Reply to Asians are suing Harvard and UNC - Chapel Hill for use of quotas

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]College admissions in the US is not the gaokao and it shouldn't be.  Testing is not everything and even the Chinese and Koreans and Japanese are debating how to reduce their reliance on college admissions testing because it stifles creativity and ignores the multiple sources of excellence.

As a first generation Chinese-American with two Ivy degrees, I am just fed up with the whining about admissions to the Ivies. There are simply no race based quotas. Since only 1 percent of college students can go to an Ivy, the debate is largely inconsequential to improving the life options of Asian Americans. Fight the discrimination that affects the other 99%.

After interviewing scores of applicants, it is pretty obvious that there are lots of students with good grades who test well, but have almost nothing else.  The profiles are often remarkably similar: math/science excellence, limited intellectual depth in literature and the arts, few ECs besides classical music training and occasionally individual sports like golf or tennis. Worse, they present themselves as pretty ho-hum with no passion or excitement for learning. It is as if their parents are all reading from the same book on how to raise a child who gets in to Harvard.

Another thing to remember is that the Ivies are all liberal arts colleges! A hugely disproportionate share of Asian-American applicants are in the STEM fields. Since Harvard is choosing students to fill all its majors, Asians are largely competing against other math and science students applying to Harvard, not the historians, lit majors, artists, or football players.  Which also means they are largely competing against themselves.  That is why the test scores look skewed and why the admission rates are lower. Caltech does not need to find students to fill its philosophy department, while Harvard does.

[/quote]What an excellent and realistic perspective for every applicant to consider.  And I'm glad it came from a Chinese-American. [/quote]

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