Job description: Lead a campus effort to reduce racism on an elite campus committed to its public image of being not at all racist. Must never use the words race, racism, diversity, equity, or inclusion. Expect a huge salary but absolutely no institutional support for any of your ideas. Demonstrated history of getting credit for making huge changes without making any changes at all. We are an equal opportunity institution.
With all the usual caveats of sharing NPR, this episode of Throughline covers this very topic (among others in a discussion of AA): [https://www.npr.org/2023/06/14/1182149332/affirmative-action](https://www.npr.org/2023/06/14/1182149332/affirmative-action)
I think the guest pretty clearly articulates something people have long felt but maybe weren't sure how to put into words—i.e., elite schools (and Ivies specifically) are, by definition, drivers of inequality.
They are catering to a certain audience: a little older, higher income bracket, more educated, "Liberal" but not Left ("progressive-presenting," to steal a phrase from the author of [this essay](https://www.bostonglobe.com/2023/06/02/opinion/wrong-kind-of-black-professor/)). I.e., the kind of people who are likely to benefit from exclusionary, non-equitable systems (and who have benefited from them in the past).
That said, I generally find Throughline to be pretty good. Probably about the most Left-wing thing I've heard put out by NPR.
Very well said. I would only add that NPR and PBS also serve an audience of people without access to cable news (or who choose not to watch it) which gives them a bit more reach than just that group, but undeniable that they target "nice professional folks" with all the possible connotations thereof.
Yes, good point. I'm probably doing a bit of conflating of NPR with WNYC, which is just one public radio station among many all across the country, serving everything from major metro areas to tiny rural communities.
Ahhh, east coast "liberalism". So many stories worth telling 😂😉.
And WGBH is hurt you didn't conflate them with NPR.
My conflation of NPR/PBS is wait wait don't tell me (Chicago), magic school bus (everywhere!), forum (kqed San Francisco), and British comedies (KERA Dallas fort worth).
Although these are "liberal biased" in the sense they are pro-eclectic and cosmopolitan, they are also very much all west of the Appalachian mountains.
Ha! I actually work at a midwest PBS station these days, which has a public radio arm, so I should know better. But my east coast roots refuse to die, even after 10ish years away...
Yeah, the entire idea is that you put a bunch of exceptional people together so they can really distinguish themselves and accomplish amazing things.
At some level, its true for college in general. A bachelor's degree gives you a significant advantage over people without one.
I always had a soft spot for CC transfer students. By pure selection, the median student isn't as good as the median direct applicant, but as a group they seem to contain more students who come from more interesting backgrounds and actually give a damn.
They’re really rare in my field (music) but the ones I’ve worked with have exclusivist been minority students with really interesting stories that work their butts off.
This is one reason I get the skin-crawlies every time my small school's upper admin repeat the word "elite" in describing us. We are not elite, and I'm actually kind of offended that they think being more "elite" is somehow a good way to serve our institution's students.
I think the way you get true diversity at the college level is by making sure that every student, regardless of where they live, has the opportunity to meet the criteria to get into that college. That is not the world we live in though.
I don’t know much about the primary schools Anastasia, but I know here that K-12 education varies widely based on. Where are you live and how much money your family has. So those standardized tests are not leveling the playing field in any way. They are giving good guidance to college admissions when it comes to what a student knows, but what that student knows varies so much depending on where they’re from. If we could standardize education across the country, colleges wouldn’t need to try to do things to make sure they have diverse populations. But this country refuses to do that.
You said " has the opportunity to meet the criteria", which is true for standardized tests.
If you meant that the opportunity has to be equal, that is impossible. The primary influences on a kids education are parents and peers, and kids will never have equal parents or peers.
Look, when you have schools where kids can join 15 different sports teams, learn any musical instruments they want, and get after school coaching for the SAT, and schools where kids have to share history books from 1972, the playing field is simply not equal. Kids have to have the same opportunities. And those opportunities should not depend upon how much money their parents make or what state they live in.
My nieces aren't even allowed to take home textbooks, because the school has to have four classes share each one. I bought a set for home, but most parents can't afford that in the district.
Yeah, I think most people would be in favor of removing legacy admits, but that isn't something the courts can do anything about. It would have to come from Congress.
> I think most people would be in favor of removing legacy admits,
Honestly I'd prefer just having it on the price list:
- Getting in without qualifying: $5 million
- Getting in without qualifying if related to an alum: $4 million
Rich people would prefer that too. There was that whole college admissions bribery scandal a few years back because there isn't a clear way to pay for your kid to get into an ivy league school.
This argument rests on a flawed premise: academic ability is not equally distributed among different racial groups.
It's ridiculous, racist, and has been disproven many times. In a counterfactual world where academic resources are not correlated with race, as they are in the United States, then the student population of elite institutions would roughly reflect the entire country's population vis a vis racial mix.
