@ucbalumnus,
You are correct regarding student posters. I was actually talking about parent posters.
My point is that I cannot often tell the race or gender of a parent poster on cc, unless s/he has mentioned his/her gender or race in the past. I assume that other parent cc posters cannot tell as well, but perhaps I am wrong in my assumption. When race or gender is excluded, we hear the voice and the opinion of the poster. It does not go through some sort of preconceived race/gender filter. (e.g. we don’t get racial profiling) To me, this is a good thing. If I or others cannot tell race or gender on an anonymous forum, then wouldn’t this be a good idea to extend it to a college application, where an ad com does not see race, gender, or name of an applicant. Then the adcom’s opinions of an applicant would not go through a preconceived race/gender filter either, unless the applicant chose to reveal it in an essay or an EC…
For instance, @ucbalumnus, I have no idea if you are male or female. And it doesn’t matter to me. I do know that your posts are usually well researched and backed up with some source.
Why can’t we extend this same idea to college applications and applicants?
The less help provided translating and/or writing in native language, the faster people adapt and kids adapt in very fast pace, unless there are in special classes that are taught in their native language. The Spanish speaking will adapt the slowest, unless they are taken out of these “helpful” environment.
I do not believe too much in smart vs dumb. I believe in hard work, it does work time and again and if a 13 y o middle schooler understands that, why not adults accept it? We are not talking here about super athletes with the talents and special physical characteristics that they were born with (and they still have to train extremely hard to achieve). We are talking here about k -12 (which is at the one of the lowest level of education in the world in comparison to many countries, including underdeveloped) and college. We are not talking about PhD in Rocket Science either. Nobody needs to be a genius to successfully complete k-12 and college, but hard work is a must.
I’m Asian and have only grown up in an Asian home, so I can’t compare – but I think what is emphasized in Asian homes whether 1st or 2nd or 3rd gen must be different. It is ALL about school esp at the young ages. Even the parents who aren’t “strict” and hovering and mandating SAT prep starting in elementary school were ALL over their kids in elementary school. They want to make sure the reading skills are solid – and solid means 2-3 grade levels higher than what is expected at school. They want to make sure the math skills are solid – again at least 2-3 grade levels higher than at school, but frankly the higher the better. They assign “extra” math problems as “homework” to make sure the kids are getting it and staying ahead. They are all over their kids to make sure they are on “principal’s honor roll” or whatever the “straight A” list is in elementary/middle school. They do this to make the kid “used to” being at the top of the class and working hard and to light a competitive fire within the kid, so that by the time they are in 6th-7th grade, they have the rep of being the “smart kid” and will do anything to protect that rep themselves – i.e. work as hard as needed.
Somehow I always assumed that my parents and their peers who came in the 70s did it this way, and it would “dilute” with each successive generation. Guess what – my friends who are having kids now and were born and raised here are doing the EXACT same stuff with their kids. Sure they’ll let their kids play soccer or whatever, but the academic culture at home is not that different than what they had growing up in the 80s or 90s with immigrant parents. It’s a formula that worked, so they are continuing it.
How is having high academic expectations for the kids necessarily different from non-Asian parents of high educational attainment?
The point is that while people tend to associate the kids’ academic achievement with a visible characteristic of race or ethnicity, it is likely much more related to parental educational attainment – which has been selected for among some races and ethnicities by the nature of immigration.
I generally agree. When you’re raised in a household with high education attainment regardless of race or ethnicity, you are more likely to attain a similar type of education – bc it’s most likely to be a family value that is passed on to the next generation. In my ethnicity, a significant % of those who are able to immigrate to the US are engineers and doctors – bc they get in under the visa quotas for “highly educated” folks in industries where there is demand; so of course it goes without saying that they expect their kids to reach similar academic levels.
