No surprise. The U.S. Justice Department supports a rightwing group suing Harvard to stop its efforts to promote diversity.
Asian-American Students Suing Harvard Over Affirmative Action Win Justice Dept. Support https://nyti.ms/2LEHdpL?smid=nytcore-ios-share
The plaintiffs want test scores to trump every other factor.
Although Asian Americans are accepted at far higher rates than their proportion of the population, the plaintiffs want fewer blacks and Hispanics admitted.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
United States Department of Injustice
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Lawsuit is so WRONG!
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http://labor411.org/411-blog/republican-governor-thinks-40000-is-too-much-to-pay-teachers-vetoes-minimum-salary/
Republican Governor Thinks $40,000 Is Too Much To Pay Teachers, Vetoes Minimum Salary
By Sahid Fawaz
“Is a minimum salary of $40,000 too much to guarantee a teacher? The governor of Illinois believes so.
The Chicago Tribune reports:
“Gov. Bruce Rauner on Sunday vetoed legislation that would have raised the minimum salary for an Illinois teacher to $40,000 within five years, putting the re-election-seeking Republican at odds with teachers unions once again.
The bill approved by lawmakers in the spring would make the minimum teacher salary for next school year $32,076. The number would rise to $40,000 for the 2022-23 term and grow with the Consumer Price Index after that.
‘Teachers are our greatest asset in ensuring the future of our youth and they deserve to be well-compensated for their hard work,’ Rauner wrote in his veto message. ‘However, minimum pay legislation is neither the most efficient nor the most effective way to compensate our teachers.
‘Things like pay-for-performance, diversified pay for teachers in hard-to-staff schools or subjects, or pay incentives for teachers with prior work experience are all viable options to provide greater compensation for teachers,’ the governor wrote.
The Democrat who sponsored the salary bill said Sunday that he was “disappointed.””
-snip-
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I wish Harvard would fight back by showing how many rich white students are admitted with lower test scores. But since that would expose them to other criticism, no doubt they will continue to keep the special advantage given to rich white students quiet.
How many higher scoring students of all backgrounds (white, Asian, African-American, Latino) were turned down from every university that admitted one of the Trump kids? It would be amusing to see Trump have to admit that his kids were the beneficiaries of affirmative action for overprivileged students given everything money could buy who could still not get in on their own merits.
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Successful and wealthy alumni donate huge sums of money, making strong contributions to the multi-billion dollar *endowments at the Ivies.
The tradition of giving an admissions advantage to the children of alumni (“legacy students”) enables the elite colleges to offer income based tuition. Many a low income student who is accepted attends for free – or well below even state level tuitions. Without legacy admissions, these exceptional financial aid packages would not be possible.
*Harvard: $37 billion
*Yale: $27 billion
*Princeton: $24 billion
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When my kids were looking at schools looking at the size of endowments was very important. Scholarship and grant money was critical to choices. Private colleges while generally pricier than state schools often have financial aid packages that public universities can’t match. I am with RageAgainstTheTestocracy in not sneering at the endowments of elite colleges.
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So your point is that all the non-rich students should be competing for whatever spaces are left once the nearly all white children of billionaires are admitted?
Let’s pit Asian-American students against African-American and Latino and middle class white students. As long as the privilege for the richest, mostly white students is preserved, all is good?
That is obviously exactly why Trump supports this lawsuit. It protects the affirmative-action given to his children and children like him while pretending that any admission that isn’t based on “merit” is wrong.
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Legacy admissions at the Ivies range from 20% to 30+%. You are overlooking the fact that studies show the vast majority (80+%) fit or exceed the academic profiles of the colleges to which they are admitted, regardless of birthright.
Harvard Class of 2021
39,506 applicants
2,037 admitted
1,687 accepted
490 legacy students (30%)
400 qualified legacy students (82%)
90 somewhat under-qualified legacy students
So, about 5% of Harvard students are those “rich white” kids who are taking up spots that more qualified students are losing. Probably a fair price to pay for the $37,000,000,000 endowment that allows many low income students to receive very generous financial aid packages that would otherwise make attending Harvard impossible. If you are looking for a system in which fairness and equity are perfectly allocated, find another planet.
