[262] in Discussion of MIT-community interests
Re: Affirmative action
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Victoria K. Anderson)
Fri Apr 27 23:09:13 2001
Message-Id: <200104280306.XAA29559@melbourne-city-street.mit.edu>
Date: Fri, 27 Apr 2001 23:05:44 -0400
To: "Christopher D. Beland" <beland@MIT.EDU>
From: "Victoria K. Anderson" <vkanders@MIT.EDU>
Cc: mit-talk@MIT.EDU
In-Reply-To: <200104280253.WAA19568@Press-Your-Luck.mit.edu>
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At 10:53 PM 4/27/01 , you wrote:
>
>What sort of "diversity" is appropriate for this community of
>scholars?
I purposefully didn't define "underrepresented minority" as a racial
category. For example, one could argue that students from the rocky
mountain and southern states are underrepresented, yet it is important to
include such students in the student body to ensure that students have an
opportunity to interact with students from all over the country (and the
world, for that matter). So this might mean admitting John from Montana
with an SAT score of 1400 instead of Ed from New York with an SAT score of
1420. I personally think that it would be more valuable to have a broader
intellectual perspective in our student body by admitting John. True, Ed
may turn out to be the winner of the Nobel Prize 20 years from now and MIT
misses out on an opportunity, but John could as well. In the meantime, John
will bring a different perspective to MIT for the four years that he is
here and benefit the other 10,000 students here *perhaps* more than Ed
would (obviously we can't make that judgement call just based on where Ed
and John are from, which is why I emphasized perhaps).
**********************
Victoria Anderson
MIT Undergraduate Association
Co-Chair, Student Committee on Educational Policy
500 Memorial Drive #428
Cambridge, MA 02139
(617) 225-8828
