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Because quotas are such a success in other areas, eh?

Universities could be punished unless they give a higher proportion of top degrees to black students, under new proposals drawn up by the regulator.

33 thoughts on “Because quotas are such a success in other areas, eh?”

  1. “..the regulator’s new “tougher” national targets for increasing the number of disadvantaged students…”

    Bit racist to assume that ‘black’ must = ‘disadvantaged’, isn’t it?

  2. If Uni’s are giving degrees away I want one.

    As for the present set-up all blacks have to do is earn the degree–so what’s the problem?

  3. So in employers’ eyes a degree held by a black person will be devalued even if that individual is pefectly worthy of it.

  4. Great, if you are white and struggling and likely to get a third because the racist university insists on judging white students’ work in the old way, identify as black. Bingo! First class honours and a lifetime of riches are yours.

    Anyway, being an old fashioned sort of chap, isn’t there some sort of process or threshold to get a First? You know, being better at something than nearly everyone else in the year?

  5. Something I’ve pointed out at Tim N’s blog is that the black students at top UK unis may not be representative of the overall UK black population – if you drill down into school results, children of West African origin do much better than those of Afro-Caribbean origin, so I suspect make up a disproportionate share of AAA students even though the latter are a larger population group. That has a big effect on who feeds through to the top unis, as does the proportion going to private or grammar school or a “good” state school in a plush area (so black people at top unis are quite likely to be drawn from the upper echelons of society – parent a doctor or businessman for example rather than from one of the rougher corners of South London or Birmingham). Also London results are better than other urban areas with a high ethnic minority population for a variety of (disputed) reasons, which again feeds through to the top unis – especially since several are in London. Overall, anything targeting black people who made it through to top universities is likely to favour those with one or more characteristics from: richer/educated family background, West African, from the southeast UK, privately educated. Which is not going to be much help for a poor Afro-Caribbean kid who goes to a crappy state school in northwest England.

  6. @MBE: that doesn’t matter to the racists that are the Left – all ‘blacks’ are alike to them. If they’ve given a wealthy Nigerian a free degree he may or may not have deserved, then their anti-racism credentials are suitably burnished and they can feel all superior (which is the true aim of all their actions).

  7. You know it’s a lefty idea. Words like “tough” and “punish” are the giveaways.

    And “giving away” is redolent of the Bertie Wooster generation.

  8. Just identify the winners, take the money off them and give them the degree. No need to waste all that time pretending to study. No need to even go to the town where the uni is and pay nasally for accommodation.

    (Seriously, defund and free the universities, they are in need of a different way of working, and an undistorted market.)

  9. Leftist decadence. They believe the country will continue to prosper even if universities give out pretend degrees.

  10. Why not just go the whole hog and award a Nobel Prize for Diversity? No particular achievements required. Just given out make up the numbers.

  11. Who cares. It makes almost no difference when a vast percentage of contemporary and near future students are getting sold expensive but worthless qualifications, then competing in a market over saturated with other under- or unemployed graduates.

    I’ve been reading The Great University Con: How we broke our universities and betrayed a generation, and it’s eye openingly frightening. I would thoroughly recommend to any parent with kids older than about 13.

    It’s UK focussed, but the same problems very likely affect US higher education too.

    Disclaimers: I have no connection with the authors or publishers, but did get my Kindle copy free (Amazon Prime). Having read (almost all of) it, with hindsight I would definitely buy.

  12. At least it’s degrees not actual jobs, unlike Obama era reform of air controllers:
    Until 2013, the FAA gave hiring preference to controller applicants who earned a degree from one of its Collegiate Training Initiative schools and scored high enough on an eight-hour screening test called the Air Traffic Selection and Training exam, or AT-SAT, which measures cognitive skills. The Obama administration, however, determined that the process excluded too many from minority groups. In May 2013, the FAA’s civil rights administrator issued “barrier analyses” of the agency’s employment procedures, which recommended “revising how the AT-SAT is used in establishing best-qualified lists.”
    This was replaced by a biographical questionnaire which penalised previous relevant qualifications and experience, favouring those with a victim narrative.
    https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2018/06/affirmative_action_in_the_control_tower.html#ixzz5QPe9pusG
    https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2016/10/the_place_of_race_in_air_traffic_control.html

  13. Just give firsts to everyone who’s black or identifies as black, and make them all billionaire cowboy astronauts.

    Obama got a Nobel prize for being a bit chocolatey, so what’s the problem?

  14. Quotas do work to limit numbers, e.g. cap & trade, fishing quotas, taxi medallions, etc.

    What’s missing from this university proposal is a mechanism to trade individual quotas. A black prospective student with a BBB Cambridge offer should be allowed to sell it to the highest bidder and pocket the profits. That’s only fair.