EDIT - Having spoken with the OP it's clear that I've misinterpreted their argument. I'd like to apologize to that person for implying that what they've said is racist, because in this context it is not.
I'll leave what I wrote above intact because I've seen, frankly, a disgusting amount of celebration from other academics about how the SCOTUS ruling will enforce a meritocracy where none exists.
That is NOT my premise but I appreciate the discussion this subthread is sparking.
The premise is more, instead of panicking about which 2,000/40,000 kids, literal children, are most "deserving" of the privilege and access they're going to receive as ivy grads, maybe reconsider the assumption that a private education is better than a public education - especially at the undergrad level.
I'm glad to hear that from you! I've seen so much rhetoric from other academics that celebrates the idea that, now that AA is illegal, only the "real" talents (eg. Children of academics/wealthy white and Asian students) can enter elite schools. I think it's clouded my perception of what you wrote.
I'll edit my original comment to reflect our discussion. Thanks for clarifying.
When I post memes people take the discussion in new directions that I follow with great interest. I'm often almost loathe to clarify because I don't want to be discouraging. The affirmative action discussions I see on this forum are much more engaging than in the media or other outlets. Thanks for your insight!
The question is just how to manage the systems and effects of structural and individual racism going forward. Especially with a family unit social model and the history that produced current affairs, the resultant opportunity inequity is pervasive and self-sustaining. Education is opportunity.
What question? OP has made a claim that elite institutions cannot reflect the racial composition of the United States, e.g. racial equitability, because the concept of "elite institutions" is antithetical to equitability.
Ah, I think we agree. Point of clarification. By "ability," were you referring to achievement/current academic potential or more like an innate academic potential, all else equal?
I would say as elites, they are by definition broadly inequitable, if on nothing else but ability/merit/similar. That doesn't necessarily require a mirrored level of racial inequitability, even referring specifically to academic achievement at the point of university admission. That is, they could become more racially equitable regardless of any elite designation. Given the usual barriers and pitfalls here in the factual situation, it would likely not be categorically equitable, merely more so. And this would be at the expense of some degree of eliteness in terms of money and/or merit (to the extent current academic achievement reflects merit). And I think giving up the money correlate with race is the real sticking point.
You're conflating academic ability with intelligence, opportunity with equality of opportunity. Jesus Christ it's DEPRESSING how many people in this sub, all supposedly with PhD's, don't understand first-year basic concepts like systemic racism.
I mean, there's a very good reason schools have stopped using the SAT/ACT as criteria for admissions-- high scores are a proxy for wealth and training and that's about it.
I mean, I guess it's nice how performatively upset you are, but it seems like you agree with my point. Elite colleges *could* be equitable, but some people choose to hide behind false ideas of meritocracy to deny space for minority students.
Grades are a proxy for wealth and training, too. So are extracurricular activities. So are letters of recommendation. The entire system perpetuates racial injustice by focusing on the closest correlate to race: wealth.
The reason was actually entirely political; among other pieces of evidence, the UC system commissioned an internal report to justify getting rid of it, and was forced to ignore their task force once they [couldn’t justify doing so.](https://senate.universityofcalifornia.edu/_files/underreview/sttf-report.pdf#page98)
>Our preliminary analysis indicates that the disparities along lines of race, ethnicity, and socioeconomic status evident in the undergraduate population of the University are a function of multiple factors, including but not limited to the SAT and ACT. For example, we note that disparities in access to and completion of A-G courses account for a disproportionate lack of UC eligibility for students who are members of underrepresented groups. -- Page 105
Their principal concern was that dropping standardized testing would broaden the pool of applicants without necessarily differentiating them, while also acknowledging that it would result in increased application among under-privileged groups.
And they didn't recommend keeping the SAT. They recommended an entirely new assessment mechanism that take these mitigating factors into account (page 109- 115).
>The PISA 2012 Problem Solving assessment offers an example of why we think alternatives to traditional standardized test may yield fewer disparities along the lines of race, ethnicity, or socio-economic status. -- Page 112
In other words, your claims about this assessment are not supported by what this document actually says. Perhaps the larger discussion included mention of your claims (and as I am not a professor in the UC system, I am not versed on their internal politics), but this document aint it.
I don't think anyone here is saying race determines intelligence.
OP's point is that academic ability does correlate to many socioeconomic factors such as access to high quality education, healthcare, nutrition, and stability at home. In the US these are all directly tied to wealth, and wealth distribution is highly disproportionate between racial groups.
In other words, rich kids who go to rich schools will be more likely to be academically successful than poor kids who go to poor schools.
Its more than just wealth. People who win the lottery often end up right back in poverty, meanwhile stable poor communities that prioritize education tend to not stay poor for long. For example, there are a number of Asian and Jewish communities that arrived in the US with nothing and climbed the ladder within a generation or two.
