# Anti-achievement at its finest: Acceptance by 20 colleges called "obnoxious" **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [April 13, 2018, 4:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anti-achievement-at-its-finest-acceptance-by-20-colleges-called-obnoxious/812353 "2018-04-13T16:51:20Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Slash1972](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slash1972/32/6461_2.png) [@Slash1972](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slash1972)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2018, 7:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anti-achievement-at-its-finest-acceptance-by-20-colleges-called-obnoxious/812353/81 "2018-04-16T19:38:00Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > Of course. People can’t honestly disagree; they must be dishonest and/or evil. Makes it much easier to mock and dismiss those who disagree. Not as much fun to mock and dismiss folks who you think are decent and honest folk just coming at things from a different point of view. You disagree with “Here is an eminently well-qualified student. Plus, he’s black. He can write his own ticket.” ??? ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2018, 7:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anti-achievement-at-its-finest-acceptance-by-20-colleges-called-obnoxious/812353/82 "2018-04-16T19:45:39Z")
> [@Slash1972](#): > > You disagree with “Here is an eminently well-qualified student. Plus, he’s black. He can write his own ticket.” ??? I generally don’t like making such assumptions. But since I was the one who criticized the myth that high achievening black people didn’t earn their positions, I assumed his shot about “trying to be offended” was about me. ---
**Author:** ![Ashtura](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ashtura/32/2963_2.png) [@Ashtura](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ashtura)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2018, 7:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anti-achievement-at-its-finest-acceptance-by-20-colleges-called-obnoxious/812353/83 "2018-04-16T19:49:51Z")
I’m not going to say it’s obnoxious, but I find it very hard to believe that he would have actually gone to every single school on that list. And yes I do think taking a slot in a school you wouldn’t go to can be detrimental to your peers. ---
**Author:** ![Slash1972](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slash1972/32/6461_2.png) [@Slash1972](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slash1972)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2018, 7:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anti-achievement-at-its-finest-acceptance-by-20-colleges-called-obnoxious/812353/84 "2018-04-16T19:55:50Z")
> [@Ashtura](#): > > I’m not going to say it’s obnoxious, but I find it very hard to believe that he would have actually gone to every single school on that list. And yes I do think taking a slot in a school you wouldn’t go to can be detrimental to your peers. Doesn’t this assume that anyone who gets accepted to any school but doesn’t attend that school makes the school have one less student that year? Seems like a faulty assumption to me. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2018, 8:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anti-achievement-at-its-finest-acceptance-by-20-colleges-called-obnoxious/812353/85 "2018-04-16T20:16:48Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > > [@manson1972](#): > > > > You disagree with “Here is an eminently well-qualified student. Plus, he’s black. He can write his own ticket.” ??? > > I generally don’t like making such assumptions. But since I was the one who criticized the myth that high achievening black people didn’t earn their positions, I assumed his shot about “trying to be offended” was about me. What assumptions are you talking about? The kid is really well-qualified - read the OP. He is really black - it’s there too. And he is in very high demand - he got accepted to 20 different schools, including some pretty prestigious ones. And I did not even imply that he didn’t earn it. He did earn it - that’s what “well-qualified” and remarks about his stellar SATs mean. You reacted to something you didn’t see. Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [April 16, 2018, 8:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anti-achievement-at-its-finest-acceptance-by-20-colleges-called-obnoxious/812353/86 "2018-04-16T20:45:37Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > What assumptions are you talking about? The kid is really well-qualified - read the OP. He is really black - it’s there too. And he is in very high demand - he got accepted to 20 different schools, including some pretty prestigious ones. And I did not even imply that he didn’t earn it. He did earn it - that’s what “well-qualified” and remarks about his stellar SATs mean. > > You reacted to something you didn’t see. > > Regards, > Shodan Possibly. I took your comment to be that it’s trivially easy for a black kid with good scores to get accepted into a good school, and that he and his parents were motivated by trying to get all these schools to compete for him, rather than that they were hedging their bets to make sure he got at least one. If I was mistaken, I’ll gladly retract. