Columbia University becomes first Ivy League institution to go permanently test-optional

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Honestly the SC case result is going to be really interesting. It’s simply clear that schools have discriminated against Asians. And it’s also clear that conservatives have wanted to end AA for decades to help white Americans to retain an upper hand in life. Many of those same conservatives won’t love to see brown (ie Asian Americans) do better than their white kids which would be the case of admissions is based purely on gpa and test scores. So do the conservative justices actually end up adhering to their principles that colleges admissions should be based on “merit” (ie gpa and tests) only? Or, continue with holistic factors and racism? Who on the supreme
Court has a kid or grandkid or great grandkid in HS now? I am sure that is informing their thinking. Fascinating….

Asians aren’t brown.

[Anonymous]

DEI is fundamentally a technology to protect whites from Asians by imposing a paradigm of proportional representation over merit. Asians are way over represented and taking up a lot of seats that would otherwise go to whites at top 20 schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Here's an anecdote for you. I'm a white guy from a working class background with parents who never finished high school. I went to a no-name college because it never even occurred to me to apply anywhere else. I ended up with an extremely high GPA and, with coaxing and coaching from a dean of the college, ended up winning a highly prestigious scholarship for graduate studies abroad .

I did not do well on the SAT and also bombed the LSAT. Coming from my background, it honestly never even occurred to me that I needed to or should prep for it. I literally thought to myself "ok, to apply to law school you need to take the LSAT," so I simply signed up and walk into the exam room and took it.

My LSAT score easily placed me in the bottom ten percent of accepted applicants. In a school where the median score of my entering class was well above the 90th percentile, my score was in the 60th percentile. I was admitted to the law school solely on the basis of my GPA and because I applied from abroad while on my graduate scholarship.

I finished my 1L year first in the class, and it wasn't close. Number 2 was an Ivy League grad with a perfect LSAT score. I was retroactively awarded a full scholarship. I ended up graduating in the top 5, landing a top federal court of appeals clerkship, getting hired by one of the most selective Biglaw firms in the country, and eventually made equity partner.

Bottom line: my test scores obviously did not reflect the full extent of my abilities in any way, shape or form. My law school apparently knew that and took a chance on me. I'm grateful for that.

My kids, on the other hand, all had SAT and ACT scores that blew mine completely out of the water, and all of them ended up attending top colleges and universities. I love my kids and obviously think they're smart, but I don't think for a second that a bunch of near geniuses (exaggerating but you get the point) were the spawn of idiot genes. It typically doesn't happen that way.

No, what happened is this: my kids' test scores were the combined product of both their natural intelligence AND the privilege of being raised in a high income environment with educated parents who understood the system and had the wherewithal to make it work for them. It's just so painfully obvious.

This board suffers from the delusion that standardized test scores used for college admissions are more than just a blunt instrument. They're not. They're axes, not scalpel. The notion that high test scores should trump everything else -- or that low test scores should be disqualifying -- is ridiculous.

In my opinion, GPA is not a good academic indicator. In my area, public schools have very low academic standards. It’s very easy to get an A with minimal effort. There are many kids with very high GPA who drop out of first year of college because it’s hard and they don’t have study habits.

[Anonymous]

This story could only happen to a white guy. Put a black guy or a girl in this place and this would never have happened.

[Anonymous]

DEI masquerades as helping black and brown. Its purpose is to validate anti Asian discrimination. Doing away with testing because of “equity” is a prime example - it favors Asians. Coincidence that California is the first state to ban testing outright???

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yep... best way to hide their discrimination.

What discrimination?

You do understand it's perfectly acceptable to accept students with lower test scores? For whatever reason they want? And that choosing to have just a disproportionate amount of Asian students versus a GROSSLY disproportionate amount of Asian students is perfectly valid discrimination, right? It's discimination in the sense that when you choose red wine to drink over white wine, you've discriminated against the white wine. Oh well. It doesn't make it wrong.[/quote

What a dumb response. You’re describing discrimination exactly

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This story could only happen to a white guy. Put a black guy or a girl in this place and this would never have happened.

And why not?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Yep... best way to hide their discrimination.

What discrimination?

You do understand it's perfectly acceptable to accept students with lower test scores? For whatever reason they want? And that choosing to have just a disproportionate amount of Asian students versus a GROSSLY disproportionate amount of Asian students is perfectly valid discrimination, right? It's discimination in the sense that when you choose red wine to drink over white wine, you've discriminated against the white wine. Oh well. It doesn't make it wrong.[/quote

What a dumb response. You’re describing discrimination exactly

+1

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Honestly the SC case result is going to be really interesting. It’s simply clear that schools have discriminated against Asians. And it’s also clear that conservatives have wanted to end AA for decades to help white Americans to retain an upper hand in life. Many of those same conservatives won’t love to see brown (ie Asian Americans) do better than their white kids which would be the case of admissions is based purely on gpa and test scores. So do the conservative justices actually end up adhering to their principles that colleges admissions should be based on “merit” (ie gpa and tests) only? Or, continue with holistic factors and racism? Who on the supreme
Court has a kid or grandkid or great grandkid in HS now? I am sure that is informing their thinking. Fascinating….

Asians aren’t brown.

Have you been to Asia? Many Asians are brown. People from Philippines, Malaysia, India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Indonesia, Nepal, etc…

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This story could only happen to a white guy. Put a black guy or a girl in this place and this would never have happened.

And why not?

