#university mismatch

[religion-is-a-mental-illness]

By: Wilfred Reilly

Published: Jul 8, 2023

Affirmative action — the decades-old practice of assigning a positive weight to some candidates’ race during application processes — is over, at least for college admissions. I’ve yapped about this in a few different forums, but will give a somewhat unique take here: The practice’s end is a good thing for minority kids.

For at least the past three or four decades, as all experts but surprisingly few laymen know, affirmative action has almost never actually meant directing technical aid to STEM programs in struggling “POC” schools, or even assigning some slight weight to race among well-qualified and otherwise roughly equal competitors. Instead, the standard practice in higher education has been to give extraordinarily large race-based bonuses to almost every black or Hispanic applicant to a selective college. The basic reason for this is simple and obvious, if awkward to discuss: There are currently substantial and fairly stable performance gaps between different racial groups on board tests like the old SAT, and any college that wants to “look like America” is going to have to take these into account.

During the very representative year of 2017, College Board data reveal that mean scores on the SAT exam were 941 for blacks (479 verbal, 462 math), 963 for native Americans (486, 477), 986 for native Hawaiians and other Pacific Islanders (498, 488), and 987 for Latinos of all races (500, 487). Whites turned in a fairly solid 1118 (565, 553), and the average for East and South Asians was almost 1200 (569, 612). A great deal can be said about these scores, and about the gaps between them.

First, notably, none of the averages are all that terrible in any global context, or for that matter when compared with the averages when velociraptors roamed the land and yours truly was a high-school student. And they vary a bit year over year: Native Americans have since dropped behind blacks, while Asians have continued to surge forward, posting a mean of 1239 in 2022. But one stark reality remains constant: The typical reasonably selective college essentially confronts three distinct groups of applicants every year — the various black, Hispanic, and native populations scoring at around 950, whites scoring at around 1100, and Asians scoring at nearly 1250.

Admitting students from these groups in anything close to proportional numbers, logically, would require — and did require until this year — affirmative-action advantages that are roughly the size of the gaps between the different populations. This has led to a remarkable and measurable level of “mismatch.” For example, per 2013–16 data, a black medical-school applicant with a lower-end MCAT score of 24–26 and a college grade-point average between 3.2 and 3.39 has long had about the same chance of acceptance — within the same set of schools — as an Asian applicant with a 30–32 MCAT and a GPA between 3.6 and 3.8.

To provide a bit more context: During the same period, an Asian college graduate with a 24–26 MCAT had just a 6 percent chance of entering medical school, while an equivalent white student had an 8 percent chance. In contrast, a black scholar with a 30–32 MCAT and respectable GPA was 94 percent likely to secure admission. Nor were the nation’s medical schools unique in this regard: The SAT subject-test averages for 2018 applicants and admittees to Harvard were, respectively, 622 and 703 for blacks, and 726 and 767 for Asian Americans.

To state the obvious: While no doubt infuriating for rejected white and Asian contenders, mismatching at this level was also terrible for admitted blacks and Hispanics. It is difficult to imagine a less friendly and welcoming introduction to the collegiate experience than being tossed into the mix at some hyper-competitive grist-mill school like Harvard or the University of Chicago, 200 SAT points behind the ability curve, while surrounded by potentially hostile peers skeptical of your right to be there. Almost certainly, as Richard Sander and Stuart Taylor point out in their 2012 book Mismatch, this reality explains much of the relative lack of black and Hispanic success at many top U.S. universities.

While these gaps may be closing somewhat, the black graduation rate is currently seven points lower than the white graduation rate at Yale (96 percent versus 89 percent), ten points lower at Cornell (93 percent–83 percent), 14 points lower at the University of North Carolina (83 percent–69 percent), 15 points lower at UCLA (88 percent–73 percent), 16 points lower at California-Berkeley (86 percent–70 percent), and an astonishing 21 points lower at my own alma mater’s Big 10 rival, the University of Michigan (88 percent–67 percent).

Absent any mismatch effect, a great many bright minority kids currently slogging their way through Michigan or an Ivy institution — and recall that a Harvard applicant with a 622 on each section of a tough test is objectively no fool — would simply have gone on to success as STEM majors at Southern Illinois or Kentucky State. Presumably, following the decision in the Fair Admissions affirmative-action case, exactly this will happen.

It is also worth noting a point so unbelievably obvious that it feels a bit bizarre to make it: Terms like “diversity” are not in fact just code words for “(liberal) black people.” Absent affirmative action, the student bodies at major U.S. universities will not be made up entirely of blonde white folks. As was noted above, essentially all large East Asian groups do better on the board tests than whites do.

South Asians like Indian Americans do as well — and Nigerians and Jews very probably do as well, although their data is harder to break out from that for larger ethnic populations. Especially if our country’s elite ivory towers are forced to abandon legacy admissions alongside affirmative action, many will be almost as multi-colored after merit admissions as before. Those who don’t make it in will still be well positioned for success at solid institutions one level down. In any sane sense of these words, it is hard to see this as a bad thing for “integration” or “minority success.”

A great deal about the future of race relations on campus frankly remains to be seen: Are legacies next? Will colleges simply duck the Fair Admissions decision for the next 15 years by using BS alternative metrics for race, such as “racial-adversity scores”? However, for now, it is worth remembering that a legal ruling that prohibits automatically advantaging the son of a Cuban dentist over the daughter of a Filipino shopkeeper does not brutalize the Brown Team or “promote white supremacy.” Across all races and eras, there has never really been a fairer system than “May the best man win.”

[ Via: https://archive.is/eNiaO ]

==

At some point, merit has to win out.

