I’m curious to hear where readers are on this issue of quotas, desegregation, and diversity, specifically with regard to how it affects South Asian students in primary and secondary schools (K-12).

the only area where it would affect south asians directly as an ethnic group is in parts of NJ & NY right? where else do we have the critical mass? otherwise, we'll just little brown stars in the multiracial firmament.

I don't get it, are you saying desi's only live in NY/NJ?

http://tazzystar.blogspot.com/2006/08/where-my-desis-at-and-look-they-be-non.html

Secondly, Is this a public or private school?

concentration. policies obviously aren't going to take account a group that is less than 1% of the local population.

i beleive that quotas are neccessary, but shouldn't be determined by ethnicity, but family's income. because there is such thing as poor indian american and rich african american families.

Shlok, I have a feeling that school systems that currently use various kinds of racial balancing/diversity systems may end up going the route you suggest -- family income, rather than race -- if the court rules against "desegregationism" next week.

HMF, this is a public school with selective admission (based, normally, on test scores).

And Razib, isn't it possible that immigrant minority groups could be a factor even where they constitute only a small slice of the population? In this case, it's not stated anywhere how much of the 40% minority quota at IS 239 is underrepresented minorities, and how much is East and South Asian students. Perhaps the Desi factor in this case might involve forcing school districts to either be more specific in how they define "minorities," or reconsider the generalized rhetoric of "diversity" to include a greater emphasis on economic equity.

Finally, it does strike me as an interesting irony that at the college level, East and South Asians are not considered “underrepresented minorities,” while in this case, Nikita Rau is clearly being defined as a “minority” student.

This would not be surprising if properly understood. Black and Hispanic minorities are good minorities because they underachieve to such a large extent and need government assistance. Asian minorities are a bad minority because they achieve and do it without the help of government institutions. If this is understood, then it's easy to analayze any situation. In the case of colleges, Asians are not minorities because they crowd out Blacks and Hispanics. In the case of the above mentioned school, Asians are minorities because they crowd out Blacks and Hispanics for the 40% quota.

In the case of the above mentioned school, Asians are minorities because they crowd out Blacks and Hispanics for the 40% quota.

VC, did you see this specified anywhere, or are you just speculating on that?

We know Nikita Rau's ethnicity, but we don't know the ethnic background of the rest of the 40%. If you have seen the ethnic breakdown of the school specified somewhere, please help us out by giving a link. It's entirely possible that Nikita Rau is one of very few Asian or brown students at the school.

It's entirely possible that Nikita Rau is one of very few Asian or brown students at the school.

the only area where it would affect south asians directly as an ethnic group is in parts of NJ & NY right?

Ok, so here's the link that I've found for IS 239. It's a little hard to say exactly what happened to Nikita Rau based on this data. It's entirely possible that Nikita was kept out to make room for another minority student since the Asian/Pacific Islander percentage is higher (28.2%) than those of other minorities. But I'll allow for the fact that this may not be the case.

http://schools.nyc.gov/Common/Templates/MainTemplate/CommonMainTemplate.aspx?NRMODE=Published&NRNODEGUID=%7b1A54F0B2-4E2F-403B-9B23-1635240B1F52%7d&NRORIGINALURL=%2fOurSchools%2fRegion7%2fK239%2fAboutUs%2fStatistics%2fregister%2ehtm&NRCACHEHINT=Guest

From the Post article:

When Nikita recently applied to Mark Twain, she took an admission test geared toward music students and scored a 79. In May, the Education Department sent her parents a letter that said Nikita was not accepted - even though white students who scored lower on the same test were admitted. Officials told the Raus that because Nikita is classified as a minority, she would need to score at least 84.4 to be accepted, while white students needed to score 77 or more.

What going on here? Are Asians bringing up the curve? Why wouldn't the Chancellor scrap standards where black and hispanics have to score higher than whites. Am i missing something?

The Supreme Court's decision regarding the racial assignment plans of two public school districts should be issued tomorrow. The plans at issue concern the use of race as a tie-breaker in assigning students to "over-subscribed" public schools. Several legal commentators have suggested, based on whether the Justices have already authored opinions in certain cases from this term, that the Chief Justice will be writing the opinion in these two cases. As a result, one may expect the circuit court rulings in favor of the school districts to be reversed, and that the Chief Justice's opinion to be based on narrow grounds in order to command a majority and for the Court to speak (as much as possible) with one voice.

Well, Coney Island reaffirms how unfashionable it is by declaring brown the new black.

I am opposed to affirmative action in all its form.

I am opposed to affirmative action in all its form.

Personally, I prefer passive-aggression. But do whatever you think works for you.

Sirc, the Chancellor appears to be waiting for the Supreme Court decision. I agree with you that he should act independently of the Supreme Court, and do what is right. As Dave's helpful comment #11 suggests, the ruling that's probably coming down tomorrow may not speak directly to this precise case. The Louisville and Seattle cases are about racial criteria in over-subscribed regular schools; this is a case of a quota in a "special" school.

Unless Roberts declares the whole principle of diversity dead (he might), the decision might still leave some ambiguity about the policies at IS 239.

Oye Rahula, kabhi serious bhi ho ja, yaara!

I am opposed to affirmative action in all its form.

Then you should be opposed to the plethora of white recipients who've received more "affirmative action" benefits than anyone else in the US.

I think there is something postive in having such quotas --obviously not for some like Nikita. This is a school for the gifted and perhaps a different issue to a normal school.

In UK many schools have a near 90%+ asian kids and in some they are of the same religion.
This type of quotas would be welcome in these areas.
Perhaps a better mix of colours and even religion might help us get along with each other. It would mean that some kids would have to travel far to attend but Im sure would be worth it.

Sorry, Amitabh, but I've nothing useful to contribute, and a long night of work contributes to excessive punchiness :)

Seriously, what I'm curious about is how much leeway do local administrators and chancellors have in practice, and how that interacts with court orders. Specifically, one of the articles seems to indicate that the chancellor has the power to override this decision. What is the meaning of a court order then?

Perhaps a better mix of colours and even religion might help us get along with each other. It would mean that some kids would have to travel far to attend but Im sure would be worth it.

Wait a gosh darn okkaly dokkaly minute. When the same reason is used to support AA in the states, as to combat the large white-dominated everything-industry, for example, it's met with scorn and disdain that it's 'reverse-racist', 'anti-American' and 'against everything MLK stood for!'

But when it's to combat an Asian majority, all of a sudden it's a social service?!?!

From the NY Sun:
"I think probably that court order is no longer necessary," Mr. Klein said at a press conference yesterday. He stopped short of taking any action, saying he will wait for a U.S. Supreme Court decision due this week.
Rau's lawyer:
If the justices deem considerations of race unconstitutional, Ms. Arnold said she will ask the court that first handed down the decision to vacate it.

But she vowed to fight the decision even if the court defends race considerations. She said she would argue that Mark Twain's current quotas are antiquated and do not match the district's actual makeup.

well all I know is that I'm going to have trouble getting into med school just because I'm brown, despite not really ever being connected to the medical community either through my cultural community or my family. my race has nothing to do with my ability or inability to be a doctor and i've taken to calling myself Bangladeshi as opposed to Indian (don't worry, I'm at least bengali) on the central application to see what difference it might make, seeing as I really have no choice but to play their game

ehhh..Sorry about the formatting/unnecessary bolding..I meant to blockquote to indicate quotes

From the Post article:

When Nikita recently applied to Mark Twain, she took an admission test geared toward music students and scored a 79. In May, the Education Department sent her parents a letter that said Nikita was not accepted - even though white students who scored lower on the same test were admitted. Officials told the Raus that because Nikita is classified as a minority, she would need to score at least 84.4 to be accepted, while white students needed to score 77 or more.

What going on here? Are Asians bringing up the curve? Why wouldn't the Chancellor scrap standards where black and hispanics have to score higher than whites. Am i missing something?

This is an interesting tidbit. I read a book a few years ago about the recruitment process for college admissions among elite universities and liberal arts colleges that was written by a career counselor for a private high school (the name escapes me today). Anyway, one of the students that was profiled was Asian student (I think Chinese-American) from Palo Alto who was trying to get into an Ivy League. She was rejected from several elite schools. The interesting thing was that her grades, extracurricular activities and test scores were comprable to students of other ethnicities that were admitted to the schools that rejected her. In fact, she was more impressive than some of the other students profiled. One of the possible theories as to why she was rejected was that she was not held to the standard of all applicants, but was held instead to a standard of applicants in her demographic. The theory was that she had to perform better than other Asian students in order to get in and that performing better than the general pool of applicants was not enough.

I don't know where I stand on affirmative action. I think it is good in that it can operate to rectify past discrimination (which was its original purpose), but when the quotas from another time are rigidly adhered to, the end result is that some really qualified students are systematically excluded from specialty programs. If schools are going to adhere to quotas, they need to appreciate that demographic groups and their respective needs will fluctuate with time and the quotas need to be adapted. Perhaps for this reason, socio-economic criteria rather than race is a better measurement.

Shlok in #4, Amardeep in #5

An economic and need based form of affirmative action is something some of us have been trying to advocate for the reservation system in India for sometime now. Oft given explanations include

1. Caste based discrimination affects even those who are relatively not poor.

2. A person of a particular caste even if not economically poor when given such an opportunity will later act as a seed (in the form of encouragement, economic and other forms of support) to promote such development in his own caste.

3. Even if someone is economically well to do, the support structure for education in backward castes in terms of the community and within the home is discouraging or at least inadequate.

Plus there is the politics of it all which does not allow it to happen in India.

I think these issues will be quite relevant to even race based affirmative action in the US.One thing that matters more here and is something never considered in India is disparity which may tilts the equation towards race based affirmative action in the US even more.

coney island is mostly black and puerto rican. I don't think it was 60% white in 1974. It was crazy in 1974 and throughout the 80s and still mostly black and puerto rican back then, at least as far back as early 80s. Desegregation is not about making the schools mirror the community in which they are, but the exact opposite -- hence the boston riots of the same year when black kids got bused into mostly white south boston. Desegregation says even if the neighborhoods are segregated, as they are, let's mix up the schools through busing, presumably so the kids won't grow up to be the racist gorillas that their parents are.

South asians in NYC, especially bengalis from bangladesh, don't share that high income/high education demographic profile that many south asians in other parts of the US have, including much of NJ, and this might account for and justify their status as "underrepresented" minority, though I don't know if that's the case here, and most south asians (except, interestingly enough guyanese and trinis) don't qualify for lots of "minority" scholarships.

Mark Twain is public (as is any school that begins with PS or IS (public school/Intermediate school).

