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US college admissions bribery
Opinion
Billy Huang
Opinion
Billy Huang

College admissions scandal highlights the vulnerability of unfairly treated Asian-Americans

  • College admissions scandal raises ire over wealth and privilege, but the unfair treatment of Asian-Americans seeking entry is now part of the conversation

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Students on campus at Harvard University. Photo: Xinhua
Billy Huang
Billy Huang is a media veteran who has worked at leading organisations across the Pacific, including Xinhua News Agency in Beijing, CNN headquarters in Atlanta, MediaCorp in Singapore, KyLinTV in New York and the South China Morning Post in Hong Kong.
Federal prosecutors in the United States on March 12 charged 50 people – including Hollywood celebrities and business big names – over an admissions scandal to get their children into prestigious schools. The breadth and audacity of the scandal has aroused public ire about the fairness of college admissions. However, the discourse has exacerbated the vulnerability of Asian-Americans, the most unfairly treated ethnic group so far in college admission.

The Asian-American Coalition for Education, a community organisation dedicated to equal rights of education, denounced the scam in a statement on March 14, saying “the college admissions process is deformed in such a way that fair consideration gave way to dishonesty”.

“Many Asian-American children, suffering from both economic and racial disadvantages, could hardly secure any chances matching their credentials in this rigged system of college admissions and fall victims to scandalous practices that only helped the rich and powerful to cheat the system.”

Now, the fight for Asian-Americans over education equality has taken on a new dimension lately. Andrew Yang, the only Asian presidential candidate for the 2020 presidential election, openly supports affirmative action in college admissions, in which race is still used as a factor against Asian applicants.

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