<p>Quote from alumother: “Second, the stereotypes that aggregate all Asians together. First, as many people have stated, the term “Asian” in this context as people are using it must mean Indian, Chinese ethnicity, and Korean. Mostly Chinese ethnicity I imagine. These cultures and countries ARE NOT THE SAME. Don’t offend people by using such a large brush. And not all Chinese ethnicity are the same. And just come to China if you don’t believe me. Northern Chinese on average are tall, and strong looking. You think Yao Ming is an anomaly? No. Just meet some guys from Inner Mongolia. You think Chinese kids have no spark? Hang out at the POS Mall in Pudong, Shanghai. Watch the kids. Plenty of spark.”</p>
<p>To Alumother: It is the Asian-Americans that want to lump themselves together, please see the website Asianam.org. They are encouraging rejected students to file complaints based on “Asian-American admissions”, and therefore they are taking the lead on this. If they decide to break it down by student groups whose families come from specific countries, so be it, but then the federal classifications will also have to be changed. Maybe you want to work on that?</p>
<p>I was actually quite surprised when I saw the high acceptance rate for Asian Americans. I had always thought that it would probably be comparable to the acceptance rate for white students, no particular advantage or disadvantage.</p>
<p>Based on a 36% acceptance rate, I now believe that being Asian American may be an admissions plus at Swarthmore. It’s certainly not a discriminatory disadvantage, looking at either the acceptance rate (36%), the percentages of acceptances (21%), or the percentage of the enrolled first year class (17%). I believe that high Asian American percentages are linked to the the increasing public high school percentages, although I’m not sure which is the chicken and which is the egg!</p>
<p>Asian Americans are a minority population in the US and do face certain forms of discrimination. Outside of California, they have difficulty reaching poistions of power. New Asian immigrants in particular, have difficulties–primarily because of their accented English and their misunderstanding of American culture.</p>
<p>However, these difficulties are minor, MINOR compared to the every day difficulties faced by African Americans who have lived in America for generations. Not only do African Americans suffer ongoing situational prejudice, they have tremendous challenges overcoming the legacy of slavery in their own culture. As the culture that enslaved them and engendered such prejudice, many European Americans feel obligated to try to right that injustice, myself included.</p>
<p>Even though the life of an immigrant is very difficult and wrought with discrimination (I know. I am an immigrant in another country), this form of discrimination is nothing compared to the struggles of African Americans.</p>
<p>My Korean American friends often complain that they are as abused as African Americans. I find that whinging offensive, frankly. It points to a lack of understanding of our complicated history. And it is disingenuous. </p>
<p>When I, as a white American, moved to an Asian country, I never ever thought I was entitled to be accepted as an Asian. The thought is laughable. In fact, my children, as whites, would never be accepted even if they were born in that Asian country. </p>
<p>The children of immigrants, if they are born in America, feel American–and that is by design. Children of immigrants feel more accepted, by and large—much more so than their immigrant parents and that is true whether the parents were Asian–or Irish or Italian.</p>
<p>I think that the Asian-Americans are going to have to be careful that they don’t get a backlash on this issue. Personally at first I thought Mr. Li was acting alone and was just a wild and crazy guy who really wanted to go to Princeton. Now that I have seen the website Amasian.org that is encouraging complaints based on erroneous data and conclusions, I have totally changed my opinion. </p>
<p>Now I just think the whole complaint filed by Mr. Li is a ridiculous waste of time, and I do hope that there is a penalty for filing frivolous complaints (there probably is not.) I am not so familiar with Princeton’s stats, but I know Swarthmore’s, and any website that advocates taking action against them for not being open enough to Asian admissions is really doing the students a disservice.</p>
<p>At first I thought Mr. Li was just a bit wacky to pursue a rejection from Princeton. Now he appears to be unappreciative and vindictive.</p>