One of the possible theories as to why she was rejected was that she was not held to the standard of all applicants, but was held instead to a standard of applicants in her demographic. The theory was that she had to perform better than other Asian students in order to get in and that performing better than the general pool of applicants was not enough.

If I recall, the first chapter of Dinesh D'Souza's illiberal education tells the story of a similar case, i think involving berkely. california did indeed compare applicants only to other members of their ethnic group, essentially giving whites preferential treatment over asians, as is happening now at Mark Twain. SCOTUS eventually declared the admissions program unconstitutional as they surely will in regards to Mark Twain if it gets that far.

The two cases before the Supreme Court will likely address quotas. For example, the circuit court in the Parents case held that:

the District's 15 percent plus or minus variance is not a quota because it does not reserve a fixed number of slots for students based on their race, but instead it seeks to enroll a critical mass of white and nonwhite students in its oversubscribed schools in order to realize its compelling interests.

[T]he District uses the racial tiebreaker to admit students whose presence will move the overall student body closer to the preferred ratio.... By its nature, the tiebreaker aims for a rigid, predetermined ratio of white and nonwhite students, and thus operates to reach “a fixed number or percentage.".... The District created a quota when it established the predetermined, preferred ratio of white and nonwhite students.

For those interested, the circuit court's opinion in the Parents case is available here in .pdf format. The opinion in the companion case is available here also in .pdf format.

I don't expect this little girl to get much sympathy from SASA type organizations. Most are are pro-affirmative action despite the fact that it does not benefit the desi community.I expect any support that she does receive from desi "progressives" to be along the lines that the quota allocation should be changed to reflect current demographics rather than questioning raced based preferences altogether

I don't expect this little girl to get much sympathy from SASA type organizations. Most are are pro-affirmative action despite the fact that it does not benefit the desi community.

strangely, i admire the sasa type organizations for their stand on principle, as opposed to whatever happens to benefit desis. just because a policy results in a particular group being under-represented, doesn't make it unfair.

Listen! African-Americans have been the most disadvantaged. Have you heard of a poor Indian in America? Indians are NOT a disadvantaged minority.

The best thing to do is do away with all quotas. Unfortunately, this country has an ugly past history of racism, so there would be a lot of fierce opposition from certain quotas. Then again, I wonder whether, in 200 or 300 years, these same groups which claim to be on the bottom rung of every performance marker because of discrimination, will cite racism as the excuse?

*From certain quarters, excuse me.

Manju- My point is that it is odd for groups to form based on ethnicity, rally vocally when second rate academics of the same ethnicity don't get tenure but then pursue policies that make it harder for "co-ethnics" to gain admission.

From the New York Post article:

When Nikita recently applied to Mark Twain, she took an admission test geared toward music students and scored a 79. Officials told the Raus that because Nikita is classified as a minority, she would need to score at least 84.4 to be accepted, while white students needed to score 77 or more.

"Maybe you should have worked harder and got an 85"

How many of y'all have parents who would say that? I can think of atleast 1 Mr and Mrs XYZ who would.

So this is the Mutiny on vacation? :)

School Desegregation and Affirmative Action are different things, and are occasionally in short-term conflict, though supposedly subserving the same long term goal. (Although in the literal sense, one is acting affirmatively to enforce both, AA now connotes mainly the college-level and workplace actions to reduce and eliminate educational and job discrimination. And while AA was sold as a means of correcting past discrimination - really, given that prejudice and discrimination are continuing facts of life, it should be here to stay, with continual refinement of the socio-economic criteria for obtaining preferences or qualifying for quotas. The free-market, to say nothing of humans, is imperfect, and this is a way of correcting the imperfections that human prejudice brings). Desegregation is related to AA in that, a desegregated grade school environment, it was thought, would contribute to a lessening of the adult prejudice that made AA necessary.

The earlier minimum but now 'maximum' of 40% is exactly what you would want if the goal is to 'desegregate' schools. The idea is not to have a majority brown-black school, even if that mirrors local demographics. Otherwise, the school is still in effect segregated. Another way of looking at it is that the school district is mandating a minimum white representation in that school, and so relaxing school standards for whites. In other words, the AA in this school here is for the whites, so that the school does not become majority black-brown.

There are other interesting issues here - the parents seem to feel that this decision (age 11) would impact her Harvard-Princeton-Yale chances - really? I have trouble believing that. And even if it did, is that really the end of the world? (No). The article does note another 'talented and gifted' school in the same district that Nikita could attend. It's not clear why that's not good enough. The other interesting issue is whether the very process of tracking students and differentially allocating resources to schools - and thus creating 'talented and gifted' schools - is not in itself so discriminatory in impact that it should be given up in favor of a more equitable distribution of resources to schools and districts, and let the kids sort themselves out in high school.

TOTALLY UNRELATED TO THE POST BUT

i just wanted to stop by and say "hi" and i fucken luv your blog. i can't believe i haven't heard of it before. i eat brown intellectual blogs for breakfast!

thank you for doing your thing,
a fan
j.f. bennett

Don't blame the AA blame the white man on that ,maybe if more minorities stuck together it would be a different story. Apathy kills.

Listen! African-Americans have been the most disadvantaged. Have you heard of a poor Indian in America? Indians are NOT a disadvantaged minority.

"Black people yelling racism, white people yelling reverse racism, chinese people yelling sideways-racism. And the Indians ain't yelling shit cuz they dead. Don't nobody have it worse than the American Indian, everyone needs to just calm the fuck down."
-Chris Rock

the school's a public magnet school.

Shortly after I graduated from my public magnet high school (that required a college-like admissions process), the school turned towards affirmative action and put aside it's purely merit-based system. My class of 420 had about 8 black people, and 20 hispanic people, most of which weren't quite the underpriviledged types. The rest were your standard intelligent asian or white suburban kid (everyone at the school was intelligent). In response to the affirmative action, the alumni, students and parents went ballistic. That system didn't even use racial quotas, even though racial quotas was the obvious stupid goal. Instead, it used "regional" quotas for various parts of the county that fed into the school. I -believe-, but I'm not sure, that the school's since gone back on some of the stuff it tried to do since then. I think instead the school board decided to offer free admissions-test lessons and stuff like that. Not too bad.

The fact that this isnt just any old public school is very important. This is a school that you apply to. This is a school where everyone around you is smart, intelligent. Everyone will go to a top-50 college. There will be your usual sex and drugs, but there are no idiots that throw their life and potential away. Peer pressure is awesome there. What sort of diversity do you want there, keeping in mind that most of this environment is only possible due to the objective nature of the admissions process?

"If we make it to 300 years from now, there's not going to be any more white people, there's not going to be any more black people. Everybody's going to be BEIGE. The whole world's mixing. Eventually we're all going to become some sort of hybrid mix of Chinese & Indian. They're the two largest populations in the world. So you can run from us now...." RUSSELL PETERS

The sooner these schools realize it & change their racial quotas...the better!

fwiw, New York has for years had a huge white flight problem in the public schools, so it's not impossible that the quota was set years ago in an attempt to keep the school from being majority-minority (which is to say, sadly, in our school system, dumped).

This does sound odd to me, because the elementary school my kid went to was about 20% white, and the middle school she's going to is predominantly asian.

Coney Island, sadly, is a strange place.

It's a great mystery to me how people, white-identified or non-white identified can actually be constrained by racial quotas in America, because with the exception of racial profiling by police officers, race is based on momentary self-identification in America. As far as I can tell (and I have a law degree from a top 5 American law school) there's nothing stopping Nikita Rau from situationally identifying as white so as to bypass the minority-restrictive quota. And then situationally changing her mind and identifying as south asian or something else in a different context when that's more in her interest. Of course, that doesn't work for racial profiling by police officers (and who knows what brown racial group they'd profile her as) but it seems to me that it would work for the purpose of checking of racial self-identification boxes when applying to schools.

Yes, I have known some poor working-class Indians in America. Spend some time in New Jersey or Queens. And some of my friends have gone through horrific ordeals, because of individual racists, institutional racism and of course post-9/11 government profiling. Brown immigrants in the US are disadvantaged minorities, even if that disadvantage takes different forms than the oppression faced by African Americans and Native Americans (and gay Americans, for that matter). The key is whether oppressed groups can learn to work together in solidarity, instead of fighting each other for scraps from the table... none of us are going to be free unless all of us are.

Now thats what I am trying to say Sarah. Let's stick together and stop the BS.

Looks like the Supreme Court has just ruled against this sort of thing.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/06/28/us/28cnd-scotus.html?hp

there's nothing stopping Nikita Rau from situationally identifying as white so as to bypass the minority-restrictive quota.

This is nonsense. Race has always been a social phenomenon, if she checked white because happened to be shopping at the Gap for 3 hours that day, the moment she walked on the school premises, not a single person would identify her that way. Secondly, there's no way of knowing which race is "beneficial" pre-emptively, given her score.

my first take on this mornings scotus decision is that klein should immediately go to the courts and ask that the order imposing racial quotas be dropped, as it is clearly illegal, and restore rau's constitutional rights by admitting her. this is a no-brainer.

although today's decision was a victory for a race-neutral and individual (as opposed to group) rights interpretation of the constitution, it is worth noting that the "diversity" exception, first put forth by justice powell in bakke, remains...although it is very narrow. i gather that kennedy's opinion, like powells, is the controlling one, and in it he re-affirms the belief that race can be taken into account as long as it is one of many factors and as long as it is done for the purpose of diversity. although the diversity exception is a minority view, it ironically becomes the rule of law since it is part of a majority ruling. (i hope that made sense).

please note that the way powell and kennedy are using diversity is very different from mlk's shackled runner metaphor or any view of AA to help the disadvantaged. It fact, i would argue that their view of AA is meant to help whites, since they are the ones who would presumably benefit from a diversity of backgrounds inhabiting their campus and classrooms. it is very narrow, and obviously only applies to classrooms (as opposed to the workplace) where a learning environment may be made arguably better by a diversity of backgrounds being present.

i think, in the past, left-leaning admissions officers ran with the bakke diversity exception as a way to get lesser qualified racial minorities admitted at the expense of the individuals right to equal protection, and scotus has consistently since reeled that in.

This is nonsense. Race has always been a social phenomenon

HMF, what Dave says is true. You are confusing the use of race by administrators with how it plays out in daily life. Check out this New York Times article from a while ago.

April 12, 2006
The DNA Age
Seeking Ancestry in DNA Ties Uncovered by Tests
By AMY HARMON

Alan Moldawer's adopted twins, Matt and Andrew, had always thought of themselves as white. But when it came time for them to apply to college last year, Mr. Moldawer thought it might be worth investigating the origins of their slightly tan-tinted skin, with a new DNA kit that he had heard could determine an individual's genetic ancestry.

