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Harvard Rated Asian-American Applicants Lower on Personality Traits: Lawsuit

102 points by poster123 8y ago

ardent_uno 8y ago
>"[Harvard] lashed out at the founder of Students for Fair Admissions, Edward Blum, accusing him of using Harvard in an effort to orchestrate a challenge to race-conscious admissions that would go to the Supreme Court." I feel that in 100 years we will look back on quotes like this and shake our heads at institutions like Harvard actually defending "race conscious admissions". Reward people that do well and hold them up as examples for other people to follow. Racial discrimination must end.
- uncletaco 8y ago
  > Reward people that do well and hold them up as examples for other people to follow. FTFY Also, I think that quote speaks more to what Edward Blum is trying to do. Blum wants to challenge "race-conscious admissions" at the level of the Supreme Court. But Harvard will probably try to prove that being "race-conscious" is only a small part of their admissions process, and not a make or break aspect of a candidate's application.
- preordained 8y ago
  >Reward groups that do well And what does that mean? Using GPA or standardized test scores as the _only_ criteria? If I have 10 people in the 99th percentile of test scores but I only have 5 seats, do I _really_ think the upper 5 who beat the lower 5 by a handful of points are the "best" fit, or are there other factors that might influence my decision? To me, these is like taking NFL players only based on their raw sprint and lift stats...yah, it's important...but it's in no way a firm indicator of "best".
  - ardent_uno 8y ago
    There are many ways to judge someone aside from "race", whatever race really means anyway. Race should have nothing to do with it. It shouldn't be part of the equation. That's the point. We don't have to restrict ourselves to test scores and GPA. Just don't be racist.
thucydidesofusa 8y ago
Is it any surprise that the admissions officers who preside over racially biased processes give such mealy mouth statements? So long as they don't say things that are overtly prejudiced against one group and affirm the progressive stack order, activist Judges seem to bless whatever they do.
ganzuul 8y ago
Why does a university have a personality test?
- Someone1234 8y ago
  That's how you maintain a certain reputation, create a harmonious atmosphere where nobody who would rock the boat gets in.
  - Nimitz14 8y ago
    Seems to me they're doing it to achieve the opposite effect (Asians are stereotypically the most docile).
- _jal 8y ago
  Because they want something that provides a subjective element for making decisions. Admissions is high-stakes for everyone, including Harvard. Having some opaque, non-mechanical criteria lets them pick and choose without giving as much of a lever to lawyers.
  - ed_balls 8y ago
    But why they need it?
    - cascom 8y ago
      Theoretically - so they can decide between two students that both had 4.0 GPAs, perfect SAT scores, and were class presidents, etc. Cynically - it gives them cover to manage to "other goals" and chalking it up to a subjective measure that can't be proved/disproved
- xapata 8y ago
  Many organizations create processes that are essentially random number generators. It allows bureaucrats to insert their personal preferences under a veneer of technocracy. Hang out at a corporate budget allocation meeting sometime.
poster123 8y ago
There may be racial differences in personality, but it is implausible that as the proportion of Asians in the high-achieving student population rises, their personalities get just worse enough that the fraction of Asian students at Harvard stays about the same. Harvard admits this when it says that what brings the Asian fraction down to 18% is "demographic". Elite universities are often accusing the broader society of racism, when in fact they are some of the most blatant perpetrators of racial discrimination.
- evanlivingston 8y ago
  I agree with you up until your last point. It's important to not confuse accusations made by the student body of a university with accusations made by the administration.
- pishpash 8y ago
  Institutions like Harvard play the same role for the aristocratic elites as Trump does for his base: keep things more or less the same as the good old days.
  - lainga 8y ago
    How is "accounting for a category called 'demographic,'... [pushing] up African-American and Hispanic numbers, while reducing whites and Asian-Americans" maintaining the "good old days"? Or are these stodgy elites just incompetent bunglers?
    - pishpash 8y ago
      That's just dividing the (small) minority pie between the 'others'. If African American or Hispanic numbers ever threaten to reach those of the Asian horde, you think they'd keep promoting diversity?
      - lainga 8y ago
        OK, first off, from TFA, "Harvard’s class of 2021 is 14.6 percent African-American, 22.2 percent Asian-American, 11.6 percent Hispanic and 2.5 percent Native-American or Pacific Islander, according to Harvard’s website." That leaves you with 49.1-percent white or Jewish, which I don't consider small pie. Second, I and my maternal ancestors haven't been part of a "horde" since Padishah Babur shacked up in the 16th century.
wozniacki 8y ago
From the horse's mouth: “We could fill our class twice over with valedictorians,” Harvard President Drew Gilpin Faust told an audience at the Aspen Ideas Festival, sponsored by the Aspen Institute and The Atlantic, on Monday. That means admissions officers rely on intangibles like interesting essays or particularly unusual recommendations to decide who comprises the 5.9 percent of applicants who get in. Faust's top tip for raising a Harvard man or woman: “Make your children interesting!” For parents and students alike, that’s both good news and bad news. The bad news is that of course it’s much easier to say that than to actually make it happen, though Faust recommended encouraging children to follow their passions as a way to develop an interesting personality. It’s much easier to complete a checklist, however daunting, than to actually be interesting.[1] [1] How to Get Into Harvard https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2014/06/how-to-get-into-harvard/373726/ https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2014/06/how-to...
- mlthoughts2018 8y ago
  “Make your children interesting,” Faust said, while rubbing her thumb against her index and middle fingers and winking at the audience.
  - ythn 8y ago
    I thought it was funny
  - JackFr 8y ago
