9 ms·

This makes sense: Harvard has a huge issue with discrimination against Asian Americans, who are not represented according to their ACT/SAT score distribution. I

by wespiser_2018 6y ago

This makes sense: Harvard has a huge issue with discrimination against Asian Americans, who are not represented according to their ACT/SAT score distribution. If Harvard could waive away these scores, they can continue their admissions policy that favor students from wealthy families who pay full price, and are likely to be institutional givers after graduation by focusing on admission factors that are much less accountable, like "personality". Student's for Fair Admissions is in the process of suing Harvard over discrimination, and their website (with legal filings) is probably the single best source of information on Ivy League admissions: https://studentsforfairadmissions.org/updates/ https://studentsforfairadmissions.org/updates/

contemporary343 6y ago
They lost the lawsuit: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/01/us/harvard-admissions-lawsuit.html https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/01/us/harvard-admissions-law...
- graeme 6y ago
  It’s being appealed. That’s in your article.
mtgp1000 6y ago
>This makes sense: Harvard has a huge issue with discrimination against Asian Americans, who are not represented according to their ACT/SAT score distribution. If Harvard could waive away these scores, they can continue their admissions policy that favor students from wealthy families who pay full price, and are likely to be institutional givers after graduation by focusing on admission factors that are much less accountable, like "personality". Please. This is about affirmative action for people who aren't Asian or White. Not wealthy donors. The argument is that lack of privilege causes poor SAT scores which is preventing certain minorities from realizing their potential, and that this justifies selectively lowering the bar and allocating additional resources. But this is all based on a conflation between equality of outcome and equality of opportunity.
- MagnumOpus 6y ago
  > Not wealthy donors Harvard's admission rate is <6% for general population - that includes affirmative action ethnicities. Harvards admission rate is >30% for "legacies" which make up one in six of their students, and even higher for donors. These are the kids who get in while being thick as a brick. The injustice is not primarily the black kid with 1400 SAT getting in over the east Asian kid with 1580 -- the injustice is the hundreds of CEOs/senators' kids being assured admission even being dumber than a sack of hammers.
  - phonon 6y ago
    25th percentile for Harvard SAT scores is 1460...so there is a limit for how many dumb as a brick legacies matriculate :-)
    - jmalicki 6y ago
      1 in 6 is only the 17th percentile, so many of them may be well under that score.
  - retortio 6y ago
    I would expect legacies to have a higher admission rate. They are a subpopulation coming from homes with intelligent parents, likely grew up in intellectually stimulating environments, and were probably focused on the Ivy League before many of their peers had even heard that term. There is definitely some application boost legacies get simply by virtue of being a legacy, but their applications are probably quite strong in general. So it's unlikely that dropping the SAT was meant to cater to them.
    - evanpw 6y ago
      This should be easy to test, right? Look at the percentage of students admitted to Harvard whose parents went to Harvard vs. the percentage admitted whose parents went to some other similarly-selective school.
- csharptwdec19 6y ago
shreygineer 6y ago
As an Asian American myself, I don't understand this notion of discrimination against Asian Americans by Ivy League schools. Per Harvards Class of 2023 Admissions data [1], Asian Americans makeup 25.3% of the admitted class. They're the largest minority group admitted. [1] https://college.harvard.edu/admissions/admissions-statistics https://college.harvard.edu/admissions/admissions-statistics
- wutbrodo 6y ago
  It doesn't make sense to assume that the HS student population is uniformly qualified to meet Harvard's admissions bar (absent explicit racial discrimination). There's a reason nobody really accuses the NBA of racial discrimination in drafting players.
  - shreygineer 6y ago
    It's not really fair to compare the NBA to Harvard. The NBA is a for-profit institution in the entertainment business that is interested in drafting the most talented players to get the most views and therefore, the most most money. Harvard is a non-profit institute that seeks to create a diverse & successful that leave a mark on the world, which therefore upholds the eliteness of Harvard.
    - hejja 6y ago
      harvard has the right to implement its own standards, to be sure. but who is implementing this, exactly, and on what agenda? it's "harvard" the institution, the non-profit business. instead of having a clear motive: making money, we have to guess what "diverse and successful" means. does a powerful institution in our society owe us an explanation for this? maybe not.
    - cambalache 6y ago
      > The NBA is a for-profit institution in the entertainment business that is interested in drafting the most talented players to get the most views and therefore, the most most money. So exactly like Hollywood who has rightly or wrongly be heavily campaigned against because of discrimination, btw it is ironic but if you check the numbers white women are over represented same as black people, the 2 leading-voices among the minorities, its is Asian- Americans, Hispanic-Americans and Native Americans who are completely sidelined in that industry.
RedBeetDeadpool 6y ago
Lets ignore your claim at possible discrimination, and ask what the ability to game a high score on an ACT/SAT has anything to do with how successful or contributing to society someone will become? In the internet age that we live in today, with access to all sorts of methods of memorization, I would argue scores on a standardized test are largely irrelevant, beyond testing for if someone can pass a test or not. The highest score goes not to the person who thinks critically but to the one who gamed the system the most. If you can teach someone to win at candy-crush, you can get them to ace the SAT's. Some of the most important people in society have not typically done well in structured schooling, and this is in part because a lot of education is bs in the first place.
- totalZero 6y ago
  I would argue that "structured schooling" refers more to a university than to the SAT. Personally I see more merit in performing well on an exam with a clear statistical context, than in filling out some bullshit lab notebook or whatever it is that people at Harvard do to earn their A- (mean grade) or A (mode). One problem with your argument is that, without the SAT, admissions counselors will have to depend MORE on structured schooling, because they have to lean more heavily on grades, school activities, and teacher recommendations. Your initial question, by the way, is flawed. School is not success, and education by itself is not a contribution to society. So why you use those things to judge a college entrance exam is unclear to me. An entrance exam is a measure of intellectual horsepower. Tons of rich people throw money at SAT courses and still fare poorly, while tons of smart kids whose families wouldn't be able to afford college without financial aid fare well.
  - RedBeetDeadpool 6y ago
    > An entrance exam is a measure of intellectual horsepower. No its not. What are neurons? What are networks of neurons? How do the wiring of neurons affect the way an intelligence output answers? Can neurons be cultivated in certain ways? If so, can you cultivate a network of neurons to output answers with the most efficiency and correctness? If so, what is the difference between one network optimized for standardized testing and another optimized for political upheaval? Do the neurons fire less quickly in the latter because they can't pass the answers to a test as quickly?
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
exo-pla-net 6y ago
Agreed. Factors such as having high literacy and the cognitive capacity to detect sarcasm should be ignored in favor of more pressing matters like making the admissions personnel feel good about themselves by accepting a Pokemon collection of scions and sympathetic stage prop students of non-Asian shades. We'll all surely shed tears of joy when the first young adult in a vegetative state overcomes his considerable hardships and gets wheeled onto Harvard's campus. Maybe a fellow student, perhaps Justin Beiber's nephew, will lift up his vegetative hand and give him a high five before they go off to their first ungraded class taught by a professor who has been thoroughly vetted to have no uncomfortable opinions. The mission of advancing human knowledge and scientific understanding in our institutions of higher learning will at that point be wholly fulfilled.
raxxorrax 6y ago
This is real institutional racism in my opinion. There are enough reason why Asians tend to do better than other groups without using explanations provided by neo-nazis that grade humans by intelligence or whatnot. But it just plainly is racist against Asians. There is no greater good to be defended here that isn't a lie. And they even have a history of discrimination with quotas, although I tend to classify AA as not being racial quotas. But if people are measured unequal due to their race, they only affirm that race exists and that they don't treat everyone on their merits. I don't see advantages here. As I said, logistics of knowledge are so cheap, that good education can reach anyone. Maybe a teacher is missing here, but it is a solid start.
psychometry 6y ago
Wow, you don't even try to hide your obvious bias. The best source of info is one side of the legal battle? What a joke.

