I read this very long article in the New York Times on how UCLA and Berkeley are going after the issue of Black Affirmative Action. So far so good. You already know my views (and here) on affirmative action so you will know that I am viscerally opposed to any form of discrimination which cannot be just, fair and equitable to all citizens.
Be that as it may, once you read the article, I had few thoughts on this.
1. Did you notice that now Asians are now lumped in with the Whites? Specially in America? And there was absolutely no mention of this fact at all. Now I wonder why would that be?
2. If I had to write this same article on the basis of say an Vietnamese, or say a Chinese, would it have the same impact? Nope.
3. I didn't realise being an Asian was a race. What race is that then?
4. I further wonder if there is a further classification? They are all African Americans, yes? But in my experience, if I go to Africa and call all Africans as Africans, they will either look at me as if I am an idiot or shoot me (or something in the middle). So how do they distinguish between an Egyptian, Somali, Nigerian and South African or Kenyan?
5. Do you further distinguish between their further ancestry? How about a Kenyan Asian African American? Or an Afrikaner South African American? Or perhaps a English Dutch Boer Afrikaner South African American? Or perhaps a Spanish English Dutch Boer Afrikaner South African American?
At end of the day, see what happened after they put in all those efforts, and I quote,
Looking at the numbers, it’s hard not to conclude that race was a factor in this year’s admissions decisions. The average SAT score for admitted African-American students fell 45 points this year, to 1,738. For Asian, Latino and white students, the averages were much more stable.
So basically after all that exercise, the fact remains that the scores were lower!, in other words? back to the original proposition that to get them educated, you have to drop the scores. So how is that just, fair and equitable?
No comments:
Post a Comment