The results, designating the boys 9 percent Native American and 11 percent northern African, arrived too late for the admissions process. But Mr. Moldawer, a business executive in Silver Spring, Md., says they could be useful in obtaining financial aid.

"Naturally when you're applying to college you're looking at how your genetic status might help you," said Mr. Moldawer, who knows that the twins' birth parents are white, but has little information about their extended family. "I have three kids going now, and you can bet that any advantage we can take we will."

Genetic tests, once obscure tools for scientists, have begun to influence everyday lives in many ways. The tests are reshaping people's sense of themselves — where they came from, why they behave as they do, what disease might be coming their way.

It may be only natural then that ethnic ancestry tests, one of the first commercial products to emerge from the genetic revolution, are spurring a thorough exploration of the question, What is in it for me?

Many scientists criticize the ethnic ancestry tests as promising more than they can deliver. The legacy of an ancestor several generations back may be too diluted to show up. And the tests have a margin of error, so results showing a small amount of ancestry from one continent may not actually mean someone has any.

Given the tests' speculative nature, it seems unlikely that colleges, governments and other institutions will embrace them. But that has not stopped many test-takers from adopting new DNA-based ethnicities — and a sense of entitlement to the privileges typically reserved for them.

Prospective employees with white skin are using the tests to apply as minority candidates, while some with black skin are citing their European ancestry in claiming inheritance rights.

One Christian is using the test to claim Jewish genetic ancestry and to demand Israeli citizenship, and Americans of every shade are staking a DNA claim to Indian scholarships, health services and casino money.

"This is not just somebody's desire to go find out whether their grandfather is Polish," said Troy Duster, a sociologist at New York University who has studied the social impact of the tests. "It's about access to money and power."

Driving the pursuit of genetic bounty are start-up testing companies with names like DNA Tribes and Ethnoancestry. For $99 to $250, they promise to satisfy the human hunger to learn about one's origins — and sometimes much more. On its Web site, a leader in this cottage industry, DNA Print Genomics, once urged people to use it "whether your goal is to validate your eligibility for race-based college admissions or government entitlements."

Tony Frudakis, the research director at DNAPrint, said the three-year-old company had coined the term American Indian Princess Syndrome to describe the insistent pursuit of Indian roots among many newly minted genetic genealogists. If the tests fail to turn up any, Mr. Frudakis added, "this type of customer is frequently quite angry."

DNAPrint calls the ethnic ancestry tests "recreational genomics" to distinguish them from the more serious medical and forensic applications of genetics. But as they ignite a debate over a variety of genetic birthrights, their impact may be further-reaching than anyone anticipated.

Some social critics fear that the tests could undermine programs meant to compensate those legitimately disadvantaged because of their race. Others say they highlight an underlying problem with labeling people by race in an increasingly multiracial society.

"If someone appears to be white and then finds out they are not, they haven't experienced the kinds of things that affirmative action is supposed to remedy," said Lester Monts, senior vice provost for student affairs at the University of Michigan, which won the right to use race as a factor in admissions in a 2003 Supreme Court decision.

Still, Michigan, like most other universities, relies on how students choose to describe themselves on admissions applications when assigning racial preferences.

Ashley Klett's younger sister marked the "Asian" box on her college applications this year, after the elder Ms. Klett, 20, took a DNA test that said she was 2 percent East Asian and 98 percent European.

Whether it mattered they do not know, but she did get into the college of her choice.

"And they gave her a scholarship," Ashley said.

Pearl Duncan has grander ambitions: she wants a castle.

A descendant of Jamaican slaves, Ms. Duncan had already identified the Scottish slave owner who was her mother's great-great-grandfather through archival records. But the DNA test confirming her 10 percent British Isles ancestry gave her the nerve to contact the Scottish cousins who had built an oil company with his fortune.

"It's one thing to feel satisfied to know something about your heritage, it's another to claim it," said Ms. Duncan, a writer in Manhattan. "There's a kind of checkmateness to the DNA."

The family's 11 castles, Ms. Duncan noted, were obtained with the proceeds of her African ancestors' labor. Perhaps they could spare one for her great-great-great-grandfather's black heirs? In case the paper records she had gathered were not persuasive, she invited male family members to take a DNA test that can identify a genetic signature passed from father to son. So far, no one has taken her up on the offer. Her appeal, Ms. Duncan said, is mostly playful. Less so is her insistence that the Scots stop referring to their common ancestors as simply "Virginia and West India merchants."

"By acknowledging me, the Scots are beginning to acknowledge that these guys were slaveholders," she said.

Other slave descendants, known as the Freedmen, see DNA as bolstering their demand to be reinstated as members of the Indian tribes that once owned their ancestors. Under a treaty with the United States, the "Five Civilized Tribes" — Choctaws, Chickasaws, Creeks, Seminoles and Cherokees — freed their African slaves and in most cases made them citizens in the mid-1800's. More recently, the tribes have sought to exclude the slaves' descendants, depriving them of health benefits and other services.

At a meeting in South Coffeyville, Okla., last month, members of the Freedmen argued that DNA results revealing their Indian ancestry underscore the racism of the tribe's position that their ancestors were never true Indians.

"Here's this DNA test that says yes, these people can establish some degree of Indian blood," said Marilyn Vann, a Cherokee Freedwoman who is suing for tribal citizenship in federal court. "It's important to combat those who want to oppress people of African descent in their own tribe."

As the assets of some tribes have swelled in the wake of the 1988 federal law allowing them to build casinos, there has been no shortage of petitioners stepping forward to assert their right to citizenship and a share of the wealth. Now, many of them are wielding genetic ancestry tests to bolster their claim.

"It used to be 'someone said my grandmother was an Indian,' " says Joyce Walker, the enrollment clerk who regularly turns away DNA petitioners for the Mashantucket Pequot tribe, which operates the lucrative Foxwoods Resort Casino in Connecticut. "Now it's 'my DNA says my grandmother was an Indian.' "

Recognizing the validity of DNA ancestry tests, some Indians say, would undermine tribal sovereignty. They say membership requires meeting the criteria in a tribe's constitution, which often requires documenting blood ties to a specific tribal member. DNA tests cannot pinpoint to which tribe an individual's ancestor belonged.

But if tribes are perceived as blocking legitimate DNA applicants to limit payouts of casino money, experts say, it could damage their standing to enforce the treaties conferring the financial benefits so many covet.

"Ancestry DNA tests are playing a part in the evolution of what the American public thinks matters," said Kim Tallbear, an American Indian studies professor at Arizona State University. "And tribes are dependent on the American public's good will, so they may have to bend."

Under no such pressure, Israeli authorities have so far denied John Haedrich what he calls his genetic birthright to citizenship without converting to Judaism. Under Israel's "law of return," only Jews may immigrate to Israel without special dispensation.

Mr. Haedrich, a nursing home director who was raised a Christian, found through a DNA ancestry test that he bears a genetic signature commonly found among Jews. He says his European ancestors may have hidden their faith for fear of persecution.

Rabbis, too, have disavowed the claim: "DNA, schmeeNA," Mr. Haedrich, 44, said the rabbi at a local synagogue in Los Angeles told him when he called to discuss it.

Undeterred, Mr. Haedrich has hired a lawyer to sue the Israeli government. As in America, he argues, DNA is widely accepted as evidence in forensics and paternity cases, so why not immigration?

"Because I was raised a gentile does not change the fact that I am," Mr. Haedrich wrote in a full-page advertisement in The Jerusalem Post, "a Jew by birth."

Shonda Brinson, an African-American college student, is still trying to figure out how best to apply her DNA results on employment forms.

In some cases, she has chosen to write in her actual statistics — 89 percent sub-Saharan African, 6 percent European and 5 percent East Asian. But she figures her best bet may be just checking all relevant boxes.

"That way, of the three categories they won't be able to determine which percentage is bigger," Ms. Brinson said.

The whole concept of Affirmative Action is unfair at the individual level.

What I really can't understand is how people think that it 'rectifies' the discrimination of the past!!

Isn't it true that it was one set of people who were discriminated against, and a whole different set of people who are claiming it's benefits?? Also how do you acertain that a set B are the descendants of set A who were discriminated against, and set D descended from set C who did the discrimination?

It's appaling how even educated people (even Desis, who're actually hurt by it) make these pathetic claims of 'rectification' to justify such a socialist concept.

The whole concept of Affirmative Action is unfair at the individual level.

What I really can't understand is how people think that it 'rectifies' the discrimination of the past!!

Isn't it true that it was one set of people who were discriminated against, and a whole different set of people who are claiming it's benefits?? Also how do you acertain that a set B are the descendants of set A who were discriminated against, and set D descended from set C who did the discrimination?

It's appaling how even educated people (even Desis, who're actually hurt by it) make these pathetic claims of 'rectification' to justify such a socialist concept.

Well, they say that the present generations suffer from the discimination of their foremother/fathers, because their discrimination caused them to be constantly set-back, which resulted in a lack of being able to properly provide oppurtunities to their offspring, and their offspring's offspring, etc. A cycle. So affirmative action is meant to break that cycle.

It's also a way to control for the 'affirmative action' that's always been given to rich white men-- legacy scholarships, old boys' networks, etc. How else would George W. Bush ever have gotten into Yale?

It's also a way to control for the 'affirmative action' that's always been given to rich white men-- legacy scholarships, old boys' networks, etc. How else would George W. Bush ever have gotten into Yale?

Yale is private, isn't it?

If public/taxpayer-funded schools have racial preferences, then it is a bad thing. In private clubs, people should be allowed to dig whatever graves they want to put themselves in...

Well, they say that the present generations suffer from the discimination of their foremother/fathers, because their discrimination caused them to be constantly set-back, which resulted in a lack of being able to properly provide oppurtunities to their offspring, and their offspring's offspring, etc. A cycle. So affirmative action is meant to break that cycle.

We've seen how the cycle is broken, in India...

The richest of the 'underpriveleged' have an accelerated rate of reform, in the name of the poorest ones. And a whole group of middle-class taxpayers end up paying the government to DISCRIMINATE AGAINST THEMSELVES. Nice justice.

I doubt if this stupid quota system helps even 20% of those discriminated against in the past. And surely the richest 20% in any case.

I personally believe that quotas in the United States of America MUST be race based, and not income based. Americans of African descent faced hardship solely> because of their race for a few hundred years in North America, therefore to reverse the disgusting effect this has had on black Americans we must give them quotas solely> because of their race. If white people are poor, they can't blame the government. The government doesn't owe them any quotas. If Americans of African descent are poor, then they can blame 200 years of slavery, 100 years of blatant discrimination and 50 years of obvious but better hidden discrimination by the majority of America.

However I do believe that if we are ever able to bring black Americans up to the level of other Americans, the quota system must end. I also believe that Africans who arrived later (in the 80s and 90s) deserve no quotas because they did not historically face hardship from the US government. The US government doesn't owe them quotas.