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“If you are looking for a system in which fairness and equity are perfectly allocated, find another planet.”
lol! I’m glad you are acknowledging that the way that rich white students — many from private schools — are admitted is not fair. By the way, the overprivileged white students admitted that way are not just legacies. Jared Kushner was not, and neither was Donald Trump himself.
“400 qualified legacy students”
What do you think “qualified” means? When you look at regular middle class students — white, Asian, African-American, etc. — who are admitted to a school like Harvard, you will almost always find some truly outstanding aspect to them. Sometimes it is perfect standardized test scores because they simply are so gifted that achieving perfect scores is something they do without really trying. Sometimes it is special talent that is outstanding. Sometimes it is a background where they overcame the odds to succeed.
When you look at the “qualified” rich white students, you see many Jared Kushners, who by all accounts could be considered “qualified.” A rich white student with SAT scores of 730/730 and an inflated private school GPA can be called “qualified”, but there will be many hundreds of middle class (and poor) more qualified and accomplished students of all races who don’t get in.
There are certainly overprivileged rich white students who are admitted on their own merits because they have won national awards or have some outstanding talent or something that sets them apart. But the study published in the NY Times last year made it clear who gets in. At Harvard, students from the top 1% in family income fill 15% of seats (and 1/3 of those seats go to the top .01%). Students from the top 5% in family income fill 39% of the seats. But students with family incomes in the top 10% (but not the top 5%) fill only 14% of seats.
This lawsuit is about pitting those students from families with income ranges in the top 5 – 20% against students from families with income in the bottom 80% for the remaining seats after the students whose family incomes are in the top 5% take 39% of the seats.
This lawsuit is about leaving in place the special privileges in admission given to students (likely mostly white students) from the top 1% (and especially the top .01%). Those students take 15% of the seats and no one has published the average SAT score of those students to see if it is lower than middle class and poor Asian-American students who are rejected.
Students with family incomes well over $200,000/year filled 39% of Harvard’s seats. I suspect the reason it is so hard for Asian-American applicants to get in is that most fall into that donut hole of students who are in the top 20% or 30% in family income but not rich enough to be in the top 5%.
PS — I don’t want to pick on Harvard because other Ivies are far worse. At Yale, 19% of seats go to the top 1% and 45% of the seats go to students whose families are in the top 5%. But students who are in in the top 10% but not the top 5% only have 12% of seats. In other words, middle class students compete with one another for 12% of seats, while the very rich fill 45% of the seats. This lawsuit wants those middle class students fighting for 12% of the seats to take some of the 43% of seats that to go students whose family incomes are in the lowest 80%. This lawsuit does not want those middle class students fighting for any of the 45% (or in the case of Harvard, 39%) of seats that go to the very richest students.
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Jared Kushner’s father made a multimillion gift to Harvard to buy his admission. He vaulted past fat better qualified students from his high school who did not gain admission to Harvard. I’m not sure if that was before or after Charles Kushner went to prison.
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All games are rigged to some degree. Its the only way to maintain power. Wealthy professional adults from the 1% tend to have been academically successful as well. Children usually don’t fall far from their family trees. The Ivies clearly do not want to maintain a student body made up of privileged white males. The diversity they seek works for them and they are not the only eight universities in the world that offer first class educations. While you are (properly?) bashing the legacy admissions you might also want to look at their athletes as well.
Yet both groups help sustain those huge endowments that benefit their low SES admissions. And we should not forget that the Ivies are private, non-profit institutions and have a number of Supreme Court decisions that support their goal of a diverse student body. Princeton was subject to a similar complaint and the Office of Civil Rights conducted a nine year investigation into the claim of quotas that limited admission of Asian students. The OCR concluded that Princeton is a super-selective institution that employed legal admissions policies. When 95% of students are rejected from these schools it is fair to assume that vast majority of the 5% are qualified.
Harvard’s 98% graduation rate is a testimony to the qualifications of their diverse student body.
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What a sensible comment! Thank you!
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“The Ivies clearly do not want to maintain a student body made up of privileged white males.”
Don’t forget, “privileged” white people have daughters, too!
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“The Ivies clearly do not want to maintain a student body made up of privileged white males [or females]”
I just pointed out that 45% of the seats at Yale, 44% of the seats at Princeton and 39% of the seats at Princeton go to students from families in the top 5% of HHI. In other words, privileged students. I suspect most — although not all — of them are white.