BUT don’t discount how important school is to the exclusion of everything else in an Asian home. Doesn’t matter if you’re growing up in an engineer household or in a household where the parents are washing dishes at a Chinese/Indian restaurant – school is the be all and end all. It is a mindset that is put into kids practically as preschoolers. Everything else – fun, sports, relationships, friends – is secondary to academic achievement; I think that is a uniquely Asian thing. I didn’t have any Caucasian friends living under the mindset of – so high school isn’t fun, I’ll have fun when I’m a doctor (which is untrue obviously bc the carefree fun you can have at 15 isn’t available to you at 30 no matter how much money you have bc the same activities aren’t available); that is a very Asian way of thinking that I saw over and over in my generation and now my generation is raising its toddlers the same way.
In some Asian homes (apparently those whom you observe). My observation (from knowing people of various races, ethnicities, and educational attainments) is that Asian homes are like those of any other race or ethnicity in that they vary in how strongly school is emphasized, and whether everything else is excluded – of course, educational attainment of the parents is a rather strong skewing factor in how strongly school is emphasized (but that does not necessarily mean excluding everything else).
“How is having high academic expectations for the kids necessarily different from non-Asian parents of high educational attainment?”
Not Asian here, just an observation and info from D’s and GrandD’s surroundings with the Asian majority in classes.
It is very different, the expectations in Asian families are more connected with the specific actions of this family. And in this way, the expectations are more “forceful” so to speak. But again, this is just my impression which is also supported by the fact that they are getting accepted to highly selective places in way over-represented numbers and more so if the official policy for admission are based strictly on the stats. Why is this happening? They simply work much harder. Also, my engineer H. has dealt a lot with Asians in China, Japan, he has traveled a lot there for long business trips. His comments were that by no measure Asians are any smarter, not at all, not the ones that he had to deal with for his employer, engineering company. But one factor is being neglected over and over. Those who got their pre-college education abroad, will have a tremendous advantage because of very weak k -12 education here in the USA. And this is NOT my opinion at all, this is the fact. Actually, this is also a bit of the factor in pre-college education of immigrant’s kids in the USA. Some have opened their own school to supplement the lack of education in k -12. But even if a kid does not attend such school, parents’ help in math and sciences at home will put a kid at the higher level. The reason that the k-12 will never be “fixed” is that general population does not want to hear that the schools are terrible. If problem is not recognized, it will never be corrected and kids of certain immigrants will continue having a huge advantage. .
Laziness is a contemporary epidemic across the board, affecting Asians every bit as much as non-. My biggest problem with almost all of my students right now (all of whom are East Asian or South Asian) is laziness. It is learned in this country.
I have exactly one non-lazy student at present. She is a recent immigrant from China who is (obviously) ESL and who wants to learn English quickly, big time. She puts her effort where her dreams are and is like some fantasy in a novel to work with. What a gem and what an exception.
I am the child of two PhD parents. My mom definitely pushed me in school, she was the quintessential “Oh you got a 97 on the test? What happened to the other 3 points?” mom. When I got an 80 in French one quarter, she grounded me and hired a tutor who came to the house every week. She used a friend’s address to get me into a certain school district (that was a thing people did in NYC in the 70s), and then herded me through the college-app-level round of public and private HS apps/tests/interviews in 8th grade, then the real college process as a senior. We’re white (though we lived in an Asian country for my early childhood).
Even though she pushed me academically, I was still given piano lessons, acting classes, vocal lessons, acted in school plays, joined an off-Bway theater group that meant rehearsals 6 days a week. I played a team sport in HS though I wasn’t very good at it. I spent part of my HS junior year abroad. I had sleepovers and went to parties and my mom knew I had alcohol and whatnot in HS.
As long as my grades were great she was OK with, even supported, all that. So in those ways it does seem different than many more recent immigrants are reporting, I guess. But the expectation to do well academically was always, definitely, there.
