Asian Americans know that the competition to get into the top colleges and universities is quite intense these days. With that in mind, as the Korean newspaper JoongAng Daily reports, many Korean American students have decided to skip the U.S. entirely and instead, attend the top universities in South Korea:

A year ago, 19-year-old Korean-American Choi Joo-eun chose Korea¡¯s Yonsei University over the prestigious University of California system in her home state. Having gotten into both UC San Diego and UC Irvine, she had earned a place in two schools even many California teenagers dream of entering.

So far she has no regrets. On campus, she takes classes taught entirely in English while spending her spare time learning Korean culture and language. Off campus, Choi, who had never visited Korea before deciding to study here, keeps busy building a new network of friends and pursuing her dream of working for the United Nations one day. . . .

While it is well known that many Koreans opt out of the highly competitive race to get into a top local university like Yonsei for an American university, an increasing number of Korean-Americans and overseas-educated Koreans are heading in the opposite direction. . . .

Still, regardless of Korea being the land of their parents, it is far from home, and the students have to overcome their share of hardship and difficulties in adjusting to a new country and culture.

The article highlights the many advantages associated with such a process -- reconnecting with one’s ancestral ethnic roots, exposure to an international climate, becoming fluently bilingual in English and Korean, etc. But as the last line of the quote I cited above alludes to, there can also be loneliness and cultural adjustment issues.

Nonetheless, this particular trend of Korean Americans “going back” to Korean schools is likely to accelerate in the coming years, as the world in general but American society in particular become increasingly globalized and transnational. As such, such transnational Korean American students are likely to have a competitive advantage.

However, it is worth noting that as the article points out, being Korean American does not automatically mean that you will have an easy time in Korea -- being Asian and Asian American are two difference things.

Nonetheless, seen another way, being Korean American does provide another avenue of personal and academic enrichment when it comes to having the cultural international connection to Korea -- one that can be seen as an asset rather than a liability as we move forward into the 21st century.

I’m not shy about it -- even professors need a spring break too. So I’m off to visit some friends and do some camping in North Carolina for a few days. Hopefully I’ll return in one piece and be back blogging on Friday. See you then.

A former student of mine, Nate Bae Kupel, has been hard at work on helping to create a new radio show devoted to Asian Americans and is happy to report that the show is finally ready. His announcement is below:

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As I Am: Asians In America Radio Pilot

As I Am is an hour-long program, hosted by author-activist Helen Zia, that examines the American experience – present, past, and future - with an Asian American lens. Through politics, arts, popular culture, history, and everyday encounters with the famous and not so famous, As I Am offers listeners a unique opportunity to learn from and about the nation’s dynamic Asian American community. In the process, those who tune in from all backgrounds will gain fresh perspectives on their own lives and experiences.

The program is produced by the Institute for Asian American Studies and WUMB Public Radio at the University of Massachusetts Boston.

About the Pilot
The As I Am pilot features reports, analyses, and commentary on social, political, cultural and artistic topics seldom heard on traditional public radio broadcasts. Hosted by the award-winning journalist, author and scholar Helen Zia, public radio audiences will hear unique voices and perspectives on a variety of issues from across the country.

The Pilot features up and coming author Min Jin Lee as she discusses her new book Free Food for Millionaires with Boston College’s Professor Min Hyoung Song. As I Am’s Paul Niwa reveals the effects of gentrification on Boston’s Chinatown through one man’s battle against his landlord’s rent increase.

Minnesota Public Radio’s Angela Kim’s journey from California to the Midwest reminds us that no matter where we may move we are often searching for something, anything, to remind us of where we came from. Nationally recognized slam poet Regie Cabico performs a piece that challenges the notion that we can be easily defined by a census box. Known for his cookbooks and popular television show Yan Can Cook, Chef

Martin Yan steps out of the kitchen to talk with the award-winning broadcast journalist Sydnie Kohara. A group of UMass Boston students’ trip to the Gulf Coast is chronicled as they discuss rebuilding the Vietnamese American communities ravaged by Hurricane Katrina. And International Studies Professor at Trinity College Vijay Prashad comments on why his ideal home isn’t in the present, it is in the future. You can hear these stories and more, on As I Am: Asians In America.