Have you ever seen a dean of college “coaxing and coaching” a minority or woman to apply?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Honestly the SC case result is going to be really interesting. It’s simply clear that schools have discriminated against Asians. And it’s also clear that conservatives have wanted to end AA for decades to help white Americans to retain an upper hand in life. Many of those same conservatives won’t love to see brown (ie Asian Americans) do better than their white kids which would be the case of admissions is based purely on gpa and test scores. So do the conservative justices actually end up adhering to their principles that colleges admissions should be based on “merit” (ie gpa and tests) only? Or, continue with holistic factors and racism? Who on the supreme
Court has a kid or grandkid or great grandkid in HS now? I am sure that is informing their thinking. Fascinating….

Asians aren’t brown.

Have you been to Asia? Many Asians are brown. People from Philippines, Malaysia, India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Indonesia, Nepal, etc…

No, darling, You misunderstood. In the US Asians are whites. Because we can't have a successful, highly performing and rapidly growing non-white group that achieves phenomenal outcomes without DEI and affirmative action and government help. Therefore Asians must really be whites because otherwise it doesn't fit the narrative of systematic racism and we need to applying huge double standards and wildly different admissions standards to keep out Asians from our elite schools.

[Anonymous]

We had a parent teacher conference yesterday with my 8 grade DD. DD has done fantastic academically in a very rigorous environment.

Her homeroom teacher told her that she is very gifted academically, but is quiet and is a girl and therefore will get overlooked. Quiet girls get overlooked. That was the message.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

No, darling, You misunderstood. In the US Asians are whites. Because we can't have a successful, highly performing and rapidly growing non-white group that achieves phenomenal outcomes without DEI and affirmative action and government help. Therefore Asians must really be whites because otherwise it doesn't fit the narrative of systematic racism and we need to applying huge double standards and wildly different admissions standards to keep out Asians from our elite schools.

You don’t get it, do you? It’s got nothing to do with you being Asian. Everyone is just sick and tired of tiger parent, drill, robotic, pressure cooker culture that you create. That and lack of cultural assimilation. Indians don’t assimilate with whites or blacks, they create only Indian groups. You are more racist than whites.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Here's an anecdote for you. I'm a white guy from a working class background with parents who never finished high school. I went to a no-name college because it never even occurred to me to apply anywhere else. I ended up with an extremely high GPA and, with coaxing and coaching from a dean of the college, ended up winning a highly prestigious scholarship for graduate studies abroad .

I did not do well on the SAT and also bombed the LSAT. Coming from my background, it honestly never even occurred to me that I needed to or should prep for it. I literally thought to myself "ok, to apply to law school you need to take the LSAT," so I simply signed up and walk into the exam room and took it.

My LSAT score easily placed me in the bottom ten percent of accepted applicants. In a school where the median score of my entering class was well above the 90th percentile, my score was in the 60th percentile. I was admitted to the law school solely on the basis of my GPA and because I applied from abroad while on my graduate scholarship.

I finished my 1L year first in the class, and it wasn't close. Number 2 was an Ivy League grad with a perfect LSAT score. I was retroactively awarded a full scholarship. I ended up graduating in the top 5, landing a top federal court of appeals clerkship, getting hired by one of the most selective Biglaw firms in the country, and eventually made equity partner.

Bottom line: my test scores obviously did not reflect the full extent of my abilities in any way, shape or form. My law school apparently knew that and took a chance on me. I'm grateful for that.

My kids, on the other hand, all had SAT and ACT scores that blew mine completely out of the water, and all of them ended up attending top colleges and universities. I love my kids and obviously think they're smart, but I don't think for a second that a bunch of near geniuses (exaggerating but you get the point) were the spawn of idiot genes. It typically doesn't happen that way.

No, what happened is this: my kids' test scores were the combined product of both their natural intelligence AND the privilege of being raised in a high income environment with educated parents who understood the system and had the wherewithal to make it work for them. It's just so painfully obvious.

This board suffers from the delusion that standardized test scores used for college admissions are more than just a blunt instrument. They're not. They're axes, not scalpel. The notion that high test scores should trump everything else -- or that low test scores should be disqualifying -- is ridiculous.

You're clearly not very smart lol. You just tried to prove a trend with a sample size of n = 1. Also, you completely omitted the 50% genetic contribution of your wife who is likely smarter than you.

And yours is the response of a nitwit.

I tend to agree. That response was unnecessarily insulting and ignored the firstfew words of the PP's post--"anecdote." So annoying how knee jerk rude so many ppl are here.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

No, darling, You misunderstood. In the US Asians are whites. Because we can't have a successful, highly performing and rapidly growing non-white group that achieves phenomenal outcomes without DEI and affirmative action and government help. Therefore Asians must really be whites because otherwise it doesn't fit the narrative of systematic racism and we need to applying huge double standards and wildly different admissions standards to keep out Asians from our elite schools.

You don’t get it, do you? It’s got nothing to do with you being Asian. Everyone is just sick and tired of tiger parent, drill, robotic, pressure cooker culture that you create. That and lack of cultural assimilation. Indians don’t assimilate with whites or blacks, they create only Indian groups. You are more racist than whites.

This post exemplifies the anti-Asian bigotry that has really built up among whites (and which is tolerated) as Asians have outcompeted them. I am writing as a white person. I think the Harvard/UNC lawsuits have really made a lot of white people mad because for the first time Asians are asserting their rights as Americans and speaking up. Whitey doesn’t like it- expects Asians to be quiet and deferential. The next goal for Asians should be to take leadership positions across America - they are drastically under represented. A quarter of the Ivy League is Asian but how many Senators and SC justices? It’s ridiculous. But Asians need to be prepared for backlash like this poster demonstrated.