(Ironically, perhaps, my brother is Chinese and he didn’t get that treatment from her, because he was “an artist” and never all that great at academic pursuits. He got to take art classes and as long as he wasn’t failing the academic stuff he was OK with her. )
We are not PhD’s and we did not push with the exception of one sentence at the age of 5y o, when I told my kid that her other activities have to follow her homework, her homework is the most important in her life. I never repeated it as it seem to stick. She had a lot on her plate when she was 6 y o and it increased with age by a lot as her sport practice eventually became a daily event that took at least 3 hours (including Saturday) with many out of town meets and she absolutely loved it, but would not quit anything else either (like piano, private art lessons, etc.). One time was enough because she was told that I am not taking her to practice until all homework is done very well. I guess, they learn to push themselves this way. Whatever that was, the only thing I was doing later was making sure that she remembers to get up, leave her books and papers alone and move on to something else as perfection became some kind of endless pursuit, which I did not approve either. Got to know when to stop!
But I believe that ECs help a lot with academics and she continued with the tons of them at college and even some at Med. School. Busy kids for sure learn very early how to manage time.
Many Chinese kids at least play an instrument and might be in several other activities also.
As far as my D. (currently resident), she is still going to art sessions with her (mostly Chinese and one Indian) resident friends when they have time. There is new thing when they can buy one session and paint there for 2 hours. She loves it!
I went to an alumni party to welcome new freshman (Duke) this summer with my kid. Out of about 10 kids, there were two children of alumni, and four of the other kids’ moms didn’t grow up in the US (but had been here for 20 years mostly). One Asian, one Israeli, one Latin (South America? Spain? I have no idea) and one some variant of British accent. I thought that was pretty fascinating in light of this thread.
Many South and Central American immigrants don’t do as well as the East/South Asians, so I’m not sure if immigration is all of it. Many Irish, Italian and Eastern European immigrants also had to cross an ocean to get to the US, but their 2nd or 3rd generation didn’t clamor to get into our best colleges. If it’s because most Asians arrive as graduate students or high tech workers, what about the children of poor Chinese immigrants in NYC who dominate schools like Stuy or Brooklyn Tech? I’m inclined to think it’s a combination of high IQ, work ethic and respect for education.
I have read that achievement by Jewish Americans under 40 have fallen off a cliff. Most of the kids who aim for the Ivies in our area are 1st or 2nd generation Asian kids. Traditionally most immigrant groups peak in the 2nd generation. I wouldn’t be surprised if asians’ performance begin to taper off by 3rd or 4th generation, as have happened with Japanese and Jewish immigrants. Eventually they all get fat and lazy like everyone else :)). However since there are so many Chinese and Indians still in Asia, we will see this huge influx of high performing 1st and 2nd generation Asian immigrants for a long time. There are 4.5B people in Asia, only 300m in the US. China and India alone have 2.5B. If only the top 2% of a population is considered “gifted”, then there are 50m gifted people between those 2 countries, who are probably all in one way or another trying to make their way here.
Eventually all the Ivies will be 70% Asian, unless they come right out and restrict admission by race. They can’t hide behind holistic admission for much longer. It’s a stupid system that’s running all our top high school kids ragged and depressed/suicidal, trying to excel in everything from academics to athletics, volunteer work, music, club activities and still be most popular and best looking, all because our top colleges are trying to restrict one demographic group.
What are the educational attainment characteristics of these immigrants from South and Central America?
Of course, the biggest source of Latino immigration is Mexico (which is in North America). But the educational attainment profile of immigrants from Mexico indicates a much lower level of educational attainment (only 30% high school graduate, 4% bachelor’s degree) than Mexicans in general or non-immigrant Americans. So we see the immigration selection effect in the opposite direction with respect to immigrants from Mexico.
Those may be part of the equation but I think the idea that they benefit from the institutions built/brought by their more highly educated immigrant peers (as described in the article posted earlier) helps too.
Hispanic immigrants are usually coming to perform manual labor, not to get PhDs and do research. Just because someone immigrates here doesn’t mean they come from strong genetics. In fact, we probably receive weaker than average members from the hispanic gene pool, while we receive stronger than average members from the Asian gene pool.