The program will be distributed on the Public Radio Exchange and is expected to have national carriage on non-commercial radio stations across the country. The program will be available for listening and downloading on our website soon. For now, listeners may go to the Institute for Asian American Studies’ website to download or stream the program.

Musical consideration for the pilot has been provided by Boston Progress Radio a community-based online radio station and blog focusing on independent Asian American music and art.

For more information on As I Am, please visit our website: www.asiam.us

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Kudos to Nate and his crew for putting this project together. As I’ve said many times in the past, we Asian Americans need to create more outlets like this where we can express ourselves however we want, instead of relying on others to do so however they want.

I received the following email asking for my help in announcing a survey on political attitudes, by researchers at SUNY Stony Brook:

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Hello. I am writing to ask for your help with a survey which is part of my dissertation project. I was wondering if you would be willing to post a link to the survey on your blog? Your help would be greatly appreciated, and I think you and your readers would be ideal candidates for the survey.

The survey is about people’s reactions to the presidential candidates in the upcoming election. If you are willing to help, please post the
following information:

***

The purpose of this survey is to examine how people think and feel about the political issues, parties, and candidates in the upcoming election. In the survey, you will be asked a series of questions about two political candidates, John McCain and Hillary Clinton. We are very interested in how
individuals that find information on the web think about politics, and your participation would be greatly appreciated. In total, the survey should take about 15 minutes to complete. The survey is completely anonymous and you can skip any questions you do not wish to answer.

Click here to take the survey: http://www.ic.sunysb.edu/stu/crweber/TAKESURVEY/election_2008.htm

Please feel free to contact Chris Weber (crweber@notes.cc.sunysb.edu) at Stony Brook University with any questions or concerns. Thanks for your help!

Thank you,

Chris Weber
PhD Candidate
Stony Brook University

Stanley Feldman
Professor
Department of Political Science

As a university professor, I tend to be particularly sensitive to how Asian Americans are treated on college campuses. With that in mind, two recent events highlight both the good and the bad aspects of how Asian Americans are treated in higher education.

First off is the bad part: as many Asian American bloggers have already commented on, last week there was a racist “satire” column published in the student newspaper at the University of Colorado at Boulder that perpetuated numerous racial stereotypes against Asian Americans.

As you can read for yourself, here are some excerpts:

Asians are not just “a product of their environment,” and their rudeness is not a “cultural misunderstanding.” They hate us all.

And I say it’s time we started hating them back. That’s right-no more “tolerance.” No more “cultural sensitivity.” No more “Mr. Pretend-I’m-Not-Racist.” It’s time for war. . . . If you’re not sure if someone is an Asian, give them a calculus problem to do in their head. If they get it right, net ‘em. . . .

Before we let the Asians go, we will go to their homes and redecorate them in a traditional American style. We will replace their rice cookers with George Foreman Grills, their green tea mochi with fried Snickers bars, and their rice rockets with Hummers. And booster seats. . . .

The only other way to make peace would be to expel you.

At best, the column is a rather idiotic and incoherent diatribe against perceived cultural differences. But in reality, it reinforces racial biases and prejudices against Asian Americans and sets us further apart as “foreigners” who will never, ever be considered “Americans.”

Of course, there are defenders of the column who argue that freedom of speech allows the writer to say whatever he wants and that ultimately, it’s meant as a joke and that we Asian Americans should all just lighten up. To that argument, here is my standard response:

What we need to recognize is that there are fundamental institutional power differences inherent in situations in which White public figures denigrate minorities and that each time an incident like that happens, it reinforces the notion of White supremacy -- that Whites can say whatever they want against anybody at any time.

I’m also not surprised to hear a White person say that they don’t feel offended by anything because as a collective racial group, Whites already enjoy so many other privileges associated with their skin color. Isn’t it just typical for Whites and their lackeys to say “sticks and stones” and “get just it over it.” Unfortunately, that comment only serves to provide us with nothing else than a clear illustration of White privilege and supremacy.