That’s a whole lot of privileged students!
My point is that the reason middle class Asian students are not getting in is likely that 39% – 45% of the seats are already reserved for the most privileged students. Middle class students from the 95% of households that are not rich compete for the remaining spots after athletic recruits are admitted.
When a university has twice as many students from the top 5% than they do students who are in the top 6% – 20%, it is all about privilege. My guess is that most Asian-American applicants fall in the top 6% – 20% range and not top 5% so there may be only half as many spots for 3 times as many students.
This could be solved easily by not giving 19% of the seats in an Ivy League college to the overprivileged students in the top 1% — families earning well over $600,000/year. If there are middle class Asian students with higher test scores, admit them before you admit the lower scoring rich white student in the 1% who are already disproportionately represented at the college, and not before you admit the low-income African-American student.
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Asian Americans are 6% of the population but 22% of the student population at Harvard. Discrimination? I don’t think so. As a private university, Harvard can shape the student body it wants.
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Can you say Jared Kushner?
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I’d rather not.
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LisaM: How much did Trump’s father have to pay to get him into college? It is obvious that he didn’t learn much…or that he’s suffering from dementia. He never learned any type of ethics in any of the expensive schools that he attended. His kids haven’t either.
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US White Housee opposes justice.
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US White House opposes justice.
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US White House obstructs justice.
(Third time’s a charm.)
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“The plaintiffs want test scores to trump every other factor.”
That’s not remotely a fair characterization of the plaintiffs’ case. It’s kind of the exact opposite of their case. My understanding is that the plaintiffs are objecting to the use of one factor — Harvard’s assessment of their personality — to trump every other factor. The other factors include test scores, high school grades, extra curricular activities, personal essays, and letters of recommendation. The plaintiffs are alleging that if they were judged by all of those factors, they would be admitted at higher rates. But, they say, Harvard is using “personality” ratings as a trump card to knock out Asian applicants so Harvard can use those spaces to achieve the racial/ethnic balance it wants.
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FLERP,
The lawsuit has been brought by a very conservative group that wants to eliminate affirmative action. Conservatives have always argued that test scores should be the only factor that determines admissions. The leader of the plaintiff group is not Asian American. His name is Edward Blum. He is a Republican Conservative from AEI.
http://www.cnn.com/2014/11/24/opinion/yang-harvard-lawsuit/index.html
Here are some statistics.
The U.S. population is about 6% Asian, African Americans are 13%, whites are 61%, Hispanics are 18%.
The Harvard class of 2021 is 22% Asian, 14.6% African American, 11.6% Latino, and 2.5% Native American or Pacific Islander.
The goal of Students for Fair Admissions is to eliminate affirmative action and to base admissions entirely on objective statistics. Conservatives have rallied to the cause because they oppose affirmative action.
The dilemma that Harvard and other elite institutions face is they they want to have a diverse student body. If they based admissions solely on tests and grades, their student body would have very few blacks or Hispanics, like New York City’s elite, exam-based high schools, where admission is determined solely by one test score, resulting in student bodies with few black or Hispanic students.
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“If they based admissions solely on tests and grades, their student body would have very few blacks or Hispanics.”
Getting closer. But it’s not just tests and grades. The sentence should read: “If they based admissions solely on tests, grades, extracurricular activities, personal essays, and letters of recommendation, their student body would have very few blacks or Hispanics.”
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FLERP! says:
“Harvard is using “personality” ratings as a trump card to knock out Asian applicants so Harvard can use those spaces to achieve the racial/ethnic balance it wants.”
In fact, the personality ratings benefitted white students the most.
If they based admissions solely on tests and grades, the student body would not have nearly enough rich white students.
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Maybe the plaintiffs want to be judged by the content of their accomplishments and not the color of their skin.
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Test scores are not a measure of ones accomplishments.
They are a measure of family income and/to test prep.
There are SAT tutors who earn huge pay because of their ability to raise scores.
How is that a student’s accomplishment?
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That is simply not true for much of the Asian community. I work in a school with a large population of Asian Americans – greater than fifty percent poverty. Many of those children end up at those ivies. One of our graduates has written (unrelated to this issue) about her upbringing – her mother worked at a sweatshop making $8,000 a year.
