mshollywoodmd said:
Yes admissions is a zero sums game but the point I was trying to make is that
for a seat that is taken away there is a greater probability that an overrepresented matriculant took the seat opposed to an underrepresented one, so why continually blame the one or two underrepresented minorities in a class? Also there are some schools who have had no underrepresented minorites in their incoming class...Who do you blame then?
I agree with most of your arguments. The likelihood is: if the seat isn't offered to a URM, it's going to go to someone similar to the "overrepresented group". AA as it's implemented right now is undeniably better than "no AA".
I do take issue with demonizing the people who suggest changes as "Blamers of the Underrepresented". Judging by your quote, the other poster didn't blame the underrepresented, just suggested that how you slice the groups makes a difference. That seems pretty accurate to me.
The reason for AA is to increase the number of underrepresented groups in medicine SO THAT UNDERREPRESENTED PATIENTS ARE SERVED BETTER, because, in theory, doctors will better serve patients with whom they have more in common. Remember the patients...the taxpayers who pay the doctors' reimbursement, guarantee the student loans, etc? Well, most of those who need the most help from this profession are poor and a lot are rural.
And {a couple of schools excepted}, there's not the same emphasis on recruiting people from those groups as there is other historically underrepresented groups. Granted, it's more difficult to recruit them because it takes more effort to identify who's "rural" and who's "poor" than identifying by skin color. That certainly doesn't mean that they have not been/are not underrepresented or "subject to differential treatment". According to AAMC, 60% of enrolled students have family incomes in the top quintile, with only 20% from the bottom three quintiles combined. I'd say the degree of underrepresentation's pretty staggering.
And I think it's normal/admirable for people to want to address the injustice of some people having to work long hours at a paid job in order to get through school, and receiving virtually no consideration from the admissions system for it. What's so unpalatable about that?
So maybe the system we've got is better than no system at all...and maybe it might take time and effort to improve it...I don't think that's any reason to "blame"
those who offer alternatives.