As an update to this story, after meeting with university officials, staff at the student newspaper have agreed to undergo diversity training to ensure that such “editing lapses” in the future. I suppose that’s good news, but it would have been nice if someone, anyone involved could have come to their senses in the beginning and realized that perpetuating racial stereotypes, even when it’s meant as satire, is almost never a good idea.

Fortunately, I have better news to try to offset this episode: the University of Washington recently announced that they will award honorary baccalaureate degrees to hundreds of former Japanese American students whose education were terminated when they were imprisoned after the Pearl Harbor attack at the start of World War II:

UW spokesman Bob Roseth said the decision to award the degrees was at least partly because of a two-part series of articles that ran two years ago in the university’s alumni magazine, Columns. The series detailed the stories of a handful of the students who were forced to leave the university more than 60 years ago. . . .

“It’s only taken … 66 years to address this injustice,” UW Regent Stanley Baer said. “It occurs to me to take some comfort in the fact that a president couldn’t do that today,” added Regent Bill Gates Sr. . . .

Tetsuden Kashima, UW professor of American ethnic studies, said limited information has been gathered about 390 of the students. Kashima, who petitioned the regents to approve the measure, isn’t sure how many of the students are still alive.

It is a little unfortunate that it took the University of Washington more than 60 years to take this step but nonetheless, it is a noteworthy and symbolic acknowledgment of a grave historical injustice.

I can only hope that as we move forward into the increasingly globalized and transnational 21st century that I will see more events like the University of Washington declaration, and less of incidents like that at the University of Colorado.

It always seems to be two steps forward, one step back.

While many college students would argue that their main goal in getting a college education -- at least academically as opposed to socially -- is to receive the “credentials” necessary to get a well-paying job once they graduate (i.e., the degree and diploma, 4.0 GPA, etc.).

However, academics like me try to convince them as just as important, and perhaps even more important, is the goal of learning how to think -- acquiring the skills necessary to organize your time, problem-solve, collect and analyze information and data, write effectively, etc.

As it turns out, according to new research from a national survey of employers, managers and executives in the corporate world seem to agree with us -- they tend to value skills over credentials:

Overall, 65 percent of those surveyed believe that new graduates of four-year colleges have most or all of the skills to succeed in entry-level positions, but only 40 percent believe that they have the skills to advance. . . .

The employers were asked to rank new graduates on 12 key areas, and the grads did best in teamwork, ethical judgments and intercultural work, and worst in global knowledge, self-direction and writing. . . .

What the employers appear to want are intensive, personally evaluated projects, not more testing. . . . Forty-six percent said it would be very effective and 70 percent said it would be very or fairly effective to have students complete an advanced project as seniors, demonstrating knowledge in the major and in problem-solving, writing, and analytic skills.

And 69 percent said it would be very effective and 83 percent said it would be very or fairly effective to see an evaluation of a supervised internship where students apply college learning in a “real-world setting.”

The results appear to contradict statements from Education Secretary Margaret Spellings and many politicians that the business community is demanding tools that allow for comparisons of colleges on how they perform in certain areas.

The other key point to appreciate from the article is that, in addition to valuing skills over credentials, the employers also noted that in terms of assessing student skills, they value substantive, in-depth evaluations over “standardized” tests that the current administration favors.

In short, these are two areas in which we academics have been emphasizing all along. Hate to say it, but we told you so . . .

As our nation celebrates the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. today, it’s appropriate that we reflect on the state of his quest toward racial harmony and equality in contemporary American society.

Specifically, in this day and age, racial/ethnic relations seem to influence many of the most controversial and hotly-debated issues in modern American society. This includes immigration (especially illegal immigration), racist imagery such as recent noose incidents, and most recently, issues surrounding Barack Obama’s campaign.

With that in mind, I think it’s useful for us -- or at least for me as a sociologist -- to try to take a step back and look at these issues from a more institutional or contextual perspective. In other words, to understand each of these specific issues that I just mentioned better, I think it’s useful for us to first understand the social context which forms the framework within which each issue unfolds.