Yes, part of that money probably did go to test prep – but that was a symbol of great sacrifice for a chance to a great education.
Yes, I realize that a bad person who truly doesn’t care has brought up this issue. But don’t we still have to look at the issue fairly?
And we can’t look at percentages of the country – isn’t that how people felt about Jewish populations in the past?
It’s a tough issue – I wish I had the answer.
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“And we can’t look at percentages of the country”
Yes, the references to the overall US demographics are strange and pointless. By that yardstick, we could conclude that Harvard is severely under-admitting applicants who are over the age of 65 (15% of the US population) and under the age of 21 (27% of the US population), and that students aged 22 to 30 are massively over-represented at Harvard. Or we could argue that white students are hugely underrepresented at the specialized high schools in New York, because “only” 25% of those students are “white,” a much lower percentage than the percentages of white residents of NYC and, even more dramatically lower than that of the US as a whole. But of course white students are not underrepresented at those NYC school’s. I’ve pointed this out to Diane in the past but she keeps using the argument that “Asians are over-represented at Harvard relative to their share of the US population.” A little disappointing.
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Asians are 6% of the US population and have nearly identical admission rates at the Ivies (20% – 29%). So yes, they are over-represented by race, yet under-represented by test-based metrics.
Excluding Asians based solely on race does not happen because most exclusive universities use a holistic process to develop racial, geographic, and socio-economic diversity. No one can argue that the 5% acceptance rate includes well qualified applicants. Perhaps a handful of academically under-qualified athletes and legacies. Few would you want to exclude athletic programs in order to include better test takers. For those who object to uber-wealthy families buying seats for their offspring (lookin at you Jared and Don) at Harvard, Yale, and Princeton – welcome to the real and imperfect world of “who you know”. As a private non-profit schools, the Ivies should be free to create a relatively diverse student body. The reality of these student populations is that they are all, despite race, religion, gender, ethnicity, or socio-economic status, remarkably similar! They all come from the same family cultures that valued education and also happened to produce very serious, hard working, and highly intelligent children. The Ivies may look like a rainbow, but unlike the visible spectrum that forms it, they are all of the same wavelength.
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When I went to Wellesley in the late 1950s, it was very selective but made no effort to promote diversity. I came from an ordinary public school. Half the girls in my class came from elite private schools. There were very few non-whites (a Puerto Rican girl was the daughter of the Governor, a few Asian students, not a single black student in my class.) Today, the College actively strives to have a diverse student body and I’m always impressed when I visit to see the variety of backgrounds of students, of all races and ethnic origins. The College has even higher standards than it did when I was there.
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I bet Harvard is a pretty good place to get an education. Over the years some mighty good professors have taught there. Still, a fellow lucky enough to have one of these great teachers would still need to study a lot after graduation to keep up the benefit of a good professor. Meanwhile, a graduate of Elcheapo State who read all of the books written by the Harvard professor and studied his whole life would generally eclipse intellectually the difference made by a prestigious university.
Of course, the Elcheapo State guy would have a harder time getting a job because of name recognition. Reputation and connection is what students vie for when they try to get into the Ivy League.
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Rightly or wrongly, an Ivy League education does open some doors, but savvy employers are well aware of graduates who come out of other highly rated programs at other schools that don’t carry the ivy label. Family connections obviously play a role as well, but keeping a job does require a certain standard of performance no matter where you were educated. You can blow an Ivy education, too. After awhile even families can’t pick up the pieces. That guy at Elcheapo State may just happen to be in a department that has earned its own reputation for turning out competent marine biologists.
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spdkr: these are good points. My main point was that good education is not good until you have valued it all life long. You are correct about employers being savvy. One of my kids works at a mfg co. Where he does what is essentially engineering. Because he never got a formal degree, they know they can pay him less. Luckily for both of them, he is happy to trade a higher salary for the stability of our community. Otherwise, he would go get his advanced degree and be off to someplace else.
