Do Elite Private Colleges Discriminate Against Asian Students?
Students of different races have varying odds of admission to elite private colleges, a study finds
A recent study of the applicants to seven elite colleges in 1997 found that Asian students were much more likely to be rejected than seemingly similar students of other races. Also, athletes and students from top high schools had admissions edges, as did low-income African-Americans and Hispanics.
[Read the full study here (PDF).]
Translating the advantages into SAT scores, study author Thomas Espenshade, a Princeton sociologist, calculated that African-Americans who achieved 1150 scores on the two original SAT tests had the same chances of getting accepted to top private colleges in 1997 as whites who scored 1460s and Asians who scored perfect 1600s.
He also found some indications that while rich students make up an increasingly large share of the entering freshman classes, the top private schools appeared to be giving admissions edges to low-income minorities, but not necessarily low-income white students. The very richest students also generally had lower acceptance rates than similarly qualified, but less wealthy, students.
Espenshade warned against concluding that his study proved that colleges improperly discriminated. For one thing, Asians, who make up less than 5 percent of the U.S. population, often make up nearly a third of the applicant pools to elite colleges. And they generally account for at least 10 percent of the student body. Meanwhile, low-income students and minorities make up disproportionately smaller shares of the applicant pools and, often, student populations. Harvard reported last year, for example, that 15 percent of its undergraduates were Asian, but only 7 percent were black, and just 6 percent were Hispanic.
In addition, Espenshade's study didn't account for "soft" qualifications such as essays, recommendations, extracurricular activities, musical or artistic talents, or community service, all of which play important roles in admissions decisions.
Nevertheless, some experts said Espenshade's findings seem likely to add more fuel to long-running criticisms of admissions offices. Even though the study reflects 12-year-old practices, "I have no doubt that circumstances have not changed in the interval between then and now," said Ward Connerly, who has spearheaded anti-affirmative action drives in several states. Connerly and other observers noted that college admissions policies have been controversial for decades.
During the 19th and first half of the 20th centuries, African-Americans, American Indians, Jews, and other minorities were barred or severely restricted from many colleges. Civil rights laws and court rulings banned discrimination and encouraged colleges to reach out to long-disadvantaged students.
Some of those efforts created resentment among white and Asian students who felt they were denied opportunities to make room for those whom they believed to be less qualified minorities. Sparked by a lawsuit filed by a white applicant who had been rejected from a medical school, the U.S. Supreme Court in 1978 ruled that racial quotas were illegal. Voters in California, Michigan, and Washington have since voted to ban many affirmative action practices. In recent years, Asian-Americans have fought admissions policies they believe artificially limited their numbers on campuses. In 2006, an Asian student who scored a perfect 2400 on the three SAT tests filed a federal complaint against Princeton alleging the university rejected him because of anti-Asian bias. The U.S. Department of Education is now examining Princeton's admissions policies.
Although the schools Espenshade studied have not been identified, Princeton says it wasn't part of the set. And it says it doesn't discriminate on the basis of race or national origin. "The class of 2010 had a record 17,564 applicants for a class of 1,231. We admitted only about half of all the applicants with maximum 2400 SAT scores," says university spokeswoman Cass Cliatt. "Princeton considers factors such as interest in and demonstrated commitment to a particular field of study or extracurricular activity, exceptional skills and talents, experiences and background, status as an alumni child or Princeton faculty or staff child, athletic achievement, musical or artistic talent, geographic or socioeconomic status, race and ethnicity, any unique circumstances, and a range of other factors," she added. Currently, Asians make up 15 percent of Princeton's undergraduate student body.
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Reader Comments
Affirmative Action is evil!
Affirmative action is just plain wrong and downright evil. Universities should take the best candidates, race or sex should never be considered. It was wrong when whites had advantages before the 70's and it is still wrong today when blacks and Latinos have privileges the rest of the population does not.
These practices not only go on in higher education. They carry on to careers and even government grants and loans. I came here from India. I heard all my life from media that whites were racist and were the privileged class in the United States discriminating against blacks. I have learned first hand that this was pure propaganda. In all my experiences here the African American and Latinos are the racists and privileged class. All they have to do is not enter a life of crime and the US government, corporations and many other organizations will help them all the way. Why don't Asians and whites have similar organizations as the United Negro College fund, NAACP, La Raza (The Race), LULAC, etc, etc, etc.
Honestly I think the three groups who get affirmative action are professional whiners and cry babies. It is my opinion they will be spouting the same propaganda in the year 2525.
