According the definition of the Under Represented Minority (URM) and the logic and explanations in this article (http://www.top-law-schools.com/urm-applicant-faq.html), I still do not understand why AA receive a higher boost than Mexican-Americans. (Full disclosure: I am a Mex. Am. Can't you tell by my name
). From what I've read, a boost is supposed to address the inequity of minority lawyers in the legal profession and law school. The theory goes: because there are so few minority lawyers and law students, in comparison to their make-up of the U.S. population, they receive a boost in admissions to have a profession and law school class some-what close to the ethnic demographics of the country. In the TLS article, it states that Asians are not URMs because they do not make up a large portion of the U.S. population. Ok, so according to this logic, Asian Americans and a lot of other smaller ethnic minorities are excluded from receiving a URM boost. That makes sense. To be clear, this is what the TLS article says and is the general consensus in the URM forum:
"Why are these groups (rather than others) considered URM’s?
There seems to be several reasons this distinction exists (cue speculation):
* One of the primary reasons we believe applicants of the above races are considered URM’s is because they are the only groups for which the LSAC (Law School Admissions Council) regularly publishes data. When the minority enrollment for a particular group is unknown, law schools have little incentive to admit students from that specific group. (The following link contains the data published most recently). http://www.lsac.org/SpecialInterests/mi ... enroll.asp
* The two groups listed on the LSAC published data that aren’t (generally) considered minorities are Asian Americans and members of Hispanic groups not listed above. The reason for this is clear when we look again at the definition for an Underrepresented Minority. Both groups’ presence in the legal field and in law schools in general are close to or exceed their numbers in the general population. For example, Asians make up just 4.4% of the U.S. population, but according to LSAC’s estimates, they make up approximately 10% of legal students. By contrast, those groups who are considered URM’s have a much lower law school representation relative to their status in the U.S. population.
* Law schools (perhaps at the ABA’s prodding) have generally expressed that they would like their student body to be at least as diverse as the general population."
While Af.Am. make up 14% of the U.S. population (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographi ... ted_States), they only make up 4% of lawyers (--LinkRemoved--) and 7.3% of law students (http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/07/education/07law.html). The "boost" makes sense to me.
Now, this gets more interesting. Hispanics in the U.S. make up 15.4% of the U.S. pop. Mexican Americans make up roughly 67% of this demographic (http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=w ... _dUadCGG2g). So, Mexican Am. make up approximately 10% of the ethnic make up of the country. According to the NYT article and the Columbia study, Mexican Americans only make up 1.5% of law students. According to this article (http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_is_the_t ... _in_the_US), which corroborates the info. on African Am. law numbers, 3.4% of lawyers are Hispanic. Note, "Hispanic" includes all types all types not just Mex. So, guessing here, the number of Mex. and PR lawyers is lower than that number, let's just call it 2%. If there are generally more Hispanics in law school than Mexican Americans, there will correspondingly be a lower number of practicing MA lawyers. To back this up, look at any enrollment statistics at individual law schools that detail the difference be Hispanic and Mex. students - always more Hispanics (and yes, I understand, Mex. are included in this category).
To compare:
African Americans
Population: 14%
Law school students: 7.3%
Lawyers in profession: 4%
Mexican Americans
Population: 10.3%
Law school students: 1.5%
Lawyers in profession: 2%
In addition, according to the Census and Wikipedia, Hispanic population in the U.S. is posed to double in the next 40 years. If Mex. Am. statistics stay constant as a percentage of the Hispanic population, in 40 years MA will make up 20% of the pop, while AA will generally stay the same. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographi ... ted_States)
Mexican Americans have a wider disparity between practicing attorneys and law students in comparison to their make-up as part of the U.S. demographic. Also, in the next 40 years, the disparity will continue to increase as the MA population increases, and probably (guessing here) MA enrollment in law schools will continue to be roughly stagnant (as the Columbia study shows, no real gains have been made in 20 years. Thus, there is no reason to expect enrollment will increase.) So, according to the logic of the TLS article, Mexicans Americans are, and over the next 40 years will be, the most Under Represented Minority in the U.S. in regards to law school enrollment and make-up of the legal profession in comparison to the ethnic demographics of the U.S. Why do African Americans receive a higher boost, IF, going by this logic, they are not and probably will never be as Under Represented as Mexican Americans? If we are going by some other standard/logic/explanation, shouldn't we be freely and openly discussing that? If there are other reasons for this boost difference, WHATEVER THEY MAY BE, shouldn't we talk about them to properly inform people on the admissions process?
