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A civil rights group is challenging legacy admissions at Harvard University

42 points by Geekette 3y ago

LatteLazy 3y ago
America seems to perpetually (a) let private groups monopolise public goods (education, healthcare, media etc) then (b) spend decades on court cases about exactly how much control those groups are allowed while (c) spending enormous amounts of money buying the goods back at inflated prices America would be much better off preventing this at source...
- imgabe 3y ago
  Harvard does not have a monopoly on education. This may be a surprise to Harvard graduates, but there are other universities.
  - reducesuffering 3y ago
    I’m quite weary of how watered down the world monopoly gets thrown around for everything. It’s counterproductive. Mono is an extremely common prefix that is easy to understand.
- inglor_cz 3y ago
  Not an American, but I will bite. Neither education nor media seem to me an obvious public good, unlike, say, clean air. Private actors should definitely be allowed to teach or publish news. And Harvard et al. aren't really a monopoly in any sense. There is a shitton of other universities across the US. The Ivies are prestigious, yes, but logically, you can't have a shitton of prestigious institutions.
  - ericmay 3y ago
    Education is pretty firmly in the public good camp. Educated workforce means skilled labor and better economic productivity, etc.
- nonethewiser 3y ago
  Harvard is a private University. In what sense are its education services a public good? Or are you saying you think education should only be offered by the government? Or …?
  - paulgb 3y ago
    It’s a 501c3. At the very least, the IRS believes that it serves a public good.
    - nonethewiser 3y ago
      Its a private institution and a 501c3. I believe you are saying it benefits from federal tax savings. Please clarify if you mean something else but in any case being a 501c3 doesnt make their education services a public good. Subject to additional compliance for receiving federal money, absolutely.
      - paulgb 3y ago
        Being a 501c3 educational institution requires that “the services provided by the organization are available to the general public.” It’s a private institution as you say, but it’s a private institution that benefits from a particular tax status in exchange for serving the public good. https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/26/501#k https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/26/501#k
  - leereeves 3y ago
    I believe they are saying that education should be available to everyone. TIL that public good has a specific meaning similar to that: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_good_(economics) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_good_(economics)
  - ericmay 3y ago
    Is there really a meaningful distinction between Harvard the private university offering an education and education “offered by the government”? I don’t see a practical difference between Harvard and Berkeley for example, other than class rankings and maybe tuition cost. Same courses and curriculum, big government research grants and funding, same accreditation bodies, both are NCAA members, both are AAU members, etc.
- boeingUH60 3y ago
  Higher education is in no way monopolized by private universities.
hoppyhoppy2 3y ago
See also https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36577656 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36577656 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36581179 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36581179 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36577057 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36577057 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36576035 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36576035
nonethewiser 3y ago
> the practice discriminates against students of color by giving an unfair boost to the mostly white children of alumni. Im not sure this will ultimately be an effective argument. You cant favor people for being a certain race. But you can favor people for other reasons, which may result in more people of a certain race. That doesnt violate the Civil Rights Act. You dont have to meet racial quotas and in fact trying to do so will likely put you on the wrong side of the law (see the recent affirmative action case). The argument seems to be that legacy admissions are wrong because they end up favoring white people which violates the Civil Rights Act. But it’s not actually discrimination by race. Any method of choosing will have imbalanced results, unless you do the one thing you CANT do and choose by race. The article doesnt make any claims that legacy admissions are in and of itself illegal. Im just not sure what law legacy admissions break. Also, a popular feeling that it’s unfair is irrelevant. Thats a job for congress.
- dcdc123 3y ago
  > Thats a job for congress. The Supreme Court doesn’t seem to think so.
  - nonethewiser 3y ago
    You’re referring to making gay marriage legal? In any case its the Supreme Court”s case to rule on what the law says. They cant just conclude legacy admissions are unlawful because they are bad. Congress can.
    - code_runner 3y ago
      The court ruled its unconstitutional to have a law forbidding gay marriage. They did not make a law.
