Putting aside the larger question of the rightness or wrongness of affirmative action in general, consider that in focusing on education, specifically Ivy League caliber education, we are looking at the wrong metric if we want to do good by the needy.
If the goal is to actually help black children increase their chances for societal succe…
Putting aside the larger question of the rightness or wrongness of affirmative action in general, consider that in focusing on education, specifically Ivy League caliber education, we are looking at the wrong metric if we want to do good by the needy.
If the goal is to actually help black children increase their chances for societal success, myopically focusing on whether Harvard or Yale has a black student population of 8% or 10% is a diversion. We, as a society, are ignoring the hundred of thousands of public school students, black and white, who can’t read, write or understand basic math. There is a large population of now 2nd and 3rd generation underclass citizens with no hope for a personal future.
We’ve had 50 years of racially based affirmative action in education and corporate America and what minimal benefits achievable from it have been banked. The left’s patting itself on the back for affirmative action policies that do no good for those in need while failing to address the disaster in our primary educational system is the height of hypocrisy.
For some reason, we have allowed the left to give us a binary choice; support affirmative action or let millions remain in poverty. Even though the beneficiaries of affirmative action are a small minority of our disadvantaged population, we accept this false choice as providing the only options available. I have no idea why.
The left needs the black underclass to stay relevant. The elite “all for me, none for thee” crowd is why public education is failing for most of us. Us meaning African Americans.
To add, affirmative action creates a mindset, a culture that does not help those it set out to help. The recipients don't have to work as hard pre college because just their "lived experience" (born the right color) will get them in. This gets carried on post college with DEI recruitment. What about the output of this individual to society? On the flip side another individual works their ass off their entire life and still gets rejected because they were born in a skin that did not agree with the ideology of the time. What about all the lost potential this individual could've contributed?
Race should not be included anywhere in the admissions process. It should only be revealed once an individual is admitted based purely on their merit both qualitative and quantitative.
Well I think the notion with elite school affirmative action is that elite school graduates tend to go onto careers in "elite" fields and become the "elite" of tomorrow, so the attempt to diversify who that "elite" will be with the goal of ostensibly getting more "diverse population" friendly policies and initiatives and practices across those varied fields they graduate into. I'm not sure we've had long enough an experience at it (basically, one generation that would have benefited from these policies to mature into leadership roles to effect these changes), and I'm not making a value judgement on it so much as to point out what the longer term goals of these programs are - change the leadership and "elite" makeup of America's leaders and influential policy makers.
Affirmative action does actually happen at lower tier schools as well, but the focus on the friction of affirmative action tends to take place at the elite schools because the amount of spots is much smaller, and the competition much fiercer. But it still a fact at public state as well as smaller private schools.
And yes, whether you support the goals or program itself, it is not a substitute for the much broader problems of some real disparities in race based educational achievement at the primary levels. Skimming off the top 10% of Black students into whatever higher education does nothing for the 90% that are being seriously underserved.
Big problem with that. When they can’t think critically, with an actual mind, nor understand what is happening around them, nor be capable of doing mathematics, then it all becomes bogus nonsense. Math matters. Whether you are an accountant or an engineer who has far more mathematical skills. Or, an astrophysicist. Math matters.
Ask yourself this very simple question—do you want the people in the cockpit on your next flight to have their jobs because of merit or affirmative action? 100% including every race, religion or gender will choose merit.
A couple of points/thoughts n no particular order.
1. There have been studies that show, that often a minority gets accepted to (say) Harvard, Stanford on an affirmative action scholarship, and either have a Real Hard Time or Drop out because they can't Cut It. Because they had a poor grade school/high school. If they went to a "Lesser" college they would do just fine.
2. Dennis Prager has said (and think he is right) It doesn't matte Where you went,, but Can You Do The Work? BTW now that I think of it Who The Hell decided (and when) that Ivy League schools were The Best Place to go? People that graduated from there?
3. For as long as I have been aware, and pad attention to the larger world (say 1958) there have been 1,000's...10's of 1,000's of articles, movies, speeches, etc about America's Race Problem (its always capitalized) what to do about it, how we need to have a Serious Conversation about Race (always capitalized). My suggestion (*and its not gonna happen, but I can dream) is we spend the next 65 years NOT talking about it, NOT having Serious Conversations about it. Then we could see whee we are at. Is it better, Worse, About The Same? at least there would be some thing to compare.