It's a bad idea to make the comparison between India's quotas and America's quotas. The Republic of India never mistreated it's SC&STs, but the United States of America did mistreat its blacks. The Indian government has no real obligation to have quotas as it has always stood for equality, and many high ranking government guys have been low castes. But the US historically stood for racism and anti-blackism, so they must impliment quotas if they wish to be fair.

What I really can't understand is how people think that it 'rectifies' the discrimination of the past!!

Isn't it true that it was one set of people who were discriminated against, and a whole different set of people who are claiming it's benefits??

Abhinay, Affirmative Action is meant to counter the current and ongoing prejudice against people of color that is endemic in the US. It *was* sold as a way of "rectifying" the discrimination of the past, when it was started in the late 1960s, but really, that was because the majority otherwise may not have supported it (even though the US economy at the time was booming like it never has since. The unemployment rate among white adult males in 1969, around the time AA was introduced, for example, was 1.9%. In the period since, it has been as high as four times that, but rarely been less than twice that. The level of passive support for AA is usually a strong function of current economic indicators.)

The majority population is usually in severe denial about the existence of color prejudice, but it is easier to get them to acknowledge that there were severe injustices "in the past". This is why the past is brought up, and it does serve as a way of tugging at their collective conscience.

But AA is really a way of acknowledging that humans are imperfect, that visible minorities exist, and that they suffer discrimination in the labor market. Also, while it was initially seen as a 'civil rights' issue, I think it ought to be seen as a market intervention instead. Like all regulatory mechanisms, AA needs to be continually fine-tuned, to avoid creating vested interests, and to see that it is really doing the job it was intended to do. But really, it is something that should be there as long as there are racial minorities, and as long as human beings, in acting on their human instincts, practice discrimination in the workplace.

Abhinay, Affirmative Action is meant to counter the current and ongoing prejudice against people of color that is endemic in the US. It *was* sold as a way of "rectifying" the discrimination of the past, when it was started in the late 1960s, but really, that was because the majority otherwise may not have supported it

chachaji:

i don't think this is historically correct. AA was originally sold as a way of rectifying past discrimination because it was aimed solely at blacks. since they experienced state sponsored discrimination they needed additional protection above and beyond the '64 civil rights act (that would presumably be enough for those of us of color whose ancestors freely came here on airplanes or snuck in and not on slave ships), the argument goes. it's called the shackled runner metaphor as championed by mlk and it was meant to be temporary. namrata's view (55), while more crudely put, more or less mimics mlk's and the civil rights movement at the time.

the watershed moment that changed this was bakke, which found AA unconstitutional unless race was taken into account as one of many factors and as long as it is done for the purpose of diversity. in order to pass constitutional scrutiny, AA had to embrace other minorities and since then, the descendants of slave owners (white women) and relatively privileged browns like you and i have tried to get our slice of the American pie on the backs of black Americans.

actually chachaji, rereading your comment i don't think we are too far apart on how AA originated and i think it is true that some sold it that way. I would just not play down the role of slavery and government-sponsered discrimination as the justification for a policy that, at least on the surface, is profoundly un-american in so much that it violates the 13th ammendment and (less importantly) the '64 civil rights act.

If you are upset by this decision write polite letters to Carol Moore, the principal of the school, and Chancellor Klein at the Department of Education and let them know why you think this is wrong. If they hear from enough people they might let her in the school:

Carol Moore, Principal
Mark Twain Intermediate School #239 for the Gifted & Talented
2401 Neptune Avenue -- Brooklyn, NY 11224
Ph. 718-266-0814 -- Fax. 718-266-0814
Email: cmoore@schools.nyc.gov

Noblekinsman writes, “[C]oney island is mostly black and puerto rican. I don't think it was 60% white in 1974.”

I’m not sure whether this is an observation or based on statistical data. All the data I am familiar with places whites far and away the majority. A recent study found Coney Island to be almost 75% white. Check it out.

Afro American asks, “Have you heard of a poor Indian in America? Indians are NOT a disadvantaged minority.” Yes, I have. Not only heard but seen with my own eyes all over NYC, dude.

Dave writes:

“It's a great mystery to me how people, white-identified or non-white identified can actually be constrained by racial quotas in America, because with the exception of racial profiling by police officers, race is based on momentary self-identification in America.”

Racial identification is voluntary information (or in your words “momentary self-identification") on college applications. But you know as well as I that if a white person filled out an application for college admission and they checked off African-American, for example, and they subsequently secured a slot in a program or received a scholarship based on that misidentification, they would not only be disqualified once they were found out, they would most likely be refused admission becaused they *lied* on their application. In other words, there are penalties for this sort of thing.

Here is an experiment. Try changing your ethnic/racial identity willy-nilly on federal grants, loans, and other government paperwork and you’ll see how “momentary” this racial identity stuff is. If you claim to be Latino and are not, for example, and get a small-business grant or some other form of government funding based on that misidentification you will be looking at serious time for defrauding the government.

Hi Manju, thanks for your clarifying comment, and for mentioning Bakke and explaining how that affected the meaning and implementation of AA.

Affirmative action helped out white women more than it did Black people. I love how people say we don't need it but they would not have gotten their job without it.

Yale is private, isn't it?

If public/taxpayer-funded schools have racial preferences, then it is a bad thing. In private clubs, people should be allowed to dig whatever graves they want to put themselves in...

Yale receives over $200 million in federal R&D funding every year. Every institution receiving such funds is required to engage in Affirmative Action to ensure equal employment opportunities, and in addition, educational institutions probably also have obligations to ensure a diverse student body.

Yale receives over $200 million in federal R&D funding every year. Every institution receiving such funds is required to engage in Affirmative Action to ensure equal employment opportunities, and in addition, educational institutions probably also have obligations to ensure a diverse student body.

is this true chachaji? finding AA constitutionally legal is a far cry form it being governmentally mandated? what type of AA are you talking about?

I was going to suggest that we withhold federal R&D funds to colleges that engage in legacy preferences, just as the bush admin withholds funds from universities that refuse to allow the military on campus. probably we should include those schools that do not adhere to the free speech principle, as documented by the film Indoctrinate U. This would ensure a fairer, more diverse campus without having to resort to unconstitutional means.

Manju, I found this nice 6-page brief on the State Department website: Federal Affirmative Action Law: A brief history (pdf file). I don't think I can improve on it. Read the last paragraph on p.2 for the specific answer to your question. Excutive Order 11246, as amended, appears to be the crucial bit.

Disclaimer: I'm not a lawyer, and do not play one on SM!

Abhinay, Affirmative Action is meant to counter the current and ongoing prejudice against people of color that is endemic in the US

Well, again here's why I think that is unfair.

a. There is prejudice, but can you measure it? If not, why have a quantitative legislation on such a subjective concept?
b. Same point again, who are the people that discriminate and who are the ones suffering from it? It always ends up that the people who did
wrong in the first place are still free to discriminate, whereas people who don't have an interest in discriminating end up taking the brunt

If Yale has government funding, then it's a pity. Maybe if the government takes out its funding, Yale would have the incentive to get the best and brightest, irrespective of color/race.

You (people from India) don't deal with racism. You (people from India) own stores in our communities (black and brown). If you were to go onto most all white campuses they would fully accept you. And you don't get followed around in stores by security ever.

If you want to disprove me just give the proof that you deal with racism in America.

Abhinay, I think you're making an argument for fine-tuning AA - and I readily concede that it can be implemented in ways that leave the beneficiaries of past discrimination, and present discriminators - intact, while harming those who had nothing to do with past discrimination and are against it today. The big question is whether the impact on society as a whole is more beneficial than the individual unfairness that can occasionally result in even the very best designed programs. That's why there is legal redress, and in the most egregious cases, people go to the Courts. So a little 'unfairness', occassionally, to some people, will probably always happen. Courts will/can decide when it is going too far in the other direction.

As far as measuring prejudice - there are any number of difficulties in doing so directly - since it apppears subjective, and is something that people do not readily own up to. I mentioned this earlier too. So you measure not prejudice itself, but its impact on labor market achievement of different groups ('races'), and normalize that for the pool of qualified candidates from different races. Then you work towards ensuring that the pool of qualified candidates from all races matches the demographic indices. So, for example, you ask how many people of a particular race are lawyers, physicists, doctors, etc, employed as such. Then you ask how many of each race were educated or have degrees in those fields, in the local area. Then you first try to get those ratios to come out roughly the same, while trying to improve the availability of candidates of under-represented races through educational opportunities.

why is racial equality the goal. i should think getting the best scoring people into school regardless of race should be the goal.

i should think getting the best scoring people into school regardless of race should be the goal.

I'm really confused on my stance on affirmative action, and reading everyone's comments, I still find myself arguing to myself what I just believed in yesterday.

One thing about "best scoring people" - is this really what we want?--- won't the best scoring people not exactly mean that someone is more intelligent but more likely it means that someone has access to resources (money to take test-prep scores, tutors in hs, etc) that would make them more likely to score higher on tests? Couldn't it be that a score that is average made by someone who has overcome economic disadvantages and racial discrimination, be just as or more intelligent, than I child who took the Kaplan SAT course and didn't have to struggle through life?

Or perhaps test scores are the most unbiased means of equating someone's capabilities?

But does that make sense? - I mean tests are obviously biased toward the wealthy; and perhaps have racial biases as well.

But does wealth really make up for a strong family unit. Couldn't a poor child who grew up in a nurturing environment have had better resources than a child from wealthy parents, but who was neglected and abused.?

I'm so confused.

You (people from India) don't deal with racism. You (people from India) own stores in our communities (black and brown). If you were to go onto most all white campuses they would fully accept you. And you don't get followed around in stores by security ever.

If you want to disprove me just give the proof that you deal with racism in America.

Ever heard of FWB-- Flying While Brown? I have Indian friends who've been strip-searched, detained and humiliated with racial slurs in airports with some regularity. I have a friend who got pulled over weekly during his commute in North Jersey-- during one stop, while they searched his trunk, they told him that he should shave his beard because it looked too Muslim. That friend is a Sikh who shaved and stopped wearing his turban after 9/11 because he was receiving death threats on the street. He also had a cousin who was beaten, dropped off by the side of the road (he is blind) and called a raghead by white racists. Two other friends were accosted in a movie theater parking lot (after a screening of 'Borat'), spat at and called n--gers.

Oh, and then there were the racist anti-immigrant rallies in Hazleton, PA and Riverside, NJ. And that whole 'macaca' business...

But does wealth really make up for a strong family unit. Couldn't a poor child who grew up in a nurturing environment have had better resources than a child from wealthy parents, but who was neglected and abused?

