URMs Feeling Pressure to Prove Themselves

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If your kid ends up going to Berkeley or Michigan, that should shut them up. But yeah, AA gives your kid a boost at most schools, you can’t have it both ways.

The rolls are really over-run with AAs, huh? How do you keep saying these things when reality is directly in your face.

[Anonymous]

I feel a lot of this has to do with some employers assumptions-perceptions-biases:
White-Asian = hard-working, smart, honest
URM = lazy, corrupt, low IQ

Employers, old boy networks will not differentiate a middle class/privileged URM from one who had to struggle for the most part. They might assume all URM have those negative qualities. So Juan Perez, no matter his SES, that graduated from U Mich might end up on the same playing field as a Kyle Connors who “summered” Martha’s Vinyard and went to U of Delaware.

I get that URM kids from higher SES groups mostly have not had to struggle in their comfortable worlds, but as they encounter the professional world, old traditions might remain, and they will end up having to work twice as hard to hang with the “finance bros”

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That's terrible people say rude things. Your daughter sounds amazing. Congrats on her acceptances!

I sincerely doubt that anyone says what OP is claiming, and I’ve been active in both private and public high schools. No one says that

Sure they say that. Maybe not as much to their face. Kid in my high school got accepted to an Ivy, was ranked somewhere around 5 in the class. No one else in the class attended an Ivy or anything close.

When my daughter was applying to colleges we used to go over the Naviance graphs. The one ivy acceptance (Yale) in my kids school in the previous 3-4 years was from a kid of African immigrants. Had excellent grades (very close to a 4.0 UW) but a 1090 on the SAT (before TO). All of the other kids with a 4.0 and 1500+ SAT scores were rejected.

Similar situation at my kid's HS.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That's terrible people say rude things. Your daughter sounds amazing. Congrats on her acceptances!

I sincerely doubt that anyone says what OP is claiming, and I’ve been active in both private and public high schools. No one says that

Sure they say that. Maybe not as much to their face. Kid in my high school got accepted to an Ivy, was ranked somewhere around 5 in the class. No one else in the class attended an Ivy or anything close.

When my daughter was applying to colleges we used to go over the Naviance graphs. The one ivy acceptance (Yale) in my kids school in the previous 3-4 years was from a kid of African immigrants. Had excellent grades (very close to a 4.0 UW) but a 1090 on the SAT (before TO). All of the other kids with a 4.0 and 1500+ SAT scores were rejected.

Similar situation at my kid's HS.

And these are the people who say that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That's terrible people say rude things. Your daughter sounds amazing. Congrats on her acceptances!

I sincerely doubt that anyone says what OP is claiming, and I’ve been active in both private and public high schools. No one says that

Sure they say that. Maybe not as much to their face. Kid in my high school got accepted to an Ivy, was ranked somewhere around 5 in the class. No one else in the class attended an Ivy or anything close.

When my daughter was applying to colleges we used to go over the Naviance graphs. The one ivy acceptance (Yale) in my kids school in the previous 3-4 years was from a kid of African immigrants. Had excellent grades (very close to a 4.0 UW) but a 1090 on the SAT (before TO). All of the other kids with a 4.0 and 1500+ SAT scores were rejected.

Similar situation at my kid's HS.

No one is getting admitted to Yale with a 1090 SAT.

Stop it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP - I am the mother of an Asian American kid. She is smart, hard working and throws herself into her EC’s. She is doing incredibly well at school. Both she and I support affirmative action. We both understand why from a perspective of providing chances for black and brown (although not brown like her) kids to see themselves in these fields requires changing the makeup of the workforce being trained. That is all well and good. But it tone deaf of you to not appreciate that your (equally smart and talented) daughter has an advantage over mine and to complain about ignorant people’s diminishing of your daughter’s accomplishments. From a societal level, I support you. From a mom dealing with college apps for her brilliant kid, I would rather be in your place.

Do you have that same feeling about job applications? Internship selections? Pay? Loan applications? Would you rather be in her daughters shoes in any of those scenarios? How about when facing a jury of your peers? Oh I see, it’s only when it comes to college admissions and you have skin in the game. Tone deaf indeed.

DP. What makes you think an Asian woman is not discriminated against when it comes to jobs, internships and pay? Most Asians try to lead lives so they are not on the other side of a jury, ever.. so there's that. Maybe others should try that too. You are the one that seems to be tone deaf.

+ 1 million

Data perhaps? https://www.bls.gov/opub/ted/2018/asian-women-and-men-earned-more-than-their-white-black-and-hispanic-counterparts-in-2017.

cutoff the link https://www.bls.gov/opub/ted/2018/asian-women-and-men-earned-more-than-their-white-black-and-hispanic-counterparts-in-2017.htm

What does this show other than on average Asian Americans are more highly educated than the general population. So the have higher average salaries. Fine. Do you really think that the stereotypes for Asian students (tryhards, robots, etc) don’t hold Asian women (or men) back when considered for leadership and leadership executive positions?

