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Harvard’s Admissions Process, Once Secret, Is Unveiled in Federal Court
61–70 of 133 posts
Re: Harvard’s Admissions Process, Once Secret, Is Unveiled in Federal Court
#62Earlier quoted context omitted.
> The rigor of a public school in rural Kansas vs. a private school in NY could be wildly different. AP scores and SATs correlate well (same test for everyone that takes it), but normal grades do not. That assumes students in rural Kansas have the same AP & SAT preparation as students in the elite NY private schools. The income disaparity between the two schools is probably quite noticable with one having more access…
Yea I agree, my point wasn't that the preparation is fair, but that it's easier (not necessarily "better") to compare 2 candidates based on the same nationwide test rather than a GPA from different schools with 4 years of different classes It's not a value judgement and the SATs are far from perfect, but just another piece in the puzzle And yea life isn't fair at the end of the day, nurture and nature are both super…
I agree it is easier to compare two candidates on a standardized metric, but my point is these kids get different levels of preparation for that metric. It isn't a suprise those with more resources to prep tend to do better overall than those that lack resources. It doesn't mean the kid from Kansas that scored lower is dumber than the kid from NY that scored higher, if the Kansas kid didn't have elite prep and the NY kid did. Luckily the internet is flattening those disadvantages to a degree, and the Kansis kid could likely go to a library and study online after school but there is no denying that poor Kansas kid has a lot more to overcome than the elite rich NY kid to get to the same point in life.
Re: Harvard’s Admissions Process, Once Secret, Is Unveiled in Federal Court
#63The answer to this is so simple: rather than trying to optimize algorithms for admission, we need to decrease the demand for admissions to these schools. 1. Increase the supply. More seats. More schools. More teachers. More locations. 2. Decrease the demand. Better alternatives. Vocational schools. On the job training. Not using degree a job criteria.
As a teacher, I agree with all the things you say in number 2. Full-heartedly. But can't really bring myself to agree with Number 1. Quality will just keep going down, and I know several schools that stay afloat right now only because of BS online programs (half supported by the state)... 2 really needs to be the answer, not 1.
Re: Harvard’s Admissions Process, Once Secret, Is Unveiled in Federal Court
#64> Harvard has testified that race, when considered in admissions, can only help, not hurt, a student’s chances of getting in. So if your race matches their preference they improve your odds of admittance. Since the number of admissions is fixed this reduces the odds of those who have a race that doesn’t match their preference. IANAL but it sounds like Harvard just admitted that they were guilty.
I presume they're trying to have it be affirmative-action-like, but your comment did make me think of it in an interesting way: You can't say "race always helps" or "race only helps" because everybody has a race. There are no Person for which Person.Race is null. (Can you tell I'm on a break from writing code tonight?)
Re: Harvard’s Admissions Process, Once Secret, Is Unveiled in Federal Court
#65On the one hand, harvard and the left repeatedly say we should live in a colorblind society. Race is not important and it isn't even real. It is a social construct of no importance to who the person is. They tell us only raicsts are obsessed with race and only racists see color.
On the other hand, harvard and the left are obsessed with race. So is harvard and the left racist? Aren't they supposed to be colorblind and not focused on a person's immutable characteristic? By giving certain racial group an unfair advantage, aren't they condescendingnly assuming these racials groups are inferior. Doesn't that make them patronizing racists?
If we are all humans and equal, why does race matter? Who cares if the humans attending harvard are all white or all asian or all black? We are humans right?
From where I stand, harvard's admissions policy seems like blatant condescending and patronizing racism.
Re: Harvard’s Admissions Process, Once Secret, Is Unveiled in Federal Court
#66I thought the ACLU had a rather interesting take on this issue: "Make no mistake: A lawsuit against Harvard that's purported to represent the interests of Asian-Americans would, if successful, primarily benefit white students. #DefendDiversity" https://twitter.com/ACLU/status/1051626960537808898
The ACLU has been corrupted by money. They have become a mirror of Democratic party talking points.