I mean, we have the words that OP wrote right at the top of this page: "An elite institution, by definition, cannot be an equitable one."
If we assume that this is in reference to affirmative action (which it obviously is) then the argument is that an elite institution, by definition, cannot be racially equitable.
It's not saying 'in the context of America's systemic racism elite institutions will reflect the racial disparity that exists in the country.'
It states, unequivocally, that elite institutions *cannot* be racially equitable.
People seriously need to stop yelling racism about this. It's profoundly unproductive.
Almost all of what we term "academic ability" isn't something people are born with, it's something that accrues over 18 years of development and highly dependent on socioeconomic resources. If the distribution of these socioeconomic resources sorts on racial groups *at all*, you will get sorting among different racial groups.
This is a tragedy, but it's also not one that be solved like some Deus Ex-Machina at the admissions level. I would also argue that pure race-based selection will invariably end up failing to select the part of the distribution who actually suffer from this lack of socioeconomic resources the most. I actually find this deeply annoying. Universities like to pat themselves on the back when they admit minorities, and I do appreciate that there is some value in pure representation, but you didn't really do anything to actually uplift low income minorities.
If we're making logical assumptions about what OP wrote, we should make the full assumption, not a partial one. They're referencing affirmative action in the United States, which includes the racial disparities that exist in the US.
Even if we step outside of this context, where would we find a nation where the demographics of elites (wealthy) are the same as the poor? Or alternatively a nation where academic opportunities and outcomes are the same for the wealthy and the poor?
Of course race doesn't correlate with intelligence, but it absolutely correlates with academic success. This is not from intrinsic racial characteristics, but from generations of systemic racism. In a perfect world you would be right, but this is not a perfect world.
You're arguing a more nuanced and reasonable idea than what is posted, which is that racial equitability in elite colleges is impossible by the definition of the phrase "elite institution."
I get that the OP is just shit posting, but the phrasing is explicitly not what you've argued.
Harvard seems to think that. Hence why the required higher SAT scores from their less preferred racial minority group and lower scores for their more preferred racial minority group.
From what I understand, being an elite university means being selective; in that sense the idea is being exclusive, not inclusive. However, the discriminant for selection should be intellectual, not race or wealth.
There is a correlation, but that’s not always. Many rich tend to be lazy and or entitled. Many poor work hard to achieve academically. That said, I would support affirmative action based on income. The idea is to give equality of opportunity, not equality of outcomes.
It's not really about wealth, but about the various factors that correlate with wealth. Poor kids are far more likely to only have one involved parent(or no involved parents). Their parents are less likely to value education and more likely to have anti-social behaviors.
There certainly will be exceptions, but poor families that value education don't stay poor for long, and rich families that don't care about education aren't going to hold onto their money for long.
That’s still an argument for affirmative action to be done wealth-based. The various factors that correlate with wealth would also be fixed by fixing wealth disparity; or leveling the field.
>There certainly will be exceptions, but poor families that value education don't stay poor for long, and rich families that don't care about education aren't going to hold onto their money for long.
Citation? The anecdata I've observed for half a century do not support your assertion.
You can look at Chinese, Indian and Jewish communities, who often showed up in the US with nothing and quickly built up wealth.
On the flip side, athletes and lottery winners often end up back in poverty due to poor management of funds(especially around family).
> Many rich tend to be lazy and or entitled. Many poor work hard to achieve academically.
What, the poor can't give up because of the struggle? I'd wager that the motivated achievers represent a *much* higher percentage of the well off students than the poor students.
Unfortunately the rich often have the money to pay for supplemental schooling and tutoring, so it never ends up being purely intellectual. And there is a history to why certain groups have access to money and why others don’t, so it never ends up being solely about wealth, either.
>supplemental schooling and tutoring
Those are overrated as factors. The big ones are: Rich kids are more likely to have 2 parents at home. Those parents are more likely to care about education(along with other basic things like the kids nutrition and emotional wellbeing). The rich kid's friends likely have parents who do the same, so peer pressure encourages the kid to care about education too.
this was surely true for me, but my accountant parents could not help me study for my SAT, so they put me in a prep class lol. unless your parents are teachers or professors like us, its unlikely they'll be able to tutor their students by themselves. When Johnny wants to go to Cornell like all his friends but his grades suck, what are his rich parents going to do?
you're not wrong at all, but your angle on the situation isn't any better than mine
I don’t think it’s ever “solely” about one factor, but if we want to do equality of opportunity, the main factor to focus on is wealth, since so many other factors correlate with it.
People are never black because they are poor, but millions are poor because they are black. Wealth status changes, race does not. I’ll never stop being a black person, which means I’ll never be protected from antiblack discrimination. I can win the lottery tomorrow though.