Honesty, people seem to have bought into the myth that because Asian Americans have figured out to rise in the rules set forth for them, they somehow face no discrimination. Which is just dumb. Doesn’t change the fact that colleges should balance their classes and trying to get a good mix of ethnicities is important for many many reasons.

And where is the through-line to power? Lots of Asian education, jobs, roles - but not leadership in significant places. I've become more hyper-focused on this in the past few years, where as a Black woman in IT, when I asked where the others were that looked like me, I was told the 'pool' was very small. However, my Asian brethren (new hires) were in the double-digits, but ALSO nowhere to be found in leadership really, when we looked at career trajectory. So the pool argument didn't really hold. When I ask now, lots and lots of blank stares.

The rules are the rules until the 'code is cracked' and then the goal posts are moved.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I feel a lot of this has to do with some employers assumptions-perceptions-biases:
White-Asian = hard-working, smart, honest
URM = lazy, corrupt, low IQ

Employers, old boy networks will not differentiate a middle class/privileged URM from one who had to struggle for the most part. They might assume all URM have those negative qualities. So Juan Perez, no matter his SES, that graduated from U Mich might end up on the same playing field as a Kyle Connors who “summered” Martha’s Vinyard and went to U of Delaware.

I get that URM kids from higher SES groups mostly have not had to struggle in their comfortable worlds, but as they encounter the professional world, old traditions might remain, and they will end up having to work twice as hard to hang with the “finance bros”

Any why do you think that is? You can't eat your cake and have it too..

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That's terrible people say rude things. Your daughter sounds amazing. Congrats on her acceptances!

I sincerely doubt that anyone says what OP is claiming, and I’ve been active in both private and public high schools. No one says that

Sure they say that. Maybe not as much to their face. Kid in my high school got accepted to an Ivy, was ranked somewhere around 5 in the class. No one else in the class attended an Ivy or anything close.

When my daughter was applying to colleges we used to go over the Naviance graphs. The one ivy acceptance (Yale) in my kids school in the previous 3-4 years was from a kid of African immigrants. Had excellent grades (very close to a 4.0 UW) but a 1090 on the SAT (before TO). All of the other kids with a 4.0 and 1500+ SAT scores were rejected.

Similar situation at my kid's HS.

No one is getting admitted to Yale with a 1090 SAT.

Stop it.

You’d be surprised, but yes, it does happen. At our school, it is the athletic recruits who are the outliers on naviance.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm very pro Affirmative Action. I was a beneficiary of the programs in the 1980s and 1990s as a URM. Maybe it's that I went to HSP schools, but all of the AA kids around me were stellar students. Sure, some of us went to crap high schools that didn't offer all the great academic opportunities that the rich kids whose parents went to college received. But we were gunners and worked hard. We all had the innate talent and brain power to meet the school's standards in our classes. What I don't get are kids who have one URM parent, don't look like and aren't treated like a URM, live in a middle or UMC white neighborhood and have lots of resources, but they still can't perform. Some of these kids are getting admitted to selective colleges with crap grades and low test scores. My SAT score (only took it once, without studying) might have been in the bottom quartile of the entering class. But that was still a really quite high score, especially given that English was my second language and my mom didn't even graduate from high school. Now I'm seeing kids who call themselves Mike instead of Miguel who are too lazy to bother studying for the SAT even though their parents could easily pay for test prep. They have mediocre grades and don't take the most rigorous courses. Nonetheless, they're being admitted to decent competitive schools. That is just wrong. If I were those kids, I'd enter college "feeling pressure to prove" myself.

It seems like you should be more pro Affirmative Action based on socioeconomic status NOT race. It’s not the 80s and 90s anymore and the basis for this program needs to evolve to meet the current needs.

[Anonymous]

It’s a hook and certainly can make the difference between getting in and being one of the many, many equally high achieving kids who doesn’t get a spot. That’s just a fact. However, it doesn’t mean they are not qualified and haven’t worked hard for their impressive stats and it’s a vastly better reason to get a boost than being a legacy or having Charles kushner as your dad. The people saying that to you are racist and ridiculous.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:That's terrible people say rude things. Your daughter sounds amazing. Congrats on her acceptances!

I sincerely doubt that anyone says what OP is claiming, and I’ve been active in both private and public high schools. No one says that

Sure they say that. Maybe not as much to their face. Kid in my high school got accepted to an Ivy, was ranked somewhere around 5 in the class. No one else in the class attended an Ivy or anything close.

When my daughter was applying to colleges we used to go over the Naviance graphs. The one ivy acceptance (Yale) in my kids school in the previous 3-4 years was from a kid of African immigrants. Had excellent grades (very close to a 4.0 UW) but a 1090 on the SAT (before TO). All of the other kids with a 4.0 and 1500+ SAT scores were rejected.