They used to defend Nazis to make a point of dedication to free speech. Now they openly abandon due process if the accused is a white guy (Kavanaugh) and have recently decided to never protect a Nazi, saying some speech shouldn't be protected. Very sad to see.
Re: Harvard’s Admissions Process, Once Secret, Is Unveiled in Federal Court
#67> Harvard has testified that race, when considered in admissions, can only help, not hurt, a student’s chances of getting in. So if your race matches their preference they improve your odds of admittance. Since the number of admissions is fixed this reduces the odds of those who have a race that doesn’t match their preference. IANAL but it sounds like Harvard just admitted that they were guilty.
I presume they're trying to have it be affirmative-action-like, but your comment did make me think of it in an interesting way: You can't say "race always helps" or "race only helps" because everybody has a race. There are no Person for which Person.Race is null. (Can you tell I'm on a break from writing code tonight?)
> There are no Person for which Person.Race is null.
Are there not? There are surely Person for which multiple rows with distinct Race exist. It's... complicated.
And yes: if you buy that "race" matters, for good or ill, it's not possible to have a completely just policy that is race-blind, it just isn't. If Harvard wants a campus whose diversity of background (and that obviously includes much more than just race) matches the world around it, which seems like a laudable goal to me, then there are going to have to be race-based decisions made.
Are they the right ones? Not to everyone, no. The best ones? Surely not. But let's not get too caught up in our schadenfreude here.
Be honest: the Preferred Admissions Policy of all the folks who are shouting the loudest here would result in a campus filled with middle+ class whites (with a detectable minority of east asians). We've tried that model. It sucked.
Re: Harvard’s Admissions Process, Once Secret, Is Unveiled in Federal Court
#68> Harvard has testified that race, when considered in admissions, can only help, not hurt, a student’s chances of getting in. So if your race matches their preference they improve your odds of admittance. Since the number of admissions is fixed this reduces the odds of those who have a race that doesn’t match their preference. IANAL but it sounds like Harvard just admitted that they were guilty.
> IANAL but it sounds like Harvard just admitted that they were guilty. I don't like what they seem to be doing, but Harvard is a private university - they should be able to recruit who they want to based on their own criteria. Of course, it's not a binary thing: universities in the US receive lots of subsidies from local states, so there is a certain expectation of fairness. Maybe the right thing to do would be to c…
The rule in the US is that a university that wants to discriminate based on race doesn't just lose its grants, it loses its tax exempt status.
Re: Harvard’s Admissions Process, Once Secret, Is Unveiled in Federal Court
#69Earlier quoted context omitted.
> IANAL but it sounds like Harvard just admitted that they were guilty. I don't like what they seem to be doing, but Harvard is a private university - they should be able to recruit who they want to based on their own criteria. Of course, it's not a binary thing: universities in the US receive lots of subsidies from local states, so there is a certain expectation of fairness. Maybe the right thing to do would be to c…
Except that this was specifically what private universities (and private everything else’s) were required by law to stop doing 50 year ago, when their preferred race was white. There’s a LONG precedent against private institutions discriminating based on race in the United States - it just hasn’t been enforced evenly.
I hate to be this guy, but...how is this different from affirmative action? I'm not saying it's wrong, but affirmative action is discriminating based on race. Surely it hasn't been illegal this whole time?
Re: Harvard’s Admissions Process, Once Secret, Is Unveiled in Federal Court
#70Earlier quoted context omitted.
Except that this was specifically what private universities (and private everything else’s) were required by law to stop doing 50 year ago, when their preferred race was white. There’s a LONG precedent against private institutions discriminating based on race in the United States - it just hasn’t been enforced evenly.
I hate to be this guy, but...how is this different from affirmative action? I'm not saying it's wrong, but affirmative action is discriminating based on race. Surely it hasn't been illegal this whole time?
It looks like it's complicated: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Affirmative_action_in_the_Unit...