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Comment by zzt123 | Hacker News Reader

Ah. So when the article says that by percentage, white students are underrepresented, that’s because the denominator for the student body population includes all students (thus also international and out of state students), rather than just in-state California students?

Tricky article!

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This is not true, you can see the data[1] yourself for in-state students. It is true that of in-state students at UCs, white students are "underrepresented" compared to their share of the population, but their share of admissions is actually very close to their share of applications so there could be other reasons for this. For example, white students in CA may be:

* more likely to apply to private schools

* more able to afford private schools

* more likely to get accepted to private schools that don't have the same race-blind admissions restrictions that UCs do

* more likely to go out-of-state for college

[1] https://accountability.universityofcalifornia.edu/2021/chapt...

Ah, thanks for the link!

There is a chance; but more than likely they're quietly mixing what they count in the denominator; especially since with the rest of the URM group and whites it seems they are very careful to call out that its comparisons between the high school pipeline and the in-state collegiate pipeline, but aren't as careful when discussing the AAPI pipeline.

Also, it looks like the study is following federal guidelines (IPEDS/NCES) on student groups; so Asian in this context for international students includes everyone from Korea, China, and Japan, down to the Malaysian Peninsula, through India, all the way west to the Arabian Peninsula (you know, like about 50% of the world population, no biggie there); so there may be some weird mixing of what's included in the denominator for AAPI students.

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