      - nonethewiser 3y ago
        They can essentially strike down laws as unconstitutional. But that’s a legal basis - they cant just say they think its bad and strike it down. Edit: (no reply button below) please clarify what you don’t understand. I dont see any disagreement between us despite your oppositional stance and fear of bigotry.
lordnacho 3y ago
I'm curious what people think about places that grant places in this way. If you see a Harvard grad, do you care whether they were a legacy? Does anyone even ask this when interviewing? Is there any difference between how legacies and non-legacies perform at the uni?
- TheOtherHobbes 3y ago
  I absolutely care if they were legacy because it means I'm not seeing a different Harvard grad who might have been less rich and more able.
  - lordnacho 3y ago
    So do you ask them about it? Is it normal to reveal on one's CV? I would guess not.
  - chii 3y ago
    > who might have been less rich and more able. but why would someone being less rich also imply they're more able? And why would someone richer not be capable just as much? It's just another form of discrimination - except that it feels justified, because it came from the axiom that legacy admissions must be worse for merit.
    - lordnacho 3y ago
      Berkson's Paradox would be one potential reason. Say you have some criteria like "potential future donor" and "really smart". They might not be connected in the general population, but when you select on the total donor+smart, such that only people with a high combined score are admitted, you get a correlation among the admitted population. It's not hard to see why: either you have loads of money and thus only need a little smarts, or you have lots of smart and need minimal money.
    - Timon3 3y ago
      > but why would someone being less rich also imply they're more able? And why would someone richer not be capable just as much? The less rich person must be able to get in. The more rich person doesn't have to be able to get in. This means that the average rich person that got in is less able than the average less-rich person. Where do you disagree with this logic?
_dain_ 3y ago
good, legacy admissions are triangulation technique, so they can pretend the quota system doesn't discriminate against white people. "look at all those white legacy admissions getting an unfair leg-up". yeah great, a few rich white people from the right families get some set-asides. they're practically a caste. 99.9% of white people do not have a chance of getting in this way. it does not help a white kid with high test scores from a working class family with no elite connections. so the overwhelming majority of whites are competing for an even tinier sliver of places than it might appear, after the AA/legacy/athlete quotas are subtracted. if you got rid of legacy admissions the white student population at top schools might shrink a little (or probably grow after AA is also abolished), but would become far more representative of the country as a whole. it would actually become more "diverse", which I am told is a good thing. there would be more square-headed midwesterners and appalachian scotch-irish, and fewer degenerate WASP scions.
eggy 3y ago
What about the higher standard for Asians per this article: https://www.northjersey.com/story/news/columnists/2022/11/03/race-based-college-admissions-and-its-impact-on-asian-americans/69614232007/ https://www.northjersey.com/story/news/columnists/2022/11/03... "According to research from Princeton University, students who identify as Asian must score 140 points higher on the SAT than whites and 450 points higher than Blacks to have the same chance of admission to private colleges."
_8j50 3y ago
My opinion on this whole thing is that whether legacy admissions or minorities, people who do badly academically, as evidenced by SAT/ACT/GPA should be denied regardless of legacy/minority status. So if they can only admit 1000 students, the the list of applicants must be sorted by SAT/ACT/GPA first. Then student essays which should not identify the student's economic status or class and ethnic backgrounds or any identifiers such as their names having been removed from the essay, should be graded and sorted then. At this point, they have the top candidates without considering any individually biasing information. Now, they can use protected group status such as race and gender as well as legacy admission status, but not for additional sorting, only as a tie-breaker. So if 500 all have perfect scores, 500 have 9/10 on essay and perfect everything else and 500 have 9/10 on essay and one of SAT,ACT,GPA then the first 500 are automatically accepted , and legacy/minority status scoring would be applied for the rest without humans looking at individual identifiers or legacy/minority status. So a legacy/minority person of perfect everything except essay and 9/10 SAT score would be ahead of a non-minority/non-legacy person with perfect everything except essay. Essentially, I am against both legacy and minority status compensating for lack of academic accomplishment but I am not against either factors being used as conditions of last resort. I am fine with harvard accepting all legacy white male students that all scored perfectly on essays,SAT,ACT and GPA.pure meritocracy is a joke but so is having anything trump someone's achievements.

