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Children of alumni no longer have admissions edge at Carnegie Mellon, Pitt

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Re: Children of alumni no longer have admissions edge at Carnegie Mellon, Pitt

#581

Post by onetimeusename »

kevinventullo wrote: post #485
onetimeusename wrote: post #392

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd hope it's not a strawman. I do think legacy admission status counts against now. The SFFA lawsuit accused Harvard of using legacy admissions of being a backdoor affirmative action for white people because the legacy admits were so disproportionately white. I think my point is that in a highly racial context, the facts are thrown out. To your point, in California, there was a law that was passed in 2019 that requi…

You claim “the facts are thrown out” but then don’t cite a single hard fact which remotely suggest anyone wants legacy status to count against. Instead you are extrapolating that removal of legacy from positive consideration will eventually lead to re-adding legacy for negative consideration, but no one is actually suggesting this. You are completely making it up. The California law you cite only applies to universit…

but then don’t cite a single hard fact which remotely suggest anyone wants legacy status to count against.

Accusing it of being affirmative action for white people or for "the rich" pretty clearly means people want it to count against. I think you are deliberately ignoring that the SFFA lawsuit said this, politicians said this, and even people ITT said this and clearly these things reflect poorly on the university. There isn't any evidence that legacy admissions is affirmative action for white people or rich people though.

simply drop legacy status from consideration altogether

There isn't any evidence that legacy status counts for. You have never established that it does. Not one of the California schools in that article I cited says that legacy admits have an advantage. Here is Stanford's policy https://provost.stanford.edu/2020/06/26/admissions-considera.... CMU from the OP article said legacy status had no bearing on admissions for years. Harvard likewise. Their reasons for tracking legacy status are probably complicated. I concede at one point they were used to allow in less qualified students but that hasn't been the case for years. But tracking legacy status does not mean it is used to give favorable admissions. I do not believe it does and the legacy admits are probably qualified. That is clearly the case for Harvard. If you did not believe this, you are saying universities are lying about their policies.

So since the accusation that legacy admissions is affirmative action for white people is disingenuous, I believe the people who continue to say that it is are actually the ones not arguing in good faith.

edit: dropping legacy status from applications may not even change the percentage of 'legacy' admits and yet I am sure that universities know who they are. Including it on applications may harm the legacy applications because the universities are now under politically charged pressure which is what I am arguing would be wrong.

Re: Children of alumni no longer have admissions edge at Carnegie Mellon, Pitt

#582

Post by nocsi »

oblio wrote: post #473
kulahan wrote: post #452

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I like that we still emphasize education even if you're going for a job that doesn't even require you to know how to read.

Don't they basically get a free pass for regular courses as long as they behave and provide results?

Yea.. These students also generate capital through ticket sales and rally alumni to donate. Unless a non-producing sport.

Re: Children of alumni no longer have admissions edge at Carnegie Mellon, Pitt

#584

Post by kelnos »

WillPostForFood wrote: post #503
vkou wrote: post #470

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Lying is the right, and truth is the wrong in your example. Lying is wrong! Except, according to you, when it leads to good outcomes! It sounds like outcome-driven morality is what you're pushing for..? Then what's the problem with AA? Not using it to compensate for structural disadvantages is being in the wrong in its case...

"Lying is wrong" is a non-sequitur - like West is to the left. It is morality for 5 year olds or Sam Harris. >Then what's the problem with AA? Not using it to compensate for structural disadvantages is being in the wrong in its case... AA fails on that criteria as well. It isn't compensating the people who were wronged and the burden falls on people didn't do the wrong. Poor asian immigrant gets kicked out so Harvard…

On the contrary, when California enacted a ban on AA in university admissions in 1996, enrollment of minorities plummeted. Sure, maybe some of them would have dropped out, and some may have changed majors, but at least they would have had the opportunity, and certainly some would have been able to take advantage of it.

Re: Children of alumni no longer have admissions edge at Carnegie Mellon, Pitt

#585

Post by nradov »

jpadkins wrote: post #545
nradov wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Everyone understands that standardized tests are biased. They are still the least bad way to identify students from underprivileged backgrounds who have high potential to succeed in college.

I am someone, and I don't understand why they are. Do you have a primer handy on this subject?

SAT scores are correlated with wealth. This CNBC article is a decent introduction to the issue, but be aware that anything you read on the subject is likely to be pushing a particular narrative so it's tough to find a neutral primer anywhere.

https://www.cnbc.com/2019/10/03/rich-students-get-better-sat...

Re: Children of alumni no longer have admissions edge at Carnegie Mellon, Pitt

#586

Post by xp84 »

rayiner wrote: post #540
dogleash wrote: post #510

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The point is that legacy admissions have always been an egregious injustice. To whom? Anyone who would have been accepted to CMU or Pitt but for the legacy apps will be accepted to another school and still be able to get a high quality education. What harm is caused? They have a slightly worse starting hand in status posturing games during the short period of their lives where anyone gives a shit where anyone went…

Look at the list of people appointed to run executive agencies, serve as judges, etc., and see the degree to which our society is run by elites from a handful of schools. The Supreme Court that issued this decision has one Justice who didn’t go to either Harvard or Yale.