That's a reasonable question, but I think the answer lies in the public school system. Most public schools in the US have de facto segregation, and a quick visit to different schools will make it clear that they are not 'separate but equal.' School funding comes largely from the tax base of each individual school district, so kids from rich districts go to beautiful schools with great resources, while kids in the ghetto have to share their outdated textbooks, use filthy bathrooms and crowd 40 kids into a classroom. (A great book to check out is Savage Inequalities by Jonathan Kozol.)

Can we really expect test scores to be equal when primary and secondary educations are very much unequal?

If public/taxpayer-funded schools have racial preferences, then it is a bad thing. In private clubs, people should be allowed to dig whatever graves they want to put themselves in...

So you'd be totally OK with the best and most prestigious schools in the country going whites-only?

"why is racial equality the goal. i should think getting the best scoring people into school regardless of race should be the goal."

Because you can't have a civil society AND racial/ethnic inequality. Eventually, you won't have a society at all. And who says we can't have both? If test scores are the sole measurement: then those who are against AA should want everybody to start the race from (more or less) the same place. My experience has been that the anti AA types are more than willing to write off entire groups of people. Can you really have equal competition without (rough) equality of education?

And maybe it's just me: but I've worked with people from elite colleges who bragged about their test scores and were completely useless.

So you'd be totally OK with the best and most prestigious schools in the country going whites-only?

Absolutley! I'd be very interested to see what happens after that.

But I'll be more interested to see why at all would tbe best colleges want to become all white, and reject non-whites with good grades or good potential. I bet you, that if that happens, the lower ranked colleges will pick up the best of non-whites and their rankings would go up sooner or later. I personally think that would be a GOOD thing (more competition) :)

Trust me, you're only afraid of something you haven't seen yet. The outcome of less intervention is ALWAYS good in the long run.

Trust me, you're only afraid of something you haven't seen yet. The outcome of less intervention is ALWAYS good in the long run.

The concept of whites-only education isn't exactly new in the US, and it didn't really go all that well. Or maybe, instead of a civil rights movement, we should have just waited until the white Southern ruling class decided they cared more about equality than having a vast source of cheap, oppressed labor? I have a feeling we'd still be waiting.

I think the problem with the whole libertarian/smith-ian concept of 'less intervention' is that the only entity it acknowledges as 'intervening' is the government. We won civil rights in this country because people stood up and fought for them, and forced a hostile government to put these protections into place. That's also how we won things like child labor laws-- would you also roll those back in the name of limiting intervention? And what about corporate intervention? I'd really like to have a health care system where penny-pinching insurance reps weren't 'intervening' and telling me I don't really need lifesaving medicines, for example-- or for that matter, that 45 million people in this country don't need health care at all.

I'm not a libertarian, but I just don't think that rampant, unchecked greed is compatible with democracy. I do, however, think racism is something worth fighting against, whether it's coming from institutions, governments or individuals.

Trust me, you're only afraid of something you haven't seen yet.

Trust me, the experiment you're talking about has already been run, and its consequences are all around us. In fact, to some extent, it is still running right now. AA is only a small ripple against the overall tide. As long as one group in society is substantially more numerous and richer than others, it will have more power to dominate and define the terms - including which other groups are 'ok', which are 'bad', which colleges are 'good', who 'deserves' better grades, how test scores should be 'normed' and how 'composite indicators' should be created that 'go beyond grades and scores'. The whole concept of 'merit' is inevitably, shall I say it, 'colored' by our biases. This does not mean we don't try harder to be objective, only, that even the best systems we could possibly come up with will still have biases. AA is a way of correcting for those biases, and the effects they have had in society over time.

Or maybe, instead of a civil rights movement, we should have just waited until the white Southern ruling class decided they cared more about equality than having a vast source of cheap, oppressed labor? I have a feeling we'd still be waiting.

Here again, the government didn't do anything special. It had to come from people's will, and that's how it happened. Do you think that if EVERY white person in the US was against the civil rights movement, would the movement have happened mysteriously? The government doesn't have a bunch of angels in it to have come up with equal rights. The people (you) did it, and I don't beleive in praising the government for what the people did.

We won civil rights in this country because people stood up and fought for them, and forced a hostile government to put these protections into place

Exactly the point! The government is always a lethargic, entitled institution holding up the works. Any real movement has come from the poeple.

That's also how we won things like child labor laws-- would you also roll those back in the name of limiting intervention?

Why are you connecting these 2 things? Child labor laws protect the rights of children (i.e. from being forced into labor), on the other hand Affirmative Action takes your taxes and tells you where you can go or not based on your race. One liberates, the other restricts.

Now health care... that's a completely different situation. Thankfully, socialists haven't had the chance to run the healthcare system here to the ground, yet. Just remember that every country with universal health care, is reverting to some form or private relief. But that's deviating from the topic here.

I'm not a libertarian, but I just don't think that rampant, unchecked greed is compatible with democracy.

It is quite obvious you haven't experienced the brunt of socialism. If you had felt it, you'd know what bliss liberty is. What you call 'unchecked greed', do you know the alternative to that? It is 'disguised greed'. Greed is inherent in humans, it won't go anywhere. Better blatant than hidden.

Trust me, the experiment you're talking about has already been run, and its consequences are all around us. In fact, to some extent, it is still running right now.

Where has the experiment been run? Please elaborate. I haven't seen any

As long as one group in society is substantially more numerous and richer than others, it will have more power to dominate and define the terms - including which other groups are 'ok', which are 'bad', which colleges are 'good', who 'deserves' better grades, how test scores should be 'normed' and how 'composite indicators' should be created that 'go beyond grades and scores'.

And that is if and only if the one group thinks as a group. My point is that, the people within the group do not necessarily think like one huge lump. Every individual has his/her own interests, and it is in each individual's best interest to recognize talent beyond race.

The whole concept of 'merit' is inevitably, shall I say it, 'colored' by our biases.

Well aren't standardized test scores objective enough? I mean if there is a test for a school that's focused on the sciences, what could be more objective than a test score in math and science? Is that biased too? How would you have me un-bias the test?

If you had merited enough, and had been turned away from something you're paying with your own tax money, you'd know.

I don't think you can fight bias with more bias, take away the discretionary power and the system will correct itself.

Ever heard of FWB-- Flying While Brown? I have Indian friends who've been strip-searched, detained and humiliated with racial slurs in airports with some regularity. I have a friend who got pulled over weekly during his commute in North Jersey-- during one stop, while they searched his trunk, they told him that he should shave his beard because it looked too Muslim. That friend is a Sikh who shaved and stopped wearing his turban after 9/11 because he was receiving death threats on the street. He also had a cousin who was beaten, dropped off by the side of the road (he is blind) and called a raghead by white racists. Two other friends were accosted in a movie theater parking lot (after a screening of 'Borat'), spat at and called n--gers.

Oh, and then there were the racist anti-immigrant rallies in Hazleton, PA and Riverside, NJ. And that whole 'macaca' business...

How come I've never seen it then. And when did this things happen if they really happen. Please so me something on youtube to prove your point. Maybe I might've been too mad.

How come I've never seen it then. And when did this things happen if they really happen. Please so me something on youtube to prove your point. Maybe I might've been too mad.

There are none so blind as those who will not see... seriously, are you paying attention? I'm sorry, I didn't hang around with a webcam to tape these things happening to the people I love. I can only assure you that I'm not making it up.

But I guess it's only real if you see it on YouTube, right? You can google the Hazleton and Riverside cases, and the George Allen 'macaca' incident, if you really, honestly don't think that brown folks in this country face racism.

Where has the experiment been run? Please elaborate. I haven't seen any

Well, if you're looking for an example of laissez-faire economics in action, here's one from an era in which free-market economics were relied upon to an unprecedented decree: Viceroy Lytton during the Madras Famine of 1877. Here's an excerpt from Mike Davis's Late Victorian Holocausts:

Smith's injunction against state attempts to regulate the price of grain during famile had been taught for years in the East India Company's famous college at Haileybury. Thus the viceroy was only repeating orthodox curriculum when he lectured Buckingham that high prices, by stimulating imports and limiting consumption, were the "natural saviours of the situation." He issued strict, "semi-theological" orders that "there is to be no interference of any kind of the part of the Government with the object of reducing the price of food," and "in his letters home to the India Office and to politicians of both parties, he denounced 'humanitarian hysterics'."...By official dictate, India like Ireland before it had become a Utilitarian laboratory where millions of lives were wagered against dogmatic faith in omnipotent markets overcoming the "inconvenience of dearth." Grain merchants, in fact, preferred to export a record 6.4 million cwt. of wheat to Europe rather than relieve starvation in India.

Several million people died. Is that the liberty you're talking about?

Well aren't standardized test scores objective enough? I mean if there is a test for a school that's focused on the sciences, what could be more objective than a test score in math and science? Is that biased too? How would you have me un-bias the test?

You still haven't accounted for the inequality of public schools.

I apologize in advance because I haven't finished reading the court's decision, nor did I read the last 15 comments; my own reactions were getting too disorganized/long.

Rahul, while I think chancellors have a degree of autonomy (cannot speak for NYC specifically), I'm pretty sure they're still constrained by the courts, both legal and of public opinion.

Most are are pro-affirmative action despite the fact that it does not benefit the desi community.

Finally, it does strike me as an interesting irony that at the college level, East and South Asians are not considered “underrepresented minorities,” while in this case, Nikita Rau is clearly being defined as a “minority” student.

Also, I really think it's important to distinguish between AA and integration - they are related, but not the same. Amardeep, it was not so long ago that South and East Asians were considered "underrepresented" in higher education as well -- this trend has only changed in the last 10 years (in admissions), despite the popular rhetoric around the "model minority." As I mentioned, it wasn't until around 2002 that Asian Americans began to reach parity in higher education (that is, the number of APIAs enrolled -- across 4 year institutions -- reached a number close to their % in the national population). Additionally, I think it's important to qualify the argument about "overrepresentation" of APIAs in elite higher ed institutions. When you break down the demographics of the huge "Asian" category, we find that many subcommunities are left out and ARE truly underrepresented in the sense of race, and even more are underrepresented when taking into account socioeconomics. I personally think that for AA to truly be useful in education it is going to have to start looking at the intersection of race and socioeconomics. So far it is not doing enough vis-a-vis its stated goal of ensuring equality of access to higher ed. Many of the POC who benefit from AA still come from relatively (economically) privileged families. While that's well and good, I think many people had hoped AA would help communities who are kept out of these institutions have children who were able to receive a high quality education and ideally bring that education back, thus fueling the local economy and increasing diversity in local and nationwide policymaking, leadership, etc.

And while AA was sold as a means of correcting past discrimination - really, given that prejudice and discrimination are continuing facts of life, it should be here to stay, with continual refinement of the socio-economic criteria for obtaining preferences or qualifying for quotas.

