Reply to Harvard's odd quota on Asian-Americans

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[quote=Anonymous]There is a widespread perception, which may be unfair, that Asian-Americans have an unhealthy fixation with going to prestigious colleges and are are spending an inordinate amount of time and resources prepping their children for standardized tests, doing excessively large numbers of extra curriculars, not for enjoyment or personal growth, but for the purpose of impressing admissions, resulting in unrealistically high entrances stats.

Again, this is the perception, not necessarily the reality, but this has created a situation where admissions are skeptical of scores coming from Asian-Americans.

Unfortunately, this stereotype hurts poorer Asian immigrants, particular ones from countries that don't have super competitive education systems. They get lumped in with the stereotypical "Asian Math Geniuses/Tiger Moms" from middle/upper-middle class backgrounds.

I think a similar issue happens to African Americans. Most colleges will accept AAs with lower stats than other races, with the assumption that they must be from impoverished backgrounds and "didn't have a father in the household," etc. But a disproportionately large proportion of the AAs that benefit from this are the middle-class AAs, or the children of immigrants from Caribbean nations, or from Africa itself -- all of whom tend to be better-off socioeconomically than the average AA. The truly poor AAs, the intended beneficiaries, don't benefit as often, and are far more likely to go to community colleges, where they will typically drop-out after a semester or two.

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