*A certain political party Depends on it for power)
4. Where does it Say you Have to go to College to be successful? I had a boss who had a BA in history, he was in charge of Shipping & Receiving at a plant I worked at. WTH did having a BA in history have to do with that he did for a living?
I’d like to see stats on the graduation rates based on these lived experiences/race (since they cherish those stats for describing their student body.) And I mean at ALL schools from elite to pedestrians! I’ve heard much anecdotal evidence that kids given access who are not qualified and have no skin in the game (free rides) drop out when then work needs to be done. How is that working out for bragging rights?
1. I say this here every week or so…the kids can’t read or write, but now we’re spending money teaching them it’s because they’re oppressed.
2. Maybe 20 or more years ago NYTimes ran an analysis piece that colleges and businesses were meeting their affirmative action goals through Caribbean and African immigrant blacks, not the inner city and rural poor blacks that drove the process…because that was guaranteed success. I’d like to see if that has changed.
Just from my personal experience, I think professional affirmative action hires are over represented with non- native, non-American blacks and with the Native American blacks stuck in the HR corporate ghetto. Non- professional affirmative action hires are often ex-military. Just anecdotal guessing though.
I agree totally. If the college wanted to do something to improve minority kids' college performance, they would support school choice and start free tutoring for college-bound kids to prepare them for the rigors of higher ed. These days, applicants are not rejected for the color of their skin but for their poor chances at success, due to terrible elementary/h.s. education. And it's just wrong to take this attitude about rejected Asian students--well, he's doing all right in spite of being rejected--as reflected in the article.
Stuart Taylor and a colleague wrote a book about the mismatch problem years ago, and describing how this harms the intended beneficiary by maximizing the potential for failure at the select school.
I’ve seen that discussed. I totally agree with it and would take it one step farther. The mismatch is not just educational. If there is no family or similar infrastructural support for the student it’s is easy for them to get lost in their first true academic environment. Candidly that happened to me 50 years ago.
I have also seen the mismatch study easily demonized by a “so you think these kids are inferior “ argument. Wrongly but effectively unfortunately.
I know several high-school teachers and EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THEM sees high-school affinity groups as the place where good younger Black kids being to shift from being good students to becoming angry and adopt a societal victimhood mentality. Those affinity groups should be disbanded and if I had an African American kid in school, he/she would be absolutely forbidden to take part in it....I'm surprised adult Blacks even allow them to exist.
Well, of course no one’s child has to participate. But when people say things like, “The organization should be disbanded in schools,” that’s a different thing. And it’s a pointless conversation, because if we’re talking about public schools, it’s not even legally possible.
You're right. I don't know why anyone would send their kids to public schools, and increasingly, to private school. An all-girl Catholic school has a trans now. Grown young man in a dress uniform.
Keep in mind that we’ve had multiple generations that grew up in the affirmative action belief system. It would take independent thought for a black parent to buck the system. All parents, black and white, have a hard time doing that. Until COVID that is.
Well said. The answer to the "problem" of the diversity in college and university is to actually improve our school system in general. If our high schools and elementary schools actually taught our children then the playing field for entry to higher education would be leveled. And as you rightly mention, this would improve life not just for those who go on to college but for every child.
No one wants to admit that the real problem is a combination of our abysmal public school system and the breakdown of the nuclear family. It isn't about race, it's about poverty. The Orwellian named "affirmative action" is a way to distract from decades of ineffective policies pushed by largely Democratic politicians who have utterly failed to improve the lives of the poor. Using the laughable "lived life experience" as a pretext to divide available college spots along racial lines isn't going to fix the real problem.
Affirmative action also doesn't "benefit" the poor and disadvantaged. A great example of this is the privileged girl that got into Duke where her Mom is a professor. Why does she "deserve" a spot over Asian or White kids that grew up in poverty but were told by their parents to key to success is hard work? It is high time to end this nonsense and figure out real solutions.