<p>Multiply his complaint by other complaints that the website encourages Asian-American students to file, and there will be a lot of ill-will generated to a group that is self-reportedly declaring themselves “Asian-Americans.” </p>
<p>I don’t know that this will so much be able to affect admissions, because schools really can have variable criteria to use in acceptance, such as geographical location, instate status, etc. But personally I think it will affect how people see the aggregate group, if there is enough of this going on.</p>
<p>Actually I have to thank that website for getting me to appreciate Swarthmore even more for its fairness in admissions. What a great place it is.</p>
<p>I agree that we need more statistics. but at lease based on the limited papers I read , I saw the statistics showing asian are treated unfairly, like the original quote I posted, I am posting it again so you can see it : ( which by the way was actually copied from collegialmom’s post)</p>
<p>“The University of Michigan may be poised for a similar leap in Asian-American enrollment, now that voters in that state have banned affirmative action. The Center for Equal Opportunity study found that, among applicants with a 1240 SAT score and 3.2 grade point average in 2005, the university admitted 10% of Asian-Americans, 14% of whites, 88% of Hispanics and 92% of blacks. Asian applicants to the university’s medical school also faced a higher admissions bar than any other group.”</p>
<p>"According to the study, without affirmative action the acceptance rate for African-American candidates likely would fall nearly two-thirds, from 33.7 percent to 12.2 percent, while the acceptance rate for Hispanic applicants likely would be cut in half, from 26.8 percent to 12.9 percent. While these declines are dramatic, the authors note that the long-term impact could be worse.
…
Removing consideration of race would have little effect on white students, the report concludes, as their acceptance rate would rise by merely 0.5 percentage points. Espenshade noted that when one group loses ground, another has to gain – in this case it would be Asian applicants. Asian students would fill nearly four out of every five places in the admitted class not taken by African-American and Hispanic students, with an acceptance rate rising from nearly 18 percent to more than 23 percent. "</p>
<p>why is that? when AA is removed, why it’s not white people who take over the places that black/hispanic lost? why it’s asian ? someone enlighten me please that it’s not because asian was treated unfairly under the consideration of race but otherwise.</p>
<p>I personally do not agaist AA at all, I think Affirmative action benefits the society and human being as a whole. However, if Asian is the only victim ( for lack of better word I can think of at this moment ) of it and no one even want to acknowledge it, it’s annoying .</p>
<p>Collegialmom. Banding together across groups for political purposes is a time-honored tradition in America. Individual people seeing those same groups as all of a kind also, unfortunately, has a long history around the world that I think we all hope eventually disappears.</p>
<p>Amother. When kids with the higher grades and SATS don’t get in and others do, it’s not necessarily a fact that there is discrimination based on race. The discrimination, as everyone here keeps pointing out, may be based on $$$, athletic abilities, or personal characteristics. There is no higher principle that mandates that grades and SATs must be the prime consideration in admissions. It may be that if you don’t accept the African American kids the CHARACTERISTICS of the white kids seem most to make up for the lost African-American kids. As I said, discrimination is not yet a fact. Discrimination is if someone says, “Wait, we don’t want any more Asians even if on ALL criteria they are the best.” And so far there is no proof of that.</p>
<p>Let me quote the reseach result one more time, this research is done by priceton professor Dr.Thomas J. Espenshade and published in Social Science Quarterly, June 2005 …</p>
<p>"According to the study, without affirmative action the acceptance rate for African-American candidates likely would fall nearly two-thirds, from 33.7 percent to 12.2 percent, while the acceptance rate for Hispanic applicants likely would be cut in half, from 26.8 percent to 12.9 percent. While these declines are dramatic, the authors note that the long-term impact could be worse.
