<p>I’m a bit tired. And, honestly, I am not awake enough to defend the position as it should be defended. </p>
<p>I have a friend who is from the exact background you mentioned. I do believe that Jamaicans and Haitians do face obstacles, as they came here very recently. Unlike with certain immigrant populations, the parents of these kids probably didn’t have access to higher education in Jamaica and Haiti leaving these students (for the most part) in lower socio-economic statuses.</p>
<p>Just a PS, I was playing devil’s advocate. On here and in general, people are mostly against AA. Personally, I find the way it is used in many universities/college appalling. But, I just wanted to throw it out there why it does exist and some of the perceived advantages. I do believe that this IS a good idea, just abused by colleges in the admissions process.</p>
<p>The way I figure it… If a college doesn’t want me, it’s not because they wanted someone who was using AA to get in; it’s because of something I did. I have a feeling that if we found out for every rejection who was filling "our’ slot, we’d all need anger management or psychotic drugs.</p>
<p>calling your “solution” unrealistic is not the same as implying that someone doesn’t think before they make “mind numbing generalizations”.</p>
<p>i’m not attacking YOU at all…i’m arguing against what your saying…there is a huge difference </p>
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<p>i not only considered your argument, i also made a counterargument that this lack of knowledge of the “value of a good education” isn’t only in minority communities and that there is no such thing as some magical public program that would solve that without addressing underlying problems.</p>
<p>on the other hand THIS is a good example of dismissing someone’s point of view without considering it:</p>
<p>I think the fundamental problem you have to look at is which students are performing poorly and why. <a href=“http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d0/1995-SAT-Income2.png[/url]”>http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d0/1995-SAT-Income2.png</a> shows that hispanic/black students in the same income bracket perform worse on the SAT than their white/asian counterparts. There are an infinite number of explanations for this phenomena, but my view is that both hispanics and black have a self-imposed bar on education instilled in their culture. An example would be a gifted black student not wanting to go into honors classes because his friends would make fun of him and abandon him for doing so.</p>
<p>On a more personal note, at my high school I see this all too often. Quite frankly, the school is segregated into the “preppy kids” who do well on tests and are hard working students- almost entirely white, and the stereotypical black/hispanic kids who are known for cutting classes, doing drugs, and not caring about school at all. In fact, I don’t think I’ve had one black or hispanic student in any of my honors classes thus far(only PE where everyone is grouped together). </p>
<p>I would agree with Shraf that no “magical public program” can solve this problem. The only way to solve this problem is to fundamentally alter the cultures of hispanic/black people, and I do not see that happening easily or soon.</p>
<p>“do you not mind that kid from South Dakota (w/ lower stats than your own) who “took your place” in a college because he brought geographic diversity?”</p>
<p>hardly a factor, smart kids from every state, columbia didn’t take a single kid from north dakota in 2010, shows they don’t stubbornly follow the policy</p>
<p>“or what about the male/female who got in w/ lower stats, “just” because of his/her gender; does that bother you, too? (just wondering…)”</p>
<p>again hardly an issue, seas has a 2:1 male:female ratio, or even worse that that, it’s much the same at most colleges. otherwise males and females on balance have fewer differences, than one sees in race today. I have no reason to beleive that columbia discriminates based on gender, </p>
<p>basically when an organization begins to discriminate on anything other than merit (however you define this) it’s annoys me.</p>
<p>To adfjkl1: Sure they can have it hard too (anyone can). But if AA is helping them and not American blacks most of the time, then AA is failing African-Americans. It’s not benefiting the group it was constructed to do so, people, whose ancestors endured slavery and rights oppression in the US. This means that your comment before about helping those who tolerated oppression doesn’t stand. It’s also dishonest for colleges to act like increasing the numbers of “blacks” on campus means helping blacks whose ancestors lived through the 1800s. All they’re doing is giving one group a huge advantage that doesn’t have an overriding need for it relative to other groups.</p>
![http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d0/1995-SAT-Income2.png[/url]](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d0/1995-SAT-Income2.png%5B/url%5D){kind=link}