No it isn’t all about poverty — in fact , very little is about poverty. It’s about the out-of-control conditions in many classrooms today. If children won’t respect the authority of the teacher to stop chaos within classrooms then it doesn’t matter if every kid has an IQ of 140. No will learn anything. This is an aspect of our failing schools that’s rarely discussed because it’s labeled “racist.”
Poverty has a lot to do with it if your public school is primarily poor kids, like many are where I live in Memphis. Every kid eats lunch free and that is sometimes the only guaranteed meal of the day. And the poverty and lack of education are multi-generational. Very hard to overcome. Charters are key to getting out of bad schools in some cities.
If the Democrats were to admit the real problem is poverty. Then they would have to include white Americans and that doesn’t work well into their agenda. (Which is muddled and confused I admit but helping white Americans doesn’t work in to the plan)
Some of the problem stems from the prison industrial complex and the psychological effect prison/gang culture has on kids growing up in poverty stricken area's. It has its own value system and replaces, for young men especially, the grounded self-esteem building rite of passage affirmation once provided by father's and a working class community. Where did the jobs, families and fathers go? Could self-interested inept and corrupt elected political leadership and bad social economic policy be a factor?
The DNC "woke" political pretended concern, exploitation and conflation of crime with revolution encouraged during the George Floyd riot's represents in large part the cause of the shop lifting, carjacking street violence we are seeing today. For the poor uneducated child at the bottom, is it better seeing oneself as a self-empowered victim with revolutionary agency and purpose or accept that my life and my future has been cancelled and I have been reduced to prison/street fodder by the rigged game narcissism of a corrupt financial elite. Is it combination of both? (We should probably all ask ourselves that question. I'm sure the J/6 people, Assange, Snowden, the growing thousands living cancelled lives and those incarcerated for thought crimes across the globe do so every day.)
Each year huge sums of tax payer dollars ear marked for education are flushed into the bureaucratic cesspool. Yet the child can't read and has no sense of the history and culture that should empower and inform his experience of America. Even the elite graduates we see assuming positions of power don't seem to actually be literate or connected to the cultural values that empower and define these things. And, the poor child is left with the metal detector he must pass through to enter the school building each morning and the atmosphere of emotional and physical violence it affirms.
We are no longer a literate society because the individual and an educated citizenry is a threat to the grift. Any half dozen articles across Substack will confirm this. Or, we can continue to believe there is no method behind this madness and those responsible can never be held to account. The violence, chaos, ignorance and disintegration will continue to escalate and it is already impacting every life here.
"I'm eighteen with a bullet/got my finger on the trigger/I'm gonna pull it..." Paul Wingfield
Because no one actually gives (as my grandma would say) a tinker's damn about poor and disadvantaged kids. The policies that got us here aren't ineffective - they accomplished every real goal they had. (Those goals just don't include improving the welfare of the "served.")
The perfect drone voter is illiterate, disinterested and dependent. The utterly abysmal state of public education in the poorest areas serves the smug chattering classes very well.
If they're black, they have an added benefit - their kids get a free pass into "elite academia". Harvard isn't going to reject the kid of a prominent leftist (like an Obama daughter), or a symbol of the left (Jazz Jennings) regardless of how ill prepared they are to get anything educational out of Harvard. (Very similar to how high performing student athletes are guaranteed admission and "assistance" throughout their college matriculation.)
I was initially going to post something about this, but you've said it all quite well.
If there is a genuine public interest in addressing persistent inequalities in circumstance and opportunity - not just by race, but also by class and geography and other kinds of situations that may hold people back unfairly - admission to elite universities is the very last place we should look.
Make sure every child in America has an opportunity to learn to read and do math; to understand the shared history and cultural heritage that somehow both unites and divides us; and above all to think, clearly and critically.
If only the Ivy''s weren't the only schools always mentioned in these articles. My ex=husband went to Harvard in the 60's . He was very smart, the son of a WHITE school teacher single mother in the hinterlands of the state where he lived. Ergo, although smart in scholastics, he was not a sophisticated well traveled 18 year old when he went off to Harvard on a full scholarship.
What he found was a freshman class filled with those "elite' ) all of whom belonged to the right clubs had traveled the world over and fit into the Harvard society. He had to work, live in a dorm with the other non-elites and was never considered a "Harvard{" type. He would never "network" with his peers. And his dorm mates were never invited to dinner at the professor's home. Professors were not above currying favor with those students from notable families.