Listen! African-Americans have been the most disadvantaged. Have you heard of a poor Indian in America? Indians are NOT a disadvantaged minority.

My class of 420 had about 8 black people, and 20 hispanic people, most of which weren't quite the underpriviledged types. The rest were your standard intelligent asian or white suburban kid (everyone at the school was intelligent).

Also, Manju, I have to disagree (of course). The court decision does not uphold a race-neutral vision; "racial neutrality" in the law in the context of the U.S. is inherently economically and racially biased.

I know I get up in arms about diversity, especially around education, but I am really shocked by the outpouring of racism on this thread. The way folks are defining merit, quality, and entitlement around racial expectations just furthers the point that race in this country is still a pivotal issue and that we still haven't reached a place where America's communities, rural and urban, black brown and white, have access to the basic freedoms and opportunities we expect of our democracy.

And more, I just couldn't leave things alone...

a. There is prejudice, but can you measure it? If not, why have a quantitative legislation on such a subjective concept?

If Yale has government funding, then it's a pity. Maybe if the government takes out its funding, Yale would have the incentive to get the best and brightest, irrespective of color/race.

Further, there is a reason why it is important for traditionally restricted groups to have access to organizations like Yale -- because these are centers of social, political, and economic power. AA would not have passed SCOTUS -- not the first time, and not the second time -- had it not been for the advocacy of the U.S. military, historically perceived to be one of the most conservative institutions in our country. We have to start asking ourselves WHY people believe diversity is important, and it is not just because such a belief is PC or sounds good. Maybe I'm too jaded, but nothing in this country moves forward unless there is a political or economic rationale for letting it move forward.

Democracy, in my opinion, is about participation and the idea that no one person is any more or less important than any other one. By systematically excluding POC, women, and poor people from educational opportunities and jobs we are undermining our economic health, our civil society, and the foundations of American democracy itself. Furthermore, we have seen that communities who are thus excluded are also excluded from policy decisions that effect their lives in addition to being excluded from appropriately designed social and health services. I believe that if we care about the health of the country from a social and economic perspective, then we have to be committed to finding ways to include those who are marginalized (and indeed, who form the majority of this country). I know that American history has always benefited elites and has overwhelmingly been defined by elites, but our past mistakes are not a reason to continue on a path that does nothing but hurt ourselves. Coincidentally, I think we need a huge overhauling of the K-12 system, which allows for such awful de facto segregation, racism in pedagogy, and "separate but (un)equal" funding that it all but ensures a continuation of the disparities we have seen for the last 100+ years.

As for Yale receiving federal funding, almost all institutions of higher learning receive federal funding, just as all states receive federal funding. Yale is welcome to adopt a racist policy of admission (which it will not, even without the federal requirement) if it simply returns or stops applying for money from the federal government, including student financial aid. Indeed, this is what Bob Jones University contemplated doing in order to retain their hyper-racist whites-only admissions and housing policies. Also, to be clear, federal funding does not require that a group have AA, it requires the group to be in compliance with federal regulations (i.e. Title IX and Title VI when it comes to 14th amendment considerations).

Puliogre, I understand where you're coming from, but I think it would be naive to think that a nurturing family will even allow someone to get into the door compared to someone whose family can afford to put them into test preparation and pay for their application fees. That said, a child brought up in nurturing environment may perform better in college and may offer more to his/her classmates. In fact, it is exactly this rationale that is used when schools decide to examine the "whole package" as opposed to a solo GPA/SAT (*public school weight/rigor) model.

It is even always efficient in the true definition of the economic term.

Also, I meant Bakke v. UC Regents... I'm so used to adding the B to UC that I got carried away.

I also believe that Africans who arrived later (in the 80s and 90s) deserve no quotas because they did not historically face hardship from the US government. The US government doesn't owe them quotas.

It's not that simple, Africans & West Indian black folks will still be "psychologically classified" as black, even though they aren't necessarily subjected to the same financial/generational barriers as native US black folks. That is to say: even though they have better educational credentials, and more amassed money, they still get the NYPD plungers up their ass. As for the gov not owing them quotas, well, it's tricky. Perhaps not in an educational setting, because scores lead for the most part, and native black folks wouldn't have the same access to test prep, suitable upbringings conducive for study, etc... But I'd say beyond that, job, housing, etc.. there's really no difference.

Maybe I'm too jaded, but nothing in this country moves forward unless there is a political or economic rationale for letting it move forward.

No Camille, you are completely on point. This happens in an entirely different space as well, technology. Every technological enhancement you can think of, Telephones, Radios, GPS, Cellular phones, Internet were all military products before they were declassified and turned into 'civilian' products.

I am so tired of this myth being trumped out over and over again! Affirmative action does benefit desis, both indirectly and directly. If you are going to analyze AA, you have to look at both its historical application and how it is used in job and contract awards.

Camille,

Can you explain to me how it benefits desis? Desis are a minority and yet we are not considered underrepresented minority as far as higher education.

Are you saying AA benefits desis in the workforce? - but again, it seems it can benefit desis in certain jobs but it doesn't seem like it would benefit desis in medical profession?

I'd love to get some clarification on your above statement.

Thanks

Are you saying AA benefits desis in the workforce? - but again, it seems it can benefit desis in certain jobs but it doesn't seem like it would benefit desis in medical profession?

It would benefit us in administration positions, hospital admin, medical board positions, things like that. Many whites don't have the experience of responding to "nonwhite" authority.

As in so many discussions on this board- more to be learned just by "listening". The often discussed,but not on this particular topic, "elephant" in the room- is of course ' White Privilege'. Largely embedded in the American psyche is still the idea that 'black' and 'white' are social classes. Class and race did not just intersect they were (are?)symmetrically, congruent.

#56 chachaji Affirmative Action is meant to counter the current and ongoing prejudice against people of color that is endemic in the US.

I would add that "black" is a shorthand way of saying poor, criminal, not college material etc. And the false opposite of 'white' being seen as just that;A [ false ]opposite. That is why some commenter's on this board, and surprisingly enough,on some AfAm blogs I visit- will write things like I grew up in "white" neighborhood when in that particular instance the race of their neighbors really didn't add anything to the topic at hand,but 'white' is used as a proxy for a 'preferred' or better SES.

#77 Abhinay: Greed is inherent in humans, it won't go anywhere. Better blatant than hidden.

#78 Abhinay: Every individual has his/her own interests, and it is in each individuals best interest to recognize talent beyond race.

Greed is inherent as well as trust/affinity for those most like ourselves, or most like what is considered to be the ideal. At no point in American history up to today, is that ideal 'black'. I'm all for 'the market' and smaller government , competition and all the other "good stuff" we have in the US and in other liberal democracies that have embraced a market system- but we all know there is human as well as market failure. Because of our b-w American history everything is racilized. That is why supposed 'scholars' still use terms from 40 yrs ago (?) such as "acting white" to describe any nonwhite [a black person] who does not fit the stereotype of what supposedly 'black' culture is. My contention is whites are complicit and more powerful in maintaining this 'idea' than blacks are.

A study release last week in the UK showed a worrying trend for white males to be underachievers in school. Some headlines said 'white boys' were let down by the education system,some said that low attainers were [poor] white boys.

However, trust me, in all the discussion etc about the 'problem' and the solutions I have heard since the headlines:No one has said, Anglo Saxon,or any other 'white' culture is the problem. Its definitely not been mentioned by the mainstream, perhaps some minorities have pointed a finger at it. Point being the issue has not been racialized by the media etc as it would be in the US or non whites involved. Gordon Brown is not going to say white culture is destroying the lives of young British men.

Having said all of that- I'm conflicted in where I stand on AA-- I have met too many people in my professional life that I'm quite certain would have never received the benefit of the doubt, had their skin been a bit darker; eg their education, work experience etc did not on paper 'qualify' them for the position they actually had. And I know from 'observed truth' especially in America- that some people have to be nudged outside of their 'white' comfort zone to realize that talent comes in all shades---I just don't buy that blind profit motive that supposedly tears down all the walls of every capitalist preconceived /culture mores etc.

I do believe some concession /inclusion of the individuals economic background has to be taken into account. So no I don't think O'Bama's kids should benefit across the board from a 'set a side' program---if nothing else to shut up all those shift managers at "fill in the blank" or wherever who believe they could have ran for president etc if it hadn't been for "the quota system". I'm also soo tired of that- I know a [black]guy who puts up his grades/ GPA so people know he didn't get over on AA line. 'cause I thought that was the point of the cum laude and other "furring" words on degrees- if it mattered that much. Or does it mean that a 4.0 from DeVry is equlivalent to the same from MIT? No the point of that story is just to slam any black person who has a "better" degree than the person making the complaint.

PS,

Can you explain to me how it benefits desis? Desis are a minority and yet we are not considered underrepresented minority as far as higher education.

Are you saying AA benefits desis in the workforce? - but again, it seems it can benefit desis in certain jobs but it doesn't seem like it would benefit desis in medical profession?

Desis are AA beneficiaries predominantly in state contract awards, which vary from state to state but often total millions of dollars in state business. This is especially true for local grants/works projects. AA also benefits desis when it comes to having a more level playing field in promotion, (public) research grants, and positions of authority. In my opinion, one of the major problems is that desis think that because they're doing ok in (elite) higher ed institutions and making $$ (in aggregate) that they have somehow reached racial or economic parity with white folks. I would have to go back to the census, but I'm pretty confident that if you compared desis to all other racial groups, controlling for all else, you would find the race factor still plays out in hiring decisions, etc. This is a factor both in the begrudgingly "positive" stereotyping (i.e. the model minority) and in negative stereotyping (xenophobia, nativist arguments about job stealing, cleanliness, etc.) that allow race to hold desis back from equal opportunity.

I think desis are too lax and allow themselves to be written out of higher education AA as well. As I mentioned earlier, APIAs were underrepresented in higher ed all the way up until the early 2000s. They may even be underrepresented now; it's hard to tell because non-citizens (who immigrate for college only) and citizens are often lumped together in the racial analysis of admissions data. Throughout the 1960s-80s APIAs, including desis, were substantially underrepresented and were being kept out of institutions because of the model minority myth; I think razib mentioned this, but they were being compared to students within their own racial group and were judged on what was the "norm" without consideration for differing migratory or class experiences. In some areas of the country, desis are still underrepresented (racially), and consequently benefit from state-level AA in higher ed. To be more clear, while "elite" (i.e. the top 20 U.S. News ranked schools) schools have large APIA enrollment, this is not the case at other institutions, particularly state colleges/universities. The hard part is it's hard to track for desis specifically because we are folded into that huge "Asian" category. Coming from CA, I think a breakdown by nationality/ethnicity within that is going to become more and more necessary in order to talk with any real authority about trends for desis and other APIA groups.

