Hired by Google as L4 but rejected by top colleges

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
A lot of talented Asian students left Gunn HS last year and moved on to the very same schools on Zhang's list. With a 60% Asian population at Gunn we know that many, many, many of them were Asian.

It is hard for me to believe Zhang was rejected because he is Asian when his Asian classmates were accepted to the same schools on his list

Seems like he was judged as not good enough compared to his peers (mostly Asians). Doesn’t this reinforce the notion that Asians are held to a higher standard just because they are competing with other Asians instead of being judged in relation to the general population?

It is ridiculous that going to a high performing, rich suburb school actually penalized him. He should have gone to a mediocre high school and be the top student. Then he will be accepted everywhere.

This is the state of US college admissions. Something has to be changed esp for state school systems such as the UCs.

Yes, he was judged against his peers and penalized for going to a high performing school. The same thing happens across the country.

Unfortunately, we don't have a uniform system of grading or even curriculum in this country--not even at the state level. Even with standardized tests, how does a school compare students in relation to the general population?

+1

Yes, this has been true for decades and has nothing to do with race.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Again, switch his skin color to black and see what would happen.

Again, UC is race blind.

This is a joke. Race can be proxied in many different ways like in the recent TJ reform. You think people are that stupid?

You are really a non-nuanced and reactive thinker. Yes, race can be proxied but the UC system admits the top 9% of each school. The kid attended a wealthy, high-performing suburban school. Kids at his school don't benefit from racial proxies. The UCs didn't pass over applicants in his school for another school with lower-performing students. They passed over him and admitted the higher performing kids (based on GPA and rigor), which are predominantly Aisan. That is the system that CA adopted. Texas has the same system but admits more OOS students, especially UT Austin, and doesn't have an exploding college-age population compared to Texas.

I mean they can tell you're an Asian from your last name. It's not that hard.

So you are arguing that he was in the top 9% of the class and skipped over because of his Asian last name? The UCs choose one of the non-Asian students ( 10% Hispanic/30% white) at his school or one of the 9% of economically disadvantaged kids?

Okay

Racists are not necessarily idiots. And practicing racial discrimination doesn't necessarily mean they would accept zero Asians. Compare his credentials with kids of different skin colors and we'll know whether there was a racial discrimination. That's why it's important to have more transparency: why he was denied and why other people were accepted.

Compare his credentials against other kids from his HS. That’s who he is competing against.

That's fine too.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
A lot of talented Asian students left Gunn HS last year and moved on to the very same schools on Zhang's list. With a 60% Asian population at Gunn we know that many, many, many of them were Asian.

It is hard for me to believe Zhang was rejected because he is Asian when his Asian classmates were accepted to the same schools on his list

Seems like he was judged as not good enough compared to his peers (mostly Asians). Doesn’t this reinforce the notion that Asians are held to a higher standard just because they are competing with other Asians instead of being judged in relation to the general population?

It is ridiculous that going to a high performing, rich suburb school actually penalized him. He should have gone to a mediocre high school and be the top student. Then he will be accepted everywhere.

This is the state of US college admissions. Something has to be changed esp for state school systems such as the UCs.

Yes, he was judged against his peers and penalized for going to a high performing school. The same thing happens across the country.

Unfortunately, we don't have a uniform system of grading or even curriculum in this country--not even at the state level. Even with standardized tests, how does a school compare students in relation to the general population?

+1

Yes, this has been true for decades and has nothing to do with race.

You don't really know. Shows how biased you are.

[Anonymous]

We don't have national standards and probably never will. A 1590 at a school where there are 50 or more students with a 1590-1600 is treated as ordinary. It is insane. Some kid with a 1590 where the school average is 950 is treated like they did something special. They did the exact same things as the students at the good school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:…A 1590 at a school where there are 50 or more students with a 1590-1600 is treated as ordinary. It is insane. Some kid with a 1590 where the school average is 950 is treated like they did something special. They did the exact same things as the students at the good school.

Exactly. A 1590 should be spectacular no matter what the kid’s high school is. A student should be judged according to his/her own merits, not relative to the students around him.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:As Elon Musk twitted, "The left hates Asians".
It's very true.

How ironic since most Asians are politically left. Not all, but most.

Elon is a nut job. Why would anyone care what he says?

People who are educated and not a-holes tend to vote D.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:…A 1590 at a school where there are 50 or more students with a 1590-1600 is treated as ordinary. It is insane. Some kid with a 1590 where the school average is 950 is treated like they did something special. They did the exact same things as the students at the good school.

Exactly. A 1590 should be spectacular no matter what the kid’s high school is. A student should be judged according to his/her own merits, not relative to the students around him.

Welcome to US college admissions. It’s been like this forever and has nothing to do with race.