…
Removing consideration of race would have little effect on white students, the report concludes, as their acceptance rate would rise by merely 0.5 percentage points. Espenshade noted that when one group loses ground, another has to gain – in this case it would be Asian applicants. Asian students would fill nearly four out of every five places in the admitted class not taken by African-American and Hispanic students, with an acceptance rate rising from nearly 18 percent to more than 23 percent. "</p>
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<p>the report precisely mentioned " if removing consideration of race…Asian applicants would fill nearly four out of every five places not taken by african-american and hispanic students…", it said clearly it’s ‘the race’ that’s at play. You admit it or not, to me it’s an obvious fact of discrimination of race.</p>
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<p>How do you know it’s not writen in somewhere in the admission process or it’s an unwriten yet be followed rule? otherwise how can above quoted results can even exists?</p>
<p>Also are you saying if it’s not spoken loadly and publicly, that means it’s not exist? When did Enron’s chiefs Kenneth Lay ever delcare that he is stealing people’s money? never, then did he do it? everyone knows the answer.</p>
<p>As a mater of fact, I wish you or other CC’ers can provide me some facts/data so I can be convinced that Asian do not have higher admission bar and asian are not discriminated because of their race in the process of college admission.</p>
<p>You are falling into the trap the authors of these reports want you to fall into. You are allowing them to manipulate you.</p>
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<p>A member here, Hoedown, is associated with UMich (faculty I believe) and has been personally involved in admissions policy at the University. He has examined the underlying data supplied the authors of the report. They hand-picked a particular data point (1270 SATS and 3.2 GPA) to highlight their agenda. However, when he looked at the underlying data, the UMich has virtually no applicants with those stats – I believe he said 5 black applicants from that data point. </p>
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<p>You need to read the underlying report. The authors are very clear that this “conclusion” is based on a hypothetical scenario in which SAT scores are the ONLY criteria for admissions.</p>
<p>Of course students with the highest SAT scores would be accepted at higher rates under that hypothetical example. That’s obvious. But, elite college admissions are NOT based solely on SAT scores. In fact, at highly-selective colleges, SAT scores play a minor role in admissions. There are, reportedly, countries where university admissions are based solely on test scores. The United States higher education system does not, and never has, worked that way. Therefore, the conclusion of the study cited here is not valid in the real world and the authors acknowledge that.</p>
<p>I’ve given you a ton of data from Swarthmore:</p>
<p>a) Asian American enrollment has risen logrithmically from 1% in 1976 to 16% today, a period of just 30 years.</p>
<p>b) Asian American students got 21% of the acceptances this year – a rate FIVE times the proportion of Asian Americans in the general population.</p>
<p>c) The Asian American acceptance rate is 36% – 1.6 times the overall acceptance rate for the school.</p>
<p>In light of this data, which is comparable to most highly-selective colleges and universities in the northeast, how can anyone argue that Asian Americans are being discriminated against?</p>
<p>Do Asian American students have higher SAT scores, on average, than African American students at the same school? Probably. So what? The African American students probably have desireable attributes that the Asian American students don’t have. The goal of colleges admissions is to enroll a diverse class that has strengths in many different areas. The issue is whether Asian Americans are being excluded by the admissions process. Since they are being enrolled in record numbers and are the only ethnic group overrepresented in enrollment (wildly overrepresented), they are clearly not being excluded. What more data do you need?</p>
<p>Do I think that some schools are more welcoming of Asian Americans – both in terms of admissions and campus culture? Yes. The same would be true for any group of students. Preppie students. Jocks. Math geeks. Gay students. Black students. Art students. Theater types. And so on and so forth.</p>
<p>Amother, I can’t prove to you that it doesn’t exist. But you said it was a fact that it does exist. It isn’t yet a fact as facts are understood in America. And believe it or not, I’m on your side as far as the eventual outcome, IF what you want is a level playing field for all regardless of race. Although I do believe part of that level playing field for the time being is atoning for harm done to African Americans and Latinos in past history. </p>