In many urban areas they are underrepresented in terms of socioeconomics, race, and immigrant status, and they are beginning to constitute a new "subgroup" of APIAs who are considered to be appropriate targets for nuanced AA programs in higher ed. I spent most of my childhood growing up in a diverse and poor urban city, and desis in this area were a mix. Some of our parents were the standard 1960s immigrants, but many of our parents were refugees or had come through family reunification. There were stark class differences, and these class differences fundamentally altered what kind of opportunities folks had access to. Those with fewer class resources (including cultural capital) were in a situation that was almost exactly comparable to the situation facing Latinos and Blacks in the same city. This is part of the reason why I think it's important to look at the crossroads of race and class, and for immigrant communities -- language, when invoking or analyzing AA (which many more higher ed institutions are beginning to do in admissions, now).

Lastly, while desis may not be, in aggregate, underrepresented in medicine, they are underrepresented in "nontraditional" fields (the arts, humanities, planning, policy, and until recently, the law). These are all places where AA operates. When we say we are not the beneficiaries, we need to really broaden our analysis of both the "types" of desis we think about re: AA as well as the industries/jobs/fields we think about. I'm not sure if that was clear? Forgive me, lots of ideas clamoring in my head, and I can't type as quickly as I think.

dilettente, thanks so much for your break down, especially the last point re: the UK.

I grew up in "white" neighborhood when in that particular instance the race of their neighbors really didn't add anything to the topic at hand,but 'white' is used as a proxy for a 'preferred' or better SES.

Camille: Indians are underepresented in the humanities/arts of their own volition. We chase the money, and the money is not in a B.A. English unless it is a stepping stone to an MBA or a law degree. Show us proof that Indians pursuing the humanities are rejected at the undergrad, grad or tenure track level due to race. You have an uphill battle trying to convince us that this is to our benefit whem UC gets rid of affirmative action and desi enrollment goes up

Slate had two interesting articles following the Supreme Court decision.

One of them talks about how the guaranteed admission program in some states (Florida, California, and Texas) is actually a kind of affirmative action that takes advantage of the segregation that exists in high schools today. I'm not sure I really agree with the article because first off, it implicitly assumes that the numbers of seats in these segregated schools is at least roughly in sync with the populations of different ethnicities (at an extreme, assume there is one all-black school and all other schools are all-white, in which case the argument basically falls apart). I don't know if this assumption is justified. Secondly, it does not take Hispanics or Asians into account in its analysis, and I certainly don't think of Asians going to "segregated" schools in the same sense that blacks do. But it is certainly worth thinking about.

The second article proposes using income as a segregator, and claims that it is almost as good a proxy for race. One paragraph in that article confused me though:
In the higher-education arena, some poorly crafted income-based affirmative action plans have failed to produce sufficient racial diversity. That's in part because low-income whites tend to achieve at higher levels than low-income blacks. But at the K-12 level, the achievement gap between racial groups can actually be used to increase the racial dividend of income-based programs. Wake County's plan to avoid concentrations of low-income students and low achieving students has yielded almost as much racial diversity in schools as its old race-based integration plan. One study found that under Wake County's old policy, 64.6 percent of schools were racially desegregated in 1999-2000. Two years later, under the new socioeconomic integration policy, 63.3 percent of schools remained racially desegregated.

Why is it that controlling for performance makes such a big difference in K-12 vs. higher education? The article does not elaborate on this topic further, and I don't know what to make of this fact. Moreover, I certainly don't see where it justifies the claim of increasing the racial dividend of income-based programs?

Finally, as an aside, I understand that as a South Asian blog, people care about the implications of AA on desis. And I realize I'm being naive when I say this, but I don't understand why people make these claims about not understanding why desis support AA even if it doesn't benefit them? Shouldn't we support a policy if we genuinely believe it supports the most deprived in our society? (claiming that it doesn't is a different argument). If whites made the same argument about not supporting AA because it goes against them (as they have in various garbs for many years), we surely wouldn't be so sympathetic to it, would we? We might even consider it racist.

Off topic, an article in the NYT chronicles a year of things going "right" in the Supreme Court.

Or does it mean that a 4.0 from DeVry is equlivalent to the same from MIT? No

What? No outcry? Is there nobody from DeVry on this board? Bueller? Bueller?

Shouldn't we support a policy if we genuinely believe it supports the most deprived in our society? (claiming that it doesn't is a different argument). If whites made the same argument about not supporting AA because it goes against them (as they have in various garbs for many years), we surely wouldn't be so sympathetic to it, would we? We might even consider it racist.

This is really a good point - we should support policies that support the most deprived in our society regardless of who it is.

But it is different if a white American would have a problem with AA b/c whites in this country have had AA for generations - they have only had to compete against themselves- everything was for them - a minority didn't have a chance. That different than new immigrants who didn't have a part in that history.

Another thing about supporting the most deprived - so many social policies support this, right? medicaid, welfare, etc...but the thing about AA is that on an individual level it seems to deprive people who've worked hard all their lives (I'm thinking Asians) from being able to compete on the same playing field as everyone else.

Thanks Camille your perspective; I'm still wrestling with what AA means to this country.

Rahul, thanks for your comments. I'm in the "AA is an important tool for social equality" school, but it is often hard to convince desis that there ought to be a self-interested investment as well.

With respect to the Texas 10 and the California 4% (eligibility in the local context), many admissions/higher ed wonks agree that this helps reconcile part of the problem, but is not as effective as AA in achieving a "critical mass" of diversity, depending on which groups you're looking for as diversity indicators. When I was at UC our "diversity indicator" populations were Blacks, Latinos, Filipinos, and SEAsians (in that order of priority). With ELC we had two challenges:
1. That many of the top 4% do not come through for our yield (that is, they apply, they get in, and then they go to Stanford).

2. Some communities are so densely populated that even if you took the top 4% it wouldn't get you to a comparable % in relation to the state population. For the Black community in California, populations are overwhelmingly concentrated in LA, Oakland, and Richmond. Even if a high school were nearly all black (which is not uncommon), even if you took 4% of say 98% of the subpopulation, you'd only get an accepted applicant pool of 3.92% (CA's "black only" population was 6.1% in 2005 -- I'm sure if it included mixed folks it would be higher). Also, these programs don't guarantee an even spread across UCs -- it guarantees admission at UC Riverside, UC Santa Cruz, and UC Merced. I have nothing but love for those campuses, but in many fields there is more "bang" for your degree at UCLA/UCB/UCSD given the way graduate admissions, etc., work.

3. It has no bearing on gender, which is a substantial factor after the undergraduate level.

4. In Texas, some have said that the 10% plan has led to over-enrollment without funding for expanding campuses, and that it has also led to "white flight." Effectively you see campuses becoming either all white or all Latino (e.g. UT Dallas may have a large Latino population, but UT Austin's diversity shifts more slowly). I think this is the challenge in almost any state system where admissions are measured at the system-level but decisions happen at the campus-level.

And lastly, in many areas socioeconomics has been described as a substitute. In California, this would lead to an increase in enrollment (in order) of Asians, whites, and then Latinos. Blacks would see little to no increase in enrollment.

louciecypher, I'll get back at you with admissions data. My point was not that undergrad enrollment decreased in UC, but it is definitely not on par at the graduate and tenure-track level, depending on your field. The breakdown is not presently available through UCOP for faculty/grad admissions, and their ethnic breakdown data is a little harder to find since it's not as readily online. That said, I can follow up with you, if you like, with the statistical background behind my comments. I know that it sounds like I come up with this stuff, but it comes from working on UC admissions for 5 years -- a lot of my data is in hardcopy in a box in storage in California.

Also, I understand that desis are not highly represented in the humanities, but I'm pretty sure that if you look among applicants in the "nontraditional" fields, things are not working out to a "natural balance" anyway. At any rate, my argument about the benefits of AA for desis hinges around contracts and job grants, not around higher ed admissions. The reason I brought up the latter was to point out that higher ed admissions (sans AA) do not benefit rural desis or low-income desis, so I think we should try to be a bit more aware of who we're talking about when we make sweeping comments about the ineffectiveness of the policy itself.

Oh, and in general I think California is an exception in the national conversation re: AA because of our super high population of APIAs and Latinos. I think it would be more interesting to take a state that is more reflective of national populations and then compare, personally.

PS, my pleasure. =)

Oh, I forgot to say, even if you have ELC you have to meet UC's a-g requirements for admission (these are basically course requirements -- X years of history, X years of English, X years of math, etc). I think something like 50% of California public high schools offer the coursework needed to become eligible. Surprise surprise, this varies by income and ethnicity of the local population. Late Assemblyman Firebaugh tried introducing a piece of legislation that would make it required for public high schools to offer a-g coursework for graduation just so that folks could be college eligible. Guess who the largest lobby against the bill was? The UC Office of the President. They argued that if they actually had to take the top 4% there would be "too many qualified" students to choose from.

Camille: That's crappy the UC president would be against mandating UC prep curricula in all Califonia high schools...canm I find and articulation of their position on this online? I would pay higher property & state taxes to make this possible. I think some pro-AA white politicians offer AA up as a way to throw a bone to minority constituencies without addressing the root cause (i.e. poor K-12 education) as that would raise taxes and piss of their core constituency.

The UC Office of the President. They argued that if they actually had to take the top 4% there would be "too many qualified" students to choose from.

Hi Camille, thanks for your contributions to this thread. So, does this mean that California has special public high schools which have their own admission criteria - and do they have to make good faith efforts to admit students on a competitive but ethnically representative basis?

Camille, thanks for the explanation. I was not aware of the phenomena of white flight and uneven distribution among state school campuses. I agree with you that there are many minorities that will not get adequate representation as they did not "appropriately segregate" themselves.

I have one technical question about your statement:

Some communities are so densely populated that even if you took the top 4% it wouldn't get you to a comparable % in relation to the state population. For the Black community in California, populations are overwhelmingly concentrated in LA, Oakland, and Richmond. Even if a high school were nearly all black (which is not uncommon), even if you took 4% of say 98% of the subpopulation, you'd only get an accepted applicant pool of 3.92%

Isn't the issue more about proportional number of school seats (assuming complete segregation), since the 4% leads to coarsening at the granularity of the number of schools? Are you saying that concentrations of populations mean that there is not a proportional number of high school slots for these concentrated populations?

Also, to clarify, while the first article I linked to is about how AA for colleges might actually work in the presence of segregation in schools, the second article is much closer to the topic of the post as well as the Supreme Court decision because it addresses how high schools can use income as a separator. My question was about the specific claims it makes about how well income works in that context.

