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As someone with East Asian ancestry in North America, you quickly learn that hard work will only rarely help you find opportunities with institutions that have

As someone with East Asian ancestry in North America, you quickly learn that hard work will only rarely help you find opportunities with institutions that have a huge demand of qualified applicants but not enough seats. This includes universities, high-prestige schools like medical schools, and a lot of creative industries (mentorship opportunities and scholarships just aren't there for you). This is unfair, but it's difficult to discuss this openly non-Asian people due to a lot of skepticism about disadvantages. But the nice thing is that the private sector truly doesn't care as much. So long as you can help make a company money, they will be eager to hire you. This includes FAAMG, Jane Street, and other companies - I personally know East Asian friends who had no difficulty working there, whereas others with similar or stronger work ethics faced a far more uphill battle getting into medical school. There is a lot of room for success at the most pragmatic and practical organizations, and there are plenty of other applicants for people doing do-good work that directly benefits society (hence the rejections despite hard work). If you really still want to contribute, effective altruism via donations to effective charities is still an option, along with entrepreneurship for good via founding your own company.

arolihas 4y ago
Private sector is better but it isn't some meritocratic utopia. There is a lot of nepotism and elitism in the upper echelon.
vxNsr 4y ago
I’ve got a friend applying to med schools, he’s a little older (late 20s vs early 20s) so he took the spray and pray approach and applied to 60 MD and DO schools. He said by and large he’s the only or one of ~3 non-minorities in any of the MD group interviews, additionally Asians aren’t well represented there either. DO group interviews on the other hand are mostly white/asain.
- throwaway6734 4y ago
  Do?
  - arolihas 4y ago
    Doctor of Osteopathic Medicine. It's known as the alternative for med school rejects basically (not saying this is a fair or completely accurate characterization but that is the perception).
- wheelinsupial 4y ago
  > Asians aren’t well represented there either What does this mean? Does it mean proportionally compared to the US population or does it mean proportional to their test scores? [1] has data on US med school matriculants for MD granting institutions. It seems to show that of the approximately 22k matriculants to US med school between 2018-2019 and 2021-2022 admissions cycles, 5k (4,687 at the lowest and 5,151 at the highest) are Asian Only. So Asian Only is roughly 21 to 22% of med school matriculants. US census results from 2020 seem to say Asians make up 6% of the population [2]. I know this isn't perfect because we really care about Asian population from those in the med school application age range, but I'm not familiar enough with US census data to find it. Unfortunately I can't find data for DO schools or for GPA and MCAT scores for admissions by race. [1] https://www.aamc.org/media/6031/download?attachment https://www.aamc.org/media/6031/download?attachment [2] https://www.census.gov/library/stories/2021/08/improved-race-ethnicity-measures-reveal-united-states-population-much-more-multiracial.html https://www.census.gov/library/stories/2021/08/improved-race...

arolihas 4y ago

Private sector is better but it isn't some meritocratic utopia. There is a lot of nepotism and elitism in the upper echelon.

vxNsr 4y ago

I’ve got a friend applying to med schools, he’s a little older (late 20s vs early 20s) so he took the spray and pray approach and applied to 60 MD and DO schools. He said by and large he’s the only or one of ~3 non-minorities in any of the MD group interviews, additionally Asians aren’t well represented there either. DO group interviews on the other hand are mostly white/asain.

throwaway6734 4y ago
Do?
- arolihas 4y ago
  Doctor of Osteopathic Medicine. It's known as the alternative for med school rejects basically (not saying this is a fair or completely accurate characterization but that is the perception).
wheelinsupial 4y ago
> Asians aren’t well represented there either What does this mean? Does it mean proportionally compared to the US population or does it mean proportional to their test scores? [1] has data on US med school matriculants for MD granting institutions. It seems to show that of the approximately 22k matriculants to US med school between 2018-2019 and 2021-2022 admissions cycles, 5k (4,687 at the lowest and 5,151 at the highest) are Asian Only. So Asian Only is roughly 21 to 22% of med school matriculants. US census results from 2020 seem to say Asians make up 6% of the population [2]. I know this isn't perfect because we really care about Asian population from those in the med school application age range, but I'm not familiar enough with US census data to find it. Unfortunately I can't find data for DO schools or for GPA and MCAT scores for admissions by race. [1] https://www.aamc.org/media/6031/download?attachment https://www.aamc.org/media/6031/download?attachment [2] https://www.census.gov/library/stories/2021/08/improved-race-ethnicity-measures-reveal-united-states-population-much-more-multiracial.html https://www.census.gov/library/stories/2021/08/improved-race...