    The thing is Harvard doesn't need your money. If your non-legacy family has the resources to make a big enough donation to move to move the needle, your likely to either: 1) get in anyway just based on who you are, or 2) not really care whether you go to Harvard or not because you're the scion of generational wealth.
    - mlthoughts2018 8y ago
      I think this is incorrect. It reminds me of The Simpsons' joke about Bill Gates, ("buy him out boys ... what, did you think I got rich by writing a bunch of checks?"). Harvard doesn't need anybody's money, but they sure aren't going to use endowment money to make things free. They want your money, regardless of whether or not they need it, whether it's a huge status-signaling donation or a drop in the ocean semester's worth of tuition. They absolutely are trying to optimize how to get that money, now and in the future. I also think you underestimate how much big scions of generational wealth compete for status symbols like Harvard degrees. Once things become decoupled from money, that type of status signaling only increases in importance, lending legitimacy to the children of foreign rulers and diplomats, acting as a currency to normalize political relations with western countries or between corporations with vastly different political party affiliations. Harvard sells status, and absolutely is looking at how to monetize that. If offering a pittance of tuition relief to underrepresented groups helps maintain their entrenched brand status, they'll do it because of the long term effect on their ability to monetize reputation, not in spite of. It also reminds me of how Harvard absolutely hounds graduates for donations, despite utterly not needing them by comparison to what Harvard Management Corporation does. Mike Reiss (Simpsons writer and Harvard alum) skewered this in [0], saying among other things, > "Harvard is like a bum who starts bugging you for spare change on the bus. And then follows you around for the rest of your life. Oh, and that bum already has $40 billion in the bank." [0]: < https://features.thecrimson.com/2014/fm-comedy-issue/article/mike-reiss-oxymorons/ https://features.thecrimson.com/2014/fm-comedy-issue/article... >
koops 8y ago
This case is important because many elite American colleges have quietly copied Harvard's 15% cap on Asian students.
jogjayr 8y ago
I can't help but think that college admissions based solely on test scores (as done in India, Russia, maybe China?), and nothing else, might be the least unfair way to judge applicants. Every admission system is unfair in some way but tests are a yardstick everyone understands and can optimize for. In India they publicly post the list of admitted students and their marks. Richer students may benefit from higher-quality test coaching but a) that happens today anyway and b) the Internet will ensure rapid dissemination of test-prep strategies for cheap or free The other downside is it might give you a more, for lack of a better word, boring student body at the higher levels. Fewer non-academic interests and achievements because every bit of spare time in high school was spent on studying. I thought the American system sounded better when I was a high-schooler in India with not good but not great marks ("surely they'd recognize my specialness despite my lower scores, even if these hidebound colleges in India won't!") but it does leave more room for implicit bias.
- tlholaday 8y ago
  Single-gate protocols reward investment in gate-deception.
  - johan_larson 8y ago
    Multi-gate protocols do that too. The investment just gets more complicated.
  - ksk 8y ago
    Any examples that are applicable here?
  - jogjayr 8y ago
    Multi-gate protocols increase amount of gate-deception investment required, making it harder only for economically- or socially-disadvantaged students to subvert them. With a single-gate protocol gate-deception investments have diminishing returns, which could (I'm not an expert) put participants on a more level playing field.
- acomjean 8y ago
danielfoster 8y ago
"Alumni interviewers give Asian-Americans personal ratings comparable to those of whites. But the admissions office gives them the worst scores of any racial group, often without even meeting them, according to Prof. Arcidiacono." I can't imagine the feeling of working so hard through elementary school, middle school, and high school to get into an Ivy League school, only for an admissions panel to declare me "low in personality" or too introverted. Harvard's admission criteria seem heavily based on outdated stereotypes of what makes an individual successful. I question if Ivy League schools are choosing the best applicants and by extension, how much prestige Ivy League degrees really deserve.
- klipt 8y ago
  America: "we only want highly skilled, highly educated immigrants." Also America: "these immigrants' children are too skilled and educated, and it's upsetting our racial quotas. We have to discriminate against them." America - you can work here, but don't dare dream that your children will be treated equally if you're from Asia. Of course, if you're from Europe your children will be lumped into the white demographic. If you're from Africa, your children may even benefit from affirmative action meant for the descendants of American slaves. Yay racial profiling!
  - Consultant32452 8y ago
    Harvard: there's more diversity between the races than within them.
- akhilcacharya 8y ago
  >I can't imagine the feeling of working so hard through elementary school, middle school, and high school to get into an Ivy League school, only for an admissions panel to declare me "low in personality" or too introverted. And yet, hundreds still get in. I went to a public school, not elite in the least, but I also worked hard throughout my K12 education like the folks you mention - and I’ll be honest, this continual focus on the tiny percentage of folks that didn’t get into Harvard but got into institutions of equivalent pedigree (one of the plaintiffs in an earlier NYT article goes to Duke) while my classmates have to struggle with a lack of opportunity and poor perceptions as a result of a lack of pedigree, even if they are hard working and talented. To me, it feels like a slap in the face. Am I wrong in thinking this?
leemailll 8y ago
Meanwhile uchicago decides to ditch sat http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/breaking/ct-university-chicago-sat-act-20180614-story,amp.html#click=https://t.co/rlHyJ6uZFB http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/breaking/ct-univers...
- threatofrain 8y ago
