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[x0vash0x]

http://blog.priceonomics.com/post/48794283011/do-elite-colleges-discriminate-against-asians


"Asian-American students face an extra source of stress when applying for college: deciding whether to respond to the application question asking for their race and ethnicity. True or not, there is a perception that Asians are at a disadvantage in the college admissions process. Asian students going through the process comment:

    "I didn’t want to put ‘Asian’ down… because my mom told me there’s discrimination against Asians in the application process… Not to really generalize, but a lot of Asians, they have perfect SATs, perfect GPAs, … so it’s hard to let them all in"

    …

    "As someone who was applying with relatively strong scores, I didn’t want to be grouped into that stereotype… I didn’t want to be written off as one of the 1.4 billion Asians that were applying."

Is their fear justified? Is it statistically more difficult to be accepted into top universities if you are Asian? Ivy League colleges and their ilk deny this to be true, but what does the data say? "

[...]

They find that being Asian is the equivalent of a 140 point score penalty on your SAT when applying to top private universities. For example, a white student that scored 1360 on the SATs would be on equal footing with an Asian student that scored 1500.

[...]

It’s hard to find evidence that contradicts what’s presented above. While the data is either stale or limited, all of it indicates that Asians are under-represented at top schools. At the same time, admissions officers vigorously deny that there is any bias against Asian Americans.

The gist of the argument that top schools don’t discriminate against Asians is that academic qualifications are only one of the many criteria used in a “holistic” admissions process. There are so many students with great academic qualifications relative to the spots available that academic qualifications almost don’t matter for serious candidates. Given that so many students meet the minimum academic criteria (which are high), successful applicants need to contribute more than just brain power to their school of choice.This viewpoint is crystallized by Rod Bugarin, former member of Brown and Columbia admissions committees:

    "Yes, if you considered only test scores, Asian and Asian-American students would seem to be at a disadvantage."

    ….

    "But the students who rise to the top of the highly personal and subjective admissions process are those who have submitted the strongest comprehensive applications."

The unstated implication of this quote is that while Asians have high test scores, the rest of their application, on average, is deficient in some manner.

[...]

In today’s world, it seems hard to swallow that federally-funded, tax-exempt institutions could continue to shroud their selection criteria in secrecy. It’s likely that admissions officers are wonderful people, but what if every time they see an Asian applicant, they subconsciously think “Another piano playing, hard working kid, with perfect SAT scores. Good candidate, but we can’t have a campus entirely full of people like that.”

[Aussie Mike]

When you are referring to Asians here, consider the entire Asian continent including India.
That equates to a huge population and some desperate people seeking a better life.
Is that something which needs to be controlled?
I believe it is, especially for education institutions as they teach for their students but also explore new way of learning.
If the student population is weighted too far one way or the other, the institution must adapt to cater which may impede other directions.

[YetAnotherCanadian]

I highly doubt anyone at a US university stops and yells "foreigner!?!?!" every time they see a yellow person.