Reply to Asian American student with 1590 SAT score blames affirmative action for rejections from 6 colleges

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Here's the solution.

Set a filter with X GPA and Y SAT scores.  Throw all people who make it into the pool and use a random computer algorithm to pick people.

Totally the fairest way to choose. All of the extraneous stuff is nonsense.  Schools should decide where they want to set the bar for quality, then have a completely race agnostic system for selection.  Drawing straws is fair after the cutoff is met.[/quote]

Then you just deal with an overcrowded CS/ENG dept and nobody in the English dept?  So much more does (and should ) go into selecting a freshman class[/quote]

It really doesn't take a slide ruler or advanced calculus to figure this out.

Fill out application with random assigned number that kids your name and identity.  Select top 3 choices for major.  Input GPA/SAT. Done.

No fluff. No legacies. No identities.  Randomly pick people who meet a cutoff for GPA/SAT. You can include parameters for random selection based on major choice and limits for capacity.

Students get accept or reject letter stating which majors they're admitted to.  This is a minor problem.  [/quote]

That is ridiculous.[/quote]

They really need to just apply to European schools (or many asian countries as well) who you take a test, score high enough you get in[/quote]

Maybe, that’s why foreign schools are now ranked higher than US universities in technical fields like engineering.  They’re admitting the best and brightest abroad and not based on flimsy ID baskets.[/quote]

True.  Look at US News best global engineering school rankings.  Even scarier is the fact that many of China’s engineering schools in the world’s T25 or T50 don’t even belong to their Ministry of Education—they belong to their Ministry of Defense.  Including world’s #5, Harbin, which is ranked just below world’s #4, MIT.  It’s a military technical university.

https://www.usnews.com/education/best-global-universities/engineering

[/quote]

Yup.

Americans are oblivious to how fast they're falling behind in technical fields.[/quote]

I wouldn’t say that we are falling behind fast, but China’s rise is a huge concern.  I read a few things about their history of nuclear and missile programs.  Not long ago (a few decades ago) the majority of that nation was poor uneducated peasants.  But they did have a few brilliant students who studied in the US and (to a lesser extent) Europe.  The founder of their missile and space program was an MIT Ph.D. and CalTech professor.  The father of their atomic bomb was a Purdue Boilermaker, helped by some Michigan Wolverines.  (Wonder if there was a Big Ten rivalry in their nuclear and missile research facilities.)  A CalTech Ph.D. and cofounder of Cornell’s aeronautical engineering (along with William Sears) (now part of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Dept) also contributed greatly to their weapons programs.  Allegedly he died in a plane crash in China—carrying hydrogen bomb design documents.  Just want to say that we are in a life-or-death struggle for technological supremacy.  The competition for technological supremacy is fiercer than ever in human history.  [b]Does AA/DEI help or hurt us in maintaining technological supremacy?  Different people may have different opinions, but that’s a question we must answer.[/b][/quote]

Do we think certain groups of people will help us maintain technological superiority?

[/quote]

That is exactly what they are saying - they can't make it in their country, so they are entitled to make it in this country, and they are entitled to take anyone else's place, because they know how to teach to the test, and Americans allegedly do not, so Americans must be inferior in Maths.

My, this is a very "Dictatorship" or "Communistic" thing to say. You do realize America is a Democracy? [/quote]

Yes, America is a democracy.  Do you realize that even deep blue California voters voted down AA, twice?  If AA is put up for a democratic vote, it does not stand a chance in this country.  Those elite college admins are NOT elected by the people. [/quote]

However, if those "elite college admins" feel it is important to increase the number of blacks, latinos and other minorities on their campus, they will find a way to do that.  Just like if they believe their is value in increasing the number of low income students on campus they will make it happen.

We do not get to vote on how private universities are run (or public really) and that is a good thing, given that only 50% of 25-60yo have even graduated college.  [/quote]

IF private universities don’t take a penny of taxpayers money then they can racially discriminate however they want.  But they do take taxpayers money. [/quote]

My tax dollars go to plenty of things that I do not get a direct say in.  Yet I still pay my taxes.

The research that private universities do with the grants they get end up "costing the country far less than if we had to hire people to do the research".  So the argument of "take away their money" does not really go very far.  Undergrads and graduate students are extremely cheap labor for the extensive research that happens.  Govt could not afford to pay for the research if it was all done in public firms/non-universities.

The amount of energy people put into complaining their kid wont or didn't get into a highly selective university is astounding.  Get over it, move on and support your kid at wherever they end up.  Fact will remain, just because you got great test scores and a 4.0 gpa and 10 APs that does NOT entitle you to an elite education.  There are more qualified candidates than spots, someone will get left out.  And the definition of "qualified" is different at each school, as they balance majors, M/F, demographics, etc.  [/quote]

You are not entitled to an elite education because of the color of your skin. [/quote]

No you are not.  Nobody is entitled to anything.  And I do not see anyone except white kids or asian kids filing lawsuits because they are not admitted to a Top university.  Show me a black family or latino family or some other minority family that has sued for that.  That's because they don't think they are entitled.  They work hard, excel, apply and hope for good results.

It is similar to how it is often easier for a smart female to gain admission to engineering or CS programs because those have been largely male dominated fields for decades.  So schools are aiming to ensure more women have the opportunity and work hard to ensure a closer to 50/50 mix (best most get to is 60/40 some have gotten better but not many).  Yes, it appears it's easier to get in as a female, but in reality that is because many girls have been told they are not good at math/science and have not had their self esteem boosted thru our educational system like boys.  So by the time college applicationtime arrives, the girls who are still interested in applying are the really smart ones, the so-so, struggling, ones on the fence have likely already been told "you can't do this" and have given up.  So the girls who are apply have self-selected as the upper portion of girls.  Whereas the guys have always been told they can do math/science and are more willing to try.  So you still have guys applying who are in the "bottom 40/50%" and they don't get in.  So for many schools, a higher percentage of girls get into eng/CS programs simply because the lower 20-50% have already disappeared due to how we educate girls.  
Also, many schools actively attempt to bring their Eng/CS closer to 50/50 M/F so that means many years/decades of admitting more females in hopes they attend and continue to attend.  Do you also complain that is not fair?  When the real injustice is that women have been restricted for decades.  When I was a kid women could not get a credit card without their husband or father signing for it, they did not have their own credit history even if they worked. Women thought their jobs could be a secretary or at most a nurse, but certainly not a lawyer, doctor, PHD in Chemistry, etc.  Women growing up in the 40/50/60s did not expect to go to college at the same level as boys in the same environments.  Do you think that world was better than today and that we should not have progressed.  Once we realize our errors in judgment we then must work to correct for those.  And that means encouraging girls to go into STEM.

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