Wed 31 Aug 2005
With regard to this thread, a reader writes:
My comments have to do with the whole nose counting issue. First, let me state the obvious: I usually disagree with Dave and often find him annoying, difficult and insensitive. Also, I do believe that affirmative action has a place in today’s world. However, Rory et. al. are driving me nuts! Why won’t they address the problem of counting a URM for your numbers but that URM not bringing any significantly different experience than a comparable non-URM? It seems a fair and justifiable question worth a response.
My hope is that the admission office looks at the applicants background in detail and sees what kind of “URM experience” they bring to the table. I think all kinds of URM’s experience are valuable: from the prep-school URM to the inner-city URM. But clearly it is in the college’s interest to have a diversity of diversity.
I hate it when people I agree with duck the hard questions and do not have the courage to take on a well thought out critique.
I hate it too.
August 31st, 2005 at 1:17 pm
To anonymous reader who writes: I’m happy to nnot duck hard questions, and I think at many points I’ve answered david’s questions. I’m tired of answering his questions–I’m tired of ephblog being a site at which half the time I enjoy myself and half the time I want to scream because an issue I care about in regards to Williams is being cynically mocked or criticized by people who I think don’t understand. But that’s what debate is about, I guess. Really, I’m just tired of the fact that where I say “people” in the last sentence, I mean David. See, for instance, this post. What in god’s name does it have to do with ephblog except to go to the main page to call me out for “ducking questions”.
The question, as I see it, is why support a policy in which a URM seems to have had the same experiences as a traditional applicant save being a minority. Other than the fact that I think that’s far too simple an answer (how is Williams to know whether or not an applicant who checks off “African American” can pass for white or not? Require a picture? Return to the days of colorism? You ask for an impossible, or at least implausible, I believe), it also assumes a lot about what affirmative action’s goal is.
Racial diversity means, quite simply, racial diversity. It does not mean class diversity, diversity of opinion, or diversity of prep school backgrounds. Affirmative action’s goal is to bring more qualified students of URMs to campus. It’s not to create an unhealthy and unnatural divide between URMs with “real minority experience” vs. URMs who are assimilated. No. It’s to bring URMs to campus. I personally support it because I believe that the experience of living in the US as a minority, regardless of your level of privilege in other means, is a unique experience and deserves credit in the college admissions process. Others say it should be for the educational value to the school.
And here I ask, as a nose counter, does the Latino kid from a prep school with little to no connection to our definition of “Latino culture” still bring a diversity to campus? Yes. That is a subset of “Latino” in the applicant pool. Does a first generation Latino from East Harlem still bring diversity to campus? Yes. That is also a subset of “Latino” in the applicant pool.
If we believe society needs to understand diversity, one of the things we need to understand is the diversity within these large backgrounds. To respect another person’s identity is to say to that person “define yourself how you would.” We might not think that the person you speak of brings “the URM experience” but I say to that, in all honesty “f#ck your definition of the URM experience”. That’s not for you or me to decide. It’s for each individual.
Of course, this leads to the question, as raised in the NY Times mag. of a family doing genetics tests to find their african genes to claim being African American for admissions even though up until that point that family had lived a “white life” if you will. It’s an interesting thought debate. There’s a lot of interesting questions at the margin of this concept of identity…if we follow my logic above, then I could say “well, I work with african americans most of the time and enjoy traditionally african american cultural things, so I’m black”. So let me add one caveat, perhaps: be able to trace your identity back to a family member who was identified by social factors as belonging to that group. So, I could not claim blackness, as I do not have that family member. But my best friend from high school who led a nearly identical life to me and brought little “URM experience” is Cuban and could claim “Latino” as an identity.
If you really think I didn’t “answer the question” to David it is because it’s like talking to a brick wall (though I think I did). So if that finally answers it satisfactorily enough, I’m still waiting to hear him defend his idea that the Record would create interesting dialogue if it wrote an article finding the Latinos. That really angers me. Not that my anger counts for much on this blog.
Finally, a quote from my first post to the last thread “Part of the value of diversity is to make the students on campus notice that not all people who are proud (or not) of their particular ethnic background are not a homogenous group. For example, I know a number of “Ipod-using, cell phone calling, prep school graduates” who were also important figures in making Williams more diverse.” I don’t see how that doesn’t answer the question. In fact, it sounds somewhat similar to the point you make in that all types of URM backgrounds add to the diversity of the school in some shape or form. I also believe this response to the idea of “URM experience” also makes a valid criticism of the original question from the second post I made in the last thread “What you’ve done now David is awful (but not surprising) in that you’ve defined URMs as having to fudamentally be “different” from the rest of the campus. They must be “real minorities” to count to you.”
