Affirmative Action-what do you think?

[rosiean86]

I know the whole affirmative action issue was really big awhile ago, but I never thought about how much it would affect me. Maybe it's just the fact that I'm really bitter that I didn't get into any of the schools I wanted to..but it really got me to thinking. If I was African-American or Hispanic, I most likely would have gotten into those school, and probably with a lot of scholarship money also. No matter how much schools deny that they have a race quota, I think most of them do. But I just think it's really unfair for schools to pick students based on their race; it should be about who's most qualified to attend the university. I mean, this is what happened half a century ago-what school you went to depended on your skin color. And now it's the same thing. And we say that we've progressed...yeah right.

[scarletwillow]

From a social perspective, I'd say it's good.

From an Asian's (caucasians too, to a slightly less degree) perspective, I *hate* it.

I have several friends who are seniors (both Asian and caucasian) who are top in the state, and even ranked nationally, for things like math and the such. A few of them applied to MIT, none got in. Yet, the black guy at my school who is really smart, BUT has a far smaller list of achievements and worse grades, got in no problem. MIT!

So yeah, I'm not in support of it.
Basically, it raises the status of blacks and hispanics, keeps whites at the status quo, and lowers the status of Asians.

[yummieboba]

Affirmative action? I don't think in any way that it's good. It's not like people who are benefitting from it now are the ones who actually have suffered the discrimination in history, and I just think that affirmative action doesn't do anything for the actual people who were hurt before.

I believe that people should be offered jobs, admission into whatever colleges, etc, based on merit, not race, ethnicity, heritage, and so on. Affirmative action is also known as reverse discrimination, right? To me at least, any sort of discrimination based on skin color (or at least on circumstances that the person can't change) is morally and ethically wrong. And it should be legally wrong, too.

[JianDan[Ai]]

its suppose to help minorities that are discriminated against
it does that for all the miniorities

except asians

haha, that simple...
i think it is a dumb idea all together (in regards to college/grad school applicants). I think that admission to higher schooling should be based completly on merit, and not on any other factors. How much u make, where u come from, none of that...the only people that should deal with that are the fiancial aid people, not admission officers.

Arguably, it is therefore unfair for people coming out of poorer areas due to poorer education, and many of the people coming from poorer areas are miniorities, which is why affirmative action is there.

And people will argue that grades do not always represent a person's true ability to perform in school. I agree in that grades are not representative of a person's knowledge in the subject, but grades are VERY representative of a person's determination and work ethic. If they didnt care how well they did in school, they would end up with B's, C's, etc. Even at the poorest schools from the poorest neighborhood in the country, if a student really strived hard enough, and wanted to do well, there is no doubt they could excel. It is how much effort you put in that matters. I am not saying that stupid people (thats sounds harsh) or people with less education should not be given a chance, thats what community colleges and vocational schools are for. I simply think that university is the highest form of education and obviously the most rigorious when compared to community college or vocational schools, and require a certain amount of determination and work ethic in order to suceed. It only hurts those who are unprepared or do not belong there, to let them in.

For example, a person i knew at my high school got into the same college as me, even though everyone knew he didnt do well in school, ditched very often and had poor grades/test scores. After first quarter he was on Academic Probahation, and after the second, he had already dropped out. (he now plays poker 8 hours a day to make a living -_-)
It was obvious to all the people that knew him that he was not going to do well, and most of us had already predicted that he would drop out (he missed several mid-terms and finals and NEVER went to class) Obviously he was not let in because of outstanding acadmics, but most likely because of affirmative action. This is probably the biggest reason i am against it.

Another important reason i dont like affirmative action is because it makes caucasians, the people instigating the affirmative action seem like they are higher than everyone else, and are giving everyone else a chance to go to college that did not exist before because of their own prejudices. It is a clear statement "we have the control, we can let u in, or not"

[Seltsi]

whoa, blame it on my limited sophmore-range education, but I thought that Affirmative Action was specifically created to help out minorities? Are Asians not considered minorities? From reading the posted replies so far, I've deducted that Affirmative Action does not apply to Asians, or does but most of the time is not by administrators...am I right? That's so strange...

