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And let's not even pretend race doesn't factor into this. The reason so many Asian students excel is that they're the children of (reasonably) high status immig

by hnbad 3y ago

And let's not even pretend race doesn't factor into this. The reason so many Asian students excel is that they're the children of (reasonably) high status immigrants. Even if the wealth in the country of origin doesn't directly translate, the social status still carries over. Likewise the reason so many Black students underperform or only gain access via Affirmative Action is that they largely originate in families of lower social status with little access to education, carried over ultimately from slavery but more directly a familial legacy pruned by centuries of racism. Social mobility is not universally seen as a good thing by everyone in society. Specifically to those at the top of the social hierarchy it can be a threat because a wide gap and inequality helps maintain a position of power: if everyone has equal power, noone does. So it's silly to expect elite universities to follow a broader economic incentive when it comes to who gets in, who graduates and who receives preferrential treatment. There are certainly economic factors at play but ultimately the entire system is heavily built around nepotism (which in this case is hardly a modern invention given that universities used to be very much run by and for the hiearchial elites of society). Sure, the more direct incentives may be financial (e.g. donations) but ultimately power and hierarchies are a better lens than the economist one of the article if you want to make sense of this.

nemo44x 3y ago
> The reason so many Asian students excel is that they're the children of (reasonably) high status immigrants. That's not true. For instance, in NYC Asians have the highest rate of poverty. And yet they also have the highest rate of advanced placement in schools. [1] And many of these kids are from these poor families. It's because their culture values this and Asian students tend to put more effort into school. Many Asian cultures believe in the connection between effort and achievement and it shows. [2] The first explanation suggests that Asian-American youth’s academic advantage can be attributed to advantages in socio-demographic factors. Relative to whites, their parents tend to be better educated, and they are more likely to live in stable, two-parent families with higher incomes (5). This explanation, however, is insufficient because advantages in socio-demographic factors only partially explain the achievement gap (2, 3, 5). Moreover, Asian Americans are not uniformly advantaged in terms of family socioeconomic background. For example, the poverty rates of Chinese and Vietnamese are higher than they are for whites (5). However, the disadvantaged children of Chinese and Vietnamese immigrant families routinely surpass the educational attainment of their native-born, middle-class white peers (6, 7). [1] http://www.roosevelthouse.hunter.cuny.edu/?forum-post=researching-asian-poverty-new-york#:~:text=According%20to%20the%202019%20New,Black%2C%20and%20Hispanic%2FAny http://www.roosevelthouse.hunter.cuny.edu/?forum-post=resear.... [2] https://www.pnas.org/doi/full/10.1073/pnas.1406402111 https://www.pnas.org/doi/full/10.1073/pnas.1406402111

by hnbad 3y ago

nemo44x 3y ago

> The reason so many Asian students excel is that they're the children of (reasonably) high status immigrants. That's not true. For instance, in NYC Asians have the highest rate of poverty. And yet they also have the highest rate of advanced placement in schools. [1] And many of these kids are from these poor families. It's because their culture values this and Asian students tend to put more effort into school. Many Asian cultures believe in the connection between effort and achievement and it shows. [2] The first explanation suggests that Asian-American youth’s academic advantage can be attributed to advantages in socio-demographic factors. Relative to whites, their parents tend to be better educated, and they are more likely to live in stable, two-parent families with higher incomes (5). This explanation, however, is insufficient because advantages in socio-demographic factors only partially explain the achievement gap (2, 3, 5). Moreover, Asian Americans are not uniformly advantaged in terms of family socioeconomic background. For example, the poverty rates of Chinese and Vietnamese are higher than they are for whites (5). However, the disadvantaged children of Chinese and Vietnamese immigrant families routinely surpass the educational attainment of their native-born, middle-class white peers (6, 7). [1] http://www.roosevelthouse.hunter.cuny.edu/?forum-post=researching-asian-poverty-new-york#:~:text=According%20to%20the%202019%20New,Black%2C%20and%20Hispanic%2FAny http://www.roosevelthouse.hunter.cuny.edu/?forum-post=resear.... [2] https://www.pnas.org/doi/full/10.1073/pnas.1406402111 https://www.pnas.org/doi/full/10.1073/pnas.1406402111