School Admissions That Are Colorblind

In response to Thomas Parham’s column, “Can Admissions Be Colorblind If Society’s Not?,” (Orange County Voices, Feb. 1) there are two points:

Certainly, if racism were still as potent and pervasive a force as Parham suggests, he would be able to come up with at least one example--out the tens of thousands of applications that UC Irvine receives each year--of an applicant who was denied admission because of his or her race. He doesn’t.

But much more important, Mr. Parham need only step outside of his office at UCI to understand his flawed perception. He will see a student population that is predominantly Asian, in a county that is still predominantly white.

How is it possible that Asians are able to gain admission to UCI in numbers vastly disproportionate to their percentage of the population? A very large percentage of these students are recent immigrants who did not have a “level playing field”--who came here not speaking English, having had to adjust to a very different culture, and probably having experienced more prejudice here than do African Americans. And they got in without racial preferences.

What these students did have was a healthy amount of ambition and a family that put a very high value on education. That’s what it takes and what must be cultivated across the board.

STEVE SCHOELLERMAN, Tustin