To David: Why in god’s name does this warrant a separate thread? I’m freakin tired of this. Besides, you’ve ducked more than half of my criticisms whenever I write. In your words, “I hate it too”
August 31st, 2005 at 1:44 pm
I appreciate Rory taking the time to write such a lengthy and thoughtful reply. Let me respond to this kindness by answering, with minimal snark, all the specific questions that he asks above. These are mostly minor points but I hope to return to the larger issues later.
1) “See, for instance, this post. What in god’s name does it have to do with ephblog except to go to the main page to call me out for “ducking questions”.”
As always, one of the purposes of EphBlog is to have precisely these sorts of debates. I doubt that I am the only Eph or the only reader of EphBlog who feels this way. In fact, I would wager that a large percentage (5%? 20%?) of the students at Williams today are much more “extreme” in their views of affirmative action. I think that they would prefer completely colorblind admissions. So the purpose of this post was not to simply call you out (although I can’t speak to the motives of the commentator), but to continue the conversation. The commentator is also someone that I have wanted to get more involved on the blog. By putting his comment on the frontpage, I pay him a compliment.
2) “I’m still waiting to hear him defend his idea that the Record would create interesting dialogue if it wrote an article finding the Latinos.”
Well, this is not super-high on my priority list of things that the Record should cover, but I would still be fascinated to read such an article and, I would predict, it would be one of the most read articles of the year.
In terms of a “defense” of the suggestion, I guess it comes down to what you think the role of a college paper should be with regard to the college administration. The College asserts that 10% of the campus is Latino and claims, implicitly, that these 10% are not a bunch of non-Spanish speaking, blue-eyed, lacrosse-playing Connecticut residents. I think that the College is not telling us the whole truth. I think that, by any reasonable standard of what it means to be Latino in contemporary US society, some of those 10% would not count — and not just in my eyes or your eyes but in the opinions of our friends at VISTA.
Now, you might find such an article offensive. I have no doubt that it would be controversial. But isn’t it the case that, right now, Ephs of all types discuss this topic around the common room. Of course, not everything that happens round the common room is fit for a newspaper article, but anything that significantly impacts admissions decisions is.
3) “Why in god’s name does this warrant a separate thread?”
Again, the separate thread is more of a compliment to the other commentator.
4) “Besides, you’ve ducked more than half of my criticisms whenever I write.”
I have not meant to. Honestly! Since I know that it is tiresome to answer my questions, why don’t we turn the tables and have me answer your questions? Ask specific questions (perhaps numbered in a handy list) about this topic and I will answer them one by one. I know that I would learn something from such an exercise.
August 31st, 2005 at 2:54 pm
Rory, I don’t think David is criticizing your view that minority status is and should be, in and of itself, an admissions factor with a weight of X%.
Rather, what he’s arguing is the same as the rationale behind the (IMO, wrongly-decided) Grutter and Bakke holdings. Those don’t say that diversity is and of itself a useable factor in all areas. Rather, these holdings are narrowly confined to education in particular, and are based on the premise that people from these backgrounds ARE different, and as such will increase the educational potential of eductional instutitions. As such, diversity for diversity’s sake — diversity without the different experiences and backgrounds that the legal opinions rely upon for their conclusions, at minimum runs contrary to the rationale of the relevant SCOTUS opinions.
I wouldn’t say that it’s explicitly unconstitutional or illegal…
… but I would compare it to the South African-born white Jewish kid a few years above me at my high school checking off “African-American” on all his college applications. It’s all of the form, and none of the substance.
August 31st, 2005 at 4:03 pm
I hate it when correspondents write anonymously or under a screen name, especially when they claim others are ducking hard questions!
August 31st, 2005 at 6:12 pm
I think Frank’s comment deserves its own thread. Yes, I also hate posts from individuals who use a screen name. However, in many discussions here, because of my position as a graduate student who will one day be applying for jobs at a university or for tenure, I often will not post. I find it dishonest to post anonymously, but also professionally unwise to post to controversial threads. Presumably there are others who would add useful comments and otherwise unknown information, but do not because anonymity somehow feels improper.
For example, Lowell and I had a fairly heated discussion several months back, and for some time it was the first google hit when you searched for “Richard Dunn economics.” Who really wants that kind of scrutiny?
August 31st, 2005 at 6:14 pm
“.. but I would compare it to the South African-born white Jewish kid a few years above me at my high school checking off “African-American” on all his college applications. It’s all of the form, and none of the substance.”
Just curious, but what should the white South African have checked on his applications? Is there a difference between “black” and “african-american” on these various surveys?
August 31st, 2005 at 6:54 pm
Shamus, AFAIK some schools put “Black” and others put “African-American”. I remember him saying that he had no problem calling himself an African-American, but that he wouldn’t call himself Black.
Similarly, I guess I could honestly call myself “Hispanic” (because, like Justice Cardozo, I am of Sephardic ancestry, though in my case it’s just a bit), though I couldn’t in good faith call myself “Latino”.
