Race and Advantage at UM Law School

Mar 28 06:21 UTC 2001

Okay, the University has lost in court, and it plans to appeal, all the way
to the supreme court if required.  

Seems like giving preference to minorities in the Michigan Law School is
illegal according to the judge.

Me, I agree with the decision.  On the other hand, most people on grex will
disagree.  Discuss

response 2 of 96:

Mar 28 06:51 UTC 2001

I favor admitting the top X % (as needed to complete an entering class)
of each high school in the state, independent of race, but with some
consideration for grades, participation in school activities, leadership,
etc, in each school. (I know this does not address out-of-state students,
but that is a different issue.)

This is not a racially-based admission policy, and would tend to
provide an advanced education to students from every sector of society.

response 4 of 96:

Mar 28 13:19 UTC 2001

I believe strongly that racial diversity benefits everyone in a 
university setting. I am not sure Affirmative Action programs are the 
*best* way to go about accomplishing that but it is one of the few 
things a university can do. 

One thing universities can do is give scholorships based on need only. 
Since more minorities are needy, this certainly would benefit minorities 
without making people feel that they have been treated unfairly. The 
only other thing I can think of that universities can do is to try to 
recruit qualified minority students. 

response 6 of 96:

Mar 28 15:57 UTC 2001

Having had to deal with a student who was admitted under AA-like policies,
was totally unequipped to keep pace at MIT, and relied on the "I'm a minority,
it looks bad for you if you fail me" theory to pass classes, I'm all in 
favor of admission based on merit alone.  If you take AA to this logical
extreme, you're going to wind up with a stereotype of "African-American and
Hispanic lawyers aren't as competent as white or Asian ones" and perpetuate
the discrimination problem.  (er, that should have been propagate, not 
perpetuate.)

response 8 of 96:

Mar 28 18:02 UTC 2001

Re #7: Are you suggesting that only minorities have that problem?

response 10 of 96:

Mar 28 19:07 UTC 2001

Lynne - it is not true that more minorities are "needy" when you look at
 the population as a whole. When you look *within* a minority
population,  you may find that the population has a higher level of
"needy" members  than society as a whole, but the majority of "needy"
people in most  societies (including this one) are from the majority
group. That is to  say, most "needy" Americans are white.

When I was at UM Law School, every minority student in my section had 
gone to a more prestigious undergraduate institution than I had. Most 
came from families that were significantly wealthier than mine. For the 
most part, they were not kids from bad neighborhoods with inferior 
schools.

The fear for UM Law School, in losing the ability to include race as a 
factor in admissions, is that it will lose its minority enrollment. It 
is not that UM would not be accepting minority applicants - but as long 
as law schools at schools like Harvard and Yale can look to minority 
status while UM cannot, those highly qualified candidates are likely to 
also receive offers from elite private institutions. Many students 
already opt for even (slightly) lesser ranked private institutions over 
UM. It could be very difficult for UM to maintain minority enrollment. 

response 12 of 96:

Mar 28 19:22 UTC 2001

Re 11.  Wrong question.  The LSAT, as I keep repeating, does not predict
grade point average.  It does predict the likelihood that a person will
flunk out of law school.  I assume the stats on the SAT are similar.

Moreover, ANY test like this will be "biased" in the sense that students
from more affluent backgrounds and with better educated parents will tend
to get higher scores.  People from those backgrounds get far more support
and encouragement for developing verbal and mathematical skills than
people from less affluent backgrounds, and (what experts say is critical) 
get far more intellectual stimulation during early stages of brain
development while they are babies and toddlers. 

Head Start and similar programs are an attempt to address this inequality,
and proved that it is possible to make a lasting difference, but such
efforts are always under attack.

response 14 of 96:

Mar 28 21:41 UTC 2001

re #9:  I think you misunderstand my point, actually--it's not so much
that this student was underqualified in the first place, but that (s)he
had learned that because of race, other people were willing to bend over
backward in order to not allow a failing grade--and come to expect that
as his/her right.  This was not an entry-level or lack-of-background
problem--this occurred in a senior-level class.  Showed up for labwork
once for under an hour (average required time to do the experiments was
15 h), didn't show up for the oral exam, wanted private tutoring for a
month before the makeup exam, when we refused to do more than 2 hours the
student didn't show up for the makeup exam either.  I went to give the
grade we'd determined to the class professor.  He wanted to quadruple it,
because he didn't want the responsibility of failing a minority student.
It has been my experience with high-level schools that once you get in,
it's very difficult to flunk out.  If this is the case, then preferential
admissions policies leads to the risk of turning out under- or un-qualified
graduates.  By the time you get to law school, you've been on your own
for four years and presumably your records reflect work habits, etc., and
differential background/preparation is no longer an issue.

response 16 of 96:

Mar 28 22:15 UTC 2001

She wasnt talking to you, aaron. duh

BTW, Yes most needy people are white but I would be willing to bet that 
scholorships based on need would certainly help schools deal with 
diversity issues. I would bet that while most poor people are white (as 
most people in this country are white), there is a higher concentration 
of minorities in the poorer socio-economic groups so providing need 
based scholorships would favor minorities to some degree. Not to the 
degree that affirmative action benefits them though, which is probably 
why affirmative action was the program chosen to bring diversity to the 
University in the first place. 

response 18 of 96:

Mar 29 01:00 UTC 2001

Re #2:  Admitting the "top X%" from each high school is grossly
unfair and wastes resources.  Suppose that I'm 72 out of a class of
350 in a high school where standards are very high.  My SAT score is
1310, I've taken AP courses; I'm more than good enough to handle the
work at U-M, but they're only taking the top 12% of the graduating
class so I can't get admitted.  Yet the kid from some lousy school
with crappy standards who gets 400 on the SAT math but ranks 27 out
of his class of 300 gets in easily.  The bill for remedial classes
goes through the roof.  Is that a sensible way to run things?  No.

It also makes it easy to game the system.  For my senior year, I
just transfer to a crappy school.  I graduate 1st in my class
because I've already taken the material in their toughest math,
science and english courses, and I'm used to working while I'm
competing with slackers.  I get into U-M, while the girl ahead
of me who stayed in my old HS gets rejected.  Is that fair?  No.

Doing stupid things like admitting the top X fraction of all HS
classes only rewards lousy schools and careless parents.  It
waters down the educational system as a whole.  What we need are
uniform standards which actually measure what students have
learned and the work they can do.  We have them:  the SAT and ACT,
and I assume the LSAT and GRE.  Let's use them.

response 20 of 96:

Mar 29 02:18 UTC 2001

Re #18: spoken like someone that has all the advantages and wishes
to exercise them at the expense of others. In order to change things,
one has to change things. Admitting the top X % of all schools will
tend to force the poorer schools to improve. (I do NOT suggest that
colleges offer remedial program - students could get them on their
own if they wish, in summer school, etc, but all students should
be treated, taught, and examined with equality.)

To clarity, I mean *offering* admission to the top X % in all schools.

If you want to transfer to a poorer school to improve your chances of
being admitted, that will improve the poorer school too. In a way, you get
advanced by helping to advance others. Not a bad trade.

response 22 of 96:

Mar 29 06:46 UTC 2001

Not at all - I read #20 as an expression of remembered self-interest,
being extended to others.

response 24 of 96:

Mar 29 16:49 UTC 2001

Students from an excellent school that aren't in the top 10% but have
fantastic credentials will wind up getting admitted anyway, just not with the
automatic admission.  They're not talking about restricting admission to
*only* the top 10%.  

Standardized tests are useless, if you ask me.