42 points by Geekette 3y ago

America seems to perpetually (a) let private groups monopolise public goods (education, healthcare, media etc) then (b) spend decades on court cases about exactly how much control those groups are allowed while (c) spending enormous amounts of money buying the goods back at inflated prices America would be much better off preventing this at source...

imgabe 3y ago
Harvard does not have a monopoly on education. This may be a surprise to Harvard graduates, but there are other universities.
- reducesuffering 3y ago
  I’m quite weary of how watered down the world monopoly gets thrown around for everything. It’s counterproductive. Mono is an extremely common prefix that is easy to understand.
inglor_cz 3y ago
Not an American, but I will bite. Neither education nor media seem to me an obvious public good, unlike, say, clean air. Private actors should definitely be allowed to teach or publish news. And Harvard et al. aren't really a monopoly in any sense. There is a shitton of other universities across the US. The Ivies are prestigious, yes, but logically, you can't have a shitton of prestigious institutions.
- ericmay 3y ago
  Education is pretty firmly in the public good camp. Educated workforce means skilled labor and better economic productivity, etc.
nonethewiser 3y ago
Harvard is a private University. In what sense are its education services a public good? Or are you saying you think education should only be offered by the government? Or …?
- paulgb 3y ago
  It’s a 501c3. At the very least, the IRS believes that it serves a public good.
  - nonethewiser 3y ago
    Its a private institution and a 501c3. I believe you are saying it benefits from federal tax savings. Please clarify if you mean something else but in any case being a 501c3 doesnt make their education services a public good. Subject to additional compliance for receiving federal money, absolutely.
    - paulgb 3y ago
      Being a 501c3 educational institution requires that “the services provided by the organization are available to the general public.” It’s a private institution as you say, but it’s a private institution that benefits from a particular tax status in exchange for serving the public good. https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/26/501#k https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/26/501#k
- leereeves 3y ago
  I believe they are saying that education should be available to everyone. TIL that public good has a specific meaning similar to that: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_good_(economics) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_good_(economics)
- ericmay 3y ago
  Is there really a meaningful distinction between Harvard the private university offering an education and education “offered by the government”? I don’t see a practical difference between Harvard and Berkeley for example, other than class rankings and maybe tuition cost. Same courses and curriculum, big government research grants and funding, same accreditation bodies, both are NCAA members, both are AAU members, etc.
boeingUH60 3y ago
Higher education is in no way monopolized by private universities.

hoppyhoppy2 3y ago

See also https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36577656 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36577656 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36581179 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36581179 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36577057 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36577057 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36576035 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36576035

nonethewiser 3y ago

> the practice discriminates against students of color by giving an unfair boost to the mostly white children of alumni. Im not sure this will ultimately be an effective argument. You cant favor people for being a certain race. But you can favor people for other reasons, which may result in more people of a certain race. That doesnt violate the Civil Rights Act. You dont have to meet racial quotas and in fact trying to do so will likely put you on the wrong side of the law (see the recent affirmative action case). The argument seems to be that legacy admissions are wrong because they end up favoring white people which violates the Civil Rights Act. But it’s not actually discrimination by race. Any method of choosing will have imbalanced results, unless you do the one thing you CANT do and choose by race. The article doesnt make any claims that legacy admissions are in and of itself illegal. Im just not sure what law legacy admissions break. Also, a popular feeling that it’s unfair is irrelevant. Thats a job for congress.

dcdc123 3y ago
> Thats a job for congress. The Supreme Court doesn’t seem to think so.
- nonethewiser 3y ago
  You’re referring to making gay marriage legal? In any case its the Supreme Court”s case to rule on what the law says. They cant just conclude legacy admissions are unlawful because they are bad. Congress can.
  - code_runner 3y ago
    The court ruled its unconstitutional to have a law forbidding gay marriage. They did not make a law.
    - nonethewiser 3y ago
      They can essentially strike down laws as unconstitutional. But that’s a legal basis - they cant just say they think its bad and strike it down. Edit: (no reply button below) please clarify what you don’t understand. I dont see any disagreement between us despite your oppositional stance and fear of bigotry.

lordnacho 3y ago

I'm curious what people think about places that grant places in this way. If you see a Harvard grad, do you care whether they were a legacy? Does anyone even ask this when interviewing? Is there any difference between how legacies and non-legacies perform at the uni?