On top of that, he said the education he received was not as advertised. All of the required classes in the first couple of years were held in huge rooms with 200 plus students,mostly taught by TA's. The big come on in those days was that Henry Kissinger was on the faculty as well as a lot of other big names, but they were never to be seen in classroom.
He hated it so much he took a year off between his junior and senior year and hung around Boston to get a taste of the life he had never lived back in his rural isolated town. He eventually graduated, went to medical school and ended up as a professor but he said he would have been happier at a smaller school with real teachers teaching real students.
I think that the pressure to succeed - not only academically but socially as well --is daunting at the Ivy's for all but the most privileged of 18 years olds. Sometimes a smaller college offers a better education and is TRULY diversified without all of the pretence ..
100% right. When my daughter went to college, she picked a small school because she said she would never get noticed or get attention in a large university. She is a shy introverted young woman, and the small school worked perfectly for her. Large elite universities lure big names and various laureates so they can brag they are on their faculty, but these professors are more like honorary figures too busy to appear in person and delegate teaching to TAs.
Agree, Bob K! Sadly the Progressive WOKE Left are more concerned about (and insisting on pushing) DEI and CRT over reading & math. Math, as well as Science, are now considered “racist” and a product of “White Privilege”
As is most every other thing the WOKE can blame in lieu of the Democrat failings to the people of color. I would say minorities, but it’s obvious the Left now views Asian people as “Whites” + any person of color who dares goes against the WOKE narrative/agenda is simply labeled a “White Supremacist of color”
Putting aside the larger question of the rightness or wrongness of affirmative action in general, consider that in focusing on education, specifically Ivy League caliber education, we are looking at the wrong metric if we want to do good by the needy.
If the goal is to actually help black children increase their chances for societal success, myopically focusing on whether Harvard or Yale has a black student population of 8% or 10% is a diversion. We, as a society, are ignoring the hundred of thousands of public school students, black and white, who can’t read, write or understand basic math. There is a large population of now 2nd and 3rd generation underclass citizens with no hope for a personal future.
We’ve had 50 years of racially based affirmative action in education and corporate America and what minimal benefits achievable from it have been banked. The left’s patting itself on the back for affirmative action policies that do no good for those in need while failing to address the disaster in our primary educational system is the height of hypocrisy.
For some reason, we have allowed the left to give us a binary choice; support affirmative action or let millions remain in poverty. Even though the beneficiaries of affirmative action are a small minority of our disadvantaged population, we accept this false choice as providing the only options available. I have no idea why.
The left needs the black underclass to stay relevant. The elite “all for me, none for thee” crowd is why public education is failing for most of us. Us meaning African Americans.
To add, affirmative action creates a mindset, a culture that does not help those it set out to help. The recipients don't have to work as hard pre college because just their "lived experience" (born the right color) will get them in. This gets carried on post college with DEI recruitment. What about the output of this individual to society? On the flip side another individual works their ass off their entire life and still gets rejected because they were born in a skin that did not agree with the ideology of the time. What about all the lost potential this individual could've contributed?
Race should not be included anywhere in the admissions process. It should only be revealed once an individual is admitted based purely on their merit both qualitative and quantitative.
Well I think the notion with elite school affirmative action is that elite school graduates tend to go onto careers in "elite" fields and become the "elite" of tomorrow, so the attempt to diversify who that "elite" will be with the goal of ostensibly getting more "diverse population" friendly policies and initiatives and practices across those varied fields they graduate into. I'm not sure we've had long enough an experience at it (basically, one generation that would have benefited from these policies to mature into leadership roles to effect these changes), and I'm not making a value judgement on it so much as to point out what the longer term goals of these programs are - change the leadership and "elite" makeup of America's leaders and influential policy makers.
Affirmative action does actually happen at lower tier schools as well, but the focus on the friction of affirmative action tends to take place at the elite schools because the amount of spots is much smaller, and the competition much fiercer. But it still a fact at public state as well as smaller private schools.
And yes, whether you support the goals or program itself, it is not a substitute for the much broader problems of some real disparities in race based educational achievement at the primary levels. Skimming off the top 10% of Black students into whatever higher education does nothing for the 90% that are being seriously underserved.
