Preparing Us for a Very Difficult Fight
A New Strategy to protect Our children - 80-20's Petition
80-20 aims to WIN a very difficult fight with a brand new strategy, whose 2 components are:
(1) We embrace the importance of diversity to education. Hence, we consent that AsAm students shall yield an advantage of 450 SAT points to African American students, and yield a 270 SAT point advantage to Hispanic students, in order to have equal access to elite colleges. This commitment lasts as long as the higher education institutions deem it desirable,
(2) We strongly resent that Asian American applicants have to score 140 SAT points higher than white applicants in order to gain equal access.
For America to see the merits of this solution, we must first allay the real but unfounded FEAR of people both within and without the AsAm community.
The Fear from Outside of Our Community Is:
If the elite colleges stop discriminating against AsAm students, will they flood those colleges?
NO! Just look at the %s of AsAm students in elite universities, which are prohibited by respective state laws to practice "race-conscious" admissions:
California Institute of Technology: 44%
University of California, Berkeley: 39%
University of Washington: 23%
University of Michigan: 13%
University of Florida: 7%
Universities of Arizona, Oklahoma, Nebraska, & New Hampshire: no data available, but we suspect the average to be below 10%.
the average % of AsAm students in Ivy Leagues schools will be
below 35%, if they stop discriminating against AsAms.
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Why? How about CalTech & UCB? CalTech & UCB's %s of AsAm students would decrease, if they were not located in CA, whose AsAm population is 15%, a factor of 2.5 higher than the national average. CalTech faces another special factor - AsAms major heavily in science and technology.
The fear from Within the Asian Am. Community:
Will agreeing to give 450 SAT pts. to blacks and 270 pts. to Hispanics be giving the store away? Will the % of AsAm students on Ivy campuses remain at about 20%, even it we win the lawsuit?
NO! If we win the lawsuit, the average % of AsAm students in the elite universities will increase by about 15%. Here is how we came to this conclusion by a "back of the envelope type" estimations.
The %s of black plus Hispanics students on Ivy campuses is about 21%. About 9% are international students. 20% are AsAm students. About 50% are white students. Since AsAms students have to yield SAT pts. to blacks, Hispanics and whites, what % of the seats are AsAms students yielding to whites? Roughly, it'll be [50% / (21% +50%)] = 5/7. Of the seats we "lost", about 5/7 of them were "lost" to white students!
What is the % of the seats that we've "lost," owing to discrimination? It is about (40% in UCB and CalTech - 20% in Ivy leagues) = 20%.
Hence, if we don't have to give points to white students, we'll get back an additional (5/7 X 20%) = 14%. That added to the 20% we are already getting in Ivy League colleges, is 34% - very close to the 35% we predicted earlier.
Does the above rough estimate confuse you? Sorry, if it does. Just remember the key conclusion:
Contrary to the common belief that the current admissions policy
benefits African Ams and Hispanics, the policy actually primarily benefits
the whites!
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Spread the word. Forward to all your friends. When the myths are broken, truth will emerge! Our endeavor will help make America "a more perfect Union."
Display a flag today! Equal rights comes with equal commitment.
S. B. Woo
President and a volunteer for the past 18 years
80-20 Initiative, Inc.
To know more about 80-20, view these videos :