Are elite NYC schools racist or are Asian kids just working harder?

[yuiyoshida]

[Jim__]

1. Or is that a false dichotomy?

The issue is worth discussing. That video is not a good basis for the discussion.

[Blue_true]

3. I agree. Some of her statements were out there.

But I do think she is right in that Indian and Chinese and to a lesser extent, Vietnamese kids are pushed hard by their families to excel academically. Her statement on voting rates looks wrong, Asians have been voting second to African Americans for democrats, you can maybe find an Asian subgroup that doesn't, but the composite does.

[Jim__]

5. I don't think she's spoken to anyone from NYC about the issue.

I've never heard anyone from New York refer to Stuyvesant High School as Stewie-vesant. New York City public schools are all one district - schools in richer neighborhoods do not get more funding because of higher property taxes. And her claim - completely unsupported in the video - that Democrats don't care about Asian-American kids is just nonsense that stifles, rather than stimulates, discussion.

[Blue_true]

2. I think that Asian kids are pushed harder.

Exactly why that works can be debated. I think that one big problem in understanding the problem is lumping all people from Southeast Asia, China and India into a catchall category. If one study achievement rates of specific country groups within the Asian category, there is a difference. Indian kids excel across a broad range of topics from spelling and languages to STEM and Medicine. Chinese kids mostly excel in STEM and Medicine. Vietnamese excel in STEM and Medicine, but at a much lower rate then Indian and Chinese kids. Laotian and Cambodian kids have pretty weak performance relative to their Asian group counterpart.

The issue of academic attainment is and has been frought with racial stereotyping for as long as the United States has been a country. There is lots of finger pointing, some valid, most not.

What I see in my area is that if you look at a shitty convenience market that is going out of business, if you see it open a year or two later, when you go in an Indian person is likely running it. The owners seem to figure out what their few customers want and start supplying more of that, then more people start coming in, soon the checkout counter is five or six people deep at lunch time and the early afternoon. The owners willingly take from other cultures, some of the best fast takeout fried chicken and some soul foods in my area can be found in Indian owned stores.

The point that the woman made about pooling resources is a valid one. If an Indian business person takes over a failing shop and get it turned around, that person doesn't go out and buy a fancy car or big home, he or she helps his or her brother or sister get a shop up and running profitably, this gets repeated, soon an entire class of retail is owned by Indians. I think that Whites and maybe African Americans don't practice the type of family resourcing to nearly the extent that Indians and Chinese do, and I think that shows up in small business success rates. White and African American businesses in my area seem to be in the trades (roofing, auto repair, auto body repair, air conditioning, landscaping, ect), area where having inside contacts in government agencies or big real estate companies or local insurance companies become a major advantage.

Just my $0.02

[Polybius]

4. Definitely not racist

The same tests were given to everyone of every background.