Monday, November 14, 2011

Veteran's Day


(Cartoon from the AAEC).

I was thinking of how I could fit Veteran's Day into the theme of my blog– women veterans? Integration of the military? Don't ask, don't tell? Then I figured, why not just veterans in general?

It seems kind of strange to think of veterans as a minority group. Then again, veterans make up less than 1% of the general population of the United States, and veteran status is protected in many university nondiscrimination policies.

The state of veterans, especially today, is rather depressing. It hardly matters whether or not one supports the United States' current military action in foreign countries. Clearly, life is a lot worse for veterans than for non-veterans. The suicide rate for Iraq and Afghanistan veterans using VA (Veterans Affairs) healthcare is more than triple that of the general population. The unemployment rate for the general population is 9.1%; for veterans, 12.1%. This number only gets worse when we look at only veterans aged 18-24, who have a 30.4% unemployment rate. Perhaps the previously mentioned suicide numbers are exacerbated by the fact that there are so few prospects available for young veterans, a hopelessness which only adds on to the trauma of going to war.

How could this be? What is happening in our country that veterans suffer so much, especially from unemployment? Well, one answer is that the current employment crisis has been particularly hard on those in rural areas, those with only a college education, and/or those who work for the government– demographics that represent quite a few recent veterans. Few of those people are eligible to work in computer programming jobs, or other positions in currently booming industries.

Luckily, there is some hope for veterans. The Senate just passed a bill that offers tax incentives to businesses that hire veterans, and the House is expected to pass it as well. Then again, with the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq by the end of the year, we could see another unexpected influx of primarily young, high school-educated men and women into the job market, and many of them will still have a hard time finding jobs.

Veteran's Day has passed. However, the problems facing veterans occur every day. If you know a veteran, take the time to thank them for their service. The battle is not over when a veteran comes home.

Sunday, November 13, 2011

Race and Class in College Admissions

Recently, college applicants all over the country breathed a sigh of relief as November 1st passed, and the nearly-universal Early Decision deadline was behind us.

Now, what does that have to do with this blog?

First of all, many of the people reading this blog are either applying to college or college-educated. Even if they are not, tax dollars still go to fund public universities. Second of all, race is a controversial subject in college admissions.

At many colleges, there is an optional portion where you can identify yourself as belonging to a certain race. Different colleges have different levels of specificity for races. With all other things being equal, it is easier for people of African-American and Hispanic descent to be accepted into college than people of White or Asian descent (although that particular site's graphs do not show it, Native Americans are also noted for race). This is an affirmative action policy that is based on the premise that people of certain races face more obstacles than other races in life, and are therefore given a boost in college admissions to combat any inequality or obstacles that people of other races do not face.

This assumption– regardless of whether or not it is true –has caused a lot of uproar. The state of California passed Proposition 209 in 1996, which said that public colleges could not consider race or ethnicity in their admissions process. There have been recent, failed attempts to overturn this measure. On the flip side, a 2003 Supreme Court court case regarding the University of Michigan Law School, Grutter v. Bollinger, stated that while there should not be quotas for race, race could be considered in college admissions to create a "critical mass" of minority students. The case was brought up by two White students who thought that their race directly contributed to their denial from the university. In essence, Grutter v. Bollinger stated that the University of Michigan was allowed to use affirmative action.

There has also been some talk of affirmative action for those who are socioeconomically disadvantaged. These students cannot take the SAT or ACT prep courses that other students can, they cannot afford to live in neighborhoods with good schools, they cannot even necessarily afford college. Some colleges The Center for Working-Class Studies at Youngstown State University argues that "[i]f we limit working-class students’ access to selective colleges, we also limit their access to the best jobs and to social networks that have significant power in American politics and business." Indeed, it is often said that poverty is a cycle. Those who cannot afford to go to college will often be denied the chance to acquire skills to move up in the world.

Critics of affirmative action might actually accuse it of discriminating against white people. Keep clutching those pearls, because African-American students still make up less than 10% of the population of most of the nation's top schools. Yes, minority students are being given some advantage. But it is completely paranoid and inaccurate to picture White and Asian students as being somehow shut out of elite colleges. Just under 60% of Hispanic students enroll in college right after high school, compared to 92.2% of Asians.

Clearly, there are those who are being under-served. As one Columbia sociology professor put it, "There is a missing revolution in our nation: one in which poor and average Americans can have a fighting chance of acquiring the kind of education and advantages that elite education provides."