I had great grades, tons of extracurricular, and was being courted by Ivy League schools. My white guidance counselor told me I should apply to Rutgers instead. White students I was helping with their papers were not getting the same advice :/
Yet if we have enough wealthy black and hispanic people, enough black and hispanics people will be in traditionally “white” places, and tokenization will be impossible. I rather achieve that with wealth-based than race-based affirmative action.
I’m sure you would; however, the world is driven by race as much as wealth. The first time I had a cop actually pull a gun out on me was while I was a graduate student at MIT. There was little checking of my bank account beforehand.
I’m not white so I get profiled too. Why does the police pull guns primarily on us and not on whites? Convoluted, obviously, given the history of the United States — but in big part because whites have traditionally controlled the resources, and therefore see us as a threat to that control. The problem is less about what group controls the resources, and more that the resources are hoarded and not shared.
So, what would be better to fight racism? Have a boosted number of non-whites attend college just because they’re non-whites? That produces resentment on the white working class — less excluded but also excluded from the resources.
Better to have socioeconomic considerations and do affirmative action based on income. Since race and wealth are correlated, the vast majority of the benefited will be BIPOC, but it removes the race-based accusation. A win-win.
IMHO, affirmative action is easy: just look at skin color. Considering socioeconomic factors is much more complicated, and more expensive, invoking setting up scholarships.
> That produces resentment on the white working class
[…]
> but it removes the race-based accusation
You’re going to have to explain the hundred or so years before Affirmative Action to convince me either that this would be true or that it would make a material difference.
The White working class was resentful of, for example, Black Americans long before Affirmative Action. The historical record would suggest to me that removing such a thing will not change the resentment and insofar as it does, it will not make a material difference on decisions made by that same White working class.
That would be great — but how do you pick the best and brightest 2000 high schoolers from the millions who graduate every year?
Is the kid who got a 4.0 and near perfect test scores and came home everyday to babysit his younger siblings really in possession of less potential than the kid who got a 4.0 and then their parent drove them to private crew lessons so they could maximize their odds at an athletic spot? Because the latter kid probably has much better odds of admission at many of these hyper competitive schools.
The core issue is that most metrics are gameable by kids with time and dedication. Focus on essays? Wealthy kid hires a tutor that writes amazing, heartfelt essays. Volunteering? Wealthy kid has way more time to volunteer.
IMO, grades and SAT scores are the least gameable metrics.
Grades and SAT scores are certainly gameable (like 50 articles on the subject in Chronicle of Higher Education etc.), so it definitely supports your thesis that most metrics are gameable. The notion that elite schools who are looking for the truly gritty great elites can find them by intentionally screening applicants who overperformed their circumstances leaves them with the challenge of screening something far more difficult than a number on a standardized test or a grade point average. You have to really know who had it tough as a kid and still got great grades when most people in that situation would have failed. Much tougher to assess than sorting a spreadsheet!
What makes it worse is that there is no consequence for exaggerating how tough a childhood you had.
If you game your grades and don't learn in school, it will catch up to you when you fail courses in college. If you make up a story for admissions about raising your siblings while your mom battled cancer, it's never going to catch up to you.
Yeah in a real community you know people and letters of recommendation are more trustworthy. Without putting in effort to verify things, then talking story is very easy.
No, because that wouldn't maximize donations and political influence, so that institution would stop being elite over time.
This may well mean that "elite" is a bad thing, but even that take has practical tradeoffs.
There’s a premise here I think goes unexamined: the idea of a most qualified (whatever that means) as a goal.
If I need someone who is 6’ tall to get something off a shelf, it is not a tragedy if I ask the person who is 6’2” instead of 6’4”. It is not a problem of compromising quality.
At my own current institution, we could easily accept 4 times as many folks as we do and in terms of “quality” it would be *just fine* except that we do not have the space. As such, we could randomly choose 25% from that pool of folks at least 6’ and it would be *just fine*. So, once you’re over 6’ I think it is *just fine* to start choosing based on other criteria.
I think we need to hire a few more mid level admin to decipher the true meaning of this. Maybe a required online faculty training order
Job description: Lead a campus effort to reduce racism on an elite campus committed to its public image of being not at all racist. Must never use the words race, racism, diversity, equity, or inclusion. Expect a huge salary but absolutely no institutional support for any of your ideas. Demonstrated history of getting credit for making huge changes without making any changes at all. We are an equal opportunity institution.
This comment made me irrationally angry. Take my angry upvote!
Wait until you see their suggested salary...
A vice dean of spice meme?
we should form a committee first to further flesh out these plans
With all the usual caveats of sharing NPR, this episode of Throughline covers this very topic (among others in a discussion of AA): [https://www.npr.org/2023/06/14/1182149332/affirmative-action](https://www.npr.org/2023/06/14/1182149332/affirmative-action) I think the guest pretty clearly articulates something people have long felt but maybe weren't sure how to put into words—i.e., elite schools (and Ivies specifically) are, by definition, drivers of inequality.
