Is The Asian Community Being Discriminated by The Top Schools In The World?

Asian communities have long suspected the most selective, elite schools in the world—Harvard University, Johns Hopkins University, Cornell University, Columbia University, etc.—to be discriminating against Asian applicants. Some have suggested that the problem is race since many more Asian students that are accepted have academics that are above Ivy League standards and have accomplished beyond exceeding expectations. So, what is the problem?

A recently filed lawsuit against Harvard University has brought the discriminative Asian-American application issue into the spotlight. “The case accuses Harvard of setting a quota on Asian-American students accepted to the university and holding them to a higher standard than applicants of other races” (source). Longtime legal strategist Edward Blum and his group, the Students for Fair Admission are responsible for bringing the case, which is still ongoing in the Supreme Court. A majority of Asian Americans have been supporting the case that acknowledges Harvard’s discriminative action towards Asian American applicants while college Asian Americans are defending Harvard, saying that those who weren’t accepted did not have the qualification of being in an Ivy League school. As a solution to this discriminatory problem, Edward Blum and the S.F.F.A suggested that any indication of the students’ race should be omitted from the application. This, as they strongly believe, would eliminate any racial review of the application or any unequal judgment compared to white applicants.

In a headline story from 2012 that resurfaced recently on The New Yorker, an Asian-American senior named Michael Wang was denied from all Ivy League schools and Stanford, excluding the University of Pennsylvania, despite getting perfect scores on his SATs and ACTs. He then filed a complaint to the US Department of Education, claiming that Stanford, Princeton, and Yale had a biased application process because of their Asian-American discrimination. That was when a nonprofit group called Students for Fair Admission (S.F.F.A) and anti-affirmative action (def: action favoring those who tend to suffer from discrimination; positive discrimination). Activist Edward Blum filed federal lawsuits accusing Harvard of illegally discriminating against Asian American applicants. With their claim, many Asian students who found a similarity in Wang’s story began to support the case, urging an immediate change in the college application system.

On Harvard’s side of the argument and defense in court, their application reviewers have always looked for a diverse and international class, including Hispanic, black, white, and Asian students. But according to statistical results, Asian students had the fewest acceptances into Ivy League schools compared to other races. Even if the Supreme Court has approved affirmative action to support the minority applicants, many black and Hispanic students have displaced other Asian-American undergraduates. For example, a black student with a lower GPA would have a higher chance of being accepted compared to an Asian-American student with a high GPA. Another major part of Harvard’s defense was the Asian-American applicants’ low score in student personality. Since Harvard values “the whole review” of an applicant, studies and recent analysis that were made public in the court documents stated that the university scored Asian Americans lower in personality, using a somewhat legal quota of “racial balancing” to make each freshman class international and diverse. On behalf of Harvard’s perspective on this issue, in order for minority groups to be a sufficient percentage of the new freshman class, they have to accept fewer Asian American students in the process, displacing them with students from smaller countries or from unique, diverse backgrounds.

According to The Boston Globe, sixteen universities including Stanford and Dartmouth came to Harvard’s defense, arguing that if the S.F.F.A and the Asian American students got the court to eliminate race as an admissions factor, it would take a toll on the “academic freedom” and internationality of all colleges. On the other hand, some Asian American students have supported the S.F.F.A and Edward Blum’s sued against Harvard, holding banners and protesting in front of the US Supreme Court.

Carrie L., a senior at AISG, confronted the issue of college discrimination from the perspective of an international student. “Many top schools in the world do have a high percentage of Asian students, but those are still mostly citizens of the country. To be honest, I am more concerned as an international student as opposed to as an Asian student, as it is clearly indicated by stats that the acceptance rate of international students is lower. However, I also understand that as most schools have to prioritize the citizens of their country or their state.”

Another senior, Songlin W., acknowledged another perspective on this case when asked about whether or not he thought the Harvard application system was fair. “I would not say the Harvard application is absolutely fair. It is almost a common sense for Asian seniors that being Asians is a disadvantage when we apply for colleges. However, to some extent, it is very fair. Asians made up 5.6% of the US population in 2010, but Harvard has 22.9% of Asian Americans in 2018. In fact, Asians are over-represented in colleges. There are just too many capable Asian applicants.”

As someone who strongly believed that Harvard and other elite schools are discriminative and biased, senior Stanley W. shared his own thoughts about this issue. “How do you enforce equality? It’s a holistic review process, it’s not like they need to tell you why they reject you. It’s way easier to find holes in someone’s application as a ground for dismissal. [Overall,] I certainly don’t think it is fair. It is no secret that many prestigious universities, Harvard perhaps being the most well-known one, holds a secret bias against Asians. The system was always balanced in favor of those that are financially capable, has [a] legacy, or comes from a prestigious family.”

I interviewed school counselor Ms. Brown to question how this lawsuit could affect our students. She said, “Since one of the problems in the Harvard case was talking about the personality of the students, we counselors are very aware, so we do speak about the personalities of our students in our recommendation letters. With US colleges being so ambiguous, they always say they’re crafting the entering class. They want the freshman class to look a certain way each year, which gets certain students accepted and other students rejected.” On a positive note, Ms. Brown suggested students to take any opportunities offered to them including alumni interviews and to try applying into top schools such as Harvard despite the recent lawsuit case. “For how it would affect our students, I think that remains to be seen. But I think with the Ivy Leagues– it’s a reach for everyone.”

Although the Harvard case is a controversial and problematic issue for the Asian (and perhaps even international) community, students should still apply for the chance to enter an Ivy, despite the discrimination in the application process. It is important to understand that diversifying dreams and catching every possible opportunity are the only practical ways of confronting this problem.

For more information, go to TheGuardian.com, NYTimes.com, NewYorker.com, NewYorker.com, News.Harvard.edu, TheAtlantic.com, Reuters.com, CornellSun.com, HarvardLawReview.org, and BostonGlobe.com