Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:


I want universities to be blind to everything except academic, and academic-adjacent, achievement. No legacy, athletics, development, family or ethnic background considerations.

If that happens schools like Harvard will cease to be Harvard. What gives the elite schools, especially Ivy League, cultural and social capital in the US is all that you seek to eliminate. I don’t personally care but I recognize the world we live in.

That’s bs. The lure of places like Harvard was the claim that it attracted the best and brightest around the world, and that the US was the top country to migrate to. Now with “holistic” admissions people can see that is not the case, coupled with the US in general decaying. Replacing an emphasis on academic achievement would actually reenergize Harvard.

What you describe is more recent history. The Ivy League brand was not built on the best and the brightest.

Forgot to add: consider Caltech and MIT. Full of smart kids but don’t have the cultural capital of Harvard.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:


I want universities to be blind to everything except academic, and academic-adjacent, achievement. No legacy, athletics, development, family or ethnic background considerations.

If that happens schools like Harvard will cease to be Harvard. What gives the elite schools, especially Ivy League, cultural and social capital in the US is all that you seek to eliminate. I don’t personally care but I recognize the world we live in.

That’s bs. The lure of places like Harvard was the claim that it attracted the best and brightest around the world, and that the US was the top country to migrate to. Now with “holistic” admissions people can see that is not the case, coupled with the US in general decaying. Replacing an emphasis on academic achievement would actually reenergize Harvard.

What you describe is more recent history. The Ivy League brand was not built on the best and the brightest.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:


I want universities to be blind to everything except academic, and academic-adjacent, achievement. No legacy, athletics, development, family or ethnic background considerations.

If that happens schools like Harvard will cease to be Harvard. What gives the elite schools, especially Ivy League, cultural and social capital in the US is all that you seek to eliminate. I don’t personally care but I recognize the world we live in.

That’s bs. The lure of places like Harvard was the claim that it attracted the best and brightest around the world, and that the US was the top country to migrate to. Now with “holistic” admissions people can see that is not the case, coupled with the US in general decaying. Replacing an emphasis on academic achievement would actually reenergize Harvard.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Merit Merit Merit
Nothing else
Will solve the admissions mess and the bloated salaries/insane tuitions
Burn it all down

And of course you want to be the one to define 'merit' for everyone.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am fine with that. College admissions needs a massive overhaul.

Depending on what the Supreme Court says, one of the biggest changes will be elimination of any sort of “Women in STEM” outreach programs, preferences, or scholarships.

Be careful what you (ignorantly) wish for.

Sure. Unless you are an Asian American woman. What this article fails to mention is that the whole college admissions process has been blatantly racist against Asians. Also since we are talking about women girls in general are disadvantaged under admissions to make way for more males that are less qualified. Again college admission here needs an overhaul. Many other countries rely on other meritocratic measures for competitive college admissions and I am all for that.

LOL how is the current college environment “racist” against Asians when they are already represented 2-3x in elite colleges relative to their share of population? Your criticism makes zero sense. Asians are doing f#cking awesome under the current system.

Man, out of all of the arguments that I see on this issue, this is the one that I can’t stand the most.

The whole point is that colleges are using targeted methods to specifically depress the number of Asian students because, based on merit (and I’m talking about extracurricular activities, too, not just robotic-like grades and test scores), they would be an even larger share of their student classes. Asians are actually *underrepresented* at elite colleges compared to their percentage of the top academic talent.

The simple way to look at it is if we “find and replace” any reference to “Asian” with “Black” in the fact pattern.

Let’s say that out of Harvard applicants, Black students had the best GPAs, top test scores, and just as good or better metrics on extracurricular activities and in-person interviews than every other race (including whites). Yet, Harvard is worried that their classes would have too many Black students compared to other racial groups (including whites). Therefore, they use the admissions office to assign a totally subjective “personality score” that just “coincidentally” gives Black students lower scores compared to every other racial group and, as a result, depresses their admissions.

Just imagine if that was the fact pattern. We wouldn’t be having a discussion if that was racist or not - it’s pretty obvious. Yet, when we “find and replace” that fact pattern with references to Asians instead, it’s somehow isn’t racist?!