  That doesn't mean they are doing anything in a less evidence-based manner. They may have simply devised a superior empirical instrument; of course, if they have done so, then it ought be demonstrable.
jsilvers 8y ago
RadioLab ran an interesting episode about the person behind this lawsuit and other lawsuits against affirmative action in schools. His activism a double edged sword. https://www.wnycstudios.org/story/more-perfect-plaintiffs/ https://www.wnycstudios.org/story/more-perfect-plaintiffs/
- thucydidesofusa 8y ago
  What's the other edge to reducing racial discrimination?
baybal2 8y ago
I wonder if HN news algo reads my mind. In another news thread, I just pulled out the fact that Xiaomi electronics makes overwhelmingly superior gadgetry, yet can't break through the stigma of Asian "uncoolness" Situation for them is pretty much as it was with Toyota in its first decade in US, and them being greatly puzzled why Americans were so bent on buying Buicks over "twice as cheap, and twice as better" Corollas, and had total nil appetite for the supreme Corona. To authors of comments in line of "being a minority is actually a boon, statistics wise" I can say this: on the other side of "social invisibility" lies life of being "trophy" talent/socialite acquaintance/romantic partner, and, the most dreaded one, the life of diversity hire.
- randyrand 8y ago
  My Xiaomi Yi 4k has numerous basic issues. I'm really not sure they're superior. They're just cheaper. And cheap is rarely whats "cool". In fact it's usually the opposite.
- Grue3 8y ago
  Xiaomi created a stigma for themselves, by shamelessly copying Apple in everything including presentation style. [1] So I can't really take them seriously (doesn't help that I don't like Apple either). [1] https://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/05/business/global/in-china-an-empire-built-by-aping-apple.html?_r=0 https://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/05/business/global/in-china-...
nmeofthestate 8y ago
I guess the more woolly selection criteria are there so that racial discrimination can be conducted, otherwise the student population would be overwhelmingly asian with a large white minority?
- Jagat 8y ago
  It's possible. Controlling for grit and time spent not resting, being the best at anything demands a significant time investment in that activity. If you had just one hour a day, you could spend it either playing basketball or doing math. I'm not saying one is better than the other; just that if you do the former, you'll get better at basketball. If you do the latter, you'll do better at math. (I'm fully aware of studies that show that being athletic leads to sharper mind and better neuronal circuitry. But moderate physical activity is sufficient to have that effect. Being the best at football requires a lot of practice beyond just staying fit. Yes there are those who are really good at doing both. But that's an exception I'd surmise.)
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
- klipt 8y ago
  Nah it would be more like UC Berkeley, which is forbidden from using racial quotas by California law. Still less than half Asian. In fact the Asian numbers at Berkeley are probably inflated due to Asian students being discriminated against elsewhere (like Harvard) and going to Berkeley instead, so if all the universities stopped discriminating, the numbers would average out to lower than Berkeley's current demographic.
  - akhilcacharya 8y ago
    Also - Asian Americans comprise a larger percentage of California’s population.
cascom 8y ago
Just thinking out loud, but I would posit that high grades/scores and "personality scores" tend to be negatively correlated, regardless of race/or within a particular race (just as i would hazard that academics and athletic achievement are often negatively correlated). e.g. the kids with highest gpa's in a school are often not the most outgoing. Has anyone tried to control for this?
dnautics 8y ago
These sorts of subjective judgements can drive you crazy. My father (who was asian-american) had a civilian job with the United States government and a part time job with the United States navy. His civilian job, which was in the most corrupt branch of the executive branch, rated him as a poor performer personality wise and as having "no leadership potential". Nobody got the message, really since after this he took a temporary leave of absence and activated his us navy job as full time - as a captain (O6), the team he led delivered the first fully digitized, network inventory system which saved the navy on the order of billions of dollars. When he got back to his civilian job those negative reviews kept coming and he was denied promotions on those bases.
- thomzi12 8y ago
  Why didn’t he leave to the private sector?
  - dnautics 8y ago
    It's not a thing (some people) do when you've got a nice pension coming with value that gets higher the longer you stay.
rb808 8y ago
I read an article a while back that compared admissions process to a bouncer in a nightclub. Was the best description of why things are done as they are. As a hazy summary - the prestigious institutions try to have a mix of different types of people - rich people bring resources, well connected families bring influence & contacts, people with high test scores bring hard work and intelligence, achievers in arts/sports/activities bring hard work and desire to win, alumni children bring culture, loyalty and resources. Its no coincidence that there are different routes in for these different types of people. Its the unique mix that makes places like Harvard great. There are other schools that choose people with highest test scores - that is a different approach. Harvard has no obligation to do this. Given the track record of alumni to achieve, the Harvard approach seems to work much better if you consider routes to powerful & high achieving jobs to be the main outcome.
- thucydidesofusa 8y ago
  >Harvard has no obligation to do this. It's not clear what obligations a non-profit, private institution like Harvard might have, but that doesn't mean they have unlimited freedom to act how they want. Businesses (and to be clear, Harvard is chartered as a business) are expected to conduct their business in a non-discriminatory way. This is why restaurants aren't allowed to say "No Irish" or "No Blacks" anymore. Now, Harvard's actions aren't rising to the level of a Jim Crow diner, but they're certainly racially motivated to some degree and the issue is whether or not the degree of racial discrimination is permissible.
- fapjacks 8y ago
  Yes, yes. But what brings in the research dollars?
- jfnixon 8y ago
