ARE IVY DEGREES WORTH THE SACRIFICES

ending their kids to ivy league universities is the dream of every Asian American parent. Or so it seems. And there is no shortage of young AA willing to oblige. As of 2000, Asian Americans made up 12-19% of the undergrad enrollments of the top-20 ivies.
     No one questions the prestige associated with ivy degrees. In fact, sneer critics, that's the only thing bought with the extra money. And even that, they add, is wearing thin in a nation in which he cultural center of gravity has shifted to California.
     It's true that investments in high ivy tuitions often don't show up in career earnings when compared with graduates of public universities of comparable student body profiles. But the criticisms run deeper than return on investment. Some Asian Americans who have attended ivy league colleges have come away regretting their decisions for other reasons.
     Foremost is the sense that the ivies are structured for the benefit of legatees, the progeny of blueblooded alumni. Comprising upwards of 40% of some ivies, the legatees are often exempted from stringent admissions standards. The result is that AA students with excellent credentials are the workhorses preserving the institutions' high academic reputations, thereby giving a free ride to undeserving legatees.
     Another common complaint is that the deck is stacked socially against Asian males in a system designed to preserve the princely status quo of the scions of WASP families. A disproportionate number of attractive AA females are admitted by the ivies, some have observed, while far fewer attractive AA males are admitted. This subtle bias, suspect critics, is implemented in the screening interviews used by most ivies.
     Then there's the Eurocentric worldview imposed by the courses. Not to mention the lousy weather, bland food and having to put up with locals hostile toward Asians. Contrast all this against the majority-ease lifestyles enjoyed by the AA in, say, the UC campuses.
     The bragging rights an ivy education affords parents, conclude critics, are far outweighed by the psychic and emotional sacrifices exacted from their kids.
     Does an ivy education provide rewards commensurate with the sacrifices? Or is it a trap for AA with overzealous parents with old-world views?

(Updated )

Yellow Panther:

I forgot to tell that the numbers i gave for Harvard, UCLA and Boalt are for their litigation practice group world wide not for other practice areas like IP or tax or corporate. Mr. sullivan i believe is connected to the D.C. firm of Covington and Burling.
Too bad your firm did not get the Microsoft account, no billable hours eh?
biakanabato
   Sunday, April 28, 2002 at 17:36:18 (PDT)
yellow panther

I had mentioned before the backgrund of the lead attorney in the MIcrosoft antitrust case. I was saying it from memory.

You claim that a guy with the Slavic sounding name of Urovsky is the lead attorney defending MIcrosoft.

I said previously several weeks ago, that the current lead attorney defending MIcrosoft in the antitrust case is someone who got his undergrad degree from Western Illinois University and his JD degree Loyola Chicago law school.

I alluded to this fact from memory,
now I checked the data again. He is indeed the guy who is the current round of Microsoft antitrust case. He is a guy by the name of Daniel Webb from the Winston and Strawn Chicago firm.
His opponent ( the one hired by the feds is Brendan Sullivan who if I remember correctly from a few months ago got his undergrad degree from Boston College and his juris doctor from Georgetown Law Center ). Oliver North hired him as his attorney during Iran - Contra affair. Brendan Sullivan a proper Catholic Irish name for 2 proper Catholic schools, don't you think so ?

biaknabato
   Sunday, April 28, 2002 at 17:17:39 (PDT)
Yellow Panther,

My recent hurried missive further requires some delineation. First of all , I am not a lawyer nor am I aspiring to be one. I am not connected to Goldman Sachs or Deloitte or Ernest Young, nor am i aspiring to be in finance or be an investment banker.

So your apropos commentary about my misordering of deceased law partners ' name is silly. Mea culpa, I would concede with regards to the incorrect scriptorial rendering of the deceased partners names' who have gone to their just reward as adjudicated by the Star Chamber in the Great Beyond.

And also, I thought there were no yellow panthers ( Panthera pardus ).
I thought there were no yellow panthers. Apparently there are. There are also clouded leopards and snow leopards (Uncas Uncas , hey I'm saying this from memory ). And yes there are also black panthers (melanism has something to do with it }.

I am happy with my current profession which has nothing to do with the law or finance. BTW. if I remeber it correctly from high school the American mountain lion aka catamount is also called a panther. Perhaps the word
biaknabato
   Sunday, April 28, 2002 at 17:05:44 (PDT)
penelope,

Since I'm not in law, I have no clue as to whether Albany is 2nd tier or last tier. But assuming Albany is not too, too far off rank-wise from Harvard, I wonder if there are cases where the white from the lower ranking school with otherwise equal credentials gets the job over the Asian.

In academia, I have heard many cases of discrimination where lower-qualified white males are picked over better-qualified white females and minorities(regardless of sex). One of my white female friends in chemistry saw this happen all the time: she tells me that when the search committee says it hasn't found anyone suitable, it really means it hasn't found any WHITE MALE suitable. This is why white female Ph.D's in chem end up bucking academia for industry.

In English lit, Europeans speaking and writing English as a second language-- will sometimes get preference over British/American-born Asians whose first language is English (with all credentials otherwise equal). LOL, I was once advised to state my birthplace in my CV AND to create a language section so that I can remind the reader that English is indeed my first language "because there are lots of ignorant people." I guess if you're AA, you still have to "prove" your "Americaness" or "Westerness"--something that an European-American, or even an European FOB, does not have to do!

Asian Dominatrix
   Monday, April 08, 2002 at 16:00:46 (PDT)

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