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [April 17, 2018, 1:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anti-achievement-at-its-finest-acceptance-by-20-colleges-called-obnoxious/812353/87 "2018-04-17T13:01:58Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > Possibly. I took your comment to be that it’s trivially easy for a black kid with good scores to get accepted into a good school, and that he and his parents were motivated by trying to get all these schools to compete for him, rather than that they were hedging their bets to make sure he got at least one. > > If I was mistaken, I’ll gladly retract. None of those things can reasonably interpreted as a claim that high-achieving blacks don’t earn their success. That’s the part that you need to retract, because that’s the part that you saw that wasn’t there. [ul][li]It **is** easy for a black kid with his kind of scores to get accepted into a good school. Notice that he got into every school he applied to.[/ul][/li][ul][li]If he and his parents didn’t apply to all those schools to get them to compete with one another, he should have. A kid like this is the intellectual equivalent of a high school basketball star - schools are desperate to get him. There is nothing whatever wrong with getting the best offer he gets, and he is going to get very good offers. A full ride scholarship is the absolute minimum he can expect. [/ul][/li][ul][li]‘Gee, I wasn’t sure I could get into any one school, so I applied to twenty different ones’ shows a becoming modesty, but there is a point at which modesty shades off into naiveté. This kid is in very high demand. If he didn’t know it before, he knows it now. Black kids who perform at his level are rather rare - see my cite, which shows that Asians and whites make up a huge majority of the top scorers on the SATs. Any school that values high achieving students, and “diversity”, is going to fall all over themselves to attract the rather few who fulfill both goals. [/ul]Come on - “obvious” is too mild a term for this.[/li] Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![Slash1972](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slash1972/32/6461_2.png) [@Slash1972](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slash1972)\ **Post date:** [April 17, 2018, 1:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anti-achievement-at-its-finest-acceptance-by-20-colleges-called-obnoxious/812353/88 "2018-04-17T13:09:21Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > Possibly. I took your comment to be that it’s trivially easy for a black kid with good scores to get accepted into a good school, and that he and his parents were motivated by trying to get all these schools to compete for him, rather than that they were hedging their bets to make sure he got at least one. > > If I was mistaken, I’ll gladly retract. You don’t think it’s trivially easy for a black kid with good scores to get accepted into a good school? ---
**Author:** ![Gyrate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gyrate/32/3588_2.png) [@Gyrate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gyrate)\ **Post date:** [April 17, 2018, 1:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anti-achievement-at-its-finest-acceptance-by-20-colleges-called-obnoxious/812353/89 "2018-04-17T13:22:29Z")
> [@Ambivalid](#): > > Maybe I’m drunk but aren’t they all required to read from the same script? I think I’m just drunk. But at least in limited scope, isn’t that true? Or am I confusing things? I suspect you’re confusing the Fox networks with the Sinclair networks - similar right-wing propaganda, but Sinclair dictates newsreader scripts and other pieces to be broadcast. Local Fox anchors have more leeway as to how big an asshole they want to be (or indeed not). ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [April 17, 2018, 1:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anti-achievement-at-its-finest-acceptance-by-20-colleges-called-obnoxious/812353/90 "2018-04-17T13:49:25Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > None of those things can reasonably interpreted as a claim that high-achieving blacks don’t earn their success. That’s the part that you need to retract, because that’s the part that you saw that wasn’t there. If you don’t believe that high-achieving black people don’t earn their success, then I’ll happily retract that part. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [April 17, 2018, 1:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anti-achievement-at-its-finest-acceptance-by-20-colleges-called-obnoxious/812353/91 "2018-04-17T13:59:06Z")
> [@](#): > > Quoth **Ashtura** : > > And yes I do think taking a slot in a school you wouldn’t go to can be detrimental to your peers. What the heck do you mean, “taking a slot in a school you wouldn’t go to”? If you’re not going to the school, you’re not taking the slot. ---