  Yes, yes, just look at the world today, built by Harvard graduates. It is the best of all possible worlds, isn't it?
  - sridca 8y ago
    The world is built by Harvard graduates? Who?
noetic_techy 8y ago
Funny how the activist at these universities cry "institutional racism" when in reality the only concrete verifiable evidence of it is their own institution. It makes no sense to cry about white privilege when you're actively holding down a race that is on pace and even outperforming whites in higher education and median income, and yet this very contradiction and others alludes people due to their own confirmation bias.
- thomzi12 8y ago
  Activists at an institution are very different people from the admissions personnel at an institution
  - noetic_techy 8y ago
    Are they? Seems like the vast majority are enablers, or at the least cowards / usefull idiots. Many espouse the same miopic ideology and feel it is thier duty to aqcuiesce to activist demands. Look at what happen at Evergreen. Look atbthe holloween costume controversy at Yale. How many speeking events have to be shut down before we start to admit the truth. Imagine if they were rating black and hispanic students lower in personality scores simply due to quotas. We’d call it what it is, outright racism.
Karishma1234 8y ago
This is newspeak for "Asians do not score well on parameters that don't matter in real life". Asian student community is remarkably focused on real results instead of pointless activism and social justice wars. Partly the reason they are high achievers in real life where as most kids who "do well on personality traits" turn out to be losers.
- azhu 8y ago
  > "parameters that don't matter in real life" Asian Americans are the least likely group in the US to be promoted to management. https://hbr.org/2018/05/asian-americans-are-the-least-likely-group-in-the-u-s-to-be-promoted-to-management https://hbr.org/2018/05/asian-americans-are-the-least-likely...
  - perl4ever 8y ago
    If that's so, it's interesting how many prominent CEOs there are. Just off the top of my head, Sundar Pichai and Satya Nadella come to mind.
  - Karishma1234 8y ago
    This has more to do with age and Chinese Exclusion Act. Most of the Indian/Chinese people are young and not in the age group where they will become CEOs. You will see a rapid increase in Indian/Chinese CEOs in next 10 years. As second generation Indians and Chinese would reach the age group of CEOs. Asians are dominating US colleges they will dominate US executives by 2040. Of course some of them might go back to India and China.
ggg9990 8y ago
What Harvard is trying to do is admit the people who will be national and global leaders 30 years from now, not the people who will get the best grades at Harvard. Since the country’s future leaders won’t be 60% Asian it doesn’t make sense for their class to be either.
- poster123 8y ago
  I don't think we should prejudge what the racial makeup of the country's future leadership should be and then use de facto racial quotas to match those assumptions.
  - ggg9990 8y ago
    I don’t think there should be racial quotas, de facto or otherwise, but if Harvard decided to only admit tall men with “upper management written all over them” that wouldn’t be irrational.
- linuxkerneldev 8y ago
  > the country’s future leaders won’t be 60% Asian huh? what? what scientific reason do you have for believing such a thing?
  - ggg9990 8y ago
    It’s not a scientific reason, it’s historical reasons. Look at the history of the US. 30 years from now it isn’t going to be a country run by its 5% Asian population.
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
dkural 8y ago
Well, why discriminate on US citizenship for that matter, if academic merit is the main criterion. Americans of any kind would be less than 10% of the student body. Harvard does not claim to be a purely academic meritocracy.
efgefgewfe 8y ago
It is time to phase out Affirmative Action, it not only hurt high achieving minorities but also those minorities that it is supposed to help. There are so many times where I have heard indirect comments that so and so got in only because he is the right minority. I see there is a lot resent among those who say they would have made it if it wasn't for AA. Trump is direct result of this resentment, and it will only get worse if we don't address this issue.
smsm42 8y ago
The "character and fitness" criteria has been instituted by Harvard in 1920s for a very simple purpose - to solve the "Jewish problem", i.e. too many Jews getting into Harvard. After Harvard's President A. Lawrence Lowell's proposal of outright Jewish quota met significant resistance, they had to find some way to keep the Jews out while not having outright ban. So they had "geographic diversity" and "character" criteria. And it did wonders - Jewish admission percentage fell to the coveted 15% that was the original quota target. Now the same old weapon is being deployed against the new "too many people of your kind here" target. http://www.businessinsider.com/the-ivy-leagues-history-of-discriminating-against-jews-2014-12 http://www.businessinsider.com/the-ivy-leagues-history-of-di...
dtawfik1 8y ago
The entire tech industry would not exist if we judged people based on this: In its admissions process, Harvard scores applicants in five categories — “academic,” “extracurricular,” “athletic,” “personal” and “overall.” They are ranked from 1 to 6, with 1 being the best.
deleted 8y ago
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abby_cohen_221 8y ago
There's a similar issue going on at the NYC elite public schools like Stuyvesant and Bronx Science. Mayor De Blasio is pushing to drop the entrance exams for those schools pretty much for the exact same reason. This guy discusses it in this Youtube video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QixRuK68lk4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QixRuK68lk4
seneca14 8y ago
While Jewish people make up less than 2% of the American population. They constitute 67% (yes you read correctly!) of Harvard graduates. In many cases "white privilege" is in fact Jewish privilege. Even after correcting for higher mean verbal IQ, there is still a high overrepresentation. Which leads to nepotism (Harvard leadership is predominantly Jewish) as the most likely explanation. This sounds to me like institutional racism against Asian- and European Americans. http://www.hillel.org/college-guide/list/record/harvard-university http://www.hillel.org/college-guide/list/record/harvard-univ... http://www.unz.com/runz/the-myth-of-american-meritocracy/ http://www.unz.com/runz/the-myth-of-american-meritocracy/