Similar situation at my kid's HS.

No one is getting admitted to Yale with a 1090 SAT.

Stop it.

For URMs, there's definitely a stigma attached to their attending selective universities. This works the other way for non-URMs. They are now competing for the smaller non-URM slots. They have to be that much better to overcome the greater competition they are now under. In short, they have to be a superman - or a superwoman - just to get in.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:OP - I am the mother of an Asian American kid. She is smart, hard working and throws herself into her EC’s. She is doing incredibly well at school. Both she and I support affirmative action. We both understand why from a perspective of providing chances for black and brown (although not brown like her) kids to see themselves in these fields requires changing the makeup of the workforce being trained. That is all well and good. But it tone deaf of you to not appreciate that your (equally smart and talented) daughter has an advantage over mine and to complain about ignorant people’s diminishing of your daughter’s accomplishments. From a societal level, I support you. From a mom dealing with college apps for her brilliant kid, I would rather be in your place.

Do you have that same feeling about job applications? Internship selections? Pay? Loan applications? Would you rather be in her daughters shoes in any of those scenarios? How about when facing a jury of your peers? Oh I see, it’s only when it comes to college admissions and you have skin in the game. Tone deaf indeed.

Maybe not my daughter. But my son? Looks like a regular brown kid. He is not likely to be treated much differently than many others if he gets into a run in with police. He is Indian American.

Do you really think Asian Americans are given preferences in pay? Maybe true. Hasn’t seemed true in my career but maybe it’s a case of not knowing what I don’t know.

Internships and jobs? My kid will hopefully be competitor but do you really think she will be more competitive than a highly qualified URM from a top school? At our work place, we are faking over ourselves to find these candidates (as we should be).

- Asian Americans are not treated any better than other non-Whites. It's just that they don't engage in behavior that tends to attract police attention.
- AAs are not given any preference in pay. No AA I know has seen that in their careers. Just because AA's as a group have the highest average salary doesn't mean each of them makes more than their non-Asian peers.
- Internships - Companies are falling all over themselves to hire URMs. Internships are no different. Why would an Asian have an advantage here?

Yea.... um..... so that's not true

[Anonymous]

Given that Affirmative Action carries so much weight in college admissions, I can’t believe that you are surprised this is happening. In my private school circle, it’s commonly accepted that URMs get an advantage and it’s commonly felt that this is unfair. If URMs don’t want to feel the extra pressure to prove themselves once they’ve gotten into a top school, we should get rid of Affirmative Action and bring back test scores, too.FWIW, I’m in favor of abandoning legacy preference and think that college sports should be run as club sports as well. Schools should field teams with the kids who made it in and let the professional leagues of each sport create their own minor league instead of relying on colleges to perform this function for them.

People are familiar with the Harvard Crimson article about score breakdowns by race. Here’s another one to peruse that breaks down medical school GPAs and MCATs by race/ethnicity. The first page is matriculations and the second is for applicants.

https://www.aamc.org/media/6066/download

It’s unfortunate that URMs who have the stats to enter top schools are treated like AA admits, but that’s the consequence of this policy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Given that Affirmative Action carries so much weight in college admissions, I can’t believe that you are surprised this is happening. In my private school circle, it’s commonly accepted that URMs get an advantage and it’s commonly felt that this is unfair. If URMs don’t want to feel the extra pressure to prove themselves once they’ve gotten into a top school, we should get rid of Affirmative Action and bring back test scores, too.FWIW, I’m in favor of abandoning legacy preference and think that college sports should be run as club sports as well. Schools should field teams with the kids who made it in and let the professional leagues of each sport create their own minor league instead of relying on colleges to perform this function for them.

People are familiar with the Harvard Crimson article about score breakdowns by race. Here’s another one to peruse that breaks down medical school GPAs and MCATs by race/ethnicity. The first page is matriculations and the second is for applicants.

https://www.aamc.org/media/6066/download

It’s unfortunate that URMs who have the stats to enter top schools are treated like AA admits, but that’s the consequence of this policy.

Said by someone with a fractional understanding of how a system works.... my goodness

[Anonymous]

There’s so much nastiness on this thread.

Truly awful assumptions about highly-successful URM, as well as bizarre beliefs that URMs “deserve” to have their achievements questioned for life.

You do you, I suppose. But it seems like a cynical and hate-filled way to live.

OP - My advice is to tell your DC that they can’t control other people, nor should they bother trying.

Encourage them to focus on what they can control - how hard they work, how well they listen and learn, how much empathy and kindness they share, and how well they put their talents to use in this world.

There will always be haters. But it’s not your DC’s job to answer to them or even engage their concerns. Work hard, live a good life, and let other people sort out their own BS.