**Author:** ![Fotheringay-Phipps](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/d9b06d/32.png) [@Fotheringay-Phipps](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fotheringay-Phipps)\ **Post date:** [April 17, 2018, 2:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anti-achievement-at-its-finest-acceptance-by-20-colleges-called-obnoxious/812353/92 "2018-04-17T14:03:17Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > If you don’t believe that high-achieving black people don’t earn their success, then I’ll happily retract that part. This is not a proper approach. Shodan made an assertion. You’ve refused to take a position on that assertion. But at the same time, you’ve inferred something else from that assertion and imputed that inference to Shodan. All the while refusing to deny that you yourself agree with the very assertion from which you’re drawing your inference. Do you think it follows from “_It is easy for a black kid with his kind of scores to get accepted into a good school_” that “_high-achieving black people don’t earn their success_”? If you believe that this follows, then you yourself must either disagree with “_It is easy for a black kid with his kind of scores to get accepted into a good school_”, in which case you should forthrightly own that position, or agree with “_high-achieving black people don’t earn their success_”, in which case you shouldn’t attack Shodan over it. And if you think the second statement does not follow from the first, then your initial inference was wrong to begin with, and you should cease attributing this position to Shodan, even in the form of a demand that he renounce it. ---
**Author:** ![MandaJo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ac91a4/32.png) [@MandaJo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MandaJo)\ **Post date:** [April 17, 2018, 2:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anti-achievement-at-its-finest-acceptance-by-20-colleges-called-obnoxious/812353/93 "2018-04-17T14:31:51Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > What the heck do you mean, “taking a slot in a school you wouldn’t go to”? If you’re not going to the school, you’re not taking the slot. There is sometimes a concern that colleges will only take a limited number of students from a particular school, district, or geographic region. There is some truth to this, but it is not absolute. Given that, applying to schools that you absolutely would not go to no matter what even if they offered you a full ride and you had no other offer is fairly obnoxious. Assembling and evaluating a competitive college application also takes a lot of time and emotional energy on the part of a lot of people–both at the applicant’s school and at the university. Again, asking people to invest that time and energy if you are 100% positive you are not going is obnoxious. That said, I see no reason to believe this student is that student. This year, I had a student apply to 20 colleges and get 1 affordable option–and that was a crazy good option. It absolutely happens. I had two students I thought were locks for MIT and needed maybe one or two backups–they applied broadly and got shut out by _everywhere_ except Duke, which was a way better school than many that rejected them. This student probably didn’t need to be _quite_ so exhaustive in his application process, but I don’t know why he would have known that: I can recognize a unicorn because I do this professionally, but all the time I work with kids who have no clue about their relative competitiveness in this game. The only thing that would be obnoxious is if he knew he was going to Stanford, where he got in early, in December. I had a little girl this year get into Yale early. THe money was good enough, it was her first choice, so she pulled her other apps. That was a good thing to do. If he was 100% Stanford, then he was wasting a lot of people’s time to apply other places. But I don’t see any reason to believe he felt that way. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [April 17, 2018, 4:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anti-achievement-at-its-finest-acceptance-by-20-colleges-called-obnoxious/812353/94 "2018-04-17T16:09:26Z")
> [@Fotheringay-Phipps](#): > > This is not a proper approach. > > Shodan made an assertion. You’ve refused to take a position on that assertion. But at the same time, you’ve inferred something else from that assertion and imputed that inference to Shodan. All the while refusing to deny that you yourself agree with the very assertion from which you’re drawing your inference. > > Do you think it follows from “_It is easy for a black kid with his kind of scores to get accepted into a good school_” that “_high-achieving black people don’t earn their success_”? If you believe that this follows, then you yourself must either disagree with “_It is easy for a black kid with his kind of scores to get accepted into a good school_”, in which case you should forthrightly own that position, or agree with “_high-achieving black people don’t earn their success_”, in which case you shouldn’t attack Shodan over it. > > And if you think the second statement does not follow from the first, then your initial inference was wrong to begin with, and you should cease attributing this position to Shodan, even in the form of a demand that he renounce it. My initial inference was from more than just that statement (I wouldn’t have made the inference from that assertion alone). I don’t know if that assertion is true or not; I’ve heard it many times before, but I also know anecdotally many black kids who did great in school but struggled to get into good colleges. And words like “easy” can mean a lot of different things. ---
