the concepts in the prep book. Whereas Student #2 was given a great education and they understand most of the concepts, so the prep book was, for the most part, practice and review. With Student #1, their lack of understanding of these concepts would make it a lot harder for them to improve their score. These concepts might have confused Student #1 and they did not stick with them and a lot of it might be new for them. So for Student #1, they have to use the month they have for both reviewing old topics and learning new ones. Also, Student #1 must have likely developed a sense of self-motivation that was either already apart of their personality or developed throughout the month. Student #1 likely felt a lot of frustration with the topics, but was likely self-motivated to keep going. They could’ve just given up and blamed their education system for their lack of knowledge of the topics, but they didn’t. They learned the new topics, reviewed the old, and still improved on the SAT. While Student #2’s score was better, but they didn’t improve as much, whereas Student #1 had very much improved and narrowed the gap between the two student’s scores. If I was a college, I might just consider Student #1 over #2. The reasons being the fact that Student #1’s ability of being able to learn a lot of new information in a short amount of time can come in handy in college. Also, throughout the month, Student #1 developed self-motivation and potentially, a newfound interest in learning. This is merely just a hypothetical situation, so I’m not trying to say anyone is wrong.
@QuadiNorth I called it reverse discrimination which looking at it certain groups have the potential to lose opportunity because of their ethnicity. Again, I’m not trying to have an argument, as I’m hardly not educated enough and I don’t feel I will be impacted enough to complain. Really no strong feelings.
@ak2018 HE WAS A PART OF THAT STORY??? That is absolutely amazing, I’d love to here his take on things. One of the greatest sports movie ever made
On Saturday, I visited Harvey Mudd College and it blew me away. The campus was gorgeous, like, roses were twining up brick walls and sunlight was illuminating the pathways. There was a pond full of koi fish that swam around a statue of a naked dude. One thing I really liked was a chalkboard full of quirky sayings and encouragements.
I went on a campus tour, and the biology department and the engineering departments were so cool! One of the doors to a robotics lab was open, and when I went inside, the place felt like a playground. There was a model of a drone and a robot made out of poptart boxes and wires and whatnot.
@Kelvin82 Lol. I’m glad you enjoyed your college visit. I had two universities on my list that I was planning on attending if I got a full ride or something. They were both super close to my house, so I figured I’d save money. University of Texas at Dallas is super diverse and their Computer Science program sounded like it’s well-funded. I could imagine myself going there, but it definitely would not be my first pick. My problem came with the second school I visited, Southern Methodist University. I absolutely hated the feel of the campus. It was in the extremely rich part of town (they technically have their own enclave), so all the buildings looked very nice. The campus just felt fake to me though. Like a dead flower that still has fragrance. I didn’t feel comfortable at all walking through the campus and I noticed that it appeared sororities and fraternities there liked to PARTY. I didn’t see a single minority the whole time I was there, which I found really weird. Also wasn’t a nice place to just walk around. It’s pretty much where all the wealthy kids in Highland Park and Plano had their parents dump them. Dallas is so diverse, but this school is like a microcosm for the elite. I wouldn’t recommend it to anyone unless they were going to be a business major. I’m honestly super glad I had this experience because it taught me how important it was to visit college campuses before I apply! SMU might be the perfect fit for someone else, but definitely not for me.
@reid799 If you met him and talked about the movie, he’d say it was pretty historically inaccurate. Coach Boone wasn’t exactly the best person; he was actually the opposite.
Also, my Chemistry teacher just gave me the miracle of a lifetime. She has seen that a lot of people have struggled with our latest test, me included, and has decided to have some people finish the test tomorrow afternoon. I’m going to study like crazy tonight.
Yeah I’m going to visit Duke, UNC Chapel Hill, Emory, and potentially Geogia Tech very soon.
I visited Columbia on a trip to NYC a bit ago and it was amazing! You step out of the crazy that is Manhattan and onto the campus and its so quiet you feel like you have to whisper. There was so much green space for being in such a big city. There were little gated mini fields with perfectly cut grass and trimmed hedges in the main area and it was right across from Central Park. It also backed up to the Mount Siani hospital which I liked. Sadly, as much as I love it, I need to be able to get out to the barn and NYC doesn’t lend itself to that.
I also went to Georgetown while on a trip to DC and liked it too! It was right off the main steet of Georgetown that had a ton of cute shops. It has some townhouses for the students that were painted in pastels IIRC that I thought were adorable! I got lunch-and-shopping-downtown kinda vibe from the campus. It also felt a bit historic but not overwhelming so. It was my first college visit so I kinda got intimidated and didn’t look around much though lol.
@Madeline25 that’s so cool! I’m planning on visiting NYU next month and I might go to Northwestern this summer. I toured UMich and really liked it. There’s a lot of party life and coffee shops (I like coffee )
I did a summer program at Georgetown and I loved the campus! I don’t really know how to describe it other than “campus-y.” It was exactly what I’ve always imagined a college to be like - its own little world that was close to a city or busy town but still separate from it.
@Madeline25 I’m so jealous! I was supposed to tour Columbia last November (when I went to NY for my birthday) but our flight was delayed so we missed our appointment
I toured Vanderbilt with my friends last year and I’m touring Georgia Tech over spring break (next week heck yeahhh).
Does anyone know how competitive the MIT biology program is?
School started again for the first time since March 13th. Felt good to be back with my friends and I enjoyed going to my classes. Also, I was very happy to run with the track team today. When I’m running all my stress passes by. Sadly, A lot of homework, but it is ok cause now I’m recharged.
@apple1893 I’m just waiting for when this thread blows up in a few months. @cxprus I don’t think it would hurt you to apply for both. If you want you could run for Key club Secretary and then be on the ASB committee. @ak2018 Congrats! I’m so uncoordinated. Yesterday, I tripped up the stairs.
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