contemporary343 6y ago

They lost the lawsuit: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/01/us/harvard-admissions-lawsuit.html https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/01/us/harvard-admissions-law...

graeme 6y ago
It’s being appealed. That’s in your article.

mtgp1000 6y ago

>This makes sense: Harvard has a huge issue with discrimination against Asian Americans, who are not represented according to their ACT/SAT score distribution. If Harvard could waive away these scores, they can continue their admissions policy that favor students from wealthy families who pay full price, and are likely to be institutional givers after graduation by focusing on admission factors that are much less accountable, like "personality". Please. This is about affirmative action for people who aren't Asian or White. Not wealthy donors. The argument is that lack of privilege causes poor SAT scores which is preventing certain minorities from realizing their potential, and that this justifies selectively lowering the bar and allocating additional resources. But this is all based on a conflation between equality of outcome and equality of opportunity.

MagnumOpus 6y ago
> Not wealthy donors Harvard's admission rate is <6% for general population - that includes affirmative action ethnicities. Harvards admission rate is >30% for "legacies" which make up one in six of their students, and even higher for donors. These are the kids who get in while being thick as a brick. The injustice is not primarily the black kid with 1400 SAT getting in over the east Asian kid with 1580 -- the injustice is the hundreds of CEOs/senators' kids being assured admission even being dumber than a sack of hammers.
- phonon 6y ago
  25th percentile for Harvard SAT scores is 1460...so there is a limit for how many dumb as a brick legacies matriculate :-)
  - jmalicki 6y ago
    1 in 6 is only the 17th percentile, so many of them may be well under that score.
- retortio 6y ago
  I would expect legacies to have a higher admission rate. They are a subpopulation coming from homes with intelligent parents, likely grew up in intellectually stimulating environments, and were probably focused on the Ivy League before many of their peers had even heard that term. There is definitely some application boost legacies get simply by virtue of being a legacy, but their applications are probably quite strong in general. So it's unlikely that dropping the SAT was meant to cater to them.
  - evanpw 6y ago
    This should be easy to test, right? Look at the percentage of students admitted to Harvard whose parents went to Harvard vs. the percentage admitted whose parents went to some other similarly-selective school.
csharptwdec19 6y ago