102 points by poster123 8y ago

>"[Harvard] lashed out at the founder of Students for Fair Admissions, Edward Blum, accusing him of using Harvard in an effort to orchestrate a challenge to race-conscious admissions that would go to the Supreme Court." I feel that in 100 years we will look back on quotes like this and shake our heads at institutions like Harvard actually defending "race conscious admissions". Reward people that do well and hold them up as examples for other people to follow. Racial discrimination must end.

uncletaco 8y ago
> Reward people that do well and hold them up as examples for other people to follow. FTFY Also, I think that quote speaks more to what Edward Blum is trying to do. Blum wants to challenge "race-conscious admissions" at the level of the Supreme Court. But Harvard will probably try to prove that being "race-conscious" is only a small part of their admissions process, and not a make or break aspect of a candidate's application.
preordained 8y ago
>Reward groups that do well And what does that mean? Using GPA or standardized test scores as the _only_ criteria? If I have 10 people in the 99th percentile of test scores but I only have 5 seats, do I _really_ think the upper 5 who beat the lower 5 by a handful of points are the "best" fit, or are there other factors that might influence my decision? To me, these is like taking NFL players only based on their raw sprint and lift stats...yah, it's important...but it's in no way a firm indicator of "best".
- ardent_uno 8y ago
  There are many ways to judge someone aside from "race", whatever race really means anyway. Race should have nothing to do with it. It shouldn't be part of the equation. That's the point. We don't have to restrict ourselves to test scores and GPA. Just don't be racist.

thucydidesofusa 8y ago

Is it any surprise that the admissions officers who preside over racially biased processes give such mealy mouth statements? So long as they don't say things that are overtly prejudiced against one group and affirm the progressive stack order, activist Judges seem to bless whatever they do.

ganzuul 8y ago

Why does a university have a personality test?

Someone1234 8y ago
That's how you maintain a certain reputation, create a harmonious atmosphere where nobody who would rock the boat gets in.
- Nimitz14 8y ago
  Seems to me they're doing it to achieve the opposite effect (Asians are stereotypically the most docile).
_jal 8y ago
Because they want something that provides a subjective element for making decisions. Admissions is high-stakes for everyone, including Harvard. Having some opaque, non-mechanical criteria lets them pick and choose without giving as much of a lever to lawyers.
- ed_balls 8y ago
  But why they need it?
  - cascom 8y ago
    Theoretically - so they can decide between two students that both had 4.0 GPAs, perfect SAT scores, and were class presidents, etc. Cynically - it gives them cover to manage to "other goals" and chalking it up to a subjective measure that can't be proved/disproved
xapata 8y ago
Many organizations create processes that are essentially random number generators. It allows bureaucrats to insert their personal preferences under a veneer of technocracy. Hang out at a corporate budget allocation meeting sometime.

poster123 8y ago

There may be racial differences in personality, but it is implausible that as the proportion of Asians in the high-achieving student population rises, their personalities get just worse enough that the fraction of Asian students at Harvard stays about the same. Harvard admits this when it says that what brings the Asian fraction down to 18% is "demographic". Elite universities are often accusing the broader society of racism, when in fact they are some of the most blatant perpetrators of racial discrimination.

evanlivingston 8y ago
I agree with you up until your last point. It's important to not confuse accusations made by the student body of a university with accusations made by the administration.
pishpash 8y ago
Institutions like Harvard play the same role for the aristocratic elites as Trump does for his base: keep things more or less the same as the good old days.
- lainga 8y ago
  How is "accounting for a category called 'demographic,'... [pushing] up African-American and Hispanic numbers, while reducing whites and Asian-Americans" maintaining the "good old days"? Or are these stodgy elites just incompetent bunglers?
  - pishpash 8y ago
    That's just dividing the (small) minority pie between the 'others'. If African American or Hispanic numbers ever threaten to reach those of the Asian horde, you think they'd keep promoting diversity?
    - lainga 8y ago
      OK, first off, from TFA, "Harvard’s class of 2021 is 14.6 percent African-American, 22.2 percent Asian-American, 11.6 percent Hispanic and 2.5 percent Native-American or Pacific Islander, according to Harvard’s website." That leaves you with 49.1-percent white or Jewish, which I don't consider small pie. Second, I and my maternal ancestors haven't been part of a "horde" since Padishah Babur shacked up in the 16th century.

wozniacki 8y ago

From the horse's mouth: “We could fill our class twice over with valedictorians,” Harvard President Drew Gilpin Faust told an audience at the Aspen Ideas Festival, sponsored by the Aspen Institute and The Atlantic, on Monday. That means admissions officers rely on intangibles like interesting essays or particularly unusual recommendations to decide who comprises the 5.9 percent of applicants who get in. Faust's top tip for raising a Harvard man or woman: “Make your children interesting!” For parents and students alike, that’s both good news and bad news. The bad news is that of course it’s much easier to say that than to actually make it happen, though Faust recommended encouraging children to follow their passions as a way to develop an interesting personality. It’s much easier to complete a checklist, however daunting, than to actually be interesting.[1] [1] How to Get Into Harvard https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2014/06/how-to-get-into-harvard/373726/ https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2014/06/how-to...

