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-   -   Asians checking "white" as college entrance strategy (http://cellar.org/showthread.php?t=26436)

Undertoad 12-03-2011 09:44 PM

Asians checking "white" as college entrance strategy
 
http://news.yahoo.com/asians-college...174442977.html

Quote:

Lanya Olmstead was born in Florida to a mother who immigrated from Taiwan and an American father of Norwegian ancestry. Ethnically, she considers herself half Taiwanese and half Norwegian. But when applying to Harvard, Olmstead checked only one box for her race: white.

"I didn't want to put 'Asian' down," Olmstead says, "because my mom told me there's discrimination against Asians in the application process."

For years, many Asian-Americans have been convinced that it's harder for them to gain admission to the nation's top colleges.
This is part of an overall trend where Asians are counted as "whites" for ethnicity purposes, at least in the US, both by accident and on purpose.

jimhelm 12-03-2011 10:13 PM

Well, why not?

Why is Mariah Carey considered black? Why the hell are there even boxes like that to check?

SamIam 12-03-2011 10:14 PM

Colleges and universities have traditionally used race based admissions as a means of affirmative action and a way of increasing the diversity of the student body. I doubt if institutions of higher education are exactly discriminating against Asians. Since Asians tend to score so well on SAT's etc., the pool of qualified Asian applicants is larger than that of other minority groups. So, a policy that started out as a way to get qualified minority students a college education has back fired in the case of the Asian population.

However, there are still many schools that admit students solely on the basis of their high school GPA, SAT scores, etc. The majority of Asian students have no difficulty in getting in to these colleges.

In what other instances are Asians counted as white? :confused:

glatt 12-04-2011 07:46 AM

Many colleges have "quotas." They don't call them that, but they do. They try to get a diverse student body, so they track all the different pigeon holes each applicant can fit into.

I live in Arlington VA, and the schools here are outstanding. But it's very hard for a student in Arlington to get into UVA because there are so many top students from Arlington applying to that top state school. It isn't enough to have straight As and perfect SAT scores.

But a student from the hills of western Virginia and a B average and 75th percentile SAT score can get into UVA without a problem.

Griff 12-04-2011 08:07 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by SamIam (Post 777518)
I doubt if institutions of higher education are exactly discriminating against Asians. Since Asians tend to score so well on SAT's etc., the pool of qualified Asian applicants is larger than that of other minority groups. So, a policy that started out as a way to get qualified minority students a college education has back fired in the case of the Asian population.

So they are "exactly" discriminating against Asians. I get the idea that schools want a diverse population, but they are discriminating, there is no denying it. College admissions can never be "fair" so the schools set goals for what they want to look like. I know Cornell has slots reserved for kids from rural upstate NY. They still need to be excellent students and it doesn't hurt to be a ranked wrestler or runner.

SamIam 12-04-2011 10:44 AM

I agree, Griff. I guess what I was trying to say is that admissions discrimination is not about some sort of Jim Crow type attitude. Its like what Glatt said.

When I attended the University of Colorado back in the paleolithic, admissions were strictly based on SATs and standing in your high school graduating class. I lived in a woman's boarding house, and out of ten of us, two were Asian. One was a Japanese from Hawaii, and the other was a Chinese girl from Lebanon. I was fascinated by those two - they seemed so exotic to me.

Lamplighter 12-04-2011 11:03 AM

This whole thing about white vs asian vs black vs me :eyebrow:

Remember in 2000 all the ads on TV trying to get Hispanics to not avoid the census.
The Census Bureau divides Hispanics into "white" vs "non-white" !

Check boxes for racial/ethic identity are a plague for programmers,
and I've never figured out what real information is to be gained from it
or how the data can used accurately.

Lola Bunny 12-04-2011 11:15 AM

Well, in the article, what Asian students are saying is that if you're Asian, your SAT score and GPA has to be even higher than average just to be considered because most Asians have straight A's and very high SAT scores. And as Glatt pointed out, there's quotas for diversity.

footfootfoot 12-04-2011 11:50 AM

Fred Astaire gets all the mad props but Ginger Rogers had to do the same steps backwards and in high heels.

That's the reason I always checked "Aleutian Islander" on my applications.

classicman 12-04-2011 12:07 PM

So there trying to take the spots of us dumb white people ... great.

Griff 12-04-2011 12:12 PM

[Tonto]Who is us white man?[/Tonto]

Smart move though, the poop would hit the fan if they checked African-American.

Aliantha 12-04-2011 04:01 PM

Official forms over here usually ask your country of birth followed up by residency status, but the only question about race as far as I can ever recall is whether you might be aboriginal or torres straight islander, and that's just because you'd get assistance for things like going to uni etc or for some health issues associated with those groups.

As Jim said, I don't see what the hell the relevance is. It's outright racism to discriminate against any applicant based on what they look like. Students should be protesting this instead of some of the other shit stupid things they protest about.

Aliantha 12-04-2011 04:02 PM

And to add to that, most asian people I know have lighter skin than I do.

Rhianne 12-04-2011 04:18 PM

I've been to Asia. I saw it all in an afternoon.

classicman 12-04-2011 06:28 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Aliantha (Post 777611)
It's outright racism to discriminate against any applicant based on what they look like. Students should be protesting this instead of some of the other shit stupid things they protest about.

