Affirmative Action in the US: is it still needed?

I don't give much credence to "income" to determine success in school. Many people I know including my own family came from very modest backgrounds.

Most of us worked ourselves through college, and were relatively successful in our careers. Our children are all college educated with professional careers.

That's the success story of this country, and that's the reason why more people want to immigrate to the US.

Most of us worked ourselves through college, and were relatively successful in our careers. Our children are all college educated with professional careers.

That's the success story of this country, and that's the reason why more people want to immigrate to the US.

You all had expectations.

They don't look at the applicant's background.

Our parents were too poor to help us pay for our college education. Take it from there.

facts that cannot be denied

Between 2001-02 and 2011-12, in-state tuition and fees at public, four-year colleges increased at an average rate of 5.6% each year, according to the College Board's 2011 report on trends in higher education pricing. That rate is higher than in previous decades: In the 1980s, tuition increased at about 4.5% each year, and in the 1990s at 3.2%.

The average tuition at a four-year public university climbed 15% between 2008 and 2010, fueled by state budget cuts for higher education and increases of 40% and more at universities in states like Georgia, Arizona and California.

At Full Sail University, a film and art school in central Florida, the average price of tuition, fees, books, and other expenses totals $43,990, even when grants and scholarships are factored in. The average net price for an incoming Harvard student: $18,277, according to the department. Net price is cost of attendance minus grant and scholarship aid.

Between 2000–01 and 2010–11, prices for undergraduate tuition, room, and board at public institutions rose 42 percent, and prices at private not-for-profit institutions rose 31 percent, after adjustment for inflation.

Not from where I'm sitting

All my siblings worked or got loans to attend college/medical school/law school.

Today's students need a lot more money proportionally than your siblings needed, or I needed, to get through university.

Salaries are not going up at the rate that educational costs have been for the past decade.

And back to the topic of the thread, there's a good chance we now wouldn't make it to university without being in the the best $ schools in the best $ neighbourhoods. Poor only equals success on an exceptional basis.

Quotas have been outlawed since the Supreme Court's decision in Regents v. Bakke in 1978. That, therefore, is a non-issue.

Who decides what constitutes "low quality" or "high quality?" An SAT score isn't a measure of "quality," it's a somewhat dubious prediction of how well a student will perform in college. Essays and recommendations are even less reliable.

Do you keep the exam, or do you try to find ways to recruit minority officers, even if those candidates would otherwise be rejected because of the exam?

how do you propose that colour/gender/race-blind evaluation be done? the existing system of testing is not neutral. it's got bias built right into it.

If this is the case then please explain the "Dreamers". All these poor illegal immigrants are going to school. It is at odds with what you are saying.

It depends. Why did the minority applicants fail the exam?

joefromchicago wrote:

Who decides what constitutes "low quality" or "high quality?" An SAT score isn't a measure of "quality," it's a somewhat dubious prediction of how well a student will perform in college. Essays and recommendations are even less reliable.

But they are both standards, however imperfect, that do not discriminate by race and gender.

That's the reason why I keep repeating that the path to success is "studying."