  15. I never collected my degrees (B. Eng and B.Sc), met the requirements but didn’t attend graduation. In my field of work, they’re not required so I never got around to formally receiving them. So if anyone knows a minority who want a worthless piece of paper, perhaps we could do a deal, assuming University of Melbourne wasn’t tracking colour then…

  16. It’s fortunate they didn’t issue such a quota call for Jews, or Thomas Fuller would be here raving about it being the product of a cabal bent on world domination.

  17. This will make a first or upper second degree obtained by a black student worthless. What a lever bit of inverse racism this incredibly stupid idea is.

  18. As a reasonable person I can go along with looking at equality of opportunity, but the current equality of outcome stuff is getting beyond ridiculous.
    How does this fit into the studies that the most disadvantaged group educationally is now poor white males?

  19. @BniC

    I think the “the most disadvantaged group educationally is now poor white males” stat is a bit disingenuous because it treats other ethnic groups as homogeneous but splits whites by socio-economic group. If I was to be regenerated, Rawls-meets-Doctor-Who style, I don’t think I’d want to be born into a poor Afro-Caribbean family either. What I would love to see (does it exist?) would be how different groups get on when split by eg income decile.

  20. Dear Mr Worstall

    I can’t wait for the day when one of these virtue-signaling levellers has a brain operation by someone who got his/her/its brain operating licence because of his/her/its skin colour/possession of a clitoris/being a girl with a willy/having had one but chose to have it off/etc.

    I hope it hurts.

    DP

  21. DP,

    They tend not to give out free degrees in subjects that lead to people being classed as professionals (I don’t class teachers as professionals). The relevant professional body will keep out people whose degrees and practice do not cut the mustard.

  22. DP

    Whilst I agree with the sentiment brain surgery is usually done under minimal anesthetic as it is not needed. The patient is kept conscious so you can talk to them during the op and determine when you are starting to cut into important areas.

  23. We need gender balance at each grade level too.

    And tall people mustn’t be over represented in the 2.1 category either.

  24. As an aside – India has some enormous social divisions by caste and tribe with big effects on higher education uptake, which various governments have attempted to at least partially resolve by instituting various quota systems.

    One result is periodic huge anti-quota demonstrations by predominantly higher-caste students. Got to keep the lower orders out. Their placards often reference the “do you want a doctor operating on you if they got in on a lower mark?” issue.*

    Another result is significant political horse-trading about who gets access to the quotas. It encourages tribal politics, because if you vote for your relevant communal party they’ll try to institute quotas that support your lot, giving better chances for your kids and nephews and nieces. Ironically, even socio-economically well-off groups are able to get favourable quotas imposed if they are well-organised and cohesive at the ballot box. If you vote for the non-sectarian party, they’re not going to stick up for you like that.

    * Actually UK medical schools do a bit of this themselves – if you come from a deprived area, and don’t have the top grades that get you a place on the main medical degree course, you can be put on a Foundation Year course instead – essentially a pre-university course designed to get you as properly ready for a medicine degree as the kids coming in with all As and A-stars. Do well enough on that and you’re allowed to progress onto the main course. This seems to me to be a reasonable enough compromise, bearing in mind that a bright kid from a poor background in a rough area is going to find it much harder to get A*A*A than a slightly-less-bright kid brought up on a diet of private education, weekly private tutors, and their holidays spent being sent to crammer centres (a grounding which is not at all unusual among med school applicants), but that the latter’s educational advantages have undoubtedly put them in a better position to start a challenging degree course. The “deprived postcode” test draws a pretty arbitrary line but I’m struggling to think of an alternative that is hard to game, unbureaucratic and doesn’t contain a toxic grenade of identity politics.

  25. what about us left handers. The most oppressed minority I the world.
    All the doors,, violins, rifles, scissors, salutes etc etc should have available easy versions for is. Plus compensation of course.

  26. Justin, the authour of that book about the university rip off was on the James Dellingpole pod cast a couple of weeks ago. Worth a listen if you didn’t already.

  27. It’s because the courses at white universities are white-imperialist biased.

    If they had courses in ‘avoiding paternal responsibilities’ or ‘juvenile drug runner management’ I’m sure we’d see a change.

    I was going to suggest ‘sleeping all afternoon under the mango tree’ as well. But that sounded a bit colonial.

  28. @isp “The patient is kept conscious so you can talk to them during the op and determine when you are starting to cut into important areas.”

    Surgeon – everything OK? How are we feeling?

    Patient – guh, pudda bluuuuuh jok

    Surgeon – OK, I’ll just stop cutting, riiight there.

  29. Common Purpose are now in charge . isn’t it great !
    Never mind . Just keep voting LibLabCon . You know it makes sense .

  30. The relevant professional body will keep out people whose degrees and practice do not cut the mustard.

    =====
    That’s a funny joke.
    Standards will last just until the first “disparate impact” suit is filed and a pandering scumbag politician (redundancy alert) gets involved.

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