For decades upon decades, race has been the basis for inequality and prejudice in the United States. Most recently, it has found a place in the elite universities of America, as a means of “leveling out the playing field.” In 2014, a non-profit membership group named Students for Fair Admissions (SFA) filed a lawsuit against Harvard University. The plaintiffs claimed that Harvard’s affirmative action admissions process discriminated against deserving Asian-American applicants. In this way, Harvard allegedly limited the number of admitted Asian-American students, holding them to a higher standard than members of other races. The plaintiffs’ motion further summarizes that, “An Asian-American applicant with a 25% chance of admission would have a 35% chance if they were white, 75% if they were Hispanic, and 95% if they were African-American”. How is this fair? How can one not admit race is a major factor in Harvard’s admissions decisions?
Does adjusting the rules to allow less of a certain people, especially Asians, to thrive and exercise their civil rights sound familiar? It should. During the 19th century, the Chinese Exclusion Act was enacted to deny immigration and naturalization based on race. During WWII in the 20th century, Japanese-American citizens were sent to internment camps. Now, during the 21st century, affirmative action sets out to discriminate against Asian-Americans applying to college. Not only has America been through these types of litigations before, but America is stubborn enough to keep repeating the same prejudicial judgements against Asians as before.
There are several factors to this case, one being the history of affirmative action. Affirmative action in the admissions process is intended to favor those who face disadvantages or inequalities in areas other than education. Between 2011 and 2016, the Obama administration actively encouraged the use of race in the admissions process as a means for promoting more diversity. In turn, an “individualized, holistic review” was pushed, as well as considerations for “race-neutral” alternatives, the loophole being only if the alternatives were “workable.” Given Harvard’s whopping $37 billion endowment, it would seem that they could work a race-neutral alternative into their admissions process, but I guess they are more concerned about their reputation than the hidden quotas they are placing on their applicants’ races. Recently, the Trump administration reversed the Obama-era guidelines, thus causing Harvard’s apparent racial preferences to be met with more scrutiny than they would have before.
Harvard still claims that its affirmative action process is for the sake of “diversity.” But how can an institution strive for diversity by manipulating subjective criteria in order to maintain the same student-body composition regardless of the ever-shifting pool of qualified applicants? Even more infuriating is its simple explanation as to why Asian-American applicants have the lowest admissions rate, while maintaining the highest academic achievement. In its application process, Harvard assigns each applicant four component scores, the components being the Academic, Extracurricular, Athletic, and Personal Ratings. The Overall Rating is Harvard’s overall assessment of the applicant, and thus the deciding factor of admission. Moreover, Harvard claims that the reason why Asian-American applicants are largely denied admission is that their “Personal Rating” score is much lower than students of other races. This means Harvard assigns and labels most Asian-American applicants as less “likable,” “helpful,” “courageous,” and “kind.” These character qualities are all arbitrary identified with a so-called “positive personality,” which is being assessed when addressing one’s Personal Rating. This is outrageous not only for its generalizations, but also its racist connotations, as not all Asians are alike, contrary to the basic stereotype.
Stereotypically, Asians are “geniuses” or “math wizards.” They are the relentless, hard-working race that attains achievements left and right. From any college admissions database, Asian-Americans score higher academically than any other race. According to Peter S. Arcidiacono, the Duke University Professor of Economics who was hired by SFA to review and analyze the data produced by Harvard, if the Harvard’s admissions process was based solely on the academic index, admitted Asian-Americans would make up over 43% of the student population. There is no explanation behind this trend other than, simply, Asian culture. It is their culture that makes them so academically qualified. It is their culture that pushes them to want to be the very best. It is their culture that denies them from admissions into the country’s most prestigious institutions.
Overall, it has been proven that Asian-Americans are objectively much more qualified. However, the odds are in the subjective factors, which must be changed if Harvard wants to equalize its admissions process at all. The perfectionism and determination that is so heavily ingrained in Asian culture, and the minds of most Asian-American students, will not go away, and the elite universities who are receiving these Asian-American applicants need to understand this.
As a Cambodian, and with many Chinese and Korean, not only are my friends and I concerned about applying, but we have more reason than ever to be worried about our chances of being admitted. For me, though I identify myself as “Southeast Asian”, I like to put more emphasis on the “Southeast” part. Cambodia is a much poorer and less developed place than, say, China, Korea, or Japan. In this way, colleges and universities do not see many Cambodian, Laotian, Thai, or Burmese applicants as much as they see Chinese, Korean, and Japanese. This known fact, fortunately, works in my favor and plays on affirmative action’s dedication to “diversity.” Nonetheless, my Chinese and Korean friends, I am sorry to say, will have a much more difficult time when being assessed by admissions, if nothing drastic happens before January 2019.
Though affirmative action is not all bad, as it definitely benefits those of certain socioeconomic backgrounds, it most definitely needs to be changed in regards to its implementation in the college admissions process. Although much easier said than done, one race cannot be put over another. People should not feel uneasy about checking the respective “race” box on the application, for everyone should feel proud of who they are.