I know that in the past minorities were mistreated in educational situations, so Affirmative Action was established to help balance the scales, but now it seems the scales are tipped more towards minorities than majorities. It seems really unfair to offer students a spot in a school not just based on their academic abilities and dedication to school, but on their race. In this sense, it looks like it could even be discrimination against the majorities. I know that it's beneficial to minorities to some extent, but if you really examine the policy carefully, it really is unfair. Besides, lately it seems like it's been more about "diversifying" the campuses to appear more attractive to college students than focusing on the accomplishments of minorities out in the crowd.

[scarletwillow]

Asians aren't treated a minorities in the American education system.

Asians are considered a majority, more than caucasians, in fact, to universities here, making it the hardest for us to get accepted.

[rosiean86]

Seltsi, it benefits some minorities, but it definitely works against Asians. It's mainly because we're usually the ones with the brains, good grades, and most importantly the drive to work hard. All of our lives, our parents drill the motto 'get into a good college and succeed' into our brains. So, there's lot of competition among Asians in good schools, because of race quotas and what not.

I agree with Alby that no matter what the circumstances, if a person wants to succeed enough and is intelligent enough, he/she will rise above those circumstances and should be able to make it without the benefit of affirmative action. Yes, grades and SAT scores don't measure a person's ability to succeed, but it darn well measure the potential. I mean..most classes are really not that bad if you study hard for it. It's just that a lot of people are lazy. THe ones who study hard and make the top grades should be rewarded; however, this is not done.

I swear, sometimes I think college admissions officers pick names out of a hat. 2 of my friends, who I swear are absolute geniuses, didn't get into MIT (1 rejected, 1 wait-listed). 4.0's, have done some research, really high SAT scores, etc. One of the girls tested into Calculus III her first semester here! (while the rest of us were still stuck in pre-cal -__-) They're involved in key club, tutoring, and one of them's an officer in Dull Roar, our music club. However, this guy got into MIT..who NO one expected. He doesn't have a 4.0, only held the position of committee head in Key Club (he ended up not even doing anything-and I ran for that position also! I should've gotten it! :-x ) wasn't involved in any ground-breaking research, cheated on Physics tests last semester (that part really pisses me off) and he's a complete clown! I swear, he's like the prankster of our class. But my two friends were asian, and he was white. Go figure.

The UC school system kinda made me mad also (sorry Alby, I'm dissing your school system here). They protect their own kids so adamantly, it's almost impossible to get in if you're out-of-state. I was rejected from UCLA and UC-Berkeley. Now I can understand UCB..btu UCLA?!? You can't honestly tell me that I'm not more qualified to attend than at least 1/2 of the people they're gonna end up accepting!! Holy cow I'm so mad! :nunchuks:

[freebird_brown]

well, rosiean86, you can't expect the colleges to only look at stats. there are billions of applicants out there with stunning stats. so although stats are a huge part of the application, colleges are looking for someone unique as opposed to someone who is just bland. so i think maybe the two 4.0 geniuses wrote boring essays. essays are a huge part of the application process and if the college doesn't feel that you're an individual, then too bad. secondly, it also depends on what department the people applied for. i don't knwo the circumstances enough except based on what you gave me. well, enough of this.
affirmative aciton worked better for the asians in my class. if there were two people who have the same chance of getting in, teh asian got in but the white one didn't. i guess it depends on the regions and the college. i couldn't speak for uc's.

[rosiean86]

I agree that essays are a huge part of the application process. However, these people are very unique-(one of them got voted most likely to take over the world :crazy: ) I mean...I obsessed over my essays-I submitted them to English major students to have them edited, and I made sure to have each of them unique. The two geniuses who applied to MIT applied for engineering-pretty typical, I guess. And I wouldn't say hat there are billions of people with amazing stats...:? Perhaps college admissions works differently in Malaysia.

It's also true that affirmative action works in different ways in different regions, and for different colleges. For example, Univ. of VA might proabably favor an asian b/c the majority of people there are white; UC schools, on the other hand, would probably want more of the other minorities.

The main thing is, I still think that affirmative action is wrong.

[JianDan[Ai]]

haha i dont even know if u would wanna go to a UC from out of state. It is INSANLY expensive for out of state people, serveral times what we hafta pay. Unless of course u get scholarships =P

haha but i do agree UCs do want to get their own californians in there. I mean, its good for us too, cuz we pay the taxes for it. =P

But dont worry, there are many other good schools.

