25 years old and deep in debt

[merithyn]

Ethnicity
African American 11%
Asian American  20%
Hispanic or Latino  12%
Native American or Pacific Islander  3%

Heh almost looks like Whitey is under represented with those percentages.

Which was kind of my point from the get-go. With only 1600 places going to anyone, using the fact that they got into Harvard to catapult them over other applicants seems... silly. At least in the early stages of the interviewing processes. There are going to be equally qualified, equally bright applicants from State School University, and dismissing them out of hand for an applicant from Harvard or Yale doesn't make sense to me.

Again, later in the process, that may come into play, but not as an initial paper shuffle kind of thing. Others may or may not agree, which is fine.

[merithyn]

Of course also seems unlikely that most "minorities" get in with seats reserved for them...

I guess it depends. How long has Harvard or Yale been saving a certain percentage for minorities? Couldn't a significant portion be legacy by now? I mean, the whole diversity push goes back to when I was in high school, and I've got kids old enough to be in college now. I'd think that minorities are well within the timeframe to also be legacies.

[DGuller]

Well, according to their website, 45% of this year's incoming freshmen are minorities. Add the 20% of legacies, and that's not leaving a whole lot for others. Maybe not 15%, but when you do the math, that leaves only about 500 seats out of 35,000 applicants.

Link

I'm sure that some of those 35,000 applicants are minorities and legacies.  And it's a bit fallacious to assume that the "others" are not competing with the minority applicants.

[DGuller]

Well, according to their website, 45% of this year's incoming freshmen are minorities. Add the 20% of legacies, and that's not leaving a whole lot for others. Maybe not 15%, but when you do the math, that leaves only about 500 seats out of 35,000 applicants.

Link

That proves my point that the largest percentage of reserved seats must be those set aside for "minorities" rather than the legacy applicants making up the greater share.

Why must they be reserved?  Are minorities incapable of beating out non-minorities on merit?

[Valmy]

Why must they be reserved?  Are minorities incapable of beating out non-minorities on merit?

Because diversity is good for campuses and stuff I guess.  So yeah probably alot of those minorities would get in anyway but if the numbers are insufficient they help them out.  The only two minorities that seem to benefit from this though are African Americans and Latinos based on the stats.  The Asians and Native Americans/Pacific Islanders seem over-represented so they clearly are kicking ass without help.

[merithyn]

Well, according to their website, 45% of this year's incoming freshmen are minorities. Add the 20% of legacies, and that's not leaving a whole lot for others. Maybe not 15%, but when you do the math, that leaves only about 500 seats out of 35,000 applicants.

Link

I'm sure that some of those 35,000 applicants are minorities and legacies.  And it's a bit fallacious to assume that the "others" are not competing with the minority applicants.

Fair enough.

[DGuller]

Why must they be reserved?  Are minorities incapable of beating out non-minorities on merit?

Because diversity is good for campuses and stuff I guess.  So yeah probably alot of those minorities would get in anyway but if the numbers are insufficient they help them out.  The only two minorities that seem to benefit from this though are African Americans and Latinos based on the stats.  The Asians and Native Americans/Pacific Islanders seem over-represented so they clearly are kicking ass without help.

Well, Asian Americans make up almost half of those minorities.  Assuming that they all go into the "reserved for minorities" bucket seems idiotic.  I would not be surprised if the vast majority of them got in on merit.  In fact, I would not be surprised if the bar were a little higher for them, so that they wouldn't take up too many of the merit spots.

[Berkut]

Some portion of the legacies could also get in on their own merits in any case.

I would suggest in fact that having parents with Ivy League level educations makes your overall chances of getting into an Ivy League type school vastly greater than the average even ignoring any preference given to legacy admissions.

That is the argument instutions like Harvard make.  But that fact that legacy applicants are accepted at such a dramatically higher percentage than non legacy applicants makes people suspect that there is more going on there.   The kinds of non legacy people who are applying to institutions like Harvard probably also come from families that are highly educated and successful. 

Actually, that is a good point. It's not like the applicant pool to Harvard is a bunch of tools.

[Valmy]

Well, Asian Americans make up almost half of those minorities.  Assuming that they all go into the "reserved for minorities" bucket seems idiotic.  I would not be surprised if the vast majority of them got in on merit.  In fact, I would not be surprised if the bar were a little higher for them, so that they wouldn't take up too many of the merit spots.

Yeah so saying 45% were reserved for minorities was probably absurd.  The actual number of minorities who got in aided by being minorities was probably less than 10% of the incoming class.

[Berkut]

One thing about "Minorities"...

You should realize that the way the define them is largely bullshit.

Case in point: my wife knows some people whose daughter just got into Cornell. She is a "minority" and got whatever extra points are given to minorities.

Now, in reality she is as white as white can be - red hair, pale complexion, white parents, 100% utterly typical white middle class America upbringing.

But supposeduly she has some percentage of native american blood. Supposedly. They were not sure whether it was enough for her to qualify as a minority though, so they tried ot find out what it means to claim you are a minority on an application, and whether or not she would be considered one.

They could not get a straight answer. Turns out the actual definition is "Anyone who checks something other than the 'White/Caucasian" box on the application". She selected "Other" and provided zero evidence or any kind of documentation, nor did they ask.

But she got in.

[CountDeMoney]

It's not like the applicant pool to Harvard is a bunch of tools.

I remember when we argued for 20 minutes with the 3 Harvardtards running our Model UN committee who insisted Spain wasn't a member of NATO.   

[Valmy]

But supposeduly she has some percentage of native american blood. Supposedly. They were not sure whether it was enough for her to qualify as a minority though, so they tried ot find out what it means to claim you are a minority on an application, and whether or not she would be considered one.

They could not get a straight answer. Turns out the actual definition is "Anyone who checks something other than the 'White/Caucasian" box on the application". She selected "Other" and provided zero evidence or any kind of documentation, nor did they ask.

But she got in.

That is incredible.  Just check off 'African American' and claim that all humans originally came from Africa.

[garbon]

I think it would have been stranger if Stanford asked me for documentation to prove I was black.

[Berkut]

But supposeduly she has some percentage of native american blood. Supposedly. They were not sure whether it was enough for her to qualify as a minority though, so they tried ot find out what it means to claim you are a minority on an application, and whether or not she would be considered one.

They could not get a straight answer. Turns out the actual definition is "Anyone who checks something other than the 'White/Caucasian" box on the application". She selected "Other" and provided zero evidence or any kind of documentation, nor did they ask.

But she got in.

That is incredible.  Just check off 'African American' and claim that all humans originally came from Africa.

Yep.

On the other hand, how could it be otherwise?

Could you imagine the shitstorm a school would unleash if they demanded some kind of documentation of minority status, and then actually rejected said status in some cases?

[Maximus]

Since all racial categories are arbitrary there's no way to create an objective definition of race.