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Over two decades ago, one of my daughters was accepted to two “elite” colleges. When we attended the weekends where the colleges invited prospective students to visit campus with their parents one of the points the admissions officers made at both schools was their intent to make the entering population both academically excellent AND geographically, economically, and culturally diverse. One of the schools made a point of emphasizing how many valedictorians and high SAT scorers were NOT accepted because of their efforts to create a class that was more reflective of the nation as a whole. In effect, these “elite” schools wanted to make it clear that their entry standards were NOT based “entirely on objective statistics”… they included other factors as well.
This reality was driven home in our initial visits to campuses as well where more than one school told a group of prospects that if the college orchestra needed an oboist or a strong tennis player that person might gain entry over someone with 1600 on their SATs. In order for colleges and universities to offer broad experiences for ALL students they need to be mindful of areas of excellence outside of the traditional “objective measures”. Indeed, I do not recall ANY school we visited in the mid-1990s who proclaimed they were identifying the “best and brightest” based solely on objective measures.
When objective academic statistics are the sole criteria for admission, music, the arts, and athletics will all suffer… and, as noted above, possibly endowments as well. But presumably, that is a price worth paying to ensure “fairness” prevails.
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UC Berkley
100,000 applicants 13% admission rate
What we look for in Berkeley students
Here at UC Berkeley we conduct what is known as holistic review. That means, we review each application in its entirety, word by word, page by page. We literally hug your application!
While grades and test scores are important and our applicant pool is highly competitive, we read each application individually—looking beyond the numbers—for students who can add to the extraordinary educational atmosphere at Berkeley. One aspect, leadership
can be demonstrated in many ways on your application.
Undergraduate class of 2017
White 24.5%
Black 2.9%
Mexican American 9.9%
Hispanic 3.7%
Asian 42.2%
International 11.6%
Decline to state 4.7%
UC Berkley is probably the most selective state college in the country. California banned affirmative action programs in 1998, and when it did, it significantly reduced the admissions of black and Hispanic students.
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It isn’t just about race. The stark difference between Berkeley and private colleges like Harvard is this:
% of students from the top .01% (in family income):
Harvard – 3% Berkeley – less than 1%
% of students from the top 1%:
Harvard – 15% Berkeley – 3.8%
% of students from the top 5%:
Harvard – 39% Berkeley – 23%
There is a similar disparity when you compare MIT with Yale:
% of students from the top .01% (in family income):
Yale – 3.7% MIT – 1.5%
% of students from the top 1%:
Yale – 19% MIT – 5.7%
% of students from the top 5%:
Yale – 45% MIT – 29%
Do you see a pattern?
At both Harvard and Yale, there are significantly more students from families with incomes in the top 5% than in the top 6% – 20%. (In the case of Yale, nearly twice as many).
At MIT and Berkeley, students who are very rich are still overrepresented, but not at the extreme rates that they are at Harvard and Yale. The students whose SAT scores should be compared to Asian students rejected are the admitted students with family incomes in the top 1% who comprise 15 – 19% of the class.
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Like it or not, Harvard is a private, non-profit institution eager to create a multi-billion dollar endowment that benefits all. Very difficult to do if they follow admissions patterns of state schools. And it is well within their right to do so.
UC Berkley is the premiere state college in the country and it is a major research institution as well. Berkley (41K) has about twice the total enrollment of Harvard (22K), yet has an endowment of only $4.3 billion compared to Harvard’s $37 billion. Two very different animals, yet almost equally prestigious undergraduate programs. Keep in mind that despite the strong desire by many to get into Harvard, it’s reputation lies primarily in it’s graduate law, business, and medical programs. As an undergraduate university, Harvard is considered low on the Ivy totem pole.
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RageAgainstTheTestocracy,
I agree with everything you say. So what?
We agree that certain elite universities want to fill anywhere from 39% – 45% of their class with the very richest students (who are mostly white). And they, to their credit, want to offer seats to some of the very poorest students and underrepresented minority students. We agree they have the right to do so. I’m just pointing out the result of those admissions policies.
That leaves the middle class white and Asian students competing for the limited seats remaining after the 39% or 45% go to the very richest students and an unknown additional % of the remaining seats are filled based on other priorities (athletic recruits, disadvantaged students).