No college wants to fill their class with kids from only a handful of magnet schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
A lot of talented Asian students left Gunn HS last year and moved on to the very same schools on Zhang's list. With a 60% Asian population at Gunn we know that many, many, many of them were Asian.

It is hard for me to believe Zhang was rejected because he is Asian when his Asian classmates were accepted to the same schools on his list

Seems like he was judged as not good enough compared to his peers (mostly Asians). Doesn’t this reinforce the notion that Asians are held to a higher standard just because they are competing with other Asians instead of being judged in relation to the general population?

It is ridiculous that going to a high performing, rich suburb school actually penalized him. He should have gone to a mediocre high school and be the top student. Then he will be accepted everywhere.

This is the state of US college admissions. Something has to be changed esp for state school systems such as the UCs.

Yes, he was judged against his peers and penalized for going to a high performing school. The same thing happens across the country.

Unfortunately, we don't have a uniform system of grading or even curriculum in this country--not even at the state level. Even with standardized tests, how does a school compare students in relation to the general population?

+1

Yes, this has been true for decades and has nothing to do with race.

You don't really know. Shows how biased you are.

Colleges don’t want to fill their classes with kids from only a small number of magnet high schools. It has nothing to do with race.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Welcome to US college admissions. It’s been like this forever and has nothing to do with race.

No college wants to fill their class with kids from only a handful of magnet schools.

Not true. Deny all you want but the problem is not as glaring as right now. Ask the graduate of UCs from 20 years ago and they will tell you that most of them will not get into top UCs now with their high school credentials.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:A lot like the electoral college system here. They don't want all of the political power to be aggregated in one place. Sort of the same with opportunities

We should hold Olympics like this too since this is such a great way to find talents.

Yes, medals will be awarded based on the geographic representations. We will have diversity, equity and inclusiveness - lovely.

Actually every country does get to send athletes to the Olympics. Hence we have a Jamaican bobsled team. It would be a really lame Olympics with just the us and Russia basically competing. Kind of like a college full of kids from the same schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:As Elon Musk twitted, "The left hates Asians".
It's very true.

How ironic since most Asians are politically left. Not all, but most.

Elon is a nut job. Why would anyone care what he says?

People who are educated and not a-holes tend to vote D.

People who are not evil don't vote D.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
A lot of talented Asian students left Gunn HS last year and moved on to the very same schools on Zhang's list. With a 60% Asian population at Gunn we know that many, many, many of them were Asian.

It is hard for me to believe Zhang was rejected because he is Asian when his Asian classmates were accepted to the same schools on his list

Seems like he was judged as not good enough compared to his peers (mostly Asians). Doesn’t this reinforce the notion that Asians are held to a higher standard just because they are competing with other Asians instead of being judged in relation to the general population?

It is ridiculous that going to a high performing, rich suburb school actually penalized him. He should have gone to a mediocre high school and be the top student. Then he will be accepted everywhere.

This is the state of US college admissions. Something has to be changed esp for state school systems such as the UCs.

Yes, he was judged against his peers and penalized for going to a high performing school. The same thing happens across the country.

Unfortunately, we don't have a uniform system of grading or even curriculum in this country--not even at the state level. Even with standardized tests, how does a school compare students in relation to the general population?

+1

Yes, this has been true for decades and has nothing to do with race.

You don't really know. Shows how biased you are.

Colleges don’t want to fill their classes with kids from only a small number of magnet high schools. It has nothing to do with race.

oh yes it does

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:As Elon Musk twitted, "The left hates Asians".
It's very true.

How ironic since most Asians are politically left. Not all, but most.

Elon is a nut job. Why would anyone care what he says?

People who are educated and not a-holes tend to vote D.

It's actually quite the opposite, especially based on what DCUM has shown us thus far.

[Anonymous]

The college admissions system is broken when a kid gets rejected from so many schools. It isn't because this kid is unpleasant or because his recommendation letters were bad. That's what I find weird about some of this thread- how quick people are to say that there must be something wrong with this kid. Nope. We should asking how to fix the real problem instead of denigrating a high school kid.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The college admissions system is broken when a kid gets rejected from so many schools. It isn't because this kid is unpleasant or because his recommendation letters were bad. That's what I find weird about some of this thread- how quick people are to say that there must be something wrong with this kid. Nope. We should asking how to fix the real problem instead of denigrating a high school kid.

Nope---this kid applied to largely Highly selective schools with the most highly selective major(very highly selective at all of theses schools). System isn't broken, there are simply more kids who want to attend than there are spots in CS at these schools. Want to get an acceptance, apply to several schools in the 30-80 range or beyond with excellent Eng/CS programs who have acceptances above 20-25%.