See also:

[tobyisave]

the new crystal temp

[brendathedoodler]

From @wilds-ponytail ‘s tags on this post

He deserved it

[thepurplecapr]

Lego lloyd!

[meadow-roses]

Jeff, Jeff, what are you going to do with yourself, smh 😔😔

also for funsies here's a scribble of him rocking it out on the electric guitar 😎

[inkgeminarim]

Silly goffy pupet man. He is my son.

I love him. And I gotta squeeze him.

[skunkes]

Hello this is from an old post of yours (I was scrolling through the Fields of Mistria tag and got pretty far back I guess lol) but you mentioned most farming games that have come out are ugly and only like two are good. I assume one of the good ones is Stardew but what is the other? Which ones are ugly?

"ugly" was exaggerated for the frustrated tone of post, in reality many just arent to my taste, art direction wise... being 3D already strikes many of them out as I dont want games that will blow up my laptop but even then im not a huge fan of the styles of many of em even if i did enjoy the 3D ones (example being my time at port/ia.... i wld put this in the aforementioned category. i don't like looking at it)

i just know that 90% of the time someone recommends a farming game to me its either 3D graphics and/or "ugly" (to me)

(and its usually both bc i often will play games that blow up my laptop if i like them enough, like DQB2! i havent liked the style of any actual 3d farming game enough yet though)

also going really far back into the tag is so real i keep stopping myself from doing that too im so excited for da game ^_^

[doomrichards]

Compilation of my fics featuring The Maker (Earth-1610 Reed Richards or Ultimate Reed Richards)

First off, I have a fic series set during Victor von Doom aka Doctor Doom's Infamous Iron Man era. With the Reed Richards he knew presumed dead, he has a one night stand with The Maker, who visits him... the series eventually ends with Earth-616 DoomReed.

Make Believe by doomrichards Explicit Words: 2,123 Summary: Victor falls asleep to thoughts of Reed Richards. When he wakes from the dream, he is greeted by a nightmare, an incubus known as the Maker. Double Check by doomrichards Explicit Words: 11,207 Summary: Second start… second chances… The second versions of the Parliament of Doom and Council of Reeds meet and match. Worlds Collide by doomrichards Explicit Words: 6,074 When Maker makes the bed, he lets Earth-1610 Victor van Damme, Earth-616 Victor von Doom, and Earth-616 Reed Richards lie in it… Blood and Water by doomrichards Explicit Words: 3,734 Maker, the Reed Richards of Earth-1610, delivers himself to Victor van Damme, the Doom of Earth-1610. ----- This fic series is in progress. I ask what if The Maker had been the one to re-scar Doom? Where in Make Believe, The Maker tops Victor, in Meet Your Maker, The Maker bottoms for Doom.

Meet your Maker by doomrichards Explicit Words: 3,161 Summary: Victor invites Maker to re-make him.

Meet your Doom (In their Triumph, like Fire and Powder) by doomrichards Explicit Words: 22,195 (WIP) Summary:

Victor von Doom is the Infamous Iron Man no more. Now, Doctor Doom embraces his destiny as the villain he was always meant to be. Who better to serve as the Monarch of Latveria’s Prince Consort than the Maker, an alternate, villainous version of his arch-nemesis, Mister Fantastic? But when Maker wants out of his deal with Doom at the last minute, Mister Fantastic agrees to secretly swap places with him. Can Victor von Doom truly be happily married to a Reed Richards that, unbeknownst to him, is the very one who tried to make him a better man?

Below are some illustrations and memes I've made for my works... But first, these three panels from Ultimates 2 (2016) #8 where the Maker introduces himself and clearly finds this reality's Victor von Doom fascinating.

Meme after Infamous Iron Man #11, and Meet Your Maker (Victor and The Maker, but for real), after Maleev/Hollingsworth, Infamous Iron Man #5

Meet Your Doom after Larroca, Fantastic Four (1998) #27

[aquickstart]

negative reviews on aftg and tfc specifically are so funny. one thing they have in common is complete misunderstanding of the vibe. refusal to suspend disbelief. which, admittedly, you have to suspend a lot of so i get it, i've been there. but it is so funny to read about disrespect that wymack gets from the foxes and the ridiculous fact of exy being a really new and wildly popular sport and neil successfully being on the run and yet fucking it all up for a stickball game all being dealbreakers for people. by asking "how did this book become so popular" these reviewers assume it did despite of these things completely missing the point that it's loved because of these things. its so funny

[aqqleshiqqing-archive]

i feel the need to mention this here but when it comes to my pkmn ships, please don't cross ship gameverse jaide with steven and mangaverse jaide with red nor polyshipping with one of my s/is - im really uncomfortable with it. just thought to mention since im sure many would confuse them

[agentemo]

saw Barbie again and I still don't like it

oh well

looking forward to an upcoming video essay titled "the existential crisis of millennial camp" which is going to talk about Barbie and is also maybe exactly how I feel about it

[fctedivided]

Picrew your muse!

Chosen muse: Chloe (in her future verse)

Stolen from @vixlenxe!

Tagging anyone who wants to do this OR steal it from me!

[benetnvsch]

My Moral Compass [OC ART]

[hometownrockstar]

playing hsr is dangerous bc u see a character and go well thats a weird outfit then u play it and the character like does things in the plot and you slowly forget about their outfit until randomly at one point you snap back and go HOW does this outfit work. I don't like seele's outfit.

[butch--dean]

I'm working on getting back into the groove of drawing again for the first time in? 5 years? and all my brain wants me to do is. spn fanart but as cards from the rider waite tarot deck. all I can think is cas as the hanged man but god I am way too out of practice to render the trench coat upside down

[typhoonvash]

...