2 ms·

I agree that the needed work (and hardest work) is access to quality pre-university education. That being said, I find it bizarre that we fret over whether min

I agree that the needed work (and hardest work) is access to quality pre-university education. That being said, I find it bizarre that we fret over whether minority applicants are given an unfair boost, while at the same time allowing legacy admissions and athletic preferance admissions to continue. Both of these boost applicants who otherwise would not make it through. We don't fret too much when a spot is taken by a wealthy legacy admit or obscure sport admit, yet we have multiple lawsuits and court cases if the spot is taken by a racial minority. John Hopkins University ended legacy admissions and I applaud them. https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/01/why-we-ended-legacy-admissions-johns-hopkins/605131/ https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/01/why-we-end...

MaxBarraclough 7y ago
I'm in the UK. I've never heard of 'legacy admissions' happening here, nor admissions in return for dropping money on a university. I get the impression from The Guardian that these things are quite unique to America, and really don't occur in the UK. [0] [1] [2] Similarly I've never heard of someone being admitted to a UK university for the purpose of getting them to complete in university sports. Sports are funded by universities, but generally, few people really care about university sports, the way it should be. It may help in admissions if you have non-academic achievements on top your academic ones, but sports aren't given the special status that they are in US universities. On the race point, the only lawsuit I'm aware of is the one against Harvard for discriminating against Asian applicants. (There's no question that Harvard have higher grade-requirements for Asian applicants.) The courts decided the Harvard admissions policy wasn't unconstitutional. [4] My understanding is that if a similar approach were taken in hiring decisions, that would be extremely illegal. If you'll excuse a tangent: we also don't have 'campus police' in the UK, for which I'm thankful. Universities hire security guards, the way business parks do. The American system is to have police officers on the payroll of a university, expected to follow orders from the university's power-structure [5]. Deans should not be able to issue orders to police officers. [0] https://www.theguardian.com/education/2019/oct/01/harvard-admissions-process-white-privilege https://www.theguardian.com/education/2019/oct/01/harvard-ad... [1] https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/jan/23/elite-schools-ivy-league-legacy-admissions-harvard-wealthier-whiter https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/jan/23/elite-school... [2] https://www.theguardian.com/education/shortcuts/2019/mar/13/us-admissions-scandal-oxbridge https://www.theguardian.com/education/shortcuts/2019/mar/13/... [4] https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/oct/01/harvard-ruling-admissions-racial-bias-asian-americans-latest https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/oct/01/harvard-ruli... [5] https://www.google.com/search?q="ordered+campus+police" https://www.google.com/search?q="ordered+campus+police"
- MyHypatia 7y ago
  Yes, unfortunately in the US we have legacy admissions and athletic admissions without much oversight on how athletically talented the student is. "A study, published earlier this month in the National Bureau of Economic Research, found that 43 percent of white students admitted to Harvard University were recruited athletes, legacy students, children of faculty and staff, or on the dean’s interest list — applicants whose parents or relatives have donated to Harvard. That number drops dramatically for black, Latino, and Asian American students, with less than 16 percent each coming from those categories. The study also found that roughly 75 percent of the white students admitted from those four categories, labeled 'ALDCs' in the study, “would have been rejected if they had been treated as white non-ALDCs,” the study said."[1] We are already aware that the current admissions policy has the effect of heavily and unfairly favoring wealthy white students. Then we try to "correct" for that. For some reason we talk about and fret a lot more about policies that tip the scales for minorities, but for legacy admissions it's just "how things are done". In my opinion if a university uses legacy admissions, they should be barred from receiving federal funding. When JHU stopped using legacy admissions, the number of minority students increased. It would be interesting to know if the number of nonwealthy white students increased as well. My point is, there is clear favoritism for the wealthy class, and at least one easy fix (drop legacy admissions) to get towards a more merit-based system. [1]https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/study-harvard-finds-43-percent-white-students-are-legacy-athletes-n1060361 https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/study-harvard-finds-43-...

MaxBarraclough 7y ago

I'm in the UK. I've never heard of 'legacy admissions' happening here, nor admissions in return for dropping money on a university. I get the impression from The Guardian that these things are quite unique to America, and really don't occur in the UK. [0] [1] [2] Similarly I've never heard of someone being admitted to a UK university for the purpose of getting them to complete in university sports. Sports are funded by universities, but generally, few people really care about university sports, the way it should be. It may help in admissions if you have non-academic achievements on top your academic ones, but sports aren't given the special status that they are in US universities. On the race point, the only lawsuit I'm aware of is the one against Harvard for discriminating against Asian applicants. (There's no question that Harvard have higher grade-requirements for Asian applicants.) The courts decided the Harvard admissions policy wasn't unconstitutional. [4] My understanding is that if a similar approach were taken in hiring decisions, that would be extremely illegal. If you'll excuse a tangent: we also don't have 'campus police' in the UK, for which I'm thankful. Universities hire security guards, the way business parks do. The American system is to have police officers on the payroll of a university, expected to follow orders from the university's power-structure [5]. Deans should not be able to issue orders to police officers. [0] https://www.theguardian.com/education/2019/oct/01/harvard-admissions-process-white-privilege https://www.theguardian.com/education/2019/oct/01/harvard-ad... [1] https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/jan/23/elite-schools-ivy-league-legacy-admissions-harvard-wealthier-whiter https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/jan/23/elite-school... [2] https://www.theguardian.com/education/shortcuts/2019/mar/13/us-admissions-scandal-oxbridge https://www.theguardian.com/education/shortcuts/2019/mar/13/... [4] https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/oct/01/harvard-ruling-admissions-racial-bias-asian-americans-latest https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/oct/01/harvard-ruli... [5] https://www.google.com/search?q="ordered+campus+police" https://www.google.com/search?q="ordered+campus+police"

MyHypatia 7y ago
Yes, unfortunately in the US we have legacy admissions and athletic admissions without much oversight on how athletically talented the student is. "A study, published earlier this month in the National Bureau of Economic Research, found that 43 percent of white students admitted to Harvard University were recruited athletes, legacy students, children of faculty and staff, or on the dean’s interest list — applicants whose parents or relatives have donated to Harvard. That number drops dramatically for black, Latino, and Asian American students, with less than 16 percent each coming from those categories. The study also found that roughly 75 percent of the white students admitted from those four categories, labeled 'ALDCs' in the study, “would have been rejected if they had been treated as white non-ALDCs,” the study said."[1] We are already aware that the current admissions policy has the effect of heavily and unfairly favoring wealthy white students. Then we try to "correct" for that. For some reason we talk about and fret a lot more about policies that tip the scales for minorities, but for legacy admissions it's just "how things are done". In my opinion if a university uses legacy admissions, they should be barred from receiving federal funding. When JHU stopped using legacy admissions, the number of minority students increased. It would be interesting to know if the number of nonwealthy white students increased as well. My point is, there is clear favoritism for the wealthy class, and at least one easy fix (drop legacy admissions) to get towards a more merit-based system. [1]https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/study-harvard-finds-43-percent-white-students-are-legacy-athletes-n1060361 https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/study-harvard-finds-43-...