4 ms·

This decision was a big win for Asians. Who right now are being discriminated against. Before race based admission was used “as a positive” for minorities, it

This decision was a big win for Asians. Who right now are being discriminated against. Before race based admission was used “as a positive” for minorities, it was being used to keep ivy leagues from being “too Jewish”. It doesn’t take very long to see what this is, but the topic is always about removing the benefit, not preventing the abuse.

seanmcdirmid 3y ago
Asians do have a general leg up in terms of family income (which correlates to education success), so if we were discriminating based on income, then we could come up with something fair that gives poorer people (which can act as a proxy for disadvantaged minorities) more opportunity, but at the expense of rich people since we don't have unlimited resources. The problem being that now you are denied getting into Harvard because your mom and dad are too rich...and I don't think many people would think that is fair either.
- firesteelrain 3y ago
  May not be fair but its Constitutional unlike Affirmative Action.
  - seanmcdirmid 3y ago
    Plenty of constitutional things won't fly in court of public opinion. Honestly, are best bet is to focus resources on K-12 so much that even poor students get great educations (in spite of their home situation). Not sure that will fly either, maybe go with an updated GI Bill or something.
mistersquid 3y ago
> This decision was a big win for Asians. Who right now are being discriminated against. This is the hope but banning race-based Affirmative Action that favors ethnic minorities, blacks in particular, will not particularly benefit Asians in college admissions. Harvard (as a proxy for elite colleges) admitted 1,942 students to the class of 2027, 15.3% of whom identify as African-American, or 297 students in total. [0] (Harvard fielded 56,937 applicants for the class of 2027) Assuming every single entering African-American undergraduate at Harvard "displaced" a more qualified Asian due to Affirmative Action, 300 spots at what is arguably the most prestigious college in the United States is not likely to accommodate all the Asians who believe they may have been unfairly rejected because a "less qualified" African-American student matriculated to Harvard. In other words, the number of matriculating African-Americans at US elite colleges and universities is dwarfed by the number of Asian applicants who will be rejected for reasons unrelated to Affirmative Action. As a side note, the notion that college acceptance is a rigid formula determined by grades, test scores, and extracurriculars is misguided. Turning the elite college and university system in the United States into a reward for cram schoolers will not improve acceptance outcomes for the vast majority of all individuals, including Asians, who are rejected by elite academic institutions. Affirmative Action is an issue that prevents people from seeing the larger problem which is: why do American elite universities fail to increase their enrollments for qualified individuals given the size of their endowments? (Harvard's endowment as of 2023 is 50.9 billion [1]) Were such well-endowed elite institutions to increase their enrollments in proportion to the meritorious student population, the controversy of Affirmative Action might become moot. [0] https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2023/03/college-makes-regular-admission-offers-to-1220/ https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2023/03/college-makes... [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_colleges_and_universities_in_the_United_States_by_endowment https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_colleges_and_universit...
- seanmcdirmid 3y ago
  This is like why doesn’t Seattle and San Francisco grow to cities of 10 or 20 million to meet demand? Harvard could increase in size 10 fold and still not come near satisfying demand. Why does Harvard have to expand at all? Why not just have more schools?

seanmcdirmid 3y ago

Asians do have a general leg up in terms of family income (which correlates to education success), so if we were discriminating based on income, then we could come up with something fair that gives poorer people (which can act as a proxy for disadvantaged minorities) more opportunity, but at the expense of rich people since we don't have unlimited resources. The problem being that now you are denied getting into Harvard because your mom and dad are too rich...and I don't think many people would think that is fair either.

firesteelrain 3y ago
May not be fair but its Constitutional unlike Affirmative Action.
- seanmcdirmid 3y ago
  Plenty of constitutional things won't fly in court of public opinion. Honestly, are best bet is to focus resources on K-12 so much that even poor students get great educations (in spite of their home situation). Not sure that will fly either, maybe go with an updated GI Bill or something.

mistersquid 3y ago

> This decision was a big win for Asians. Who right now are being discriminated against. This is the hope but banning race-based Affirmative Action that favors ethnic minorities, blacks in particular, will not particularly benefit Asians in college admissions. Harvard (as a proxy for elite colleges) admitted 1,942 students to the class of 2027, 15.3% of whom identify as African-American, or 297 students in total. [0] (Harvard fielded 56,937 applicants for the class of 2027) Assuming every single entering African-American undergraduate at Harvard "displaced" a more qualified Asian due to Affirmative Action, 300 spots at what is arguably the most prestigious college in the United States is not likely to accommodate all the Asians who believe they may have been unfairly rejected because a "less qualified" African-American student matriculated to Harvard. In other words, the number of matriculating African-Americans at US elite colleges and universities is dwarfed by the number of Asian applicants who will be rejected for reasons unrelated to Affirmative Action. As a side note, the notion that college acceptance is a rigid formula determined by grades, test scores, and extracurriculars is misguided. Turning the elite college and university system in the United States into a reward for cram schoolers will not improve acceptance outcomes for the vast majority of all individuals, including Asians, who are rejected by elite academic institutions. Affirmative Action is an issue that prevents people from seeing the larger problem which is: why do American elite universities fail to increase their enrollments for qualified individuals given the size of their endowments? (Harvard's endowment as of 2023 is 50.9 billion [1]) Were such well-endowed elite institutions to increase their enrollments in proportion to the meritorious student population, the controversy of Affirmative Action might become moot. [0] https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2023/03/college-makes-regular-admission-offers-to-1220/ https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2023/03/college-makes... [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_colleges_and_universities_in_the_United_States_by_endowment https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_colleges_and_universit...

seanmcdirmid 3y ago
This is like why doesn’t Seattle and San Francisco grow to cities of 10 or 20 million to meet demand? Harvard could increase in size 10 fold and still not come near satisfying demand. Why does Harvard have to expand at all? Why not just have more schools?