<p>But I think statements that something is a fact when it’s not a fact hurt your case.</p>
<p>It is a fact, however, that stereotypes, pernicious stereotypes, about Asians permeate America. Let’s focus on that instead of on college admissions. It’s much more damaging and racist if Asian Americans never get made CEO in large American companies, don’t sit on corporate boards, are rarely elected Senator, do not make the Managing Committee at top law firms, and don’t run prestigious American universities than if all the Asian Americans who get 2400 on their SATs fail to get into Princeton.</p>
<p>From Alumother: “Collegialmom. Banding together across groups for political purposes is a time-honored tradition in America. Individual people seeing those same groups as all of a kind also, unfortunately, has a long history around the world that I think we all hope eventually disappears.”</p>
<p>Reply: I don’t care if Asian-Americans want to lump themselves together for admissions purposes. Another poster was lamenting this was happening, and that the subgroups within this category are so vastly different. </p>
<p>As far as I am concerned, the group of Asian-Americans as a whole has a good thing going in college admissions and are ruining a lot of goodwill with their whining and complaining about having to going to Yale vs Princeton. I think that anyone who whines like this should immediately have to go to the worst-ranked school closest to thieir parents’ house with no need or merit based scholarship assistance.</p>
<p>When I first saw Li’s story, I thought his complaint was ridiculous, because the college admissions process is so selective that many more qualified kids get denied than get accepted. However, I could understand why many Asians feel that colleges have “quotas.”</p>
<p>But now that I’m seeing those statistics from Swarthmore, my opinion has shifted.</p>
<p>Why on earth should Asians be accepted at a rate of 36%, when the overall acceptance rate is 20%? Why should the freshmen class have 20% Asians when Asians make up a much smaller fraction of the population?</p>
<p>Seems to me that there is an argument to be made that there might be some perfectly qualified whites or blacks or Hispanics who are being rejected so Asians can fill seats at these schools.</p>
<p>And is it possible that many of those rejected students are highly qualified women?</p>
<p>So if I were a litigious sort of person, should I sue because my daughter didn’t get accepted somewhere while an Asian took her place?</p>
<p>Because it seems to me that there might be a much stronger case to make that women are now being discriminated against because of their gender. </p>
<p>And we have lots of evidence of that discrimination. We’ve got that NY Times op ed piece from the admissions director at Kenyon, and statistics from lots of schools that show large gaps of acceptance rates between men and women, where a significantly higher percentage of male applicants are accepted.</p>
<p>Instead of suggesting that Asians are being discriminated against, seems to me someone could argue they are getting unreasonably favorable treatment from college admissions offices, since they are accepted at a higher rate than other students. And that their high rate of acceptance must be hurting other qualified students.</p>
Alumother: Then white people and black people should be equally offended. Quite a large group of countries and cultures are lumped together in those categories, too.</p>
<p>Collegial: Good point that it is Mr. Li’s advocacy gorup that is doing the lumping when it suits them.</p>
<p>Amother: Hines Ward, MVP of Superbowl 2006, is Korean.</p>
<p>The Asian-applicant cliche is that it’s Ivy or bust. If that’s true, then top LACs like Swarthmore may accept ethnic Asian kids at a higher rate in order to maintain diversity. The overall Asian population at Swat is only about 15% – not much higher than Princeton’s, and at a school with 0 football recruits, so that 15% may be a smaller percentage of the “general population” than Princeton’s 13% is.</p>
<p>Also, with small schools like Swat, absolute numbers are a concern, too. Putting one Korean, one Tamil, and one Hawaiian Islander in a room and telling them that they’re the Asian Students Association won’t make anyone very happy. With only about 55 Asian kids per class, if you factor in only gross categories like international vs. American, South Asian vs. ethnic Chinese vs. other (Korean, Japanese, Pac Islander, etc.), Christian vs. Hindu vs. Muslim vs. Buddhist vs. Other, Swat probably struggles in a way the larger Us don’t to get enough critical mass in each major category that kids have a chance to feel welcome and comfortable.</p>
<p>“The Asian-applicant cliche is that it’s Ivy or bust.”</p>
<p>Typical stereotype. </p>