shreygineer 6y ago

As an Asian American myself, I don't understand this notion of discrimination against Asian Americans by Ivy League schools. Per Harvards Class of 2023 Admissions data [1], Asian Americans makeup 25.3% of the admitted class. They're the largest minority group admitted. [1] https://college.harvard.edu/admissions/admissions-statistics https://college.harvard.edu/admissions/admissions-statistics

wutbrodo 6y ago
It doesn't make sense to assume that the HS student population is uniformly qualified to meet Harvard's admissions bar (absent explicit racial discrimination). There's a reason nobody really accuses the NBA of racial discrimination in drafting players.
- shreygineer 6y ago
  It's not really fair to compare the NBA to Harvard. The NBA is a for-profit institution in the entertainment business that is interested in drafting the most talented players to get the most views and therefore, the most most money. Harvard is a non-profit institute that seeks to create a diverse & successful that leave a mark on the world, which therefore upholds the eliteness of Harvard.
  - hejja 6y ago
    harvard has the right to implement its own standards, to be sure. but who is implementing this, exactly, and on what agenda? it's "harvard" the institution, the non-profit business. instead of having a clear motive: making money, we have to guess what "diverse and successful" means. does a powerful institution in our society owe us an explanation for this? maybe not.
  - cambalache 6y ago
    > The NBA is a for-profit institution in the entertainment business that is interested in drafting the most talented players to get the most views and therefore, the most most money. So exactly like Hollywood who has rightly or wrongly be heavily campaigned against because of discrimination, btw it is ironic but if you check the numbers white women are over represented same as black people, the 2 leading-voices among the minorities, its is Asian- Americans, Hispanic-Americans and Native Americans who are completely sidelined in that industry.

RedBeetDeadpool 6y ago

Lets ignore your claim at possible discrimination, and ask what the ability to game a high score on an ACT/SAT has anything to do with how successful or contributing to society someone will become? In the internet age that we live in today, with access to all sorts of methods of memorization, I would argue scores on a standardized test are largely irrelevant, beyond testing for if someone can pass a test or not. The highest score goes not to the person who thinks critically but to the one who gamed the system the most. If you can teach someone to win at candy-crush, you can get them to ace the SAT's. Some of the most important people in society have not typically done well in structured schooling, and this is in part because a lot of education is bs in the first place.

totalZero 6y ago
I would argue that "structured schooling" refers more to a university than to the SAT. Personally I see more merit in performing well on an exam with a clear statistical context, than in filling out some bullshit lab notebook or whatever it is that people at Harvard do to earn their A- (mean grade) or A (mode). One problem with your argument is that, without the SAT, admissions counselors will have to depend MORE on structured schooling, because they have to lean more heavily on grades, school activities, and teacher recommendations. Your initial question, by the way, is flawed. School is not success, and education by itself is not a contribution to society. So why you use those things to judge a college entrance exam is unclear to me. An entrance exam is a measure of intellectual horsepower. Tons of rich people throw money at SAT courses and still fare poorly, while tons of smart kids whose families wouldn't be able to afford college without financial aid fare well.
- RedBeetDeadpool 6y ago
  > An entrance exam is a measure of intellectual horsepower. No its not. What are neurons? What are networks of neurons? How do the wiring of neurons affect the way an intelligence output answers? Can neurons be cultivated in certain ways? If so, can you cultivate a network of neurons to output answers with the most efficiency and correctness? If so, what is the difference between one network optimized for standardized testing and another optimized for political upheaval? Do the neurons fire less quickly in the latter because they can't pass the answers to a test as quickly?

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

exo-pla-net 6y ago

Agreed. Factors such as having high literacy and the cognitive capacity to detect sarcasm should be ignored in favor of more pressing matters like making the admissions personnel feel good about themselves by accepting a Pokemon collection of scions and sympathetic stage prop students of non-Asian shades. We'll all surely shed tears of joy when the first young adult in a vegetative state overcomes his considerable hardships and gets wheeled onto Harvard's campus. Maybe a fellow student, perhaps Justin Beiber's nephew, will lift up his vegetative hand and give him a high five before they go off to their first ungraded class taught by a professor who has been thoroughly vetted to have no uncomfortable opinions. The mission of advancing human knowledge and scientific understanding in our institutions of higher learning will at that point be wholly fulfilled.

raxxorrax 6y ago

This is real institutional racism in my opinion. There are enough reason why Asians tend to do better than other groups without using explanations provided by neo-nazis that grade humans by intelligence or whatnot. But it just plainly is racist against Asians. There is no greater good to be defended here that isn't a lie. And they even have a history of discrimination with quotas, although I tend to classify AA as not being racial quotas. But if people are measured unequal due to their race, they only affirm that race exists and that they don't treat everyone on their merits. I don't see advantages here. As I said, logistics of knowledge are so cheap, that good education can reach anyone. Maybe a teacher is missing here, but it is a solid start.

psychometry 6y ago

Wow, you don't even try to hide your obvious bias. The best source of info is one side of the legal battle? What a joke.