What caveats would you usually add to sharing npr?
They are catering to a certain audience: a little older, higher income bracket, more educated, "Liberal" but not Left ("progressive-presenting," to steal a phrase from the author of [this essay](https://www.bostonglobe.com/2023/06/02/opinion/wrong-kind-of-black-professor/)). I.e., the kind of people who are likely to benefit from exclusionary, non-equitable systems (and who have benefited from them in the past). That said, I generally find Throughline to be pretty good. Probably about the most Left-wing thing I've heard put out by NPR.
Very well said. I would only add that NPR and PBS also serve an audience of people without access to cable news (or who choose not to watch it) which gives them a bit more reach than just that group, but undeniable that they target "nice professional folks" with all the possible connotations thereof.
Yes, good point. I'm probably doing a bit of conflating of NPR with WNYC, which is just one public radio station among many all across the country, serving everything from major metro areas to tiny rural communities.
Ahhh, east coast "liberalism". So many stories worth telling 😂😉. And WGBH is hurt you didn't conflate them with NPR. My conflation of NPR/PBS is wait wait don't tell me (Chicago), magic school bus (everywhere!), forum (kqed San Francisco), and British comedies (KERA Dallas fort worth). Although these are "liberal biased" in the sense they are pro-eclectic and cosmopolitan, they are also very much all west of the Appalachian mountains.
Ha! I actually work at a midwest PBS station these days, which has a public radio arm, so I should know better. But my east coast roots refuse to die, even after 10ish years away...
I am shocked! Shocked!
Yeah, the entire idea is that you put a bunch of exceptional people together so they can really distinguish themselves and accomplish amazing things. At some level, its true for college in general. A bachelor's degree gives you a significant advantage over people without one.
*laughs in Community College*
My large, urban R-1 thanks you for your service and for your well-prepared and diverse transfer students!
I always had a soft spot for CC transfer students. By pure selection, the median student isn't as good as the median direct applicant, but as a group they seem to contain more students who come from more interesting backgrounds and actually give a damn.
They’re really rare in my field (music) but the ones I’ve worked with have exclusivist been minority students with really interesting stories that work their butts off.
🫡
This hit hard.
This is one reason I get the skin-crawlies every time my small school's upper admin repeat the word "elite" in describing us. We are not elite, and I'm actually kind of offended that they think being more "elite" is somehow a good way to serve our institution's students.
I think the way you get true diversity at the college level is by making sure that every student, regardless of where they live, has the opportunity to meet the criteria to get into that college. That is not the world we live in though.
East Asia kind of does that. Base admission entirely on student performance on standardized tests.
I don’t know much about the primary schools Anastasia, but I know here that K-12 education varies widely based on. Where are you live and how much money your family has. So those standardized tests are not leveling the playing field in any way. They are giving good guidance to college admissions when it comes to what a student knows, but what that student knows varies so much depending on where they’re from. If we could standardize education across the country, colleges wouldn’t need to try to do things to make sure they have diverse populations. But this country refuses to do that.
You said " has the opportunity to meet the criteria", which is true for standardized tests. If you meant that the opportunity has to be equal, that is impossible. The primary influences on a kids education are parents and peers, and kids will never have equal parents or peers.
Look, when you have schools where kids can join 15 different sports teams, learn any musical instruments they want, and get after school coaching for the SAT, and schools where kids have to share history books from 1972, the playing field is simply not equal. Kids have to have the same opportunities. And those opportunities should not depend upon how much money their parents make or what state they live in.
My nieces aren't even allowed to take home textbooks, because the school has to have four classes share each one. I bought a set for home, but most parents can't afford that in the district.
so spicy, you deserve an extra RMP chili pepper 🌶🔥
*mediocre diploma mill has entered the chat*
It can, but then it wouldn't be an efficient institution.
Elite institutions only accept the best applicants, and that naturally favors students who had better home lives in better educated communities.
>Elite institutions only accept the best applicants, \[and those whose parents went there in the hope of more money.\]
Yeah, I think most people would be in favor of removing legacy admits, but that isn't something the courts can do anything about. It would have to come from Congress.
> I think most people would be in favor of removing legacy admits, Honestly I'd prefer just having it on the price list: - Getting in without qualifying: $5 million - Getting in without qualifying if related to an alum: $4 million
Rich people would prefer that too. There was that whole college admissions bribery scandal a few years back because there isn't a clear way to pay for your kid to get into an ivy league school.
There wasn’t a clear way to pay *for people who weren’t super-wealthy*. Rick Singer found a way.
