Asians/South Asians - really minorities?

[utaustin]

What's the status on this? Because, I'd like to know if this is even a consideration.

I remember for undergrad, being asian wasn't considered minority status.

I was thinking about mentioning a part of it in my personal statement. No one in my family (and extended family) practices law or knows very much about it. My formative experiences with lawyers I've come across are 50 year old republicans who talk about how smart their daughter is going to Baylor.

[dgatl]

First of all, yes, we are minorities.  Well I can't speak for all asians in general, but I'm sure mongolians or hmongs would be URM (underrepresented).  South Asian?  Well being desi I hate that phrase because it doesn't mean *&^%.  Indian people are over-represented.  I'm sure its the same of pakis.  Dunno if bangladeshi/nepali/afghani people are just lumped in with desis or if they are URM.

But don't expect any kind of an advantage. 

Your PS could play that angle.  One of my PS described the resounding cry of disbelief at a family gathering when they found out I was going to go for law instead of medicine. 

[Dewitt]

some schools consider southeast asian's urm's. for instance, the university of wisconsin law school. with that school, they have several boxes for asians to check. most, however, just have you check the all encompassing "asian" box.

[NerdasaurusRex]

I wonder how knowledgeable addcomms are of figuring out ethnicity based on last names.

[ElizaB]

I'm not Asian but I came across this board so I thought I would share what little knowledge I had on the subject.

I did some research on whether Asian's were considered "under-represented" in the college admissions process because my nephew by marriage (he lives with my brother who is, for all purposes, his "Dad") is half Hispanic and half Fillipino.  My brother asked me what his nephew should list as his race/ethnicity.  Interestingly enough, I found out that that MCAT scores and GPA's for Asian and Indian Americans admitted to Med School were actually quite a bit higher than the average MCAT scores and GPA's of the admitted white people.  They are not given under-represented status.  Now, I have to admit that I was researching medical school (not law school), so it may be entirely possible that Asian-Americans are considered under-represented for law school.     

[ab3]

Yeah, I've wondered this same thing.  As someone whose father is from India, but whose mother is from Trinidad, I always dread ticking off the "Other" box.  I tend to wonder if law schools prefer that you belong to one of the categories that they can show off more succinctly in their stats.

Since my mom is not Indian, I also wonder if I should tick off Asian / African American to better my chances.  The only thing is I look 100% indian and have an indian name!

Ideas?

[Tobias Beecher]

Yeah, I've wondered this same thing.  As someone whose father is from India, but whose mother is from Trinidad, I always dread ticking off the "Other" box.  I tend to wonder if law schools prefer that you belong to one of the categories that they can show off more succinctly in their stats.

Since my mom is not Indian, I also wonder if I should tick off Asian / African American to better my chances.  The only thing is I look 100% indian and have an indian name!

Ideas?

you may use the "one drop rule" in this case.

[UMHBmom]

In Baylor's diversity statement, they do specifically list Asians as URM. I'm thinking this may be a case-by-case basis. I'm half Korean and half Jewish, but I check the Asian box for 2 reasons: I look it, therefore I'm treated like it, and my father died when I was young and I was raised in Koreatown. I get a bit testy about the "Asian" box, personally. There are an awful lot of ethnicities that fall under the category. Japanese and Chinese Americans are the overwhelming majority of Asian college students, but that's simply due to the fact that they have been in this country longer and they have larger populations than other Asian communities. It would be a shame for Philipinos and Vietnamese to lose URM status because the schools are flooded with other ethnicities that in no way represent THEIR culture. I know that the Korean community is booming now, too, but it wasn't long ago when most Americans had never even HEARD of Korea. I spent most of my grade school years being referred to as "that Chinese girl". Regardless, while Asians are well-represented in colleges, they are not well-represented in the law. My .02.

[DOWNY COOLEY]

did you know that if you stuff pancakes down your pants and run a marathon that they will come out with butter on them?