<p>Rtgrove123, </p>
<p>I just looked up your program. You were one of about 25 students admitted into a dual degree program with Penn and Wharton. With all due respect, you really shouldn’t be too bitter when you run across those 4 or 5 wealthy URMs that presumably didn’t have to work as hard as you did.</p>
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<p>But there is a legitimate cause for complaint when the overwhelming majority of “underrepresented” minorities at elite schools come from wealthy families. What I abhor, despise, and detest is waving the “poor black kid from the ghetto” flag to justify affirmative action when the black son of two professionals living in Pacific Palisades or Menlo Park is far, far, far more likely to benefit from the racial preference than the aforementioned kid.</p>
<p>If we’re going to use racial preferences, then we at least ought to be honest about what kind of “underrepresented” minorities we get from the program.</p>
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<p>And your source is?</p>
<p>Family income should be judged according to location and family size. There are many areas of US where 80,000 is considered a high household income but not in NYC.</p>
<p>I think the bottom line just comes down that like most things in the United States, institutions of higher learning are a business. They must do whatever they can to attract the maximum number of people. This comes in hand with creating the best enviorment for their “customers”, which are college students, to thrive in so that they enjoy their college experience and maybe in the future donate to the school. Admissions to these schools is not, and will never be, a meritocracy. Instead, they look to add students that will add to the entire package of the school to make it more attractive for the other ‘customers’. In reality, who wants to go to a school that is 50% white, 45% asian, and 5% of students of color? Surely not a student of color. By having better balanced percentages, you make the education package much more desirable by most, not all, of the “customers” and the institution makes its money.</p>
<p>^^ I think there’s always an oversupply of people applying to top schools, so whether 5% apply or not, it’s not going to affect the bottom line much. Plus, from a strictly business perspective, I would expect affirmative action results in more financial aid given out anyway. I think affirmative action is more a political decision/“social justice” (I don’t agree with it) than a business decision.</p>
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<p>First of all, I’m not hostile. Hostile is mean and derogatory. Often, I do become very blunt, and then ease off a little once I’ve made my point. It’s a characteristic I possess on both CC and in real life. I assure you though, I am not bipolar or anything of the sort. :)</p>
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<p>Unforunately, this is true to a certain extent. The huge barrier is SAT scores, which correlate strongly with family income: virtually no one with a family income below $60,000 will score a 2300 or higher, and a very very select few of that income level will score a 2200 or higher. That’s why the system needs to be reformatted, like I said earlier, so that URMs from households making more than $100K family should have no benefits, and less emphasis should be placed upon SAT scores for low-income applicants. Because really, at the $100K point, those people, URMs or not, face little hardship when compared to low-income Whites/Asians. But for low-income URMs, considerable advantage should still be given.</p>
<p>EDIT: Also, I believe Hispanics/Latinos should not be given advantage if they are less than 50% Hispanic/Latino and are not fluent in Spanish. It doesn’t matter if that’s their race/ethnicity, because if it didn’t play an important role in their life, they bring no more diversity than an identical White/Asian applicant.</p>
<p>^^^^
I agree with you decrescendo. (Well, maybe not about your views regarding which hispanics should receive benefits…but ya I mostly agree with you =D)</p>
<p>I really just don’t understand how any one can believe that just because a URM family making ~100k a year can face no “hardships” in their life. That is just false. Both financially and racially there are difficulties that come with the “upper-middle class black family” persona. People believe that just because you are the child of two semi-professional black people you have been liberated from being black or something ridiculous, and use racial slurs that they think are now a “joke”. I’ve been the victim more discriminatory racism than I’ve ever been the seen the “benefit” of preferential racism. </p>
<p>The bottom live is: However much you make: There are adversities for Minorities. The End.</p>
<p>Asian families face hardship and racism too!</p>
<p>Could somebody answer this question?</p>
<p>What educational disadvantages do you have if you are an URM from college educated upper middle class family?</p>
<p>At the end of the day, college is a business. It is free to admit whom ever they want to in order to maximize its profit and prestige + future endowment. Unless you are running an university, or have direct influence within the university, the discussion is useless and waste of time. If you wish to change the way that it is done, establish your own university.</p>
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<p>Good question!</p>
<p>I acknowledge that if I am to use the following source, then I must rewrite my claim, “…the overwhelming majority of ‘underrepresented’ minorities at elite schools do not come from low-income households.”</p>
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<p>[url=<a href=“http://dukechronicle.com/print/151644]Source[/url”>http://dukechronicle.com/print/151644]Source[/url</a>]</p>
<p>You may respond by saying, “That’s just one school–Duke. You can’t generalize that to other elites.” Hey, you got me there. Is Duke less socioeconomically diverse than other elites? That is, do their results apply only to them? Let’s see if we can find out.</p>
<p>According to college-insight.org, in the years 2004-2005 through 2007-2008, the percentage of Duke’s 12-month enrollment receiving Pell Grants ranged from 9 to 10%. During the same time frame, Harvard’s figures ranged from 6 to 7%, Yale’s from 8 to 9%, Princeton’s from 8 to 10%, and Stanford’s was stable at 12% all four years.</p>
<p>If you divide the undergraduate aid applicants by the 12-month enrollment for the schools in all four years, you find that proportionally, more Duke students apply for financial aid (44-48%) than do both Harvard (29-30%) and Yale students (38%), but not Princeton (46-49%) or Stanford (47-50%).</p>
<p>My analysis is cursory for sure, but I don’t think those numbers suggest that Duke’s student body is on average, more wealthy than Harvard or Yale’s student body. Proportionally, more students at Duke receive Pell Grants than do those at Harvard and Yale, and proportionally, more students apply for financial aid at Duke than at Harvard and Yale.</p>
<p>This thread is quite busy right now. While everyone is jumping in, could I please [what</a> do you mean by “underrepresented”?](<a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/1064853590-post14.html]what”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/1064853590-post14.html) It seems to me that there are differing possible definitions of what groups are underrepresented (if any) in the admission process, and it is important to distinguish what definition you support. </p>
<p>Best wishes to all of you applying to college this year.</p>
<p>So I gather that it is in the best interest of a Hispanic male to apply Early Action/Decision to ivies because that is the time when they accept most of their minority apps to make sure they have a evenly distributed racially diverse student body. Then they accept all the whites and asians! is this somewhat correct?></p>
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<p>I have seen no evidence of this; plenty of URM’s are deferred early and then accepted, and plenty of unhooked Whites and Asians are accepted early. Applicants who are hooked for non-racial/ethnic reasons (e.g., legacy and being athletically recruited) do seem to be picked up mostly during early action or early decision, though.</p>
<p>Hmmm ok thanks silverturtle…and I read somewhere you are Hispanic and Jewish! I guess we do have something in common haha as weird of a combination as it is.
