Should you worry about the collaboration between DNA test marketers and anxious students and parents eager to get their way into top schools? David over at EphBlog certainly thinks so (EphBlog is an unofficial Williams community blog which I mention here frequently as an excellent example of an unofficial school blog that adds lots of value and is a great resource even for prospective students).

There are many “chances” posts on College Confidential, requests from potential applicants for comments on their chances of getting into Williams and advice on how to do so. See here, here and here for recent examples. I am often tempted to reply: “Take a genetic genealogy test and, if it comes back black, join the appropriate clubs in your high school and check the right box on the Common Application.”

Good advice?

I don’t necessarily want to spark an affirmative action debate here as happened last year on the blog with my writings on Jian Li. What I do find interesting are the questions posed by these new technologies. As a biracial student I am particularly interested in points 4 and 5 about Williams.

4) Besides studying the trends in the number of applicants from different groups, the Record could have a lot of fun just by looking at the pictures of Williams students. There are, allegedly, 49 or so African-Americans in the class of 2011. Want to bet? I have no doubt that the admissions office is being honest — 49 students did indeed check that box. But, could an outsider look at pictures of all the members of the class of 2011 and pick out those 49 individuals? I doubt it. The Record ought to give it a try. Background information here.

5) Don’t forget that there are some administrators at the College who would actually welcome this development. The College loves to be able to claim that 10% of Williams is African-American, whatever the underlying “truth” might be. In this dimension, the College certainly practices a Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell philosophy. Even better would be having a 10% African-American class with average SAT scores above 1400. Not hard to do if a lot of applicants start checking that box.

I know that I would frequently be surprised to hear that “such and such is [insert minority here], actually” in the context of high school college admissions gossip. Sometimes this was something which would definitely have affected that person’s life experience and background and was very relevant to who they were and their family; other times, it was surprising as well as implausible just because the link could be so tenuous.

When there are DNA test marketers who are happy to give results which will tell people they are “black” and college admissions folks happy to accept those students (see point 5) statistics take on an especially distorted relation with reality… just wanted to poll you readers and see what you all thought of this.

Also, merry Christmas and happy new year!