Tough Odds for Asian Americans

For Asian American applicants to Harvard, checking off the “particular ethnic group” box on the Common Application just became more nerve-wracking.

According to a study published Friday in the UCLA Journal of Education and Information Studies, affirmative action policies disadvantage Asian American applicants more than they do white ones.

Charles V. Willie, a professor at Harvard’s Graduate School of Education and an expert in school desegregation, attributes this finding to Asian Americans having the most integrated educational experiences and attending college at very high rates relative to other groups.

Still, he said, the College strives to maintain its standard of diversity.

“Harvard has not disproportionately excluded Asian Americans,” Willie said, adding that Asian Americans make up the highest proportion of ethnic minorities at Harvard. “The issue has been whether the white people will take all the goodies. Harvard has decided no.”

But others disagree with Harvard’s use of affirmative action.

Roger B. Clegg, president and general counsel of the Center for Equal Opportunity, believes in a merit-based system of college admission that does not consider race.

In a system where one group is deemed “overrepresented,” such as Asian Americans under current admissions schemes, it is inevitable that other “underrepresented” groups will gain ground, Clegg said.

Harvard’s Asian American enrollment has slightly increased over the years. According to Harvard College Admissions Office statistics in the Harvard Gazette, 19.6% of students admitted for the class of 2011 were Asian Americans, up from 16.4% for the class of 2000.

This is not the first time top schools have come under scrutiny for their admissions policies regarding Asian Americans.

In 1990, the federal government investigated Harvard for discriminating against Asian applicants. The investigation found that lower admission rates for Asians—despite somewhat stronger academic credentials—could be attributed to legacy and athlete preferences, which primarily benefited white applicants.

Yi Chen ’09, co-president of the Asian American Association, said that she didn’t think too much about her ethnicity when applying to college.

“Harvard is hard to get into, period,” Chen said. “You just appreciate racial diversity here.”

The study was conducted by David R. Colburn, a history professor at the University of Florida; Victor M. Yellen, a former director of institutional research at Florida; and Charles E. Young, professor and former chancellor of UCLA. The trio looked at enrollment data from the University of California’s Berkeley, Los Angeles, and San Diego campuses, as well as the University of Florida and the University of Texas at Austin.

All three schools ended affirmative action during the period under examination, after state-wide laws banned the policy, the study says.

According to the Chronicle of Higher Education, Asian American enrollment increased at each of the aforementioned schools after the policy change.

—Staff writer Lingbo Li can be reached at lingboli@fas.harvard.edu.