Big problem with that. When they can’t think critically, with an actual mind, nor understand what is happening around them, nor be capable of doing mathematics, then it all becomes bogus nonsense. Math matters. Whether you are an accountant or an engineer who has far more mathematical skills. Or, an astrophysicist. Math matters.
If you can’t do math, then just be quiet.
Ask yourself this very simple question—do you want the people in the cockpit on your next flight to have their jobs because of merit or affirmative action? 100% including every race, religion or gender will choose merit.
Great post!!
Thanks greatly. Much appreciate any praise. Not much practice on that end.
A couple of points/thoughts n no particular order.
1. There have been studies that show, that often a minority gets accepted to (say) Harvard, Stanford on an affirmative action scholarship, and either have a Real Hard Time or Drop out because they can't Cut It. Because they had a poor grade school/high school. If they went to a "Lesser" college they would do just fine.
2. Dennis Prager has said (and think he is right) It doesn't matte Where you went,, but Can You Do The Work? BTW now that I think of it Who The Hell decided (and when) that Ivy League schools were The Best Place to go? People that graduated from there?
3. For as long as I have been aware, and pad attention to the larger world (say 1958) there have been 1,000's...10's of 1,000's of articles, movies, speeches, etc about America's Race Problem (its always capitalized) what to do about it, how we need to have a Serious Conversation about Race (always capitalized). My suggestion (*and its not gonna happen, but I can dream) is we spend the next 65 years NOT talking about it, NOT having Serious Conversations about it. Then we could see whee we are at. Is it better, Worse, About The Same? at least there would be some thing to compare.
*A certain political party Depends on it for power)
4. Where does it Say you Have to go to College to be successful? I had a boss who had a BA in history, he was in charge of Shipping & Receiving at a plant I worked at. WTH did having a BA in history have to do with that he did for a living?
I’d like to see stats on the graduation rates based on these lived experiences/race (since they cherish those stats for describing their student body.) And I mean at ALL schools from elite to pedestrians! I’ve heard much anecdotal evidence that kids given access who are not qualified and have no skin in the game (free rides) drop out when then work needs to be done. How is that working out for bragging rights?
Are they held to a grading scale? Does one even exist any more?
Two parts here:
1. I say this here every week or so…the kids can’t read or write, but now we’re spending money teaching them it’s because they’re oppressed.
2. Maybe 20 or more years ago NYTimes ran an analysis piece that colleges and businesses were meeting their affirmative action goals through Caribbean and African immigrant blacks, not the inner city and rural poor blacks that drove the process…because that was guaranteed success. I’d like to see if that has changed.
Just from my personal experience, I think professional affirmative action hires are over represented with non- native, non-American blacks and with the Native American blacks stuck in the HR corporate ghetto. Non- professional affirmative action hires are often ex-military. Just anecdotal guessing though.
I agree totally. If the college wanted to do something to improve minority kids' college performance, they would support school choice and start free tutoring for college-bound kids to prepare them for the rigors of higher ed. These days, applicants are not rejected for the color of their skin but for their poor chances at success, due to terrible elementary/h.s. education. And it's just wrong to take this attitude about rejected Asian students--well, he's doing all right in spite of being rejected--as reflected in the article.
Stuart Taylor and a colleague wrote a book about the mismatch problem years ago, and describing how this harms the intended beneficiary by maximizing the potential for failure at the select school.
https://www.amazon.com/Mismatch-Affirmative-Students-%C2%92s-Universities/dp/0465029965/ref=la_B001H6IBCU_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1405540387&sr=1-2
Glad you brought this up. I was surprised the author didn't make this point as it seems to be a central problem that undermines the entire project.
I’ve seen that discussed. I totally agree with it and would take it one step farther. The mismatch is not just educational. If there is no family or similar infrastructural support for the student it’s is easy for them to get lost in their first true academic environment. Candidly that happened to me 50 years ago.
I have also seen the mismatch study easily demonized by a “so you think these kids are inferior “ argument. Wrongly but effectively unfortunately.
It's nice to see the comment section on this headed up by such an accurate and well thought out response.
I’ve always found the FP community to be generally thoughtful and polite.