With that in mind, the results from two national-level surveys have just been released to try to give us this larger, societal picture of the current state of racial/ethnic relations. Specifically, studies conducted by the Pew Research Center and New America Media each provide data and insight on attitudes toward and between different racial/ethnic groups in America. So let’s take a look at each to see what they say and how they can help us understand American racial/ethnic relations better.

The Pew Research Center study generally concludes that among Whites, Blacks, and Latinos, large majorities of each group report that they get along “pretty well” or “very well” with members of the other groups. However, there are some differences -- Black and Latino seem to be slightly less positive:

While 70% of blacks say blacks and Hispanics get along very or pretty well, just 57% of Hispanics agree. Meantime, some 30% of Hispanics say blacks and Hispanics get along not too or not at all well; this is the most negative assessment registered by any group in the survey about any inter-group relationship.

It’s important to note however, that although this 57% of Latinos who report good relations with Blacks is lower than what Blacks report themselves, it is still a numerical majority.

The Pew study also reports that generally speaking, those with higher education and income tend to report better cross-racial relations. Perhaps surprisingly, Blacks living in rural areas tend to report better relations with Whites than Blacks who live in urban or suburban areas. Also, there were no significant differences in terms of attitudes by region of country. Finally and perhaps on a discouraging note, younger Blacks report worse relations with Whites than older Blacks.

In general, I found the Pew study informative but with one significant drawback -- they chose to exclude Asian Americans from the study.

In my opinion, this omission is absolutely inexcusable in this day and age when the Asian American population is close to 15 million, in which Asian Americans are some of the most socioeconomically successful ethnic groups in the U.S., and when Asian Americans increasingly make up large proportions of the population of many states and majorities in many cities.

I am extremely disappointed that an organization as otherwise professional and well-regarded as the Pew Research Center chose to exclude Asian Americans from this important study.

To remedy that, let’s turn to the other national study on racial attitudes, from New America Media (NAM), in conjunction with Bendixen & Associates. This survey included Asian Americans, Latinos, and African Americans, but because it focused on attitudes among and between racial/ethnic minority groups, the study did not include Whites.

Similar to the Pew study, I am a little disappointed that Whites were not included, but in relative terms, there is already a sufficient level of racial attitude data that exists among Whites, but much less so when it comes to data on racial minorities, especially Asian Americans.

Also, I am impressed that the NAM study was conducted in multiple languages to maximize its overall validity and generalizeability. A Powerpoint presentation of their major findings is also available for download. To summarize, the study notes:

[The poll] uncovered serious tensions among these ethnic groups, including mistrust and significant stereotyping, but a majority of each group also said they should put aside differences and work together to better their communities. . . .

Predominantly immigrant populations - Hispanics and Asians - expressed far greater optimism about their lives in America, concluding that hard work is rewarded in this society. By contrast, more than 60% of the African Americans polled do not believe the American Dream works for them. . . .

[Regarding tensions and mistrust], 44% of Hispanics and 47% of Asians are “generally afraid of African Americans because they are responsible for most of the crime.” Meanwhile, 46% of Hispanics and 52% of African Americans believe “most Asian business owners do not treat them with respect.” And half of African Americans feel threatened by Latin American immigrants because “they are taking jobs, housing and political power away from the Black community.” . . .

[Nonetheless], the poll found “a shared appreciation” for each group’s cultural and political contributions. “Hispanics and Asians recognize that African Americans led the fight for civil rights and against discrimination, forging a better future for the other groups,” she said.

“Asian Americans and African Americans say Hispanic culture has enriched the quality of their lives. African Americans and Hispanics perceive Asian Americans as role models when it comes to family and educational values.”

Generally, I am saddened -- but entirely shocked -- to hear that apparently, there is still a lot of racial tension and suspicion between Asian Americans, Latinos, and African Americans. I agree that important issues need to be addressed for these stereotypes to eventually be disproved.

Nonetheless, I would point out two points in regard to this NAM survey. The first is that as the Pew Research Center study generally showed, more educated and higher-income respondents are likely to be more positive about cross-racial attitudes and experiences.