This is a really thought-provoking reply. I appreciate it.

The thing it makes me wonder, though: Isn't this unmerited dominance of Ivy Leaguers in our society the real problem that both AA and the discussion about legacies, is purporting to "solve" or "improve"?

It seems like every society has elites, and we're trying to put a thumb on the scale (or remove other thumbs on the scale really) in hopes we can propel the brightest (poor/nonwhite/non-upper-class) kids into the elite category, but I worry that this is doomed to make little difference because no matter what, not everyone can graduate from Harvard or Yale. No matter what there will be people just as smart/virtuous/etc as the ones admitted to Harvard and Yale who were just unlucky.

I feel like it's more of a problem of humanity -- that we tend to be tribal and exalt some people based on things like what school you went to. Many of the most intelligent and thoughtful people I've worked with dropped out of college or didn't go at all.

Re: Children of alumni no longer have admissions edge at Carnegie Mellon, Pitt

#587

Post by rank0 »

low_tech_punk wrote: post #166

Can we end education resource scarcity please. More open courses by schools and less credentialism by employers could make these debates irrelevant.

There’s not a scarcity of education. Anyone is free to attend community college with guaranteed transfer to a larger state university provided they meet their GPA requirements.

EDIT: I do agree with you about employers overvaluing credentials though. Ultimately that’s not something you can unilaterally remove in a free society.

Re: Children of alumni no longer have admissions edge at Carnegie Mellon, Pitt

#588

Post by banana_feather »

vhold wrote: post #276
banana_feather wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I do wonder if this will have any impact on alumni donations. Wonder not. "[T]here is no statistically significant evidence that legacy preferences impact total alumni giving." https://production-tcf.imgix.net/app/uploads/2016/03/0820191...

"Prior to controlling for wealth, however, the results indicate that schools with legacy preference policies indeed have much higher alumni giving. These combined results suggest that higher alumni giving at top institutions that employ legacy preferences is not a result of the preference policy exerting influence on alumni giving behavior, but rather that the policy allows elite schools to over-select from their own…

They actually investigate this starting on p. 115 and find no significant short-term decrease based on observations from institutions that ceased consideration of legacy status.

I think the more important point this comment misses is that the family's wealth isn't going anywhere and their kids will still go to college, so it stands to reason that the alumni will still give, they'll just be giving to e.g. Arizona State instead of Harvard, which seems like a net positive to me. If people are being honest about their concern that donations from wealthy alumni are good because they subsidize education, those fears are totally allayed.

Re: Children of alumni no longer have admissions edge at Carnegie Mellon, Pitt

#589

Post by rank0 »

dbish wrote: post #561
rank0 wrote: post #552

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have a hard time defining my own stance on this point. For example, my alma mater GAtech allows for automatic admissions of my immediate relatives provided they reach some bar like 3.5 gpa + 1400 SAT (math+reading). Do you think this should be illegal? It’s quite clearly an attempt to create an enduring GT community. It’s also clearly not the same as racially discriminatory admissions. I do see the argument that it…

Yes, that should not be allowed. The best should get in, not a relative.

I concede that maybe it’s not the way “things ought to be”

But what’s your legal argument for why this practice should be prohibited?

Re: Children of alumni no longer have admissions edge at Carnegie Mellon, Pitt

#590

Post by alex_young »

rank0 wrote: post #538
Shacklz wrote: post #463

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> This is, in effect, one of the most common ways wealth is redistributed in the US. Why is it so bad? Because the government could simply tax those with wealth more and use taxation as a means of redistribution. Like most western countries do. Anand Giridharadas dissects this topic rather convincingly in his "Winners Take All", see also his infamous google talk: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d_zt3kGW1NM

Enlighten me. Which G20 nation has better economic conditions than the United States? According to this: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_average... The PPP adjusted median income is highest in the US (not counting Iceland/Luxembourg for obvious reasons). And as a follow up, how stable is the government in your example countries? The US has the worlds oldest document-based government. The rest of…

I think it's worth pointing out that income inequality is much worse in the US; the Wikipedia page you referenced reflects this somewhat: "2020 average wage in the United States was $53,383, while the 2020 median wage was $34,612."

If you define 'better economic conditions' as meaning more wealth in total, sure, the US is at or near the top. But however, if you're interested in knowing how most people are doing, the reality is that many of our European friends are better off than we are.

The one example I'm personally aware of is Switzerland, which has a wealth tax and relatively low overall taxation. People they tend to live longer lives than we do, they have more disposable income, great infrastructure, a pristine natural environment, local manufacturing, and they have hundreds of years of political stability.

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