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October 02, 2003
Wanna Buy a Diversity Essay?
There's a snarky piece at the NRO which outlines the ever sophisticating fraud of Diversity. Pursuant to the Bollinger decision, applicants to the University of Michigan will, rather than using a check box to indicate their racial identity, write a 250 word essay.
But the "diversity essay" isn't merely a smokescreen. It is also a device to ensure that candidates commit themselves, at least rhetorically, to the campus ideology of diversity. I suspect most high-school students are plenty capable of figuring out what kind of essay they need to submit to earn the "diversity bonus" that will vault them ahead of academically better qualified candidates. But The Chronicle of Higher Education reports that leaders of some campus groups expressed fear that "young applicants might have difficulty writing essays that adequately reflected the impact of their race or ethnicity on their lives." A UM senior, Ricardo Valle, declared that, prior to coming to college, "I did not know what diversity was or how to interpret my experiences as a Latino youth."
I've said that it's almost an insult to expect that so much might be said in as little as 250 words, but to serve the purposes of racial integration it's a decent enough alternative. So if any high school seniors out there want to use my essay, here's one.
I am Black.Once upon a midnight dreary, my father got arrested for going on a date with a white woman. If he had not spent the night in jail for pursuing such folly, the first line in this essay might have been different. As it stands we are a society of law and the law enforced by the jailing of my father has expressed the will of the people in making me black.
There are other laws which express the will of the people and such laws have determined the shape and format of this essay. It might have been a simple checkbox; instead it is this personal rendition. What does my race mean to me, and more importantly what does it mean to you as an admissions counselor? The balance is in your favor because since I only have 250 words it would be impossible to communicate all that it means to me to know what effect the jailing of my father has been on my life in the space of a few paragraphs. In fact, it is difficult for me to believe that anyone's consideration of matters of race in their life can be summed up so quickly.
I am trying to get the best education I can. I deserve it, and I'll work hard for it. The fact that I am not applying to an all-black school demonstrates my willingness to be integrated. If the stigma of Affirmative Action is the pain I get for my pursuit of my folly, I can accept that. I am at least as strong as my father.
That's 267 words. It could probably be edited down by a professional.
My advice is to basically talk about the differences or the sameness between yourself and your parents and what that distance means to you in the context of recieving a higher education in the United States of America. That's a pretty rich mountain to mine, if you can get it down to three paragraphs, more power to you. If you can't, my suggestion would be to give 'em both barrels, and a short one too. But you should probably ask if the rules exclude them from considering a longer essay.
Posted by mbowen at October 2, 2003 07:22 AM
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Comments
I say, give 'em hell!
My own "response" to the essay question is at the URL given here. It sticks to the topic, is true (satirically), and fits in 250 words.
Of course, I'm not actually applying to UM.
I encourage anyone with a website to post a response to the diversity question. This could be fun!
Posted by: R. A. at March 7, 2004 11:40 AM