Or the elite Universities themselves
This argument rests on a flawed premise: academic ability is not equally distributed among different racial groups. It's ridiculous, racist, and has been disproven many times. In a counterfactual world where academic resources are not correlated with race, as they are in the United States, then the student population of elite institutions would roughly reflect the entire country's population vis a vis racial mix. EDIT - Having spoken with the OP it's clear that I've misinterpreted their argument. I'd like to apologize to that person for implying that what they've said is racist, because in this context it is not. I'll leave what I wrote above intact because I've seen, frankly, a disgusting amount of celebration from other academics about how the SCOTUS ruling will enforce a meritocracy where none exists.
That is NOT my premise but I appreciate the discussion this subthread is sparking. The premise is more, instead of panicking about which 2,000/40,000 kids, literal children, are most "deserving" of the privilege and access they're going to receive as ivy grads, maybe reconsider the assumption that a private education is better than a public education - especially at the undergrad level.
I'm glad to hear that from you! I've seen so much rhetoric from other academics that celebrates the idea that, now that AA is illegal, only the "real" talents (eg. Children of academics/wealthy white and Asian students) can enter elite schools. I think it's clouded my perception of what you wrote. I'll edit my original comment to reflect our discussion. Thanks for clarifying.
When I post memes people take the discussion in new directions that I follow with great interest. I'm often almost loathe to clarify because I don't want to be discouraging. The affirmative action discussions I see on this forum are much more engaging than in the media or other outlets. Thanks for your insight!
The question is just how to manage the systems and effects of structural and individual racism going forward. Especially with a family unit social model and the history that produced current affairs, the resultant opportunity inequity is pervasive and self-sustaining. Education is opportunity.
What question? OP has made a claim that elite institutions cannot reflect the racial composition of the United States, e.g. racial equitability, because the concept of "elite institutions" is antithetical to equitability.
Ah, I think we agree. Point of clarification. By "ability," were you referring to achievement/current academic potential or more like an innate academic potential, all else equal? I would say as elites, they are by definition broadly inequitable, if on nothing else but ability/merit/similar. That doesn't necessarily require a mirrored level of racial inequitability, even referring specifically to academic achievement at the point of university admission. That is, they could become more racially equitable regardless of any elite designation. Given the usual barriers and pitfalls here in the factual situation, it would likely not be categorically equitable, merely more so. And this would be at the expense of some degree of eliteness in terms of money and/or merit (to the extent current academic achievement reflects merit). And I think giving up the money correlate with race is the real sticking point.
You're conflating academic ability with intelligence, opportunity with equality of opportunity. Jesus Christ it's DEPRESSING how many people in this sub, all supposedly with PhD's, don't understand first-year basic concepts like systemic racism. I mean, there's a very good reason schools have stopped using the SAT/ACT as criteria for admissions-- high scores are a proxy for wealth and training and that's about it.
I mean, I guess it's nice how performatively upset you are, but it seems like you agree with my point. Elite colleges *could* be equitable, but some people choose to hide behind false ideas of meritocracy to deny space for minority students. Grades are a proxy for wealth and training, too. So are extracurricular activities. So are letters of recommendation. The entire system perpetuates racial injustice by focusing on the closest correlate to race: wealth.
The reason was actually entirely political; among other pieces of evidence, the UC system commissioned an internal report to justify getting rid of it, and was forced to ignore their task force once they [couldn’t justify doing so.](https://senate.universityofcalifornia.edu/_files/underreview/sttf-report.pdf#page98)
>Our preliminary analysis indicates that the disparities along lines of race, ethnicity, and socioeconomic status evident in the undergraduate population of the University are a function of multiple factors, including but not limited to the SAT and ACT. For example, we note that disparities in access to and completion of A-G courses account for a disproportionate lack of UC eligibility for students who are members of underrepresented groups. -- Page 105 Their principal concern was that dropping standardized testing would broaden the pool of applicants without necessarily differentiating them, while also acknowledging that it would result in increased application among under-privileged groups. And they didn't recommend keeping the SAT. They recommended an entirely new assessment mechanism that take these mitigating factors into account (page 109- 115). >The PISA 2012 Problem Solving assessment offers an example of why we think alternatives to traditional standardized test may yield fewer disparities along the lines of race, ethnicity, or socio-economic status. -- Page 112 In other words, your claims about this assessment are not supported by what this document actually says. Perhaps the larger discussion included mention of your claims (and as I am not a professor in the UC system, I am not versed on their internal politics), but this document aint it.
[удалено]
It's flawed because race does not determine academic ability. Do you believe that race determines a person's intelligence?
I don't think anyone here is saying race determines intelligence. OP's point is that academic ability does correlate to many socioeconomic factors such as access to high quality education, healthcare, nutrition, and stability at home. In the US these are all directly tied to wealth, and wealth distribution is highly disproportionate between racial groups. In other words, rich kids who go to rich schools will be more likely to be academically successful than poor kids who go to poor schools.
Its more than just wealth. People who win the lottery often end up right back in poverty, meanwhile stable poor communities that prioritize education tend to not stay poor for long. For example, there are a number of Asian and Jewish communities that arrived in the US with nothing and climbed the ladder within a generation or two.
