Should it be harder for Asians to get into good schools?

[Archbob]

Asians in generally study and work harder in grade school. Why should they not have better luck getting into a good college?

Its really not test-prep oppurtunities or all that Jazz, its really the parents and the culture that makes the differences. Given equal social-economic level. Asians will perform whites and the other minorities because our family and community pushes us for academic excellence much more than other communities.

 

[Flying Pig]

Asians in generally study and work harder in grade school. Why should they not have better luck getting into a good college?

Its really not test-prep oppurtunities or all that Jazz, its really the parents and the culture that makes the differences. Given equal social-economic level [my edition: and assuming that equal amounts of that are spent on 'educational' stuff]. Asians will perform whites and the other minorities because our family and community pushes us for academic excellence much more than other communities.

Which is a huge assumption that very rarely works in practice.

 

[luiz]

As a fairly obvious white male (though my huge penis size might throw the color blind measurers off track), I got affirmative action. I even got into law school ahead whites, blacks, asians, hispanics, etc. with higher undergraduate GPAs than me. I have no problem with race being a factor among several. I am interested in this nose measuring business though - which American universities have resorted to this that you know of? Do you consider it a flaw that they have not?

AA for whites is just as wrong as AA for anybody else...

The point about measuring skulls and noses is real. If you institute a policy that race X has preferential treatment (which might be a quota, an extra point, or just preference in case there's a tie) that means you have to define who belongs to race X. A poster here already mentioned part asian kids listing their ethnicity as anything but asian. I know of a pair of identical twins, who happened to be light-skinned mulattos, where one got accepted as "black" by the university, and thus got into a quota for blacks, while the other was denied. I find the notion of determing what race other people belong to repugnant. In fact I find analysing race in any way, even if it is to supposedely "help" the "oppressed race", to be an abhorrent idea. Shouldn't we be beyond judging people by the color of their skin by now?

 

[Traitorfish]

I think that it is possible to acknowledge the existence of race as a social category without being obliged to accept the concept of race as a biological category. There's no need to be so, and I pray that you'll forgive the inadvertent pun, black and white about it.

 

[Camikaze]

AA is meant to redress inequality of opportunity, but where do you measure it from? If measured from birth or primary schooling, then a lot of Asians, at least here, where we have a lot of first or second generation migrants in the some of the poorest areas of the south-west of the city, would be disadvantaged in terms opportunity. If AA is looking at that, then it should not necessarily be trying to equalise the outcome, but compensate for the unequal opportunity. However, once you get past primary schooling, there is a very high intake of Asian students into selective high schools, which give them a great advantage in terms of opportunity. When looking at university admissions, should there be compensation for the initial lack of opportunity, or compensation to others who have not received the advantage of attending a selective school? There's more than one level of opportunity to look at. If anything the former would make sense; someone shouldn't be disadvantaged if they have manufactured an advantageous position out of a poor socio-economic background.

Of course, this isn't going to be the case for all Asians at all, either. Not all Asians live in the south-west suburbs or come from lower-income families, and not all Asians attend selective schools. I'm really not opposed to the principle of racially based AA, but at least in the Australian context, it simply doesn't make much sense to apply that as a criterion in this case (specifically with regards to Asians). The determinant factor, if anything, is the socio-economic background. We also have what I think is a far fairer system based on state-wide high school testing, and university admission (apart from a few courses) is based purely on academic merit. There is not the need to redress Oxbridge style institutional bias in selection. But then, we don't have colleges in the same sense either; the majority of people commute to uni and live at home. And the situation with regards to Asian advantage/disadvantage is probably different in the US too. So it's hard to say how applicable this is to American unis.

 

[Archbob]

Which is a huge assumption that very rarely works in practice.

Time and dedication is up to each individual family, you can't legislate that. That should not be taken into consideration when making AA policy decisions.

 

[Flying Pig]

Time and dedication is up to each individual family, you can't legislate that. That should not be taken into consideration when making AA policy decisions.

It depends. Clearly a student who can get the arbitrary 90% in their exam without any extra help is better than one who gets 90% after years of tuition in that exam. Furthermore, should we 'discriminate' against students for coming from bad families?

 

[innonimatu]

You don't come and demand that someone with inferior results is included in the team "because, being from underprivileged background, he couldn't afford to train".

If we're going for social equality, acting at the college entrance level is way too late.

I think that Yeekim and Murky were actually arguing the same thing, and it's a fair point.
I'm just not sure that there would be a willingness to actually do enough to level the field from an early age. That's require a society were everything but entertainment were accessible to all families. Which is in stark contrast with the present world where politicians are cutting welfare, withdrawing labor protections, allowing increases in income inequality, legislating ever more legal monopolies, privatizing what were formerly essential public services and/or placing tolls on access to such services, and so on...