It bothers me so much because I actually *do* consider myself a liberal that believes in DEI efforts and can’t stand that my fellow liberals can’t simply acknowledge on this college admissions issue that they are outright discriminating against one minority group in favor of other minority groups. Instead, it’s all hemming and hawing about the value of diversity (as long as it’s the “right mix” of diversity), somehow Asians aren’t being discriminated against (often pointing to your “overrepresentation compared to the general population” argument, and pretty much every argument other than facing the fact that the tools they’re using are lowering Asian student numbers even more than white student numbers.

If that were at least acknowledged and then argued that such discrimination is outweighed by the greater good for allowing more Black and Latino students into elite colleges, then we can at least get somewhere even if we might not all agree. However, it’s the lack of the acknowledgment or outright denial of the discriminatory impact on Asian students in the first place that’s insulting (because as I’ve shown in my “find and replace” fact pattern above, Harvard’s tactics would be unambiguously seen as racist if it were Blacks and Latinos impacted as opposed to Asians).

You've shown absolutely nothing with your imaginary scenario. Why do you make the assumption that Asian students "had the best GPAs, top test scores, and just as good or better metrics on extracurricular activities and in-person interviews than every other race." While Asian students typically invest in GPA/test score results, you can't infer from a stats-based view (which is NOT merit in an of itself btw) that they are all superior in all ways or better candidates for a school.

DP: Try to keep up with the Harvard case. It's eye-opening.

Anonymous wrote:I think the interesting unintended consequence will be the explosion of women in selective colleges. Right now, women make up 60% of colleges students. It’s not exactly a shock that women also need better credential to get into non-engineering programs at selective colleges.

https://feed.georgetown.edu/access-affordability/women-increasingly-outnumber-men-at-u-s-colleges-but-why/

It will be interesting to watch UVA Arts & Sciences, WM, IVpvys etc become gender blind in admissions and hit 70% women. Because race, national origin, gender and religion are the big protected classes. It’s hard to imagine prohibiting consideration of race but allowing gender consideration.

It’s interesting to watch as women become more educated than men and less dependent on them. There is a society wide shift underway that is creating the Incels and MAGAs, who are pushing to legally restrict women. This decision will make womens power and mens resentment explode.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:


I want universities to be blind to everything except academic, and academic-adjacent, achievement. No legacy, athletics, development, family or ethnic background considerations.

If that happens schools like Harvard will cease to be Harvard. What gives the elite schools, especially Ivy League, cultural and social capital in the US is all that you seek to eliminate. I don’t personally care but I recognize the world we live in.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Additionally, I think a by-product of the Supreme Court ruling will be the dismantlement of the historically black colleges and universities. They will no longer qualify for federal funding because that would be “racist” under the SC’s twisted logic. I give HCBUs maybe a decade before the vast majority are shut down due to disqualification for federal funds and programs.

The consequences of this decision will be Orwellian.

Trump wholeheartedly supported HBCUs.

Trump never wholehearted supported anything but Trump and KFC.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They can’t get rid of athletic preferences or they won’t be able to field a team. It makes no sense.

I still don’t see how colleges won’t be able to still keep doing it with.holistic admissions . The whole process is such a random crapshoot anyway,

Good. These are institutions of higher learning. Focus on that. Nothing else. Look at what most other countires do. Our system is so corrupted by $$

Our higher education system, whether you're right about the corruption or not, is the envy of the world.

Grad, not undergrad.

Few Europeans for example come to US colleges -- better and cheaper back home.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Merit Merit Merit
Nothing else
Will solve the admissions mess and the bloated salaries/insane tuitions
Burn it all down

And of course you want to be the one to define 'merit' for everyone.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They can’t get rid of athletic preferences or they won’t be able to field a team. It makes no sense.

I still don’t see how colleges won’t be able to still keep doing it with.holistic admissions . The whole process is such a random crapshoot anyway,

Good. These are institutions of higher learning. Focus on that. Nothing else. Look at what most other countires do. Our system is so corrupted by $$

This.

The FTC should go after colleges for false marketing claims.

Anonymous wrote:And even with the end of those preference programs, it may not be enough to to stave off a rapid decline in URM enrollment. Zip codes of residence will become much more important for building diverse student bodies that are not uniformly UMC.

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/15/us/affirmative-action-admissions-scotus.html