The Boulder Daily Camera today ran a front-page story about the recent study about Asian Americans and the model minority myth.
The study found that because Asians are not all high-achieving academic wiz-kids, and that the diversity of the Asian communities (we’re not just Japanese, Chinese and Koreans, but also Laotian, Hmong, Cambodian, Indian, Filipino, Vietnamese, and so on) and the range of generations from first-generation immigrants with poor English skills to fourth, fifth or sixth generations of Americans, leads to a reality that’s less modeled and more uneven. Not all Asian Americans go into the top Ivy-League schools, either: a growing number is opting to go to community colleges instead of major universities.
The article quotes CU professor Daryl Maeda, an assistant professor of ethnic studies:
Another part of the “model minority myth†— that Asian-American students should perform well in science, technology, engineering and math fields — also can be unfair to students, Maeda said.
“Some are great at music or English,†Maeda said. “And if they don’t live up to the model minority myth it puts an extra pressure on them, giving them the idea that they somehow aren’t good enough in their endeavors.â€
