Indian American Discrimination in Admissions

Stereotypes are fixed-action patterns. And they’ve been preprogrammed into our brains since the time when we were hunter-gatherers. So do college admissions officers stereotype? They’re human. You bet they do.

With the announcement that an Asian American coalition will be filing suit against Brown University, Dartmouth College, and Yale University for alleged discriminatory practices in admissions, we feel the need to draw attention to another group of students who also face discrimination in highly selective college admissions — they just don’t form coalitions that file civil rights suits against universities. And that group? It’s Indian American applicants. They certainly don’t get the publicity that Chinese American and Korean American applicants for the high bar they must surmount to earn admission to these very schools, but they face very similar discrimination nonetheless.

We help our Indian American students overcome the discrimination that they will invariably face in admissions. We help them — dare we say it — not play into stereotypes. And, yes, admissions officers at highly selective colleges stereotype. Will they admit it? No way. But we all stereotype. It’s part of being human. We were all originally hunter-gatherers. We had to make quick decisions — to survive. Stereotyping is using fixed-action patterns to understand scenarios rapidly. So anyone who should suggest that they don’t stereotype might be trying to be politically correct but they are defying the very laws of science. And those laws are surely at play in highly selective college admissions. To stereotype is to be human.

Have a question about the discrimination that Indian American students face in highly selective college admissions? We’re curious to hear from our readers so post a Comment below.