As to how affirmative actions works. Bascially they set a ratio or standard for a certain number or percent of race must be accepted into a school. So for example they might say, u must have at least 10% black, 10% latino, and 30% asian in any years admission. Asians get the short end of things because we lose spots to other people who may not qualify, but are there because they help the school admissions meet the requirements. It hurts us more than say caucasians because overall asians perform much better than all other racial groups and therefore if admission was based on grades only, we would have the largest percentage by far.

It is a complicated issue. My feeling is that it is simply unfair to some, and does not always help those it intends to.

[roche]

wow...
i know that the president of my university was in a pretty big scandal/courtcase involving affirmative action awhile back while he was president of another university (before his appointment here)....

honestly, i believe in admission by merit. however, i was under the (mistaken?) impression that affirmative action applies kinda only when applicants of equal ability are fighting for the same spot. ie, if there's a caucasian dude and a african-american dude with similar qualifications, then the latter would gain admission. i didn't think that this policy COULD be applied to accept students of inferior quality over a much superior applicant.

honestly though, the application process is a rather iffy one. for the more competitive schools, its definitely not easy to select something like 15% of the applicant pool from thousands of applicants!!! and i'm positive that the essay plays a huge role in the admissions process....since most applicants that make the first cut generally have minimal qualifications (like GPA, SAT scores)
i have heard from several sources that once you attain a minimum, the exact scores don't matter as much....
so then things like recommendations and essays play a huge role....

i remember during my college application process (gosh, that seems SO LONG ago!!! my grad sch apps are much fresher in my head)
i felt that the whole admission process is pretty random, since i got into some of the "better" schools that i applied to, and got rejected by a school that was supposed to be more of a "safety"...

[hisashiluv14]

To my knowledge, we don't have affirmative action in Singapore, unless whatever was written in the upper-secondary school Social Studies textbooks about the S'pore government practicing meritocracy was truly a bunch of shit. I don't know much about this policy in the States except for the little I've heard and the stuff I've read about in the posts here.

I think that university admission should be based solely on meritocracy and nothing else. the race factor is bullshit. They do it in Malaysia, fix a certain quota of Malay students in the university to protect the status of the Malays as the indigenous population, and that is exactly the reason why I'd never become a citizen of Malaysia. It must feel really nice to be marginalised.

And so what if the minorities were discriminated against in the past? That's in the PAST. Just because you give them a place in the university doesn't mean that they would make something out of it. They have to prove their worth, just like everybody else.

A question. Would foreign students, non-Americans, applying to American colleges be subjected to this thingy too?

[Lingy420]

You can't please everyone.
I am all for affirmative action. Granted, there are people of middle class African American backgrounds that might use this to their advantage. And that is possibly what you Asian Americans have experienced in your schools.
However, beyond the argument of meritocracy, one has to look at other issues you are facing as well. Not all students enter University with the same education. I volunteer at an inner city High School in Chicago and the school is on the verge of being shut down because of a lack of funding from the government. Their libraries are pathetic and many of the students work part time jobs outside of school and many come from low income single parent households. Most don't make it to college but for those who manage to make use of whatever there is available to them in terms of their educational resources, Affirmative action can be a huge help. If everything were to be based on meritocracy, the top colleges would be filled with middle class, white and asian kids, kids with privileged upbringings from well funded suburban high schools.

Even if something happened in the past, it shouldn't be left at that. The disparities are too great and too defined by race. That needs to change and even though affirmative action may be manipulated by some, until someone can think of a better alternative, it needs to be there. Asians didn't make it because they were harder working. Different social circumstances that surrounded their social position led to them being more economically mobile than other races. Asians are doing well in America, and fact is, in the US, poverty and race are intertwined for the most part. Affirmative Action is not a race issue but an issue of poverty and social-economic mobility. It just so happens that black and hispanics represent the bulk of the lower class, and this was a result of America's bleak racist history of oppression and exploitation.