I believe our only disagreement is that I find the lawsuit a farce because it is designed to exclude looking at the 39% of seats given overprivileged white students from the top 1% who are admitted. Those students are never compared directly to the Asian-American students who are rejected, despite the fact those students comprise 39% of the class! What is the median SAT score of admitted students who are in the top 1% of family incomes is. And what the median SAT score of admitted students who are in the top 5% of family incomes. If this lawsuit really cared about merit, it would tell us how many Asian-American students who scored above that median were rejected and question why so many overprivileged students would be admitted with lower SAT scores.
In my opinion, the best way to fight the hypocrites who claim affirmative action hurts Asian-American students is to point out that what really hurts high scoring Asian-American students are the 45% (or in the case of Harvard, 39%) of seats that go to (mostly white) students who are very rich. Leaving most high scoring Asian-American students to compete for the disproportionately low number of remaining seats with recruited athletes, URM, and and middle class white students because the privilege that fills those 39 – 45% of seats must remain untouched.
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NYC PSP,
The tuition at these universities is at least $50,000 a year. Why are you surprised that only wealthy people can pay the tuition without a scholarship? None of these universities can afford to offer free tuition for all.
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Princeton has a simple financial aid philosophy that may seem hard to believe: “No student graduates with debt.” Their needs-based tuition assistance program makes Princeton one of the best bargains in the business for those in the 99% . . .if you can get in. All made possible by a $24 billion endowment.
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“None of these universities can afford to offer free tuition for all.”
I just find it interesting that Yale and Princeton fill 44% and 45% of their seats with students in the top 5% of HHI — the very rich.
And yet MIT only fills 29% of its seats with the very richest students.
If MIT can survive financially by reserving “only” 29% of their seats for the very richest students, surely Harvard, Yale and Princeton could do the same. Very rich students would still be present and take a disproportionately high number of seats. Just not quite as shockingly high as they do now.
What if Princeton was like MIT and 15% of the seats given to the very richest students were now open for middle class students to compete for based only on merit. I suspect that Princeton could survive financially if the very richest students were only 29% of the population – like at MIT — instead of 44%. It’s very odd when the very richest students from the top 5% are given 3x as many seats than middle class/upper middle class students in the top 6% – 10% — a group that likely includes far more Asian-American students. Or maybe not so odd when admitting a large cohort of extremely privileged students (45%!!) is just as much a priority as admitting a much smaller number of underrepresented minority students to the college. Or when admitting a large cohort of extremely privileged students whose parents will pay full freight (and perhaps donate more) is far more important than admitting middle class Asian-American students.
MIT is not prioritizing admitting the wealthiest students. It still admits many wealthy students, but there are significantly more seats available for the other 95%.
Please don’t misunderstand me. If a private college wants to fill nearly half the class with the most highly privileged students, that is their decision.
But if middle class and poorer students – both Asian and white – are complaining that they are getting rejected while students with lower test scores get in, they should be looking to the huge cohort of students much more privileged instead of the students who are much less privileged. And this lawsuit does not do that because the purpose of the lawsuit is not admission by merit, but to preserve the privilege of the richest students and to end affirmative action for the least privileged.
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It struck me when I was thinking about this issue that the problem with our discussion of affirmative action is logical. We have defined testing as fair a priori. We see it as an impartial arbitrator of human ability. This is false. As so many of those who post here have pointed out, testing is increasingly bogus. It was probably always bogus. This includes evaluations of essays, counting the number of clubs a student was in, and a host of other “measures” of who a student is. The degree to which a student is rated by these various methods is silly.
Joe goes to a school that cannot afford clubs, so he is never president of the SCDF. His competition comes from a different school where there were opportunities for every student to be president of something. So Joe fails to compete because he grew up in a Particular place. What is fair about this picture. We are used to searching for fairness in numbers, but numbers are not nearly as fair if you know what is behind them.
My father built up our worn out Tennessee farm with a life of conservation and labor. It was somewhat productive. A similar farmer in the boot heel of Missouri would have yielded at least twice the crop by just occasionally getting off the front porch. Comparing the two farmers by numbers coming from their crop yields would say nothing about the character of either farmer.
I was raised with the admonition that fairness was a vague concept that was difficult to achieve. The ancients wrote that if God were fair, no one would stand. My enlightenment through the constitution taught me that we must reach for fairness. Put these two things together and you get a simple conclusion: all action, indeed inaction, is affirmative action.
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