August 31st, 2005 at 7:16 pm
Cool. That is what I was thinking. I wish we had more South Africans at Williams, black and white. Maybe I’ll write the admissions office!
If only they’d had a 3rd generation Irish box, I would have been all set.
August 31st, 2005 at 7:19 pm
I never knew that a guy named Shamus Brady could be of Irish ancestry… next thing you know, somebody will be telling me that Conan Hollis Leary ‘02 is from an Irish background as well!
August 31st, 2005 at 9:12 pm
I think Richard is wise to be so careful. I wish the world were less threatening to the non-tenured among us, but such is life. One of the reasons that we allow and even encourage anonymous posts is to bring people with less job security than, say, Frank Uible, into the conversation.
Although I sometimes make fun of graduate student John Phillips, I think that he should consider Richard’s comments carefully.
Actually, I should probably consider Richard’s comments more carefully since I still want to teach at Williams someday, but old habits die hard.
August 31st, 2005 at 10:02 pm
I feel a need to clarify a few things:
- I am the anonymous post writer. I’m sorry that I did not include my name with the original post. It was a “family miscommunication” about the purpose of the comments. (Don’t assume it was David’s fault either.)
- Rory, the purpose of my post was not to challenge you. In fact, if I knew it was going to be posted I would have constructed it differently. That said, I would like to apologize for the way the post reads. It can clearly be interpted as challenging your courage and that was NOT my intent nor was I trying to call you out. Again, my apologies.
- In terms of the issue at hand. I agree with the majority of Rory’s points (ie. “As a nose counter, does the Latino kid from a prep school with little to no connection to our definition of “Latino culture” still bring a diversity to campus? Yes. That is a subset of “Latino” in the applicant pool. Does a first generation Latino from East Harlem still bring diversity to campus? Yes. That is also a subset of “Latino” in the applicant pool.”) but I need clarification on one small issue.
Wouldn’t it be a problem if all the the URM’s in one year came from the same subset? If ALL the people in a URM were from the “Ipod-using, cell phone calling, prep school graduates” subset or any other subset - wouldn’t that be a bad thing?
That was the question I was trying to answer. Now it may be mostly a theoretical question with little possibility of occurring but I did think it was worth searching for an answer.
August 31st, 2005 at 10:18 pm
Brendon,
I appreciate the clarification and please do not worry about any misinterpretation. As for trying to answer the question you raise, both yes and no. Though affirmative action is geared solely toward racial inequity, it is also supposed to have an economic benefit. As it is, it is overly useful for middle and upper-class URMs as compared to those in the most need (hence my desire to see both economic and racial affirmative action), URMs from lower class backgrounds.
Were it to be only useful for rich and semi-rich URMs, that’d be a problem. Were it only useful for poorer URMs, that’d be slightly better as it would be more aggressively focused on society’s main need in terms of improving the overall picture for URMs, but it would fail to present an adequate picture of the overall URM experience.
Or, at least, that’s how I see it.
But, as an entering graduate student, I’m starting to get nervous about my comments on ephblog as well:)
August 31st, 2005 at 10:38 pm
David: It is a many faceted issue, not merely one of more or less job security. At any rate failure to take open responsibility for one’s public statements is personally diminishing, among other possible consequences.
August 31st, 2005 at 10:51 pm
I want to clarify a couple of points. Rory writes:
1) What is the meaning of “credit” here? I can think of two possibilities. First, the admissions office already gives some amount of “credit” to all applicants on the basis of the opportunities avaiable to them. That is, if you take all the AP classes that your high school offers, you are given credit for taking the most rigorous schedule possible even if this schedule is, objectively, less rigorous than the one taken by applicants from Exeter. I think that we all agree that this is a good thing and that, American society being what it is, URMs are more likely to benefit from these sorts of adjustments than non-URMs, but that the adjustments themselves have nothing to do with URM-status directly.
Second, “credit” might mean “extra benefit” in the sense that if we have two applicants who are exactly the same in every sense (go to the same school, parents with the same education levels, same family income and so on) except that one is Asian American and one is Chilean American, Williams should choose the latter even if his actual academic (and other) achievements and potential are objectively lower. Is that what you mean by “credit”?
2) Now, to revisit a point made by Lowell, there are all sorts of reasons for supporting affirmative action. You seem to argue that it would be a good thing, in and of itself, if Williams looked like America. Professor Crane has argued that affirmative action is a moral obligation to make up for historical injustices. Both of these are reasonable positions.
But they are not the official reasons provided by Williams College. They are not the reasons that Morty gives. They are, in all likelihood, illegal reasons (although, like any good Federalist, I wish that the laws were different and that Williams could do what it wanted). In the context of Williams admissions, the only legal reason for treating applicants differently because of their URM status is for the purpose of improving education.