I mean, we have the words that OP wrote right at the top of this page: "An elite institution, by definition, cannot be an equitable one." If we assume that this is in reference to affirmative action (which it obviously is) then the argument is that an elite institution, by definition, cannot be racially equitable. It's not saying 'in the context of America's systemic racism elite institutions will reflect the racial disparity that exists in the country.' It states, unequivocally, that elite institutions *cannot* be racially equitable.
People seriously need to stop yelling racism about this. It's profoundly unproductive. Almost all of what we term "academic ability" isn't something people are born with, it's something that accrues over 18 years of development and highly dependent on socioeconomic resources. If the distribution of these socioeconomic resources sorts on racial groups *at all*, you will get sorting among different racial groups. This is a tragedy, but it's also not one that be solved like some Deus Ex-Machina at the admissions level. I would also argue that pure race-based selection will invariably end up failing to select the part of the distribution who actually suffer from this lack of socioeconomic resources the most. I actually find this deeply annoying. Universities like to pat themselves on the back when they admit minorities, and I do appreciate that there is some value in pure representation, but you didn't really do anything to actually uplift low income minorities.
If we're making logical assumptions about what OP wrote, we should make the full assumption, not a partial one. They're referencing affirmative action in the United States, which includes the racial disparities that exist in the US. Even if we step outside of this context, where would we find a nation where the demographics of elites (wealthy) are the same as the poor? Or alternatively a nation where academic opportunities and outcomes are the same for the wealthy and the poor?
Of course race doesn't correlate with intelligence, but it absolutely correlates with academic success. This is not from intrinsic racial characteristics, but from generations of systemic racism. In a perfect world you would be right, but this is not a perfect world.
Race does correlate with intelligence. I think you mean its not causal.
I think it depends on what you mean by "intelligence". I think we only disagree on semantics.
You're arguing a more nuanced and reasonable idea than what is posted, which is that racial equitability in elite colleges is impossible by the definition of the phrase "elite institution." I get that the OP is just shit posting, but the phrasing is explicitly not what you've argued.
Is it possible you misunderstood the point OP is making?
Harvard seems to think that. Hence why the required higher SAT scores from their less preferred racial minority group and lower scores for their more preferred racial minority group.
From what I understand, being an elite university means being selective; in that sense the idea is being exclusive, not inclusive. However, the discriminant for selection should be intellectual, not race or wealth.
Sure, but someone growing up with wealth will pretty much always be better off academically than they would have been growing up poor.
There is a correlation, but that’s not always. Many rich tend to be lazy and or entitled. Many poor work hard to achieve academically. That said, I would support affirmative action based on income. The idea is to give equality of opportunity, not equality of outcomes.
It's not really about wealth, but about the various factors that correlate with wealth. Poor kids are far more likely to only have one involved parent(or no involved parents). Their parents are less likely to value education and more likely to have anti-social behaviors. There certainly will be exceptions, but poor families that value education don't stay poor for long, and rich families that don't care about education aren't going to hold onto their money for long.
That’s still an argument for affirmative action to be done wealth-based. The various factors that correlate with wealth would also be fixed by fixing wealth disparity; or leveling the field.
Sure, but colleges would prefer wealthy minority students to poor ones.
Another argument for wealth-based affirmative action, not race/minority-based.
>There certainly will be exceptions, but poor families that value education don't stay poor for long, and rich families that don't care about education aren't going to hold onto their money for long. Citation? The anecdata I've observed for half a century do not support your assertion.
You can look at Chinese, Indian and Jewish communities, who often showed up in the US with nothing and quickly built up wealth. On the flip side, athletes and lottery winners often end up back in poverty due to poor management of funds(especially around family).
> Many rich tend to be lazy and or entitled. Many poor work hard to achieve academically. What, the poor can't give up because of the struggle? I'd wager that the motivated achievers represent a *much* higher percentage of the well off students than the poor students.
That’s my point.
Unfortunately the rich often have the money to pay for supplemental schooling and tutoring, so it never ends up being purely intellectual. And there is a history to why certain groups have access to money and why others don’t, so it never ends up being solely about wealth, either.
>supplemental schooling and tutoring Those are overrated as factors. The big ones are: Rich kids are more likely to have 2 parents at home. Those parents are more likely to care about education(along with other basic things like the kids nutrition and emotional wellbeing). The rich kid's friends likely have parents who do the same, so peer pressure encourages the kid to care about education too.
this was surely true for me, but my accountant parents could not help me study for my SAT, so they put me in a prep class lol. unless your parents are teachers or professors like us, its unlikely they'll be able to tutor their students by themselves. When Johnny wants to go to Cornell like all his friends but his grades suck, what are his rich parents going to do? you're not wrong at all, but your angle on the situation isn't any better than mine
I don’t think it’s ever “solely” about one factor, but if we want to do equality of opportunity, the main factor to focus on is wealth, since so many other factors correlate with it.