With that in mind, it appears that the NAM survey did not disaggregate its responses by social class, instead lumping everyone from all kinds of educational, income, and occupational backgrounds together within each racial/ethnic group. This is disappointing and unfortunately, distorts the findings a little bit.

But perhaps more importantly, I am disappointed in some of the wording of the questions in the NAM survey. For example, it asked Asian and Latino respondents whether they agreed with the statement “I am generally afraid of African Americans because they are responsible for most of the crime.”

I must say that I finding that wording to be a biased, leading, and confusing, based on conventional sociological methodologies and guidelines of creating empirically valid surveys. First of all, it asks two questions in one -- whether they are afraid of African Americans, and two, whether they agree that African Americans commit most of the crime. One of the key rules about questionnaire design is that you should only ask one question at a time.

Second, presenting the statement that African Americans “are responsible for most of the crime” is leading -- it should have just asked the question, “Do you agree or disagree that African Americans are responsible for most crimes committed” would have been less leading and more direct. The distinction between the two is subtle, but empirically valid.

Another example of a poorly-worded and misleading question is “Latin American immigrants are taking away jobs, housing and political power from the Black community,” asked of African American and Asian respondents. Again, the problem here is that there are three questions combined into one -- whether Latino immigrants take away jobs, take away housing, and take away political power are all three distinct issues and questions that are unfortunately all rolled into one.

Take together, I would argue that these two questions may have distorted and exaggerated the overall level of racial tension between Asians, African Americans, and Latinos, especially considering most of the other findings in the NAM study, which generally showed a high level of willingness to cooperate with each other.

Specifically, 86% of Asians, 89% of African Americans, and 92% of Latinos agreed with the statement, “African Americans, Latinos, and Asians have many similar problems. They should put aside their differences and work together on issues that affect their communities.”

Ultimately and in my opinion, that is the probably the most significant finding from the NAM survey -- although some tensions and stereotypes still exist between Asians, Latinos, and Africans Americans (although the true extent is still unknown because some of the questions asked were biased and misleading), overwhelming majorities of each group are willing to work together to address issues of discrimination and inequality that they have in common.

To conclude, both the Pew and NAM studies stand as useful examples of both useful and interesting data, but also how shortcomings in their fundamental design unfortunately compromised their overall value.

As sociologists and as Americans in general, these are the kinds of institutional issues we need to keep in mind when we try to apply them to better understand specific issues.

You don’t need me to tell you that affirmative action is still one of the most controversial and divisive issues in American society. I am on record as saying that I support affirmative action as a means to achieve racial/ethnic diversity within a particular institution. Of course, many people feel differently and I respect their opinion in opposition.

Recently, the New York Times interviewed Scott E. Page, a professor of complex systems, political science, and economics at the University of Michigan, on his new book The Difference: How the Power of Diversity Creates Better Groups, Firms, Schools and Societies in which he argues that programs such as affirmative action that increase diversity in any organizational setting are ultimately beneficial for society (quotes from Prof. Page):

Diverse groups of people bring to organizations more and different ways of seeing a problem and, thus, faster/better ways of solving it.

People from different backgrounds have varying ways of looking at problems, what I call “tools.” The sum of these tools is far more powerful in organizations with diversity than in ones where everyone has gone to the same schools, been trained in the same mold and thinks in almost identical ways.

The problems we face in the world are very complicated. Any one of us can get stuck. If we’re in an organization where everyone thinks in the same way, everyone will get stuck in the same place. . . . [Affirmative action is] a flat-out good because, as I said earlier, it makes everything we do more powerful.

From what I hear, Prof. Page is using the idea that diversity and heterogeneity in any organization leads to innovation and ultimately produces benefits the entire organization to support the fundamental principles behind affirmative action. He also argues that diversity can come in many different forms, not just simple racial/ethnic identity.

From what it sounds like, Prof. Page is arguing in support of holistic admissions, something that I posted about earlier that used Oregon State University’s admissions guidelines as a model for how affirmative action can be put into place for everyone’s benefit, not just underrepresented racial/ethnic groups.

Prof. Page’s book may or may not lead people to change their mind in support of affirmative action, but at the least, it is another resource that supporters like me can use to bolster the case for affirmative action.