**Author:** ![Fotheringay-Phipps](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/d9b06d/32.png) [@Fotheringay-Phipps](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fotheringay-Phipps)\ **Post date:** [April 17, 2018, 4:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anti-achievement-at-its-finest-acceptance-by-20-colleges-called-obnoxious/812353/95 "2018-04-17T16:15:01Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > My initial inference was from more than just that statement (I wouldn’t have made the inference from that assertion alone). What was the inference from? > [@](#): > > I don’t know if that assertion is true or not; I’ve heard it many times before, but I also know anecdotally many black kids who did great in school but struggled to get into good colleges. Shodan posted some numbers, with a link. Leaving aside both what you heard and what you know anecdotally, it would seem that his numbers support his claim. > [@](#): > > And words like “easy” can mean a lot of different things. In the context of both this thread and his specific point, it seems pretty clear that “easy” as used here means “has a high likelihood of success”. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [April 17, 2018, 4:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anti-achievement-at-its-finest-acceptance-by-20-colleges-called-obnoxious/812353/96 "2018-04-17T16:23:02Z")
> [@Fotheringay-Phipps](#): > > What was the inference from?Shodan posted some numbers, with a link. Leaving aside both what you heard and what you know anecdotally, it would seem that his numbers support his claim.In the context of both this thread and his specific point, it seems pretty clear that “easy” as used here means “has a high likelihood of success”. This is boring enough that I don’t feel like looking back at what he wrote and then I wrote and then answering. You and Shodan win, I lose, you are the triumphant victors; feel free to display my caged, huddled husk in a parade down the Via Sacra to the cheering masses. ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2018, 1:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anti-achievement-at-its-finest-acceptance-by-20-colleges-called-obnoxious/812353/97 "2018-04-19T13:18:09Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > Because he found out that all twenty would be throwing money at him.What the dickens are you talking about? > > Regards, > Shodan He is offended that you think that being black helped him get into all 20 colleges. You are implying that he wouldn’t have gotten accepted at all 20 colleges if he weren’t black. He is further offended that black people who get into good schools have to deal with the stigma associated with AA even if they didn’t need the AA to get in. ---
**Author:** ![Slash1972](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slash1972/32/6461_2.png) [@Slash1972](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slash1972)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2018, 1:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anti-achievement-at-its-finest-acceptance-by-20-colleges-called-obnoxious/812353/98 "2018-04-19T13:25:32Z")
> [@Damuri\_Ajashi](#): > > He is offended that you think that being black helped him get into all 20 colleges. You are implying that he wouldn’t have gotten accepted at all 20 colleges if he weren’t black. > > He is further offended that black people who get into good schools have to deal with the stigma associated with AA even if they didn’t need the AA to get in. I don’t think that’s it. I think he is offended that people can work hard to get ahead in life and be successful without having to wait around for the end of systemic racism. ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2018, 1:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anti-achievement-at-its-finest-acceptance-by-20-colleges-called-obnoxious/812353/99 "2018-04-19T13:40:13Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > I generally don’t like making such assumptions. But since I was the one who criticized the myth that high achievening black people didn’t earn their positions, I assumed his shot about “trying to be offended” was about me. But you ARE trying to be offended and calling Shodan a racist in the process. Betting into all 8 ivy’s is rare and it doesn’t ONLY happen to black students but it happens to them disproportionately and being black is the reason why. They would probably have gotten into a few of them but getting into all of them is really rubbing their high achievement into the faces of white people who think AA is the reason why they are going to community college instead of Princeton. So stop it high achieving black people. Stop making white people sad. ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [April 19, 2018, 1:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anti-achievement-at-its-finest-acceptance-by-20-colleges-called-obnoxious/812353/100 "2018-04-19T13:43:13Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > Possibly. I took your comment to be that it’s trivially easy for a black kid with good scores to get accepted into a good school, and that he and his parents were motivated by trying to get all these schools to compete for him, rather than that they were hedging their bets to make sure he got at least one. > > If I was mistaken, I’ll gladly retract. Will you promise not to keep looking for reasons to be offended? Because that happens too much around here and if you’re not part of the solution, then… [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anti-achievement-at-its-finest-acceptance-by-20-colleges-called-obnoxious/812353.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/anti-achievement-at-its-finest-acceptance-by-20-colleges-called-obnoxious/812353.md?page=6)