And also looking at the data, if you are a URM you still need amazing stats, unless you overcame outstanding harships?</p>
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<p>My family income is 20,000 a year, and i scored a 2130. I know it’s not a 2200, but its the highest anyone I know has ever heard of from around here. Plus, that was my score for my first time taking the SAT, perhaps I will get a 2200 second time around lol. Maybe.</p>
<p>The truth that everyone points out makes me really mad. It is true that most of the URMs are rich kids who didn’t face hardships.</p>
<p>Living at the poverty line, and coming from an alcoholic family has given me many hardships. How was I supposed to play sports when there is no money for all the equipment and certainly no mother willing to pick me up from practice? I was able to obtain the SAT score that I did by borrowing a book from the library and killing myself with studying after work. There was no fancy, 200 dollar SAT class for me.</p>
<p>And to top it all off, I did face racism. I am 3/4ths german and was born in Heidelberg to my full-blooded german mother and an army father. Because my mother taught me how to talk, I had an extremely thick accent growing up. [It wasn’t until 11 years of age that I managed to talk ‘normally’] Furthermore, I was Jewish. The white Jewish kid (who ‘killed jesus’ and is therefore evil) and who talks and dresses funny surrounded by black Baptist children is not generally popular. [My elementary school was predominantly black, the poor part of town]. I wonder if any of the Hispanics from families that make 100k have had their faced shoved into a mud puddle full of dead bugs at the age of 7? Or watched their brother have the **** beaten out of him at the age of 9?</p>
<p>What really ****es me off about this is that none of it matters to the colleges, because I’m a poor WHITE kid. It’s always the same in this country, the help never goes to the people that really need or deserve it.</p>
<p>However, at least I will get into college, even if it’s not an amazing one. More than we can say for most of the unlucky kids around me : /</p>
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<p>URM’s certainly need to be qualified as well, though it depends on what you mean by “amazing stats.”</p>
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<p>Preparatory classes are woefully ineffective and inefficient ways of preparing for the SAT.</p>
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<p>You should be very, very proud of that score. I’m a middle-class Hispanic (~80K per year), and I got a 2180, which is only a few questions away from your score. So be very happy, because for your circumstances, that score is remarkable. :)</p>
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<p>Sad. And true. That’s why upper-class URMs should have be given no benefit whatsoever, diversity or no diversity.</p>
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<p>Fortunately, not true. Colleges will see your low family income and your situation, especially if you talk about it in one of your essays, and they will judge you considerably easier than other people. Low-income kids get a boost, regardless of whether or not they’re URM (although poor URMs do get a bigger boost than poor Whites). Also, did either of your parents go to college? Because if neither one did, you’re a first-generation college student, and that will help you as well.</p>
<p>Overall, don’t lose hope. I go to a poor public school in Louisiana. The most impressive school anyone has gotten into in the last five years is Tulane: almost everyone else goes to a local college or LSU. And we have a 65% dropout rate.</p>
<p>I know it’s not easy. And I’m rooting for you and people like you. I hate that rich URMs get benefits: they deserve nothing. But you should absolutely apply to top schools: don’t let a 2130 stop you, because given your life circumstances, adcoms would give you serious consideration if you had good grades, decent EC’s, and heartfelt essays.</p>
<p>Best of luck to you. :)</p>
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<p>Mm, thank you 
I didn’t think colleges really looked at one’s income… </p>
<p>Unfortunately for me my dad decided to get an online college degree two years ago, long after I had stopped living with him. Unfortunately for him it didn’t even help him find a job. So I’m guessing I would not be considered a first-generation?</p>
<p>About the essay thing, would it be alright for me to talk about my situation and disadvantages? Or do you think that it would seem… like I was whining or desperate or something like that? I don’t want to seem like that…</p>
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<p>I dunno, everyone I talked to online who’d taken them had 2200+.</p>
<p>But I really am hoping to bring up my SAT math score. Does anyone know what the best way to do that would be? I’m hoping to retake the SAT in November, so I have a good amount of time to prepare. My math was a disappointing 620… [A sharp contrast to my 800 reading score…]</p>