[rosiean86]

I respect your opinions, Lingy420, but you cannot honestly tell me that we made it because we're not hard-working. Don't compare the Asians nowadays with the first immigrants that arrived. A lot of the Asian-Americans you see now are spoiled and take advantage of everything their parents earned, and some of the ones that just immigrated are rich kids sent by their parents to have a priveleged education in America. The first Chinese immigrants had to do back-breaking work on the railroads. I personally know that my parents, especially my dad, worked his butt off to get where he is right now, and I respect that so much about him. You think these kids have it worse than Chinese immigrants? My father came from one of the poorest provinces in China and his dad died when he was young. But he worked hard, and made it to one of the best colleges in Beijing. From there, he went to graduate school in America, having also to overcome a language barrier. Now, he's a successful software engineer. Sometimes I get mad at him for being stingy, but I can't even begin to imagine how hard it was for him.

If these kids had half of the drive that my father (and other successful people) exhibited, affirmative action wouldn't need to exist. :dry: Why can't these people work harder? I know it means completely changing their culture, and I know that it's quite impossible, but does making things easier really benefit them?

Of course I'm willing to account for the fact that we have cultural differences; Asians have always emphasized education a lot more than Hispanics or African-Americans. However, if you really wanted to, you could rise above your circumstances.

[wrx'03]

This reminds me of the time when my younger sister got rejected from Harvard and Stanford, but this other girl got in because she put down that she was Hispanic on the application even though her father was from Spain and her mother is Taiwanese. Complete bullshit. My sister got 1580 on her SAT, took countless AP classes and passed those exams, had a part time job after school, played in the 1st flute chair in her youth symphony, volunteered at a hospital every week, got straight A's, played varsity tennis, ran varsity track, and graduated as valedictorian of her school. The other girl did not do any sports, got 12?? on her SAT, had a measly 3.5 GPA with AP art as the only AP class, had no job, and did no volunteer work. Two people from the same neighborhood, went to the same school, had the same opportunities, but one got in because of race.

Affirmative action is retarded. Two wrongs don't make a right and I definitely don't want an affirmative action hire doctor operating on me if I require surgery.

[snowflake]

In Singapore, it is more like affiliated. Like you study in a certain Primary school and then you can get into their secondary school with a lower marks compared to those not from the Primary school.

I think it is a delicate balance for the schools/companies or any organizations that adopted the affirmative action. They should tried and strike a balance when admitting students. And perhaps do a probe into the students’ background to ensure that they are being truthful about their races and so on. Maybe the intention for the affirmative action is good but in the process of implementing it, thins goes wrong.

[epiphany]

Seems like lots of ppl are angry with the UC's system, but I thought California has Pro209, which bans affirmative action.

[wrx'03]

Seems like lots of ppl are angry with the UC's system, but I thought California has Pro209, which bans affirmative action.

Prop 209 bans affirmative action for public schools, which is why Asian people are now the majority in the UC school system. However, affirmative action has no bearing on private schools.

[KendoTiger]

However, if you really wanted to, you could rise above your circumstances.

Although Affirmative actions is one of the arguments I'm staying away from, I will say that I agree with this point. It's been true with my family ~ which I can swear has been poorer than every one of the "underpriveledged youths" you mention.

I'll agree that I personally would not want an "affirmative action doctor" to operate on me ~ just because you would naturally want the person with more of a talent/strength in the area.

[rickisha]

honestly I don't have a problem with it. and I know no one wants to hear this (I know it wasn't you people who actually did this) but white people have been HORRIBLE to almost ever monority. If people were put into a bad situation I think they need help getting out of that situation. I know its just a cycle of black after black living in poverty in USA. In th efuture we might not need it , but right now I know that we need it. How are minorities that don't have the means to grow up in an enriching environment suppose to compete with those who do have the money to grow up in an environment that fosters development from an early age? Life isn't fair and maybe and maybe affirmative action isn't completly fair, but it's time to give something back.

[mrazfan4ever]

I'm against Affirmative Action. Yes, it benefits the "unpriveleged youth", but think of all those that had a chance...but were denied because they were a "priveleged youth"!! The system should be fair!!

Another reason I dislike it is simple, I'm Asian. And nowadays, many universities maintain the Asian population to a minimum...therefore using affirmative action. That's sick. I don't want to be rejected from Yale or Harvard becuase of my race and becuase they feel there's too many of us! If I'm not up to thier standards, then please reject me..but don't reject me becuase I'm Asian and proud of it!

[wrx'03]

My father came to this country with no money and no support from his family. How is it that a penniless foreigner is able to make something for himself, yet we are expected to give handouts by the way of affirmative action? Affirmative action is the biggest joke ever concocted by left wing hippie liberals.