Thursday, August 09, 2018

Asian-Americans Are Finally Cluing Into The Racism Underlying Identity Politics

https://thefederalist.com/2018/06/19/asian-americans-finally-cluing-racism-underlying-identity-politics/

2 comments:

  1. According to a New York Times report, in Harvard’s “holistic” admission process, it scores applicants in five categories — “academic,” “extracurricular,” “athletic,” “personal” and “overall.” They are ranked from 1 to 6, with 1 being the best. SFFA analysis shows that while Asian American students scored higher than students of any other racial or ethnic group on academic and extracurricular categories, Harvard admission office always “rated Asian-American applicants lower than others on traits like “positive personality,” likability, courage, kindness and being “widely respected,” and “often without even meeting them (Asian applicants).”

    In addition, as far as the "personality" portion of the admissions process, it's significant to note Asian-Americans scored on par with whites when they were interviewed by Harvard alumni interviewers.

    However, it's largely been the admissions officers who didn't interview Asian-Americans, yet who gave Asian-Americans lower scores on personality than others.

    See here for more information:

    It said that in 2013, a Harvard research division found that over a decade Asian-American admission rates were lower than those for whites annually even though whites only outperformed Asian-American applicants on a subjective rating of a student’s personality.

    But the group said Harvard ultimately killed the study and buried the reports from it.


    Also, from the same article:

    In court papers, Arlington, Virginia-based Students for Fair Admissions said an Asian-American male applicant with a 25 percent chance of admission would have a 35 percent chance if he was white, 75 percent if he were Hispanic and a 95 percent chance if he were black.

    And:

    The group in its 2014 complaint said Harvard defines “Asian-Americans” as including individuals of Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Vietnamese, Cambodian, Hmong or Indian descent.

    I take issue with the common argument (echoed by De Blasio) that Asian-Americans excel academically primarily due to coming from rich families who can afford test preparation. However, suppose (arguendo) it's true. At best, then it would most likely be true of East Asians from nations like Singapore, Taiwan, South Korea, and the capital cities of China (e.g. Hong Kong, Shanghai, Beijing), i.e. the Four Asian Tigers. It'd be a hard sell to say it's likewise true of Southeast Asians, many if not most of whom come from and occupy a significantly lower socioeconomic strata. (And one hasn't even begun to discuss the disparities in and among India, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, and Pakistan.) Yet apparently Harvard considers all Asian-Americans the same. All this is in tension with the argument that Asian-Americans come from rich enough families who can afford test prep.

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  2. Personality in admissions? Had not heard that one before. I wonder if that means they discriminate based upon a percieved temperment like introversion.
    https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/15/us/harvard-universities-personality-criteria-admissions.html
    Upon reading this article, it struck me that 'open mindedness' and 'empathy' as being a selected for trait would keep Christians out due to the socially charged context of those words.

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