mlthoughts2018 8y ago
“Make your children interesting,” Faust said, while rubbing her thumb against her index and middle fingers and winking at the audience.
- ythn 8y ago
  I thought it was funny
- JackFr 8y ago
  The thing is Harvard doesn't need your money. If your non-legacy family has the resources to make a big enough donation to move to move the needle, your likely to either: 1) get in anyway just based on who you are, or 2) not really care whether you go to Harvard or not because you're the scion of generational wealth.
  - mlthoughts2018 8y ago
    I think this is incorrect. It reminds me of The Simpsons' joke about Bill Gates, ("buy him out boys ... what, did you think I got rich by writing a bunch of checks?"). Harvard doesn't need anybody's money, but they sure aren't going to use endowment money to make things free. They want your money, regardless of whether or not they need it, whether it's a huge status-signaling donation or a drop in the ocean semester's worth of tuition. They absolutely are trying to optimize how to get that money, now and in the future. I also think you underestimate how much big scions of generational wealth compete for status symbols like Harvard degrees. Once things become decoupled from money, that type of status signaling only increases in importance, lending legitimacy to the children of foreign rulers and diplomats, acting as a currency to normalize political relations with western countries or between corporations with vastly different political party affiliations. Harvard sells status, and absolutely is looking at how to monetize that. If offering a pittance of tuition relief to underrepresented groups helps maintain their entrenched brand status, they'll do it because of the long term effect on their ability to monetize reputation, not in spite of. It also reminds me of how Harvard absolutely hounds graduates for donations, despite utterly not needing them by comparison to what Harvard Management Corporation does. Mike Reiss (Simpsons writer and Harvard alum) skewered this in [0], saying among other things, > "Harvard is like a bum who starts bugging you for spare change on the bus. And then follows you around for the rest of your life. Oh, and that bum already has $40 billion in the bank." [0]: < https://features.thecrimson.com/2014/fm-comedy-issue/article/mike-reiss-oxymorons/ https://features.thecrimson.com/2014/fm-comedy-issue/article... >

koops 8y ago

This case is important because many elite American colleges have quietly copied Harvard's 15% cap on Asian students.

jogjayr 8y ago

I can't help but think that college admissions based solely on test scores (as done in India, Russia, maybe China?), and nothing else, might be the least unfair way to judge applicants. Every admission system is unfair in some way but tests are a yardstick everyone understands and can optimize for. In India they publicly post the list of admitted students and their marks. Richer students may benefit from higher-quality test coaching but a) that happens today anyway and b) the Internet will ensure rapid dissemination of test-prep strategies for cheap or free The other downside is it might give you a more, for lack of a better word, boring student body at the higher levels. Fewer non-academic interests and achievements because every bit of spare time in high school was spent on studying. I thought the American system sounded better when I was a high-schooler in India with not good but not great marks ("surely they'd recognize my specialness despite my lower scores, even if these hidebound colleges in India won't!") but it does leave more room for implicit bias.

tlholaday 8y ago
Single-gate protocols reward investment in gate-deception.
- johan_larson 8y ago
  Multi-gate protocols do that too. The investment just gets more complicated.
- ksk 8y ago
  Any examples that are applicable here?
- jogjayr 8y ago
  Multi-gate protocols increase amount of gate-deception investment required, making it harder only for economically- or socially-disadvantaged students to subvert them. With a single-gate protocol gate-deception investments have diminishing returns, which could (I'm not an expert) put participants on a more level playing field.
acomjean 8y ago

danielfoster 8y ago

"Alumni interviewers give Asian-Americans personal ratings comparable to those of whites. But the admissions office gives them the worst scores of any racial group, often without even meeting them, according to Prof. Arcidiacono." I can't imagine the feeling of working so hard through elementary school, middle school, and high school to get into an Ivy League school, only for an admissions panel to declare me "low in personality" or too introverted. Harvard's admission criteria seem heavily based on outdated stereotypes of what makes an individual successful. I question if Ivy League schools are choosing the best applicants and by extension, how much prestige Ivy League degrees really deserve.

klipt 8y ago
America: "we only want highly skilled, highly educated immigrants." Also America: "these immigrants' children are too skilled and educated, and it's upsetting our racial quotas. We have to discriminate against them." America - you can work here, but don't dare dream that your children will be treated equally if you're from Asia. Of course, if you're from Europe your children will be lumped into the white demographic. If you're from Africa, your children may even benefit from affirmative action meant for the descendants of American slaves. Yay racial profiling!
- Consultant32452 8y ago
  Harvard: there's more diversity between the races than within them.
akhilcacharya 8y ago
>I can't imagine the feeling of working so hard through elementary school, middle school, and high school to get into an Ivy League school, only for an admissions panel to declare me "low in personality" or too introverted. And yet, hundreds still get in. I went to a public school, not elite in the least, but I also worked hard throughout my K12 education like the folks you mention - and I’ll be honest, this continual focus on the tiny percentage of folks that didn’t get into Harvard but got into institutions of equivalent pedigree (one of the plaintiffs in an earlier NYT article goes to Duke) while my classmates have to struggle with a lack of opportunity and poor perceptions as a result of a lack of pedigree, even if they are hard working and talented. To me, it feels like a slap in the face. Am I wrong in thinking this?

leemailll 8y ago

Meanwhile uchicago decides to ditch sat http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/breaking/ct-university-chicago-sat-act-20180614-story,amp.html#click=https://t.co/rlHyJ6uZFB http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/breaking/ct-univers...

threatofrain 8y ago
That doesn't mean they are doing anything in a less evidence-based manner. They may have simply devised a superior empirical instrument; of course, if they have done so, then it ought be demonstrable.

