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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]One of the criticisms is that the Harvard admissions office is ranking/rating the candidate's personality without meeting him/her.  But it seems likely to me that the admissions office is relying heavily on letters of recommendation.  That seems perfectly legitimate to me.[/quote]
the folks interviewing the students gave them positive "personality" assessments, but the admissions staff would give those same students negative scores without ever having met them.  How would you rate a personality based on letters of recommendation?[/quote]

Do you really think an alumni interviewer has a better sense of a candidate's personality than a teacher who taught him/her for a year (or perhaps more)?  I'm not saying that teacher recommendations might not be biased, but certainly a teacher is likely to comment on a student's personality (is she friendly, mature, responsible, caring, etc.), so I don't think it's fair to say that Harvard admissions officers are basing their personality assessments on nothing.  Unless the study takes teacher recommendations into account, then I am unpersuaded by the fact that admissions officers disagree with an alum's recommendation based on a one-off interview.[/quote]
Would a teacher recommendation state that the student is "like a robot, not friendly, and immature"?  One would have to have a pretty high level of responsibility and maturity to get the grades and e.c.s to at least have Admissions look at your application.[/quote]

Getting good grades doesn't mean you are mature...it may just mean you have really demanding/controlling parents.  It may also mean you are one-dimensional.  I am an academic who writes letters of recommendation all the time.  While none of my letters are bad per se (I wouldn't agree to write a letter if I couldn't say anything positive), some are simply good while others are glowing.  The glowing ones go way beyond grades and talk about the student's interpersonal skills (important for my discipline), maturity, leadership qualities, ability to work in teams, etc.  I have no doubt that admissions offices are looking at letters of rec to get a sense of the candidate's personality and, more important, potential to become something special.  They want students with that je ne sais quoi that goes beyond grades and test scores.

[/quote]
And what makes you think that those Asian American students don't have that "je ne sais quoi " quality?  I hear people say not to stereotype or look at URM students as statistics. Yet, these same folks don't seem to have any problems doing this very thing to Asian American students.

Read the other posts re: stuyvesant students/teachers.[/quote]

The PP is obviously applying ignorant, racial stereotypes instead of reading informed posts.  Typical low intelligence DCUM poster.[/quote]

Actually, I'm not applying any stereotypes at all.  And I certainly never said that Asian Americans don't have that je ne sais quoi.  The point I am making is that Admissions may be making assessments about candidates' personalities and "soft qualities," as some have referred to them, based on teacher recommendations.  I say this because others have criticized admissions for making these assessments when they've never met the student (i.e., they must be giving them low personality scores simply based on the fact that they are Asian American).  My point is that high grades and test scores and a long list of ECs don't tell admissions officers whether a student has that je ne sais quoi.  But a letter of recommendation very well may.  Unless the plaintiffs in this lawsuit have read every letter of rec for admitted/rejected students, I don't see how they have a case (and, btw, I'm a law professor, so I think I have a pretty good sense of what it takes to prevail in a case like this).[/quote]
The problem here is that this is a very subjective view. How do we know if this same student was a URM with the same letter of recommendation, this student would not get in?

I don't have a problem with universities looking at other non academic measures. The problem I have is that it appears that an Asian American student can have all of the qualities the university is looking for but because there are "too many" of them, they will take the other candidate over the Asian American one.  Harvard and other universities have stated that their goal is diversity, which I agree, is laudable. However, when they start looking at ways to disqualify a student from one racial group over another with the same credentials simply because of the color of their skin, then it is discriminatory.  This is what Harvard did years ago with Jews. [b]If this same student was a URM with the exact same credentials and soft quality as the Asian American student and could get in, but the Asian American student can't, how is that not discriminatory[/b]?

Years ago, a black man had to outshoot, outscore, out-do everything a white man could do if he wanted a promotion or be picked up by a major league sports team.  If it was wrong back then, why is it ok now?[/quote]

But this is how affirmative action works.  Whether affirmative action impacts whites or Asian Americans doesn't really matter.  SCOTUS has said it's appropriate for schools to take race into account in admissions decisions.  How is this case any different than the many other affirmative action challenges that have come along?[/quote]

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