I know several high-school teachers and EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THEM sees high-school affinity groups as the place where good younger Black kids being to shift from being good students to becoming angry and adopt a societal victimhood mentality. Those affinity groups should be disbanded and if I had an African American kid in school, he/she would be absolutely forbidden to take part in it....I'm surprised adult Blacks even allow them to exist.
You can’t just “disband” an affinity group in a public school. It’s a First Amendment issue.
Yes, but your child doesn't have to participate.
Well, of course no one’s child has to participate. But when people say things like, “The organization should be disbanded in schools,” that’s a different thing. And it’s a pointless conversation, because if we’re talking about public schools, it’s not even legally possible.
You're right. I don't know why anyone would send their kids to public schools, and increasingly, to private school. An all-girl Catholic school has a trans now. Grown young man in a dress uniform.
Keep in mind that we’ve had multiple generations that grew up in the affirmative action belief system. It would take independent thought for a black parent to buck the system. All parents, black and white, have a hard time doing that. Until COVID that is.
Well said. The answer to the "problem" of the diversity in college and university is to actually improve our school system in general. If our high schools and elementary schools actually taught our children then the playing field for entry to higher education would be leveled. And as you rightly mention, this would improve life not just for those who go on to college but for every child.
"...a binary choice; support affirmative action or let millions remain in poverty."
Less a choice than both and.
You wrote the wrong conjunction. That should have been “and”.
Hmm... reply not sticking. Trying again, I was using a quote (forgot first quote marks) so you'll have to take that up with the author.
No one wants to admit that the real problem is a combination of our abysmal public school system and the breakdown of the nuclear family. It isn't about race, it's about poverty. The Orwellian named "affirmative action" is a way to distract from decades of ineffective policies pushed by largely Democratic politicians who have utterly failed to improve the lives of the poor. Using the laughable "lived life experience" as a pretext to divide available college spots along racial lines isn't going to fix the real problem.
Affirmative action also doesn't "benefit" the poor and disadvantaged. A great example of this is the privileged girl that got into Duke where her Mom is a professor. Why does she "deserve" a spot over Asian or White kids that grew up in poverty but were told by their parents to key to success is hard work? It is high time to end this nonsense and figure out real solutions.
No it isn’t all about poverty — in fact , very little is about poverty. It’s about the out-of-control conditions in many classrooms today. If children won’t respect the authority of the teacher to stop chaos within classrooms then it doesn’t matter if every kid has an IQ of 140. No will learn anything. This is an aspect of our failing schools that’s rarely discussed because it’s labeled “racist.”
Poverty has a lot to do with it if your public school is primarily poor kids, like many are where I live in Memphis. Every kid eats lunch free and that is sometimes the only guaranteed meal of the day. And the poverty and lack of education are multi-generational. Very hard to overcome. Charters are key to getting out of bad schools in some cities.
Wrong. People with money wouldn't tolerate that shit in their kid's school for a nanosecond.
If the Democrats were to admit the real problem is poverty. Then they would have to include white Americans and that doesn’t work well into their agenda. (Which is muddled and confused I admit but helping white Americans doesn’t work in to the plan)
Yep.
Some of the problem stems from the prison industrial complex and the psychological effect prison/gang culture has on kids growing up in poverty stricken area's. It has its own value system and replaces, for young men especially, the grounded self-esteem building rite of passage affirmation once provided by father's and a working class community. Where did the jobs, families and fathers go? Could self-interested inept and corrupt elected political leadership and bad social economic policy be a factor?
The DNC "woke" political pretended concern, exploitation and conflation of crime with revolution encouraged during the George Floyd riot's represents in large part the cause of the shop lifting, carjacking street violence we are seeing today. For the poor uneducated child at the bottom, is it better seeing oneself as a self-empowered victim with revolutionary agency and purpose or accept that my life and my future has been cancelled and I have been reduced to prison/street fodder by the rigged game narcissism of a corrupt financial elite. Is it combination of both? (We should probably all ask ourselves that question. I'm sure the J/6 people, Assange, Snowden, the growing thousands living cancelled lives and those incarcerated for thought crimes across the globe do so every day.)
