At what point is URM status finally determined?

[Anonymous]

OP maybe you should ask the admissions officer at the school you are applying to? THey can tell you what they require.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP maybe you should ask the admissions officer at the school you are applying to? THey can tell you what they require.

Or the website may help.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Right, because this would be a really good lesson to teach your kids. Maybe the last thing they learn from you before they're off on their and making all their own decisions.

Huh? What's wrong with answering a question honestly?

Wut? For 17 years OP checks the "Caucasian/white" box. So were they being honest then or being honest now?

Both? Maybe mixed is the right answer. As a pp noted, there are reasons people hide URM status.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Right, because this would be a really good lesson to teach your kids. Maybe the last thing they learn from you before they're off on their and making all their own decisions.

Huh? What's wrong with answering a question honestly?

Wut? For 17 years OP checks the "Caucasian/white" box. So were they being honest then or being honest now?

By OP's own admission, checking the white/Caucasian box was not ENTIRELY accurate, the reason for not reporting the Native American heritage may present a teachable moment.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP maybe you should ask the admissions officer at the school you are applying to? THey can tell you what they require.

No school in this country is going to require proof of the ethnicity you self identify. Applying foe scholarships etc. is a different story.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Right, because this would be a really good lesson to teach your kids. Maybe the last thing they learn from you before they're off on their and making all their own decisions.

Elizabeth Warren did the same thing and she might be the next president.

http://legalinsurrection.com/2012/04/confirmed-elizabeth-warren-knowingly-self-identified-as-native-american-on-law-association-forms/

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:In the Midwest it is not at all unusual to find families that there are many families that obscured Native American heritage in the family history. Some families would, for example, claim “Black Irish” ancestry to account for dark hair and eyes. I knew people that looked entirely European, but held a Cherokee Nation registration card "1/128 degree Cherokee blood."

I’m not surprised that someone with Native American ancestry might wish to continue to obscure that heritage in an area like the DMV where most people see nothing wrong with using a Native American slur as the nickname of the most popular sports team and there is very little support for Native Americans. I’d be surprised if any local high schools had Native American support groups.
All this is to say that I don’t think you should be ashamed of “coming out of the closet” so to speak about your children’s ethnicity. The past (present?) need to obscure Native American ancestry is a manifestation of past discrimination. Your children likely offer a perspective that colleges would value. Indeed, they might consider a college essay on the topic of what it is like to hide their ethnicity. I had a friend whose mixed-race child wrote a compelling essay on what it was like to have a white mother when the child was very dark skinned.

No I think the problem is that having American Indian heritage is actually considered rather cool so I'm more wary of white folks who claim it when it's actually a very small part of their entire ethnic heritage. (Here's looking at you, Elizabeth Warren!) Having a distant ancestor who was Native American is not the same experience as someone who grew up in an Indian family.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Right, because this would be a really good lesson to teach your kids. Maybe the last thing they learn from you before they're off on their and making all their own decisions.

Elizabeth Warren did the same thing and she might be the next president.

http://legalinsurrection.com/2012/04/confirmed-elizabeth-warren-knowingly-self-identified-as-native-american-on-law-association-forms/

In my family, it is the exact same number of generations on my father's side since anyone lived in Ireland than it is on my mother's side where someone was Native American. If I say "my family is Irish" or "I"m Irish" no one bats an eye, but if I say "my ancestors are Native American" apparently I am trying to scam the system, stretch the truth, whatever.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:In the Midwest it is not at all unusual to find families that there are many families that obscured Native American heritage in the family history. Some families would, for example, claim “Black Irish” ancestry to account for dark hair and eyes. I knew people that looked entirely European, but held a Cherokee Nation registration card "1/128 degree Cherokee blood."

I’m not surprised that someone with Native American ancestry might wish to continue to obscure that heritage in an area like the DMV where most people see nothing wrong with using a Native American slur as the nickname of the most popular sports team and there is very little support for Native Americans. I’d be surprised if any local high schools had Native American support groups.
All this is to say that I don’t think you should be ashamed of “coming out of the closet” so to speak about your children’s ethnicity. The past (present?) need to obscure Native American ancestry is a manifestation of past discrimination. Your children likely offer a perspective that colleges would value. Indeed, they might consider a college essay on the topic of what it is like to hide their ethnicity. I had a friend whose mixed-race child wrote a compelling essay on what it was like to have a white mother when the child was very dark skinned.

No I think the problem is that having American Indian heritage is actually considered rather cool so I'm more wary of white folks who claim it when it's actually a very small part of their entire ethnic heritage. (Here's looking at you, Elizabeth Warren!) Having a distant ancestor who was Native American is not the same experience as someone who grew up in an Indian family.