Do Elite Private Colleges Discriminate Against Asian Students?
Given that roughly half of the world population (billions!) is "Asian", it is quite unfair for the small group of Asian Americans to be lumped in with East Asians, South Asians, and Southeast Asians - resulting in 50% of the world population effectively having to share the 5-10% allowable admissions quota in US colleges.
It is also grossly unfair to not account for the affect that a lifetime of discrimination will have on the psyche of an AA, when handing out Affirmative Action seats in favor of only the Blacks and Hispanics.
But the truly dangerous wave of the near future is when the backlash happens - the fallout effects of lumping all the groups of poor: Laotian, Cambodian, Vietnamese and Burmese refugees in with the privileged children of Asian immigrant doctors, engineers, scientists and academics.
Diversity should be measured by mental and cultural contributions, not physical features only - this is cosmetic. Many AA's are exactly like their white counterparts inside their skins, and should not be feared as part of the "AsianInvasion". Most of them forgot that they are not white. They are domesticated and, I repeat, not to be feared.
All 4.0 students with perfect SAT scores should be put into the same pot and then separated into those with more interesting personal qualities, vs. those without. Then, if someone is just a boring, rote learning student, then by all means, eliminate that person in favor of someone with community leadership and athletic skills.
If whites are sad about lesser admission percentages, I have a FANTASTIC solution for them, HIT THE BOOKS!!!!!!!!!!!!! Don't penalize the AA's who skipped the drinking parties in order to do well on exams. You should call them and offer to join their study groups, you might even enjoy a few delicious cross-cultural meals.
Even the hiring practices of Diversity Professionals are discriminatory, in that Blacks and Hispanics are more likely to be hired than Asian Americans. So if even these key Admissions and HR professionals do not have knowledge about the AA issues, how can this growing minority AA population ever hope to receive fair treatment?
It is a crime against humanity to still be discriminating against Asian Americans at this late date in US history.
But I'll bet this is a factor that will contribute to there being more women and Asian Americans in heaven.
PS. I would agree with quotas controlling the percentage of AA's in colleges, if we could balance this with quotas controlling the percentage of whites in residential areas, it's only fair. It's all for diversity's sake, after all...
Jos of XX: AA needs to stay
Jonathan of XX, I think you encapsulated some of my further ideas. Jos of XX, I think you missed some of my point. My apologies for generalizing. What Jonathan mentioned is a good point, the reason why a disproportionate# of Asians still get top billing in the U of Cal, where affirmative action has been eliminated, has much to do with resource access. Asians in general,, particularly second generation Asian Americans, have greater social mobility and more cash to dispose of on skill preparation for their children. As I said before, if they don't have the money, they find it by sacrificing other things. Many more socioeconomically disadvantaged minorities lack equal access to the same resources; quite often the comparative disadvantage begins very early and poverty trap cycles can become a multi-generational problem that hinders probabilities of success over an extensive time frame.
Essentially, AA acts to equilibrate through social and political policy an apartheid state in America, in which the poorest areas in cities are often <95% black and hispanic poor. Native Americans are a special case in that they are an almost infinitesimally small minority in danger of dying out and usually found outside of cities, in reservations.Asians are for the most part excluded from this process due to features and characteristics of their engagement with the US that is qualitatively different but a major advantage over blacks, latinos and NA.
The politics of AA policy in schools is a reflection of this apartheid reality and symbolizes a substantive attempt to ameliorate current asymmetries in opportunity at the tertiary level of education. It might be in many ways a bandaid approach with weak prescriptive resolve, but institutionally it is an essential policy.
Returning to Asians, I do NOT think that they are all 'robotic', though this more rote pattern of thinking is a reflection of Asian schools outside the US, distilled from Asian cultural and familial values, and subsequently imported into the US as Asians have migrated. Such values are not necessarily intrinsically bad but they can be in stark contradiction to the US model for liberal curricula and subjective reasoning, which Asians can to struggle with more.
I stand by my earlier statement that it is a good thing more Asians are being rejected. This is not to say that it is a good thing that other minorities are being accepted when at times (and definitely not most of the time) they are less qualified. But please keep in mind that diversity enhances the quality of learning by creating an environment in which different intellectual and cultural perspectives converge on common problems and issues. Remember that there are other advantages in the admissions process, such as legacy, development cases (applicants with very rich parents who may be potential donors and athletics. Only ONE of these three other factors actually gives non-Asian minorities an admissions edge, and very few of the
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