I’d have to know more to venture a guess as to why. First, how do you know they’re from poor Chinese immigrants? Second, if they are poor, what are the circumstances around them being poor? Are we talking about descendents from those who were elite before Communism who had to flee perhaps?
Academic attainment matters to Asians whether they are research scientists or dishwashers. Obviously the research scientists are better positioned to get their kids to where they want them to be – in terms of finances and knowledge --, but even those Asians without an education realize the value of one; they truly do believe that education is the only way to uplift and will do everything they can to get their kid the right degrees. Often time this involves talking to every peer they know who has a successful kid and then mandating their kid do things the same way – xyz did this-and-this to be at the top at Stuy and then get into Harvard and he applied for merit aid using these forms, so that is what you must do.
While it would be nice to think that Asians benefit from their more highly educated immigrant peers, let’s be honest – all the Asian cultures I know are fairly “classist.” If you and your wife are dishwashers at a Chinese restaurant and are renting a 1 bedroom in Queens for your family of 4, chances are you have little to no interaction with the wealthy engineers in your culture who are living in a McMansion in NJ. Frankly you were of different classes and education in the old country and wouldn’t have socialized there, so there’s a high chance you won’t socialize here either.
In terms of what drives Asians, obviously different for every family – but in talking to my parents now who came over in the 70s – they always talk about FEAR. They – like many Asians – came over by themselves; they didn’t have any siblings here or any extended fam for at least their first 15-20 yrs in the country (in part bc if you sponsor a spouse or parent to come over here – it still takes about a decade for that to actually happen). The fear of failure while being totally alone in a new country drove them – to save every penny they could and later when there were kids, to educate them to the hilt. They viewed it as – we only have our nuclear family of 4, so we must all be in a financial position to help each other if the need ever arises. My parents talk about how hard it was that if you got a new job and needed to move – there was no one you could borrow a few hundred (back then) for a security deposit – whereas back in the old country, they could have turned to their parents in a pinch. That feeling of – it’s all on us – is a huge part of why Asians push their kids into the “stable” and “traditional” professions like medicine, engineering etc. bc they never want their kids to be in a position where they can’t provide for themselves or where they have to worry too much about money – the way the parents’ generation did; in some families they “expect” the well educated kids (sons) to then turn around and provide for the parents’ retirement, though I haven’t seen that to be true in the middle class so much – they genuinely just want their kids to have an “easier” life financially.
That seems like a lot of generalization of observations of your parents and friends to all Asian American people, even though there are many who are not like your parents and friends. I know plenty of Asian American people who are not tiger parents pushing their kids to medicine, engineering, and the like or berating them for bringing shame on their families for getting an A- grade. Also, the various immigrant ethnic groups from Asia vary considerably in culture and educational attainment, so the generalization to all Asian people and their cultures is overclaiming in that respect as well.
I thought #75 was interesting, because it reminded me of the experience of a lot of Jewish immigrants, especially those who came here after WWII. There was a strong preference for portable careers, like medicine, because of a fear that it might be necessary to move again–some Jewish families, even in the US, kept a set of packed bags, just in case. I doubt if many do this any more, but there are still elements of this fear, especially amon
I appreciated @aj725 explanation of what motivated his parents. I think that fear and insecurity can play a big part in motivating people for high educational attainment. After all, knowledge is power.
As far as Asian cultures being classist, your description infers that there is an intentional grouping among SES groups. I think that there is a natural grouping based on lifestyle differences. When higher SES families are planning European vacations, those who can only afford the local state park probably feel a bit insecure. Or when higher SES families routinely go out for steak dinners whereas the lower SES can only afford it on special occasions. When lifestyles are predicated on economic standing, it becomes difficult to socialize on a regular basis. So even though obsessing about HYP may be unsophisticated, I can understand why some families view it as a worthy goal. They may believe that it is a way to elevate their social standing.