51–60 of 133 posts
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It's not. And as a person of color, I'll tell you that laws preventing discrimination offered me and my family zero protections (specifically with respect to restaurants) in the post CRA-III era.
CRA-III?
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That's why it's not up to you and Harvard has a $40B endowment ;) But more seriously, grades do not correlate across schools in the slightest. 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 And good grades are already a prerequisite for admission, you generally need to…
> 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…
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 important for determining future achievement
> 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.
> can only help, not hurt, a student’s chances of getting in. Ok, can someone explain to me if this distinction even matters effectively? If every group is getting a bonus and one group is not doesn't that effectively mean that one group is being penalized?
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"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" How is this argument different than supporting a private restaurant not serving e.g. Chinese people since they "are a private company that should be able to serve whom they want based on their own criteria?"
It's not. And as a person of color, I'll tell you that laws preventing discrimination offered me and my family zero protections (specifically with respect to restaurants) in the post CRA-III era.
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I think you're coming at this from the wrong perspective. The fact that someone is grappling with their sexual identity isn't by itself a qualification. On the other hand, if in the essays or interviews you get the feeling that this candidate has matured beyond his/her peers as a result of it, or if this candidate demonstrates resilience dealing with growing up this way in an extremely conservative culture, then you'…
At that point why specifically call out sexuality? Why not just say “candidates whom have matured behind their peers because of difficult life experiences”?
I 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
Whether the law is a good idea or a bad idea as written is another question, and is up to the legislature to debate that and amend the law as needed. But courts shouldn't be in the business of rewriting laws because they had some consequences that their authors didn't intend (although in this case I suspect that the original authors actually did very much intend for this sort of thing to be illegal also, since the laws were written back in the era where being color-blind was not considered bad).
> 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.
> can only help, not hurt, a student’s chances of getting in. Ok, can someone explain to me if this distinction even matters effectively? If every group is getting a bonus and one group is not doesn't that effectively mean that one group is being penalized?
Distinct from $race_b-2 and $race_a+2, as this only hurts the subset of $race_b applicants lacking [c,d,..n]
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I think you're coming at this from the wrong perspective. The fact that someone is grappling with their sexual identity isn't by itself a qualification. On the other hand, if in the essays or interviews you get the feeling that this candidate has matured beyond his/her peers as a result of it, or if this candidate demonstrates resilience dealing with growing up this way in an extremely conservative culture, then you'…
At that point why specifically call out sexuality? Why not just say “candidates whom have matured behind their peers because of difficult life experiences”?
The "secret" (at least for me back in 1972 ;-) was to be in a far-flung location (San Diego for me) where there's slim pickin's. ;-) Seriously, I'm sure the decision process has quantitative elements, but it's got to still be 70% intuition. And the "legacy" applicants most definitely get a big bump.
Yeah, I think the legacy crap is the real crime.
To those who have a problem with Harvard's alleged discrimination. Do you think female-only schools should exist? In addition, would you agree with an admission policy that only uses SAT and AP scores? Grades inherently are subjective and can unfairly be given on the basis of race on the K-12 level, so that's helpful. Harvard should just model China and make the SAT the only criterion. If there are too many people wi…
Goodhart's Law: “When a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure.” SATs will quickly become one of the poorest indicators for success.
I'm sure the other sections are the same, though I didn't look at those. But, really, any math exam with multiple choice answers can be gamed, at least to an extent. And then people will start teaching how to game it (especially if funding comes from them, which some does in the state I teach in)