<p>yolochka, you have a right to your opinion and I have a right to disagree with it. Clearly this thread would not have gone on for nearly 150 pages if everyone agreed with everyone else. What I found offensive was you saying this:</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Apart from presuming to know more than the MIT admissions staff about a student whose application you have not read, you are claiming that your child has a superior PERSONALITY. Which is in direct contradiction to this:</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>In your earlier post you suggest that “personality” should have given your son the edge over the girl from his school, who you and your friends agree has a lesser personality. But now you are saying it is only about demonstrated passion and STEM talent. Does MIT REALLY lead people to believe they can get in if they simply “follow their passion for STEM and are extremely good at it”? Because I have never seen anything that suggests MIT gives students false hopes, what with its 8.9% admit rate. </p>
<p>Also, if you believe all the boys are competing against the other boys and likewise the girls are competing against the other girls, why do you keep bringing up gender as an issue for your son?</p>
<p>I am not trying to rile you up with my comments, but I do find the claims you are making specious, not to mention illogical, and I feel compelled to respond.</p>
<p>yolochka, in case you have forgotten, this is what you said last week about female (and minority) students at MIT. You ARE overly focused on gender, even if you claim not to be now.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Why would you even waste the application fee on an institution with which you have such disagreement?</p>
<p>Sally, my opinion about MIT policies has developed gradually. Initially, I thought something like “wow what a great place for someone passionate about STEM.” When we visited, it reminded me about an institution both my husband and I attended, which we loved. In any case, my son made the decisions where to apply. Frankly, I wasn’t excited about Stanford for various reasons, and I thought it was a waste of $90. He decided where to apply and he’ll decide where to go, and we’ll support that.
I’m only focused on gender with respect to MIT AA admission policies. Otherwise, I would like to see more females in STEM and politics, everywhere where males currently dominate the field. But I believe we need to start earlier to raise girls interested in STEM. It’s sad that high school engineering courses and robotics clubs are mostly male. Let’s discuss what we can do to change that.
Sally, why are you not insulted when people on this thread suggest that it’s okay to admit more girls to make MIT more attractive to boys? Can you see what’s wrong with this logic? </p>
<p>Of course, you can disagree with me, but you tend to state your disagreement in such a way that I feel you want to shut me up. Please take into consideration that English is not my first language.</p>
<p>Almost forgot to answer your “personality” accusation. I don’t know how it can be inferred that my son has an edge just because of personality. It was mentioned last on the list. Adcoms make decisions based on application while I state my opinion based on knowing the person. I am not going to provide details here out of privacy concerns. But I did mention personality because someone here could suggest that it could be a reason for why she was selected over my son. Again, you don’t have to believe my opinion.</p>
I hope you can understand that a sample of 15 kids from one highschool in one state in one country is not comparable to MIT’s “sample” of 20,000 students from all over the world.</p>
<p>
</p>
<h2>Please cite your source. What led you to believe that all strong STEM students would be admitted to MIT? I have read probably 100s of the blogs by now and the common theme I picked up was that thousands of very talented STEM students apply, and very few are accepted. There is simply not enough space.</h2>
<p>On another note, I suspect the reason many people object so vehemently to your posts is that many of them border on blatant sexism, coupled with your constant assertions that your son is superior to apparently all of his female classmates (all the ones you’ve mentioned at least).
<p>yolochka-
The rejected person’s scores that you linked-- that person had a 27-29 ACT *and a 650 Chem SAT II. Its doubtful that an interview alone was the cause of this admission denial.</p>
<p>As for admissions of males vs females, agree–its more likely that the males were compared to the male applicants, and the females to the females, not across gender. But its quite likely that the number of fully qualified applicants in each gender group is significantly higher than the number they can offer a spot to. So have to agree with sally-- grousing about the girl’s admission against your s’s denial sounds unbecoming.</p>
<p>“build a class that will help deliver a truly superior experience, including an incomparable athletic experience for participants and spectators”</p>
<p>Xiggi - D certainly enjoys going to the football games for someone who had no interest in it for the first 18 years of her life! It is also interesting how they distribute all the athletes in the regular dorms where they room with freshman swimmers/divers, volleyball players, water polo olympians etc. </p>
<p>"all his male friends are in the robotic team, in the math team and has taken very similar courses. So they have similar interests. They all had chosen the intended major as computer science, electrical or computer engineering or mechanical engineering. "</p>
<p>If I were an MIT adcom, I probably would have seen 90% of the male applicants claiming to be on robotics club. Where is the individuality in that. If I was a boy’s father, I would prevent them from joining one or admitting to be a member on their application to MIT. You might as well be a lump of clay if there are 20 boys applying from your school and there is not much to differentiate you from them. OTOH, if you are a boy and you started the neuroscience club in your school or represented your school in economics competitions …</p>
<p>unicameral2013, could you provide a quote that would show my “blatant sexism”? How is it sexist to suggest that gender shouldn’t be a very important factor in admission decisions to a technical school?</p>
<p>Also, I believe you read my posts selectively. Otherwise you would notice that my “sample” includes at least one girl who is unquestionably superior to most boys I know who applied to MIT, and even those who got to MIT.