 

[Terxpahseyton]

I once watched a late night philosophical talk show with political relevance (publicly funded TV will give you that) where a renowned academic guy with a fondness for statistics claimed that statics show that before a kid even gets to be a teenager there is a statistic certainty of over 90% how this kid will do later in life with regards to leading a productive life.
Meaning yes - college entrance seems way too late to address inequality.
And the best time to do so is supposedly kindergartens and elementary schools. After that, "lost" kids pretty much are that - lost. Statistically speaking anyway.

Now I suppose the great thing about a welfare state is that governments are forced to deal with this. Because in contrast to America where you can just let them rot - in Germany we will have to pay for his or her living. And if we allow failed households to breed failed children, we face the threat of an epidemic of failed households which in the end will become too much bear --> breakdown of the wellfare state.
A countermeasure is special kindergartens and special elementary schools (more money, more staff, more individual and ambitious educational concepts) for underprivileged children. The statistics guy claimed those to be the only chance we have to save the German welfare state. And according to him, this is also happening (it in deed is not unheard of, but never made the news in the dimensions portrayed by this guy).

Admittedly, I am not talking about exactly the same issue here. But I think it allows to draw some conclusion for the topic of the thread as well.

 

[JollyRoger]

The point about measuring skulls and noses is real.

If it's real, point me to a school that does it.

 

[Zelig]

Asians in generally study and work harder in grade school. Why should they not have better luck getting into a good college?

Because colleges should select based on intelligence, rather than results of tests that can be studied for.

 

[Takhisis]

So you'd be keen on getting someone like Dustin Hoffman's Rain man in at any cost?

 

[Camikaze]

I don't really understand the idea that tests aren't a reasonably good reflection of actual intelligence. They can be studied for, sure, but everyone can study for them, and the more intelligent you are, the better you will be able to study, or to turn that study into results. It's of course not going to be completely accurate (if you fluke a test, or if someone intelligent just doesn't study), but is anyone seriously contending that some other arbitrary criteria (entrance based on interview questions, for instance) is? There are certainly problems with standardised testing, but basing university admission on academic achievement would certainly seem to be a reasonable way of reflecting intelligence.

Either way, why should those that work hard to get a good result be considered less worthy of a university place than someone who gets a good result more based on natural talent? Both have demonstrated the capacity to get the same result.

 

[cybrxkhan]

For some, the problem with tests is not the tests in and of themselves, but rather that the tests are relied on too heavily as an indicator of intelligence (or at least most people convince themselves that it is one of the most important indicators).

 

[Archbob]

Because colleges should select based on intelligence, rather than results of tests that can be studied for.

I don't agree with that. Work ethic is equally as important as intelligence. Getting good grades throughout school and scoring well on exams as well as participating in extra-cirriculars means you actually care about going somewhere in life.

Tests can be studied for by anyone. Old tests are readily available online and schools themselves have resources.

I'm just not sure that there would be a willingness to actually do enough to level the field from an early age. That's require a society were everything but entertainment were accessible to all families.

Most of the problem is in the families themselves. You can try to create equality all you want but you can't command parents to actually give a crap about their child's education.

 

[luiz]

If it's real, point me to a school that does it.

UNB and UERJ (that I know of) have denied people AA for not having enough black facial features.

 

[Murky]

I think that Yeekim and Murky were actually arguing the same thing, and it's a fair point.
I'm just not sure that there would be a willingness to actually do enough to level the field from an early age. That's require a society were everything but entertainment were accessible to all families. Which is in stark contrast with the present world where politicians are cutting welfare, withdrawing labor protections, allowing increases in income inequality, legislating ever more legal monopolies, privatizing what were formerly essential public services and/or placing tolls on access to such services, and so on...

We need to vote the bad politicians out and put good people in their place. The problem with that is that when people go to the polls they don't see it like that. This is especially true in regressive states like Texas and Kansas. The people there are hell bent on electing people who are most like them. They are deeply religious to the point of promoting ignorance. The people with money like huge income gaps because they like having a lot more wealth than everyone else. It gives them more influence over politics. This why creationist get elected to run the school boards. That is why governor Rick Perry won't touch the rainy day fund instead of cutting funding for public education. The last thing rich Texans want is equality.

 

[Traitorfish]

UNB and UERJ (that I know of) have denied people AA for not having enough black facial features.

That probably says more about the ill-advisedness of importing North American methods into Latin American societies than anything else.

 

[downtown]

Yeah, the idea of using facial features or something is nuts to me. In the US, it's 100% self-reported. Using anything else seems like a horrible idea.

I think we may be able to get around this problem if we stopped the silly notion that college merit = standardized test performance. I think that is increasingly a silly metric.

 

[luiz]

That probably says more about the ill-advisedness of importing North American methods into Latin American societies than anything else.

Considering that there are over 50 million people of Latin American origin in the USA, and that 50% of the ALL american kids belong to some ethnic minority, one wonders how well do those North American methods work in North America. There is no shortage of mulattos, asian-hispanics, and every possible mix in the USA.

The US is the third most populous Latin American country.