<p>don’t blacks, hispanic or whites think the same? Actually, asians would pick and choose the college based on the ranking in their particular field of study. For many others going to an ivy is ‘nirvana’. Many believe no ivy attendance is like sitting in the back of a yellow bus.</p>
<p>“mini: If the institutions or the students disappeared?”</p>
<p>The instititutions. They are increasingly irrelevant to long-term needs, and long-term trends, in American education. They turn out a shrinking proportion of inventors, writers, fortune 500 executives, Nobel Prize winners, senators, congresspeople, diplomats, actors, athletes, and top chefs. (Not bankers, but that has more to do with their connections going in than coming out.) They have grown less economically diverse in the past 25 years, and will likely continue to do so, representing a smaller and smaller slice of American society. </p>
<p>They are all very fine schools, of course (or they should be, given all the money they have), even if many of them can’t seem to get a handle on the tide of incipient alcoholism.</p>
<p>"“The Asian-applicant cliche is that it’s Ivy or bust.”</p>
<p>Typical stereotype. "</p>
<p>Simba, again, by calling it a stereotype, you attempt to dismiss with a mere sleigh of the hand a phenomenom that is VERY prevalent. I understand you love to play the devil’s advocate, but after reading the boards for a number of years, you’d be hard pressed to reject the notion that asian ARE applying to the highest ranking schools in a disproportionate manner. Right here on CC, one can find lists of potential schools that have as SOLE common denominator the fact that the schools belong to the Ivy League or were ranked in the top 10 by US News reports. Having gone through the exercise for your son, I hope you’d agree with me that applicants should not really consider ALL eight Ivies to offer … the best fit. Are schools such as Penn or Cornell really similar to Princeton or Dartmouth? Aren’t there enough differences between Columbia and Brown that their applicants pool should not be one and the same? </p>
<p>Further, despite representing an exercise in absolute futility, you may want to list the racial distribution of the applicants of the top schools ranked by USNews and draw your own conclusion. Mine were that the percentage of asian applicants drop in tandem with the rankings, be on a national basis or a state basis (a la California.) For a simpler test, compare the applicants at Wellesley and Smith, and try to explain the vastly different numbers at two schools that are --or should be-- almost identical. </p>
<p>Lastly, I believe you’ll find the “Ivy or bust” syndrome to be a parental issue, and mostly one created by recent immigrants. But again, you may want to explain the differences between the overall population and the number of asian applicants at the top schools with different arguments.</p>
<p>I identified the “Ivy or bust” mentality as a cliche. I certainly didn’t mean to suggest that it’s universally true, but since I have been reading CC one of the things that has surprised me is how true that is for ethnic Chinese kids especially. Very few top performing ethnic Chinese kids seem to consider LACs at all, whereas many equivalent white students do. I think if you looked at application patterns by ethnicity, you would see very marked differences among similar kids from different ethnic groups. Not absolute differences, of course, but different distributions of the institutions to which the kids apply.</p>
<p>Look, you know that’s true from this thread. Princeton and Swarthmore: two institutions whose students are nearly identical from the standpoint of GPAs and test scores, both very high prestige, only about 60 miles apart. They have close to the same percentage of Asian kids in their student bodies. Want to bet that the acceptance rate for Asian applicants to Princeton is nowhere near 38%? In fact, I think it’s well below Princeton’s general acceptance rate (which is about 10%), whereas the number at Swarthmore is more than 1.5x it’s general acceptance rate (22%). Asian kids probably constitute about twice the percentage of total applicants at Princeton vs. Swarthmore.</p>
<p>JHS,
I also would bet that due to their not applying to LACS that much, Asians are highly sought after students at LACs including many of the top ones. From what i can figure out, they are highly sought out by Grinnell, Davidson and probably places like Bowdoin and Bates. There probably are top LACs that also would give Asians an admissions advantage.</p>
<p>Also the traits that many Asians have – being students who were extremely focused on studying and weren’t as interested in ECs – probably are more valued at LACs, which pride themselves on producing many students who eventually get doctorates. Places like HPY are more interested in producing leaders in a variety of fields, not scholars, which is why such colleges put a lot of emphasis on ECs in admission.</p>