Speaking of sample size, you don’t seem to be bothered by sample sizes of 1 which are used by the majority of posters. </p>
<p>Also, I’m puzzled that you are not bothered by the suggestion some people here make that MIT should be admitting more girls as a bait for males. Isn’t this sexist and insulting to girls?</p>
<p>jym626, I made no comment on MIT’s decision regarding the poster. What was interesting in his post was that the opinion of his interviewer (MIT graduate) seemed to agree with mine.</p>
<p>Well, then, thank goodness your son dodged THAT bullet! I mean, why would you ever want your son to apply to a place that discusses applicants in disrespectful terms and doesn’t accept the best of the best? Gosh, I certainly want my kids going to school with the best of the best, and if I thought a school didn’t accept the BOTB, I wouldn’t waste MY application money there. Whew! Thank goodness!</p>
You have not presented any data to support your assertion that gender is a very important factor in admissions today. Yes, at MIT the acceptance rate for women is higher than that for men. There are several factors that could explain this, including that just maybe, the female pool is stronger overall than the male pool. And regardless, it is MIT’s prerogative to balance its gender ratio. Did your son apply to any all-male schools? No? Maybe there is some benefit to having a 50/50 gender ratio…</p>
<ol>
<li>I believe I already did, recopied here for your convenience: </li>
</ol>
<p>“To me it seems like MIT has changed its mission to include mediocre students because they fill some niches (URM, females, etc.) … the quality of education had to suffer because these new groups are not as prepared to handle the load”</p>
<p>To spell it out, saying that female students are less capable than male students is sexism. Especially since you haven’t shown that a) the female students are less qualified than the male students or b) that the quality of education has suffered because of the female students.</p>
<p>
OK? If I have not made it abundantly clear yet, I could not care less about these examples you seem so intent on furnishing. They are meaningless. I don’t care if you know the Loch Ness Monster. Your anecdata is useless.</p>
<p>
Like who? As you have been told several times already, nobody else does this, and if they do they generally get called out.</p>
<p>
This has already been cleared up. Previously, it was established that dating is NOT the only benefit to having a balanced gender ratio. I won’t rehash the discussion as I wouldn’t do it any justice, but it’s a few pages back in the thread.</p>
I’ll borrow lookingforward’s line here and point out that it doesn’t matter who was better than who. The only factor is whose application was better. Have you seen any of these girl’s applications?</p>
<p>yolochka, you do very well with your English–I understand you. Perhaps you think I am too direct but that is just how I write. I am sorry if it rubs you the wrong way.</p>
<p>texaspg nails the very reason kids of different backgrounds should be considered for MIT admissions, no matter their gender or race. The university is not the Massachusetts Institute of Robotics or the Massachusetts Institute of Engineering. Nor is it the Massachusetts Institute of White and Asian Males. And believe it or not, there are plenty of MIT-qualified male students who choose other institutions BECAUSE they want a rich social life in the four years that many people believe are the best years of one’s life. They WANT to meet girls, and might actually prefer to meet girls who are not <em>only</em> the type of girls they knew from robotics club in high school. </p>
<p>As to your comments about personality, do you really not see the problem with mentioning it? You are essentially disparaging a girl you may or may not know well, and judging her very character. It may not have been the first reason you listed in defense of your son’s superiority, but it was a reason. And again, evaluation of one’s personal qualities is subjective. MIT admissions are subjective. I am glad your own child was SUBJECTIVELY chosen at other universities he is interested in.</p>
<p>I apologize to anyone who is offended by my suggestion that it looks like MIT has AA for females. It appears just the thought of it threatens some people’s comfort zone. I don’t want to upset anyone! Let’s agree to disagree on this. I won’t react anymore to replies to my posts however misconstrued my opinion is presented. Not because I have nothing to say, but because I have more important things to do. Anyways, I wish everybody the best. Try to relax. The world is not collapsing!</p>
<p>" If I were an MIT adcom, I probably would have seen 90% of the male applicants claiming to be on robotics club. Where is the individuality in that. If I was a boy’s father, I would prevent them from joining one or admitting to be a member on their application to MIT. You might as well be a lump of clay if there are 20 boys applying from your school and there is not much to differentiate you from them. OTOH, if you are a boy and you started the neuroscience club in your school or represented your school in economics competitions … "</p>
<p>I wouldn’t do any thing differently just to seperate the student out. Don’t we encourage them to follow their passions? What if following passion doesnt get to MIT… Anyday, my S will chose his love for math and technology over any school. And so do many studnets I know.</p>
<p>Do wish some would quit telling us we can’t manage dispute or that we’re threatened.
…</p>
<p>Btw, don’t have your kids drop robotics, math team, et al, thinking it will seem too same old. Instead, make sure there is balance and some breadth.</p>
It’s not just more attractive to boys, it’s also more attractive to girls. D declined to apply anywhere where the ratio was greater than ~60/40 in EITHER direction. She doesn’t want to be “the only girl” any more than she wants there to be MOSTLY girls. D is a girly girl, but she wants for there to be guys as well. There is nothing wrong with having balance be one of your criteria.</p>
<p>But then, I guess being attractive to girls is low on your list.</p>
<p>"I wouldn’t do any thing differently just to seperate the student out. Don’t we encourage them to follow their passions? "</p>
<p>DONIVRIAN - There are passions and there are goals. All I am suggesting is that if there is not much differentiating me from another applicant, I can’t blame an adcom for not selecting me because the adcom can’t figure out why I am different from 20 other applicants from my school. I do suspect MIT adcoms have an easier job figuring out which girls fit in at MIT since they are usually interested subjects beyond CS/EE/ME for their majors and are not all in robotics/math/chess clubs. Although MIT started out as tech school to be unique from Harvard a very long time ago (so I have been told), they are now competing for similar students as Ivies/Stanford/Chicago/Duke/Northwestern etc. as opposed to being perceived as a tech school. They are as interested in health these days as they are in engineering. The question is - are the boys interested in what MIT is interested in pushing?</p>
Especially since you haven’t shown that a) the female students are less qualified than the male students or b) that the quality of education has suffered because of the female students.</p>