Hey everyone,

Thanks, and it is my pleasure to discuss.

louciecypher, I don't think you can find an articulation of UCOP's policy re: high school graduation requirements & (purposefully) limiting admissions eligibility online (probably because it is hugely impolitic). However, if you look at budget testimony over the past 4 years, the standard line before the Legislature is "we can't expand; we have no money." The bill was introduced and withdrawn in either 2003 or 2004 (I can't remember which legislative cycle b/c it happened during my soph year of college). The issue came up in front of BOARS, a committee within the system-wide Academic Senate, and so there may be something in their minutes, but I'm fairly sure that UCOP lobbied within the Assemblyman's office, so there wouldn't be a public record of the content, just that a visit occurred.

chachaji,

So, does this mean that California has special public high schools which have their own admission criteria - and do they have to make good faith efforts to admit students on a competitive but ethnically representative basis?

Maybe what I wrote was confusing? What I meant to say is that some high school districts in CA require that a student fulfill UC's a-g requirements for admissions eligibility in order to graduate. For example, at my high school I had to take at least 3 years of math, 4 years of English, 3 years of history/social science, 2 years of science, 2 years of foreign language, and 1 year of arts to graduate. At the time, this ensured I was eligible, provided I maintained a 3.0 average, for admission to both UC and CSU. However, in many lower income and rural public schools, not only is such coursework not required to graduate, it isn't even offered.

Rahul,

Are you saying that concentrations of populations mean that there is not a proportional number of high school slots for these concentrated populations?

If you take 4% of an all-black school, you can only get a 4% (max) pool from which to offer admission. If the population of folks in the state is higher than that (e.g. 6.1%), then you'll never reach parity.

That's not true, prima facie. Consider an extreme case. Suppose there are 5 districts, each with a 1000 people. 4 districts are all-black, and one is all-white, so the population is 80% black. Each of them has a school which can admit 100 students. Now, if you take the top 4% from each school, you will have 20 students, 16 of whom are black, thereby retaining the 80% representation.

The argument is true only if there is a significant mismatch between the populations and the number of school seats available to them. I can totally believe that this is true, which is why I didn't believe the statement in the article. That's why I was asking, and I will stop harping on this now :)

No, it's ok :) There is a large mismatch between available seats and number of students; this is kind of how UC is designed (inherently elitist). Sorry, I was being dense and not understanding :)

Sarah: Several million people died. Is that the liberty you're talking about?

Now what the hell are you comparing??? Was the british rule in India was a free market to start with?

To compare selective laissez-faire during a rule (that was there to profit the empire) to economics in an independent democratic nation, you must be completely absurd or heavily leftist biased.

:O where the hell did come from...

What about the liberty that has brought America so much prosperity? What about your wonderful planned economy in Russia, that sent space shuttles into deep space, but couldn't help the people queuing up in the cold for rationed bread?

You find an instance of pseudo-free economics and vilify the whole lot of progress that the free market has brought to this country.

How would you have me un-bias the test?

You still haven't accounted for the inequality of public schools.

Do you have a measure to account for the inequality of public schools? Can you measure the bias? Without a flimsy made-up bunch of numbers?

If you can't measure the bias properly, then why have a measured policy to counter an unmeasurable bias...

The NYT has a commentary on Brown v. Board in retrospect by Jeffrey Rosen. Of course, there's a lot of speculation about what will happen in the aftermath of the most recent decision.

This quota nonsense 'affirmative action' is a liberal abomination that originated in the DEMOCRAT party and has no relation to The Civil Rights Act.

It is time Indians stop thinking as third class citizens. We are first class Americans, and a model minority.

This girl's parents could have easily cliamed she was 'White' after all she IS Caucasian as are all people of pure ethnic Indian origin.

Caucasian does not mean White. Race is a biological distinction. There are only three; Caucasoid, Mongoloid, and Negroid. All other sub-divisions are social and have to do with region language, and culture.

Rajesh, you're right. Blacks and Latinos underperform because they are not a "model" minority. And we are Caucasian! I mean, that argument has worked so well for us in the past.

Excuse me while I go vomit.

Rajesh - Camille has already answered this, but just think about what you wrote. Even if it is granted that 'Indians are Caucasian', you concede yourself that 'Caucasian does not mean White' in the very next line. How then can her parents claim she is 'White' on the basis of her being 'Caucasian' ?

All these categories are a little fuzzy at their edges - and this is not because they are ethnic identifiers - all categories are a little fuzzy when you stare hard enough. That still does not give you the ability (or the license) to willy-nilly redefine yourself ethnically. 'White', even if it cannot be exactly defined, is still quite well understood, it is not that arbitrary.

Chachi.- Thank you for pointing out my contradiction. In defining race color should not be included, for example the Bushman is not the Same color as the Massai or Zulu eventhough they belong to the same race but different ethnic groups.
I do not define my-self as white but an American who is ethnic Indian and not Indian-American. In military and government official documents I have been correctly classified as Caucasian in the presence of the official doing the said recording. I am quite brown and on only one occasian did I have to insist that they put down Caucasian.

Thank God the Supreme Court agreed with me and struck down at least this abomination that has its origins in the DEMOCRAT party. This has nothing to do with Civil Rights Act, which Democrats woted against.

Rajesh, what about us poor Tamilians? Also, you might enjoy this. Be warned though, if the laugh track doesn't cue you in, it is comedy. White Power!

Chachaji,
Sorry for the typo on your name and other places. I just had one too many vodka martinis.

Rahul - I know Chapelle is funny. I could not get the video to load. Yes! Tamils are CAUCASOID. Wikipedia is not a reliable source.

Chachaji, Sorry for the typo on your name and other places. I just had one too many vodka martinis.

Cool, no probs. Many years ago, when I went to get my Maryland driver's license for the first time, the form actually said 'people from the Indian subcontinent and the Middle East' should fill in the code for 'white' (i.e., not just 'Caucasian', but 'white') on the form. I was quite puzzled then, but I daresay they have revised this since. So the category is not only intrinsically fuzzy, but also temporally fluid and situationally contingent. My point still stands.

I also remember the Smithsonian Museum's ethnographic map in the Museum of Natural History in Washington DC - which had indicated that people from the subcontinent were 'Caucasian' on the basis of distribution of blood groups - not skin color. I remember feeling secretly reassured then - brown we may be, but we were 'Caucasian' - we were 'non-white' Caucasian. The confusion arises when 'Caucasian' is used in popular parlance interchangeably with 'white'. In my view the 'non-white Caucasian' category has largely receded into history, and hopefully will not cause too much confusion in the future.

Chachaji,
Thanks! You finally got the point. The problem begins when Caucasian is confused with White. The Smithsonian has it just right. Also Google around Caucas as a region and the Caucasian mountains from whence the race(Caucasian) is supposed to have originated, got its name and spread out to the rest of the continent during pre-historic times.

Rajesh, the point was that 'non-white' Caucasian is a distinction without much meaning. It may have made vague sense at one point, and it was maintained when the number of such 'non-white' Caucasians was still small, or of the 'right' religion, or in areas where the racial Other was identifiably different - but sociologically it is much less meaningful now. Sorry for not being clear earlier, and Good Night!

Tamils are CAUCASOID.

Then why do they seem to have issues with every North Indian group, or group descended from North Indians? For example, they fought so-called "Hindi imposition" with everything they had, and they are fighting from a seperate homeland in Sri Lanka. I used to debate Indian history on a certain website (not this one). Many Tamil members became furious over the mere mention of the word "Vedas." There was also hostility towards Tamil Brahmins... but these same Tamils would eagerly re-invent Indian history to reflect its "Tamilness" for example, one of their claims being that Tamils were the original bearers of Hinduism, and "Sanskritization", as they called it, was just an attempt at stealing Tamil ideas. And before I forget, one of the most popular topics was "Sanskrit words borrowed from Tamil."

I don't doubt Tamils have their own history, which they should be very proud of. BUT, it has been my unfortunate experience that discussing Indian history with Tamils is a difficult task. I try to avoid it now, if I can.

*fighting for a

We are first class Americans

In defining race color should not be included

There are only three; Caucasoid, Mongoloid, and Negroid

You finally got the point. The problem begins when Caucasian is confused with White

That is indeed poses a problem, people do associate white with "first class Americans". I can see how it hinders you from taking full advantage of White Caucasian power. You could get a vanity plate, or a T-Shirt with a Venn diagram to educate everyone, that whites, are a subset of Caucasians?

Iranians (Persians) are the true Aryans. Iran actually means "land where the Aryans lived." I don't know where this blonde-haired blue-eyed rubbish came from. As for Tamils, they are related to the Australian Aboriginal population.

LK1,
I see your point and I am well aware of every thing you stated. This conflict between north and south Indians has to do with language, region, and culture and is therefore ethnic. Dravidian is not a race nor is Aryan. They just happen to be both Caucasian. The natives of New Guinea and the Massai of Africa are quite different, but both belong to the same race.

You are right to avoid discussing Indian history with a south Indian, especially now, as some (even north Indians ) are trying to re-write the Aryan invasion theory and changing text books. It is difficult for a person to be objective when they are ethnocentric. The point that most on this discussion seem to be missing is that race is Bioligical and therefore Scientific, it has to do with genetics, blood type, and certain physical features and not not skin colour.

LK1,
You are right about the Persians. We have the same ancestors and are related. Blond , blue-eyed Aryan is a Hollywood myth, just look at the Austrians. I have to admit that I am not sure of the relationship of the Australian Aborigines to Tamils. Someone will have to do a genetics test.

Tamils are CAUCASOID. Wikipedia is not a reliable source.

Rajesh, these might have been 9 tiny words to you. But they shattered the twin pillars of my existence. I have been curled up in bed all day, wondering whether all those buses and trains I stopped, those bridges I blocked, those Hindi books I burnt, those Scythians I stared down, was it all for nought based on measly incorrect information by the evil Wikipedia? Should I have trusted this instead? What separates me from Clayton Bigsby then?

Rahul,
I had no intention of causing you and other Tamils such grief. We need to start thinking of ourselves as Indians first and you can start by not being opposed to Hindi. FYI. I wish I knew Hindi. I speak only English, both the Queens English and American. My Grand-parents spoke Bhojpuri. (I hope I spelled it right). I blame them for not passing on their language.

you can start by not being opposed to Hindi.

Rajesh, believe me, I tried so hard. But there were so many slights. First, the rejection of Kamal Haasan's start turn in Ek Duje ke liye. But really the last vada that broke this Dravidian camel's back was my favorite Superstar Rajinikanth's second billing (to some Amitabh ke Bacche) in Andha Kaanoon. I just couldn't take it!!! How could they insult my hero so?

Folks, this thread has drifted seriously off-topic. It's probably time to move on...