TheOtherHobbes 3y ago
I absolutely care if they were legacy because it means I'm not seeing a different Harvard grad who might have been less rich and more able.
- lordnacho 3y ago
  So do you ask them about it? Is it normal to reveal on one's CV? I would guess not.
- chii 3y ago
  > who might have been less rich and more able. but why would someone being less rich also imply they're more able? And why would someone richer not be capable just as much? It's just another form of discrimination - except that it feels justified, because it came from the axiom that legacy admissions must be worse for merit.
  - lordnacho 3y ago
    Berkson's Paradox would be one potential reason. Say you have some criteria like "potential future donor" and "really smart". They might not be connected in the general population, but when you select on the total donor+smart, such that only people with a high combined score are admitted, you get a correlation among the admitted population. It's not hard to see why: either you have loads of money and thus only need a little smarts, or you have lots of smart and need minimal money.
  - Timon3 3y ago
    > but why would someone being less rich also imply they're more able? And why would someone richer not be capable just as much? The less rich person must be able to get in. The more rich person doesn't have to be able to get in. This means that the average rich person that got in is less able than the average less-rich person. Where do you disagree with this logic?

_dain_ 3y ago

good, legacy admissions are triangulation technique, so they can pretend the quota system doesn't discriminate against white people. "look at all those white legacy admissions getting an unfair leg-up". yeah great, a few rich white people from the right families get some set-asides. they're practically a caste. 99.9% of white people do not have a chance of getting in this way. it does not help a white kid with high test scores from a working class family with no elite connections. so the overwhelming majority of whites are competing for an even tinier sliver of places than it might appear, after the AA/legacy/athlete quotas are subtracted. if you got rid of legacy admissions the white student population at top schools might shrink a little (or probably grow after AA is also abolished), but would become far more representative of the country as a whole. it would actually become more "diverse", which I am told is a good thing. there would be more square-headed midwesterners and appalachian scotch-irish, and fewer degenerate WASP scions.

eggy 3y ago

What about the higher standard for Asians per this article: https://www.northjersey.com/story/news/columnists/2022/11/03/race-based-college-admissions-and-its-impact-on-asian-americans/69614232007/ https://www.northjersey.com/story/news/columnists/2022/11/03... "According to research from Princeton University, students who identify as Asian must score 140 points higher on the SAT than whites and 450 points higher than Blacks to have the same chance of admission to private colleges."

_8j50 3y ago

My opinion on this whole thing is that whether legacy admissions or minorities, people who do badly academically, as evidenced by SAT/ACT/GPA should be denied regardless of legacy/minority status. So if they can only admit 1000 students, the the list of applicants must be sorted by SAT/ACT/GPA first. Then student essays which should not identify the student's economic status or class and ethnic backgrounds or any identifiers such as their names having been removed from the essay, should be graded and sorted then. At this point, they have the top candidates without considering any individually biasing information. Now, they can use protected group status such as race and gender as well as legacy admission status, but not for additional sorting, only as a tie-breaker. So if 500 all have perfect scores, 500 have 9/10 on essay and perfect everything else and 500 have 9/10 on essay and one of SAT,ACT,GPA then the first 500 are automatically accepted , and legacy/minority status scoring would be applied for the rest without humans looking at individual identifiers or legacy/minority status. So a legacy/minority person of perfect everything except essay and 9/10 SAT score would be ahead of a non-minority/non-legacy person with perfect everything except essay. Essentially, I am against both legacy and minority status compensating for lack of academic accomplishment but I am not against either factors being used as conditions of last resort. I am fine with harvard accepting all legacy white male students that all scored perfectly on essays,SAT,ACT and GPA.pure meritocracy is a joke but so is having anything trump someone's achievements.