jsilvers 8y ago

RadioLab ran an interesting episode about the person behind this lawsuit and other lawsuits against affirmative action in schools. His activism a double edged sword. https://www.wnycstudios.org/story/more-perfect-plaintiffs/ https://www.wnycstudios.org/story/more-perfect-plaintiffs/

thucydidesofusa 8y ago
What's the other edge to reducing racial discrimination?

baybal2 8y ago

I wonder if HN news algo reads my mind. In another news thread, I just pulled out the fact that Xiaomi electronics makes overwhelmingly superior gadgetry, yet can't break through the stigma of Asian "uncoolness" Situation for them is pretty much as it was with Toyota in its first decade in US, and them being greatly puzzled why Americans were so bent on buying Buicks over "twice as cheap, and twice as better" Corollas, and had total nil appetite for the supreme Corona. To authors of comments in line of "being a minority is actually a boon, statistics wise" I can say this: on the other side of "social invisibility" lies life of being "trophy" talent/socialite acquaintance/romantic partner, and, the most dreaded one, the life of diversity hire.

randyrand 8y ago
My Xiaomi Yi 4k has numerous basic issues. I'm really not sure they're superior. They're just cheaper. And cheap is rarely whats "cool". In fact it's usually the opposite.
Grue3 8y ago
Xiaomi created a stigma for themselves, by shamelessly copying Apple in everything including presentation style. [1] So I can't really take them seriously (doesn't help that I don't like Apple either). [1] https://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/05/business/global/in-china-an-empire-built-by-aping-apple.html?_r=0 https://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/05/business/global/in-china-...

nmeofthestate 8y ago

I guess the more woolly selection criteria are there so that racial discrimination can be conducted, otherwise the student population would be overwhelmingly asian with a large white minority?

Jagat 8y ago
It's possible. Controlling for grit and time spent not resting, being the best at anything demands a significant time investment in that activity. If you had just one hour a day, you could spend it either playing basketball or doing math. I'm not saying one is better than the other; just that if you do the former, you'll get better at basketball. If you do the latter, you'll do better at math. (I'm fully aware of studies that show that being athletic leads to sharper mind and better neuronal circuitry. But moderate physical activity is sufficient to have that effect. Being the best at football requires a lot of practice beyond just staying fit. Yes there are those who are really good at doing both. But that's an exception I'd surmise.)
- deleted 8y ago
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klipt 8y ago
Nah it would be more like UC Berkeley, which is forbidden from using racial quotas by California law. Still less than half Asian. In fact the Asian numbers at Berkeley are probably inflated due to Asian students being discriminated against elsewhere (like Harvard) and going to Berkeley instead, so if all the universities stopped discriminating, the numbers would average out to lower than Berkeley's current demographic.
- akhilcacharya 8y ago
  Also - Asian Americans comprise a larger percentage of California’s population.

cascom 8y ago

Just thinking out loud, but I would posit that high grades/scores and "personality scores" tend to be negatively correlated, regardless of race/or within a particular race (just as i would hazard that academics and athletic achievement are often negatively correlated). e.g. the kids with highest gpa's in a school are often not the most outgoing. Has anyone tried to control for this?

dnautics 8y ago

These sorts of subjective judgements can drive you crazy. My father (who was asian-american) had a civilian job with the United States government and a part time job with the United States navy. His civilian job, which was in the most corrupt branch of the executive branch, rated him as a poor performer personality wise and as having "no leadership potential". Nobody got the message, really since after this he took a temporary leave of absence and activated his us navy job as full time - as a captain (O6), the team he led delivered the first fully digitized, network inventory system which saved the navy on the order of billions of dollars. When he got back to his civilian job those negative reviews kept coming and he was denied promotions on those bases.

thomzi12 8y ago
Why didn’t he leave to the private sector?
- dnautics 8y ago
  It's not a thing (some people) do when you've got a nice pension coming with value that gets higher the longer you stay.

rb808 8y ago

I read an article a while back that compared admissions process to a bouncer in a nightclub. Was the best description of why things are done as they are. As a hazy summary - the prestigious institutions try to have a mix of different types of people - rich people bring resources, well connected families bring influence & contacts, people with high test scores bring hard work and intelligence, achievers in arts/sports/activities bring hard work and desire to win, alumni children bring culture, loyalty and resources. Its no coincidence that there are different routes in for these different types of people. Its the unique mix that makes places like Harvard great. There are other schools that choose people with highest test scores - that is a different approach. Harvard has no obligation to do this. Given the track record of alumni to achieve, the Harvard approach seems to work much better if you consider routes to powerful & high achieving jobs to be the main outcome.

thucydidesofusa 8y ago
>Harvard has no obligation to do this. It's not clear what obligations a non-profit, private institution like Harvard might have, but that doesn't mean they have unlimited freedom to act how they want. Businesses (and to be clear, Harvard is chartered as a business) are expected to conduct their business in a non-discriminatory way. This is why restaurants aren't allowed to say "No Irish" or "No Blacks" anymore. Now, Harvard's actions aren't rising to the level of a Jim Crow diner, but they're certainly racially motivated to some degree and the issue is whether or not the degree of racial discrimination is permissible.
fapjacks 8y ago
Yes, yes. But what brings in the research dollars?
jfnixon 8y ago
Yes, yes, just look at the world today, built by Harvard graduates. It is the best of all possible worlds, isn't it?
- sridca 8y ago
  The world is built by Harvard graduates? Who?

