This isn’t limited to just college admissions, but yes unsurprisingly, being rich is a lifehack in general
In other astonishing news, water is wet and we’ve fucked up this planet.
technically speaking, water isn’t wet, it makes other things wet. http://scienceline.ucsb.edu/getkey.php?key=6097
Two interesting takes I’ve seen on this is that
A) It’s really the hyper-rich top 1% who are vastly overrepresented, if you look at the top 20% or something the effect isn’t there, which is interesting.
B) Some see the removal of standardized tests as a way to encourage diversity, but Nate Silver pointed out that the hyper-rich have the same test scores as other applicants but do much better on recommendations and extracurricular activities etc, so if you want to prevent rich people from being overrepresented one solution is relying MORE on standardized tests.
“Poor people hate this trick!”
Honestly as well meaning affirmative action is meant to be, it’s arguably targeting the wrong thing, which rather than admitting based on race, it should be based on class. True diversity comes from people from different lifestyles, regardless of race, instead of all from the elite.