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UC Berkeley inappropriately admitted students as favors to donors

auditor.ca.gov

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Re: UC Berkeley inappropriately admitted students as favors to donors

#161

Post by kevincrane »

awillen wrote: post #154
Balgair wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Since when were Water Polo, Golf, or Volleyball rich person sports? Costs are pretty cheap at public courses. Beach Volleyball, I guess, kinda, but sand is pretty cheap even in cold weather climates. Crew, sure. The 'field' is hard to get things to, typically. Lacrosse, well, maybe 20 years ago, but it's everywhere now. Now, (horse) Polo and Dressage. Those are rich people sports.

Where on earth do you think inner city kids are playing water polo and golf? Just because golf courses aren't that expensive to play on doesn't mean they're accessible to poor people (plus there's the cost of clubs, obviously). And water polo... even if there are public pools near you, they probably aren't dedicating space for competitive water polo.

I played water polo at my public high school and only had to buy a swimsuit?

Re: UC Berkeley inappropriately admitted students as favors to donors

#162

Post by goodluckchuck »

60secz wrote: post #65

Don't know if I'm just jaded -- but I'm seriously not bothered by people making large donations to a university to have their kid admitted. It's a transaction which benefits the university and the student. Granted -- it should be above board and there should be formal policies. Not justifying the specific actions in this case just curious at the outrage.

It can be fraud against other students. Applicants are told that admissions decisions are based on qualifications. Students pay tens of thousands of dollars for that qualification. They pay $50-100 to apply. Then it turns out that the qualification isn’t real... That admission can simply be purchased. If admissions can be purchased, the the degrees can likely be purchased too. Fraud is a crime.

Re: UC Berkeley inappropriately admitted students as favors to donors

#163

Post by Upvoter33 »

Here's the real problem: Universities are expensive places to run and need huge resources to build buildings, hire and retain faculty, and other costly endeavors. Hence, the need for donors. Once you have donors, it is VERY hard to avoid this sort of tit-for-tat deal.

The best way to get around the funny business: have a system where students are classified into bins. Be very clear with donors: if a student isn't in the "top bin", they will not get in. However, in that bin, allow the "donor connection" to influence admission.

Is this perfect? No, of course not. But it accepts the reality of the world without perverting it too much. And honestly: can you really predict if one student is going to do better than another because of 1pt on some standardized test?

Re: UC Berkeley inappropriately admitted students as favors to donors

#164

Post by scandox »

mywittyname wrote: post #89

People are always going to use their money to buy status. So as long as these college offer prestige & status, people with money are going to use it to get in. Much like doping in sports, you have two paths you can take: try to combat cheating, or accept the cheating as part of the game. I think these universities should accept that they are providing an education, but they are selling prestige, and split their admis…

I went to a boarding school in the UK that followed this model. Ultimately you lose the prestige. Not necessarily quickly enough for any individual to care. But that's the path.

Lots of boys sitting in their rooms smoking weed and ordering pizza and having to be edged out over 2 or 3 years because their parents paid for a swimming pool...

Re: UC Berkeley inappropriately admitted students as favors to donors

#165

Post by beervirus »

amithassan wrote: post #112
beervirus wrote: post #61

Abolish legacy admissions. Abolish race-based admissions. Pure meritocracy.

But who decides what merit is, and who deserves it? And certain kinds of merit can come primarily/only from high caste individuals. How do you choose merit that isn't coloured in race or otherwise?

> But who decides what merit is, and who deserves it?

Academic merit, evaluated by testing.

Re: UC Berkeley inappropriately admitted students as favors to donors

#166

Post by bumby »

asdfasgasdgasdg wrote: post #73
jjeaff wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And just in case anyone thinks the idea that an elite school won't help a rich kid, there have been studies indicating that is the case. The one that comes to mind was the study that compared long term outcomes of students who were accepted to Harvard and attended to those who were accepted but did not attend. Average future incomes were not statistically different. But the study did note that the starkest improvents…

Do you have a cite for this? Not saying you're wrong as it's my prior that selection bias is the most important factor in any difference in educational outcomes. But I'd love to have something solid to point to. I will say I don't totally understand how future income differences can be not statistically significant and also be "stark" between lower income students at the same time.

I’ve previously read this study (and at least one follow on study) and what they said jibes with my recollection. I’ll see if I can find the exact citation

Edit: I believe this is it: https://www.nber.org/papers/w7322

Re: UC Berkeley inappropriately admitted students as favors to donors

#167

Post by samatman »

microtherion wrote: post #133
ciarannolan wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you also have to determine the purpose of a university. It's either to take the top students, bar none, or it is to educate and uplift poorer students (economically and educationally). Mixing these two doesn't work.

Or you can choose to define "top students" as those who performed best, relative to their starting conditions . You could make an argument that such student are most efficient at using the opportunities they are given, and thus would benefit most from the education.

That would work, if the last measure taken was immediately prior to admission.

Alas, university doesn't work that way: students continue to be measured throughout their tenure, and those measures are an important component of the next phase of their life, be it work or further education.

The evidence is unequivocal: lowering the admissions standards for some section of the student body, results in those students doing poorly relative to students who were subject to the full standards.

This shouldn't be surprising, and no, it doesn't seem to matter why the standards were lowered, affirmative action, legacy preference, or otherwise.

Re: UC Berkeley inappropriately admitted students as favors to donors

#168

Post by Balgair »

kevincrane wrote: post #161
awillen wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where on earth do you think inner city kids are playing water polo and golf? Just because golf courses aren't that expensive to play on doesn't mean they're accessible to poor people (plus there's the cost of clubs, obviously). And water polo... even if there are public pools near you, they probably aren't dedicating space for competitive water polo.

I played water polo at my public high school and only had to buy a swimsuit?

Yeah, it's a pretty common HS sport on the west coast and in states that don't freeze. Any school with a pool nearby may have a team. My HS shared the pool with three other HS teams during after-school practice.

Re: UC Berkeley inappropriately admitted students as favors to donors

#169

Post by samatman »

wegs wrote: post #35
asciident wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would be careful about following this line of thinking too much. Like a few politicians are corrupt, they're all corrupt. It's no longer useful to vote. Or some Hacker News commenters made up stuff on the spot. So all Hacker News comments are garbage. It dismisses the vast majority of people who are doing the right thing.

The vast majority of people are doing the right thing. The vast majority of people in highly-competitive positions are not doing the right thing. * A statement like "all politicians are corrupt" is to a first order accurate. You can't get elected without money, and you can't get money without doing donor bidding. * A statement like "all executives are psychopaths" is not accurate, but becomes pretty close to accurate…

I wouldn't have expected a detailed elucidation of the maxim "power corrupts" to be so unpopular, but, here we are.

Re: UC Berkeley inappropriately admitted students as favors to donors

#170

Post by kenjackson »

belorn wrote: post #128
mywittyname wrote: post #89

People are always going to use their money to buy status. So as long as these college offer prestige & status, people with money are going to use it to get in. Much like doping in sports, you have two paths you can take: try to combat cheating, or accept the cheating as part of the game. I think these universities should accept that they are providing an education, but they are selling prestige, and split their admis…

There are three systems. People who pay their way in, people who has the highest grades, and people who get in through diversity quota. Transparency in all three would cause a major waves into the public perspective of admission practices.

There's not just three ways. There is alumni. There is celebrity admits. There are special achievement admits. Athletic admits. Etc...

And it probably differs from school to school -- depending on what the goal of the school is.

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