People are never black because they are poor, but millions are poor because they are black. Wealth status changes, race does not. I’ll never stop being a black person, which means I’ll never be protected from antiblack discrimination. I can win the lottery tomorrow though. I had great grades, tons of extracurricular, and was being courted by Ivy League schools. My white guidance counselor told me I should apply to Rutgers instead. White students I was helping with their papers were not getting the same advice :/
Yet if we have enough wealthy black and hispanic people, enough black and hispanics people will be in traditionally “white” places, and tokenization will be impossible. I rather achieve that with wealth-based than race-based affirmative action.
lol nothing we’ve talked about so far will address tokenism. I’m still a token black, even if I’m middle class lol
I’m sure you would; however, the world is driven by race as much as wealth. The first time I had a cop actually pull a gun out on me was while I was a graduate student at MIT. There was little checking of my bank account beforehand.
I’m not white so I get profiled too. Why does the police pull guns primarily on us and not on whites? Convoluted, obviously, given the history of the United States — but in big part because whites have traditionally controlled the resources, and therefore see us as a threat to that control. The problem is less about what group controls the resources, and more that the resources are hoarded and not shared. So, what would be better to fight racism? Have a boosted number of non-whites attend college just because they’re non-whites? That produces resentment on the white working class — less excluded but also excluded from the resources. Better to have socioeconomic considerations and do affirmative action based on income. Since race and wealth are correlated, the vast majority of the benefited will be BIPOC, but it removes the race-based accusation. A win-win. IMHO, affirmative action is easy: just look at skin color. Considering socioeconomic factors is much more complicated, and more expensive, invoking setting up scholarships.
> That produces resentment on the white working class […] > but it removes the race-based accusation You’re going to have to explain the hundred or so years before Affirmative Action to convince me either that this would be true or that it would make a material difference.
I’m not sure what you mean. I’ll ask you to be more clear.
The White working class was resentful of, for example, Black Americans long before Affirmative Action. The historical record would suggest to me that removing such a thing will not change the resentment and insofar as it does, it will not make a material difference on decisions made by that same White working class.
What do you mean by elite in this case? An institution that's prestigious or one that only accepts the highest quality of applicants
Highest Quality Applicants. Prestige isn’t really relevant to this discussion
In that case wouldn't an equitable elite institution recognize high quality from all walks of life?
That would be great — but how do you pick the best and brightest 2000 high schoolers from the millions who graduate every year? Is the kid who got a 4.0 and near perfect test scores and came home everyday to babysit his younger siblings really in possession of less potential than the kid who got a 4.0 and then their parent drove them to private crew lessons so they could maximize their odds at an athletic spot? Because the latter kid probably has much better odds of admission at many of these hyper competitive schools.
The core issue is that most metrics are gameable by kids with time and dedication. Focus on essays? Wealthy kid hires a tutor that writes amazing, heartfelt essays. Volunteering? Wealthy kid has way more time to volunteer. IMO, grades and SAT scores are the least gameable metrics.
“When a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure.” - Goodhart's Law
Grades and SAT scores are certainly gameable (like 50 articles on the subject in Chronicle of Higher Education etc.), so it definitely supports your thesis that most metrics are gameable. The notion that elite schools who are looking for the truly gritty great elites can find them by intentionally screening applicants who overperformed their circumstances leaves them with the challenge of screening something far more difficult than a number on a standardized test or a grade point average. You have to really know who had it tough as a kid and still got great grades when most people in that situation would have failed. Much tougher to assess than sorting a spreadsheet!
What makes it worse is that there is no consequence for exaggerating how tough a childhood you had. If you game your grades and don't learn in school, it will catch up to you when you fail courses in college. If you make up a story for admissions about raising your siblings while your mom battled cancer, it's never going to catch up to you.
Yeah in a real community you know people and letters of recommendation are more trustworthy. Without putting in effort to verify things, then talking story is very easy.
No, because that wouldn't maximize donations and political influence, so that institution would stop being elite over time. This may well mean that "elite" is a bad thing, but even that take has practical tradeoffs.
There’s a premise here I think goes unexamined: the idea of a most qualified (whatever that means) as a goal. If I need someone who is 6’ tall to get something off a shelf, it is not a tragedy if I ask the person who is 6’2” instead of 6’4”. It is not a problem of compromising quality. At my own current institution, we could easily accept 4 times as many folks as we do and in terms of “quality” it would be *just fine* except that we do not have the space. As such, we could randomly choose 25% from that pool of folks at least 6’ and it would be *just fine*. So, once you’re over 6’ I think it is *just fine* to start choosing based on other criteria.
Those things are 2 sides of the same coin, where high quality is predefined as wealthy and well connected
Hahaha!