noetic_techy 8y ago

Funny how the activist at these universities cry "institutional racism" when in reality the only concrete verifiable evidence of it is their own institution. It makes no sense to cry about white privilege when you're actively holding down a race that is on pace and even outperforming whites in higher education and median income, and yet this very contradiction and others alludes people due to their own confirmation bias.

thomzi12 8y ago
Activists at an institution are very different people from the admissions personnel at an institution
- noetic_techy 8y ago
  Are they? Seems like the vast majority are enablers, or at the least cowards / usefull idiots. Many espouse the same miopic ideology and feel it is thier duty to aqcuiesce to activist demands. Look at what happen at Evergreen. Look atbthe holloween costume controversy at Yale. How many speeking events have to be shut down before we start to admit the truth. Imagine if they were rating black and hispanic students lower in personality scores simply due to quotas. We’d call it what it is, outright racism.

Karishma1234 8y ago

This is newspeak for "Asians do not score well on parameters that don't matter in real life". Asian student community is remarkably focused on real results instead of pointless activism and social justice wars. Partly the reason they are high achievers in real life where as most kids who "do well on personality traits" turn out to be losers.

azhu 8y ago
> "parameters that don't matter in real life" Asian Americans are the least likely group in the US to be promoted to management. https://hbr.org/2018/05/asian-americans-are-the-least-likely-group-in-the-u-s-to-be-promoted-to-management https://hbr.org/2018/05/asian-americans-are-the-least-likely...
- perl4ever 8y ago
  If that's so, it's interesting how many prominent CEOs there are. Just off the top of my head, Sundar Pichai and Satya Nadella come to mind.
- Karishma1234 8y ago
  This has more to do with age and Chinese Exclusion Act. Most of the Indian/Chinese people are young and not in the age group where they will become CEOs. You will see a rapid increase in Indian/Chinese CEOs in next 10 years. As second generation Indians and Chinese would reach the age group of CEOs. Asians are dominating US colleges they will dominate US executives by 2040. Of course some of them might go back to India and China.

ggg9990 8y ago

What Harvard is trying to do is admit the people who will be national and global leaders 30 years from now, not the people who will get the best grades at Harvard. Since the country’s future leaders won’t be 60% Asian it doesn’t make sense for their class to be either.

poster123 8y ago
I don't think we should prejudge what the racial makeup of the country's future leadership should be and then use de facto racial quotas to match those assumptions.
- ggg9990 8y ago
  I don’t think there should be racial quotas, de facto or otherwise, but if Harvard decided to only admit tall men with “upper management written all over them” that wouldn’t be irrational.
linuxkerneldev 8y ago
> the country’s future leaders won’t be 60% Asian huh? what? what scientific reason do you have for believing such a thing?
- ggg9990 8y ago
  It’s not a scientific reason, it’s historical reasons. Look at the history of the US. 30 years from now it isn’t going to be a country run by its 5% Asian population.

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dkural 8y ago

Well, why discriminate on US citizenship for that matter, if academic merit is the main criterion. Americans of any kind would be less than 10% of the student body. Harvard does not claim to be a purely academic meritocracy.

efgefgewfe 8y ago

It is time to phase out Affirmative Action, it not only hurt high achieving minorities but also those minorities that it is supposed to help. There are so many times where I have heard indirect comments that so and so got in only because he is the right minority. I see there is a lot resent among those who say they would have made it if it wasn't for AA. Trump is direct result of this resentment, and it will only get worse if we don't address this issue.

smsm42 8y ago

The "character and fitness" criteria has been instituted by Harvard in 1920s for a very simple purpose - to solve the "Jewish problem", i.e. too many Jews getting into Harvard. After Harvard's President A. Lawrence Lowell's proposal of outright Jewish quota met significant resistance, they had to find some way to keep the Jews out while not having outright ban. So they had "geographic diversity" and "character" criteria. And it did wonders - Jewish admission percentage fell to the coveted 15% that was the original quota target. Now the same old weapon is being deployed against the new "too many people of your kind here" target. http://www.businessinsider.com/the-ivy-leagues-history-of-discriminating-against-jews-2014-12 http://www.businessinsider.com/the-ivy-leagues-history-of-di...

dtawfik1 8y ago

The entire tech industry would not exist if we judged people based on this: In its admissions process, Harvard scores applicants in five categories — “academic,” “extracurricular,” “athletic,” “personal” and “overall.” They are ranked from 1 to 6, with 1 being the best.

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abby_cohen_221 8y ago

There's a similar issue going on at the NYC elite public schools like Stuyvesant and Bronx Science. Mayor De Blasio is pushing to drop the entrance exams for those schools pretty much for the exact same reason. This guy discusses it in this Youtube video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QixRuK68lk4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QixRuK68lk4

seneca14 8y ago

While Jewish people make up less than 2% of the American population. They constitute 67% (yes you read correctly!) of Harvard graduates. In many cases "white privilege" is in fact Jewish privilege. Even after correcting for higher mean verbal IQ, there is still a high overrepresentation. Which leads to nepotism (Harvard leadership is predominantly Jewish) as the most likely explanation. This sounds to me like institutional racism against Asian- and European Americans. http://www.hillel.org/college-guide/list/record/harvard-university http://www.hillel.org/college-guide/list/record/harvard-univ... http://www.unz.com/runz/the-myth-of-american-meritocracy/ http://www.unz.com/runz/the-myth-of-american-meritocracy/