response 205 of 232:

Jan 29 01:53 UTC 2003

I don't have a cite for this, but I remember hearing a few years ago about
a study showing that UM minority students tended not to do as well as white
students with identical high school records, SAT scores, and other qualifying
information.

response 207 of 232:

Jan 29 13:24 UTC 2003

re resp:206: Should "diversity" be just for admissions, or should 
granting of degrees be for people of different ethnic backgrounds as 
well?  I think any university should be giving primary consideration to 
who can graduate.  There's no point in admitting anyone who can't.

response 209 of 232:

Jan 29 17:22 UTC 2003

UM is undertaking a study of the factors related to graduation rates for
different demographics. They have lots of data, but are going over them
to determine which data are statistically significant. 

Re #207: the objective is to provide an environment in which all admitted
students have the potential to graduate without compromising standards. 

response 211 of 232:

Jan 29 18:04 UTC 2003

I doubt that, but there is an inescapable subjective element in the choice
of significance levels. 

response 213 of 232:

Jan 29 23:06 UTC 2003

Re #206:  If the actual result of AA is to give minorities about
half the proportion of degrees that the rest of the student body
gets, meanwhile convincing many non-minorities that minorities are
academically unprepared or even inferior, is that good?

response 215 of 232:

Jan 30 02:05 UTC 2003

Just about anyone who wants to earn a college degree can probably get 
one, but he has to select a college that matches his level of 
competence.  You are solving the problem as Solomon suggested (cut the 
baby in half).  Do you really believe that the student who drops out 
because he is inappropriately placed is a sacrifice worth making?

response 217 of 232:

Jan 30 04:47 UTC 2003

Re #214:  Let's play a little bit with numbers, just for curiosity's sake.

Suppose that the current AA system graduates 34% of AA-qualified
minorities and 59% of others.  This is a dropout rate of 66% for
the AA group and 41% for others.

Change this so that AA-qualified minorities no longer get admitted
to institutions for which they would not otherwise qualify.  They
go to less-rigorous institutions instead, and are replaced with
non-AA students who would have made the cutoff otherwise.  Suppose
that this broader group would have a 57% graduation rate.

If the AA-qualified are otherwise no different from the rest of
the population, their graduation rate would rise from 34% to 57%
(23% increase).  That is a 2/3 improvement.  Meanwhile, the broader
population's graduation rate falls from 59% to 57% (a 3.4% drop).

If AA students make up 10% of the population, the total graduation
rate with AA is .34 * .1 + .59 * .9 = 56.5%, while afterwards the
total graduation rate is 57%.  This is slightly better as a whole,
while being far better for the AA group. 

It appears that the race-sensitive admissions program could easily
be *worse* for minorities (in terms of degrees awarded), and worse
for the non-minorities - the exact opposite of the intended result!
Of course, this analysis is highly sensitive to the guesstimate of
the graduation rate of the broader population.  If the aggregate
graduation rate of a student body selected without AA is 55%, the
effect of AA is to *increase* majority graduation numbers while
hurting minorities.  This is exactly the sort of discrimination AA
was intended to solve.... wasn't it?

response 219 of 232:

Jan 30 07:01 UTC 2003

Realize also that no one is forcing admitted students to attend UM
(most don't), and it is sure to be common knowledge among all demographics,
what are the "chances" at any school they consider. Only an *opportunity* is
being offered. So all that numerology about % graduating is largely
beside the point in regard to AA. It *is* of importance in making the
best use of resources avalable to the University, but that is a different
issue.

response 221 of 232:

Jan 30 17:27 UTC 2003

re:  "#219 (rcurl):  Realize also that no one is forcing admitted 
students to attend UM (most don't), and it is sure to be common 
knowledge among all demographics, what are the "chances" at any school 
they consider."

I'm not sure what you mean by "chances," but I attended one of the 
better schools in the Detroit area, where I studied hard, and was 
shocked at the level of work I needed to do @ UM.  If a minority 
student attends a poor, inner city school where he does comparatively 
well and is given a chance to attend UM, I wonder how well he 
understands what's going to be required of him at a highly selective 
university.


re: "#220 (jep): re resp:210: Surely the university can be considered 
qualified to obtain and study data.  In my opinion, even if there's a 
chance of bias, there's no more competent researcher in the state than 
the University of Michigan"

You aren't suspect of an organization researching itself on a highly-
charged issue like this?  If you were the university employee 
conducting the study, might you think your conclusions would have an 
effect on your continued employment?  What do you think of the 
scientific studies on tobacco smoking put out by the cigarette 
companies?

response 223 of 232:

Jan 30 23:46 UTC 2003

Re #218:  My suppositions are labelled as exactly that, but the
current figures are drawn from jep's numbers earlier in this item.

response 225 of 232:

May 14 17:08 UTC 2003

Golly, and after all we did for those poor niggers, rescuing them from Africa,
giving them free transportation to America, teaching them a proper religion,
teaching them trades, and even allowing their women to have sex with our men.
And that's the kind of shit they're giving us back?

</extreme sarcasm>

response 227 of 232:

May 15 02:41 UTC 2003

Re #224: there was no need to guess: any answer is correct (apart from
perhaps the newspaper and the particular student cited). You could put
Chinese in the blank, and it would apply somewhere. In fact, try putting
in Human.