Yebbut, reverse racism happens everyday and not just in test scores being lower for some groups (non-white) than others.

Aliantha 12-04-2011 08:30 PM

I'm not sure what you mean classic, but my response to that would be that if asian students do so much better than 'white' (and I use inverted comas because I think the term white is highly subjective anyway) students, then maybe white students need to have a look at why.

classicman 12-04-2011 08:40 PM

I was actually referring to job application tests where Caucasians who scored higher than non-caucasians still were not hired because of minority quotas that had to be filled.

Aliantha 12-04-2011 08:42 PM

OH yeah, well that's not fair either.

Lamplighter 12-04-2011 09:49 PM

Then too, there are the non-whites who score higher than the whites.

And throughout their career they are believed to be less qualified,
and are getting the degree or job only as part of an alleged quota system.

Classic, I believe you have better ideas than this one.

classicman 12-04-2011 10:05 PM

I never implied it was a one way situation.

Cyber Wolf 12-04-2011 11:35 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Aliantha (Post 777611)
As Jim said, I don't see what the hell the relevance is. It's outright racism to discriminate against any applicant based on what they look like. Students should be protesting this instead of some of the other shit stupid things they protest about.

Students are protesting it. This was in the news as recently as ~2 months ago.

regular.joe 12-05-2011 01:04 AM

I am truly looking forward to a time when we will be Americans, at least here in the United States. Then we will not have to fill quotas based on what we look like, or where we grew up.

The way I see it, the more we call attention to our differences...the more we call attention to our differences.

DanaC 12-05-2011 04:32 AM

But the reason you're calling attention to your differences is because there was a grotesue disparity in opportunity and life chances between 'whites' and other ethnic groups.

For all the inherent unfairnesses in the positive discrimination systems, they have served to ameliorate some of the worst excesses of institutional racism which underpinned society at the time those systems were devised. However unfair and grotesque the anomalies thrown up by those systems (such as the highly qualified white man passed over in favour of a less qualified asian man) they barely shake the dish on that side of the scales compared to the weight of unfairness that existed, and some would argue still exists in large part on the other side.

infinite monkey 12-05-2011 07:16 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lamplighter (Post 777681)
Then too, there are the non-whites who score higher than the whites.

And throughout their career they are believed to be less qualified,
and are getting the degree or job only as part of an alleged quota system.

Oh yeah, like women. :cool:

Lamplighter 12-05-2011 08:19 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Cyber Wolf (Post 777701)

This article belongs in The Proud Parent Thread. :rolleyes:

Spexxvet 12-05-2011 08:32 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by regular.joe (Post 777705)
I am truly looking forward to a time when we will be Americans, at least here in the United States. Then we will not have to fill quotas based on what we look like, or where we grew up.

The way I see it, the more we call attention to our differences...the more we call attention to our differences.

I'm looking forward to a time when we will be Earthlings.

Spexxvet 12-05-2011 08:36 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by classicman (Post 777657)
I was actually referring to job application tests where Caucasians who scored higher than non-caucasians still were not hired because of minority quotas that had to be filled.

Unfortunately, it's so much more common for the good-old-white-boy network to pass over a more qualified monority to give a job to a god-old-white-boy that these quotas are required. Yes, they are STILL required.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Aliantha (Post 777611)
torres straight islander

Do you get more help if you're a torees Bi islander?

SamIam 12-05-2011 10:25 AM

Racism in this country is far from dead. It has just gone underground. For example, I have been told not to rent a room to anyone from Towaoc or Ignacio. These two towns are on the Ute reservation and are inhabited almost exclusively by Native Americans. We can't say "no Utes", but we can do the next best thing. This policy pisses me off so much that not only do I rent rooms to Utes from anywhere, I also give them the cheaper business rate.

If anyone asks me about this, I just say "They looked hispanic to me." :mad:

footfootfoot 12-05-2011 10:36 AM

You are all racists and you are ignoring me because I come from the Aleutian Islands.

infinite monkey 12-05-2011 10:45 AM

You Unangans all look alike! You're a swarthy, ruddy people.

Lamplighter 12-05-2011 10:45 AM

FT3, IM will rent you a room because Ale-uti-ans look hispanic

infinite monkey 12-05-2011 10:48 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lamplighter (Post 777826)
FT3, IM will rent you a room because Ale-uti-ans look hispanic

Heeeeee!

No, Sam will rent him a room.

Hell, I'll just give him one! :D

Lamplighter 12-05-2011 10:50 AM

Oooops, all reverse racists look alike to me.

infinite monkey 12-05-2011 10:51 AM

BWAAAAHAAHAAAA!

What's reverse peristalsis look like to you?

Lamplighter 12-05-2011 10:51 AM

:D

Spexxvet 12-05-2011 10:52 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by footfootfoot (Post 777818)
You are all racists and you are ignoring me because I come from the Aleutian Islands.

No, it's the third foot. We're footists.

TheMercenary 12-07-2011 09:37 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Undertoad (Post 777516)
http://news.yahoo.com/asians-college...174442977.html



This is part of an overall trend where Asians are counted as "whites" for ethnicity purposes, at least in the US, both by accident and on purpose.

Imagine that....


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