<p>The following is from the Dean of a very good, selective private university, bragging on the nature of the incoming class of 2012, which IMO could have been written by and about any number of schools [the name of the specific university has been omitted to protect the innocent]. </p>
<p>“ from a gated, celebrity-filled community in Beverly Hills to a gritty neighborhood in the Bronx where a student noted “it’s not unusual (for me) to be awakened by gunshots in the middle of the night.” … “I grew up in an upper middle-class, monochromatic suburb with three younger siblings adopted from Bolivia,” one wrote. Others were reared by “a very conservative Confucian family” in Seoul and by a single lesbian mother in Wisconsin; on a Colorado alfalfa farm and a trailer park in Maine; and amidst a Cambodian refugee camp in Malaysia. . Nearly 20 have experienced the death of a parent; one is an emancipated minor. … The class is preppie and tattooed; carnivorous, kosher and vegan; straight and gay; at least two are trans-gendered. A Jewish Californian wants to learn Arabic so she can study the Quran in its original form while the Dairy Princess for Columbia County, New York proudly calls herself “a passionate orator for agriculture and the dairy industry.” A Ugandan refugee from Mississippi celebrated his identity as “a moderate Republican in a high school that was 96% Democratic”; he speaks eight tribal languages. …Religious identities are fluid. “I may not follow Islam’s traditions or avidly practice it,” a Turkish-American revealed, “but my faith is a part of me. I chose to be Muslim, Islam did not choose me.” a gecko breeder, a “raw foodist” budding Buddhist from Vancouver, the grand niece of Malcolm X, and a cyclist who pedaled his way from Seattle to Nantucket. the director of a children’s theater in Baltimore, and “a blue-eyed, blonde-haired, gay Catholic from ‘that family’ that receives food on Christmas from the local church”. socioeconomic diversity is an important characteristic of the new class. global identities are common and ethnic boundaries are elastic. “I am the only African-American Cuban Muslim woman who is fluent in French that I know,” xxx of Washington, DC proclaimed. A Cape Verdean from Shanghai, a Syrian-Croatian from Orange County, a member of Canada’s Malisset tribe and a Chinese-Mexican in the Yaqui tribe, and a Somali-Canadian from Maine arrived today. Identities are fluid. “I’m a multiracial woman demanding recognition for my character, not my race,” proclaimed a black-Japanese-Swede from California. Overall, more than 27 percent are Americans of color but many listed “human” when the Common Application asked for a racial identity One is wheelchair-bound and deaf as a result of muscular dystrophy; he wants to break down prejudices against the handicapped. A Colombian was kidnapped by his family driver and held captive in a Bogota motel for 58 days; he was six at the time. A gay student in a conservative town was tripped down a staircase in school because someone “thought it would be funny to see a fairy fly.” the son of a lesbian couple addressed the Vermont Legislature on behalf of his mothers’ right to marry and to bear witness to the “intolerance” his family has experienced, while an abusive father produced an activist against domestic violence. The lead singer in an Istanbul rock band;”</p>
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