So, while you (and Sam Crane) are under no obligation to even consider the effects that URMs have the overall quality of education at Williams since those effects are irrelevant to your reasons for supporting the policy, Williams (and Morty and Nesbitt) are not so fortunate. They have an obligation to argue and provide evidence that affirmative action improves things. For them, it must matter how the experiences/outlooks/concerns of URMs — who would not have been admitted in a color blind system — effect life at Williams. If those URMs have no such effect (either because what they bring to the College is not that different from what everyone else brings or for some other reason), then there is a problem.
This was not my intention. Any URM (or alumni child or billionaire’s daughter or football star) who deserves admissions to Williams independent of their special status can do whatever they damn well want. It is not up to me (or anyone else) to judge them.
The problem arises with those special admits who do not live up to their end of the bargain, who the College admits because of their special status but whose special status is not as special as it appears.
But that’s is a topic for a different post.
August 31st, 2005 at 11:50 pm
David, this seems to have become a back-and-forth without much change.
You seem to be arguing that the “special status” of a URM lies not in simply being a minority, but rather the specific experiences of being a URM that would be “additions” to Williams. The argument, it seems to be, is that only a minority that really spends his/her days living as a minority (as opposed to a privileged one) is deserving of the special “credit” (as I call it. I simply mean that being a URM be counted in and of itself as a “push factor” a la good grades, impressive leadership, SAT scores, athletic ability, etc.) granted via affirmative action. As you say, the legal argument of the court (an argument you and I both dislike, but for different reasons…almost agreement between us…almost) is that affirmative action needs to present an educational benefit thru enhancing diversity.
My argument is that a minority coming from the most traditional Williams background (over the ages, a northeast prep school and a wealthy family), even if that minority is 100% assimilated (whatever that means) and is of a skin hue and shape and has a very “white” name (say, Robert Smith, a light-skinned Latino, to make up an example), that minority brings an important aspect of diversity. Namely, that “minority” or even URM does not mean “different”, that blacks are not all gangstas, that Latinos don’t all dance salsa and speak Spanish when angry, and that all Asians are not nerdy math geeks, for example.
That may not be the diversity everyone imagines when they think of affirmative action, but that’s a part of diversity and deserves respect as well.
So, what you are saying is that any URM getting affirmative action must be from a “different” background from the traditional white williams student. Fine–except any URM is different from the traditional white williams experience because s/he is a URM.
So, while it might feel “better” or “more effective” or “more diverse” or any other term we might want to come up with to describe a poor URM from the urban Southwest who was born in another country (to get a really different background) than some rich prepster from Exeter, they both bring some aspect of diversity, that’s been my argument from the beginning. And to deny that rich prepster his/her experience as a URM, even if a privileged one, is to assign identities to others, generally a bad idea, I believe.
September 2nd, 2005 at 7:19 am
Rory writes:
Untrue! Or, at the very least, I understand your position much more clearly now than I did at the start of the discussion. Progress has been made and I appreciate the time you have taken.
Correct. But, just to reiterate, this is what Morty and Williams argue. This is the official College position. That doesn’t make it right or wrong, but does demonstrate that, at least in this case, I am not just a solo wingnutter.
This is a subtle argument which I have never heard before. Let me try to restate it.
Williams students arrive with all sorts of pre-conceptions, assumptions and prejudices. One of the goals of a Williams education is to challenge these. One of those (mis)conceptions is that all members of an unfamiliar group that are alike. They might think that all Latinos dance salsa or all rich people eat caviar. By demonstrating that these assumptions are false, the College is doing its job.
I guess that this is plausible. My reading of current law is that it might even be legal. I also agree that, via this definition, there is no reason to inquire about the specific backgrounds of the 56 Hispanics in the class of 2009. From your perspective, their backgrounds are irrelevant. Even if every single one of them is a lacrosse-playing, blond-haired, prep-schooler, the simple fact they are different from what some other students expect when they hear the term “Hispanic” means that everything is okey-dokey in the land of Williams admissions.
Color me skeptical. Even if I grant your premise — give people a push if they check the right box regardless of how much their background will help educate their peers because their very presence will dispel stereotypes — I would still want to know more details about who the College is letting in and why.
But perhaps we can agree on that! Let me drop the issue of a Record article. Instead, I would propose that the College release much more aggregate information about the class of 2009 then it currently does. How many students spoke a language other than English growing up? What languages? How many have parents without college degrees? What are the cross-tabulations among these categories?
In this case, I am not interested in the data for any one particular student, just aggregate information for the class as a whole. Do you think that the College ought to release this data?
September 2nd, 2005 at 8:19 am
David: Do you find it desirable to have your position on any subject congruent with that of the College or Morty? If so, how boring!