Well yeah . . . because someone growing up in an "Indian family" was in a South Asian family, not a Native American family.

It's a very slippery slope trying to set hard rules for who is or is not - a certain ethnicity - that's why schools rely on self identification.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Right, because this would be a really good lesson to teach your kids. Maybe the last thing they learn from you before they're off on their and making all their own decisions.

Elizabeth Warren did the same thing and she might be the next president.

http://legalinsurrection.com/2012/04/confirmed-elizabeth-warren-knowingly-self-identified-as-native-american-on-law-association-forms/

In my family, it is the exact same number of generations on my father's side since anyone lived in Ireland than it is on my mother's side where someone was Native American. If I say "my family is Irish" or "I"m Irish" no one bats an eye, but if I say "my ancestors are Native American" apparently I am trying to scam the system, stretch the truth, whatever.

AND those people don't understand the circumstances the Irish faced when they first got here - that ethnicity SHOULD be a ++

[Anonymous]

Is there a box for "Irish"? Don't think so. If your kids' great great grandfather was the last Cherokee Indian in the bloodline, do you think your kid should have an admissions advantage?

[Anonymous]

As someone who has sat on faculty hiring committees, I think Elizabeth Warren is not being truthful when she says she never benefitted from checking the American Indian box.

I could check that box but I don't. I have always identified as white and have not faced the discrimination that historically plagued Indians where I come from. I personally don't think it's right to game the system like this, and that's what you're proposing. If your kid has always identified as white, never faced discrimination, and does not have a family history of the social ills that trouble many families with Indian ancestry, I think you're subverting the purpose of affirmative action.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:As someone who has sat on faculty hiring committees, I think Elizabeth Warren is not being truthful when she says she never benefitted from checking the American Indian box.

I could check that box but I don't. I have always identified as white and have not faced the discrimination that historically plagued Indians where I come from. I personally don't think it's right to game the system like this, and that's what you're proposing. If your kid has always identified as white, never faced discrimination, and does not have a family history of the social ills that trouble many families with Indian ancestry, I think you're subverting the purpose of affirmative action.

Totally disagree. Many families his their ethnic origin to avoid prejudice - that itself is a symptom of discrimination. More to the point though, you are reading too much into the question being asked, which is generally something like "what is your ethnic origin?" NOT "have you (or your ancestors) suffered from discrimination due to ethnic origin?" - Or course, MANY white people (Jews, Slavs, Italians, Irish) could answer YES to the latter question - but that is not the question being asked.

Schools look at more than the ethnic origin response. A Native American with a 20815 zip code won't look the same as a native American with a 74105 zip code. First generation college student status stands out too.

[Anonymous]

families HIDE their ethnic origin

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:In the Midwest it is not at all unusual to find families that there are many families that obscured Native American heritage in the family history. Some families would, for example, claim “Black Irish” ancestry to account for dark hair and eyes. I knew people that looked entirely European, but held a Cherokee Nation registration card "1/128 degree Cherokee blood."

I’m not surprised that someone with Native American ancestry might wish to continue to obscure that heritage in an area like the DMV where most people see nothing wrong with using a Native American slur as the nickname of the most popular sports team and there is very little support for Native Americans. I’d be surprised if any local high schools had Native American support groups.
All this is to say that I don’t think you should be ashamed of “coming out of the closet” so to speak about your children’s ethnicity. The past (present?) need to obscure Native American ancestry is a manifestation of past discrimination. Your children likely offer a perspective that colleges would value. Indeed, they might consider a college essay on the topic of what it is like to hide their ethnicity. I had a friend whose mixed-race child wrote a compelling essay on what it was like to have a white mother when the child was very dark skinned.

No I think the problem is that having American Indian heritage is actually considered rather cool so I'm more wary of white folks who claim it when it's actually a very small part of their entire ethnic heritage. (Here's looking at you, Elizabeth Warren!) Having a distant ancestor who was Native American is not the same experience as someone who grew up in an Indian family.

Well yeah . . . because someone growing up in an "Indian family" was in a South Asian family, not a Native American family.

It's a very slippery slope trying to set hard rules for who is or is not - a certain ethnicity - that's why schools rely on self identification.

If you pay attention, you'll notice that a lot of folks who are considered "Native American" refer to themselves as American Indians. That's why it's called the National Museum of the American Indian at the Smithsonian, for example (www.nmai.si.edu). I try to follow what I hear people say, eg it can be Latino or Hispanic depending who who's speaking. Among the people concerned, I don't notice a consensus on the exact term, so enough of the lectures.