Each year huge sums of tax payer dollars ear marked for education are flushed into the bureaucratic cesspool. Yet the child can't read and has no sense of the history and culture that should empower and inform his experience of America. Even the elite graduates we see assuming positions of power don't seem to actually be literate or connected to the cultural values that empower and define these things. And, the poor child is left with the metal detector he must pass through to enter the school building each morning and the atmosphere of emotional and physical violence it affirms.
We are no longer a literate society because the individual and an educated citizenry is a threat to the grift. Any half dozen articles across Substack will confirm this. Or, we can continue to believe there is no method behind this madness and those responsible can never be held to account. The violence, chaos, ignorance and disintegration will continue to escalate and it is already impacting every life here.
"I'm eighteen with a bullet/got my finger on the trigger/I'm gonna pull it..." Paul Wingfield
Carter started the Department of Education in 1979 and schools have plunged straight downward in quality from that day to this.
DoE should be closed and all of its employees placed on 'do not re-hire.'
Because no one actually gives (as my grandma would say) a tinker's damn about poor and disadvantaged kids. The policies that got us here aren't ineffective - they accomplished every real goal they had. (Those goals just don't include improving the welfare of the "served.")
The perfect drone voter is illiterate, disinterested and dependent. The utterly abysmal state of public education in the poorest areas serves the smug chattering classes very well.
If they're black, they have an added benefit - their kids get a free pass into "elite academia". Harvard isn't going to reject the kid of a prominent leftist (like an Obama daughter), or a symbol of the left (Jazz Jennings) regardless of how ill prepared they are to get anything educational out of Harvard. (Very similar to how high performing student athletes are guaranteed admission and "assistance" throughout their college matriculation.)
I was initially going to post something about this, but you've said it all quite well.
If there is a genuine public interest in addressing persistent inequalities in circumstance and opportunity - not just by race, but also by class and geography and other kinds of situations that may hold people back unfairly - admission to elite universities is the very last place we should look.
Make sure every child in America has an opportunity to learn to read and do math; to understand the shared history and cultural heritage that somehow both unites and divides us; and above all to think, clearly and critically.
Improve candidates, not lower standards? You horrible man! ;)
I know, I know. I'm such a reactionary troglodyte!
If only the Ivy''s weren't the only schools always mentioned in these articles. My ex=husband went to Harvard in the 60's . He was very smart, the son of a WHITE school teacher single mother in the hinterlands of the state where he lived. Ergo, although smart in scholastics, he was not a sophisticated well traveled 18 year old when he went off to Harvard on a full scholarship.
What he found was a freshman class filled with those "elite' ) all of whom belonged to the right clubs had traveled the world over and fit into the Harvard society. He had to work, live in a dorm with the other non-elites and was never considered a "Harvard{" type. He would never "network" with his peers. And his dorm mates were never invited to dinner at the professor's home. Professors were not above currying favor with those students from notable families.
On top of that, he said the education he received was not as advertised. All of the required classes in the first couple of years were held in huge rooms with 200 plus students,mostly taught by TA's. The big come on in those days was that Henry Kissinger was on the faculty as well as a lot of other big names, but they were never to be seen in classroom.
He hated it so much he took a year off between his junior and senior year and hung around Boston to get a taste of the life he had never lived back in his rural isolated town. He eventually graduated, went to medical school and ended up as a professor but he said he would have been happier at a smaller school with real teachers teaching real students.
I think that the pressure to succeed - not only academically but socially as well --is daunting at the Ivy's for all but the most privileged of 18 years olds. Sometimes a smaller college offers a better education and is TRULY diversified without all of the pretence ..
100% right. When my daughter went to college, she picked a small school because she said she would never get noticed or get attention in a large university. She is a shy introverted young woman, and the small school worked perfectly for her. Large elite universities lure big names and various laureates so they can brag they are on their faculty, but these professors are more like honorary figures too busy to appear in person and delegate teaching to TAs.
Agree, Bob K! Sadly the Progressive WOKE Left are more concerned about (and insisting on pushing) DEI and CRT over reading & math. Math, as well as Science, are now considered “racist” and a product of “White Privilege”
As is most every other thing the WOKE can blame in lieu of the Democrat failings to the people of color. I would say minorities, but it’s obvious the Left now views Asian people as “Whites” + any person of color who dares goes against the WOKE narrative/agenda is simply labeled a “White Supremacist of color”