From: roten@cuba.gsfc.nasa.gov (Charles Roten)
Subject: Don't Kill The Messengers (was: L.S.U. Professor says Indians Suck !!)
Organization: The COBE project ???  Organized ?!?!?  HAHAHAHAHAHAHA !!!
Date: Thu, 28 Jan 1993 19:50:05 GMT
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Summary: A response to the Rice article.  Long post .. be warned.  :-)
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Anyone who does not want to read a discussion of the problems of American 
education and industry, in the context of high foriegn enrollments in 
American graduate programs, is encouaged to hit 'n' now.  :-)  

The following post is excerpted from an email conversation I had with 
another netter, B7D@PSUVM.PSU.EDU, about the article by Richard G. Rice 
of Louisiana State University, which reginald@rankin.aspentec.com 
(Suresh Reginald) posted.  I am posting it _with_ the permission of 
B7D@PSUVM.PSU.EDU.  There are a few small edits I made to improve the 
clarity of my language and delete irrelevant material.  I will sum up 
afterwards.  

==================== begin email excerpt ====================
From roten Wed Jan 27 15:11:59 1993
Date: Wed, 27 Jan 93 15:11:54 -0500
From: roten (Charles Roten)
To: B7D@PSUVM.PSU.EDU
Subject: Re: L.S.U. Professor says Indians Suck !!
Cc: roten@cuba.gsfc.nasa.gov

Hi, Duane.  You write ...

 [deletion]
>                                            Anyway. I do find your post 
> very informative although it totally broke my dream of being a 
> mathematician:-). You seem to agree with some reactions, emotional or 
> not, from Yagui or other Indian persons to Rice, but I consider 
> otherwise: you proved Rice's article to be correct, at least partially. 
> As a foreigner, like other Indian or Chinese who responded to Rice's 
> article, I can feel Rice's reluctance to accept foreigners in this 
> country. But if I put me in his shoes, I can't find why such emotional 
> reactions are rational. 

The problem I saw in a few of the resonses to Rice's article was the 
focus on foriegn grad students as the _root_ _cause_ of the problem.  I 
agree with you .. IMO, Rice's emotional reactions are _not_ rational.  
He sees the problem, but mis-identifies the cause, and many of the 
effects.  

It is a slippery slope from his position (much of which I agree with .. 
I'll talk about the parts I _don't_ agree with below) to asian-bashing 
and crypto-racism.  So it is important to keep our balance.  

>                         Your reasoning proved Rice's: the problem with 
> too many foreign graduates is coming from deans and department heads or 
> money-driven academia. (At least one professor from Florida, according 
> to Yagui's post at that time, attributed the tragety of Lu Gang 
> partially to this business-like situation of academia). 

The pressure on a grad student finishing his degree in a field like 
math or physics can be brutal.  And in the dog-eat-dog world of academic 
politics, the grad student is on the bottom of the heap.  I rmemeber all 
to well what _my_ last couple of years were like ... :-(.  

Although it became quite clear in the posts to SCC just after the tragedy 
that Lu Gang was not well in his mind or personality, and this predated 
his predicament.  

 [more deletions]

> I realized how far from the truth people can go when things relate to 
> themselves. I would suppose the person who sensed Rice's article 
> impling 'Indian Suck' should at least convince others that there are no 
> more than 80% Indians who stayed after their graduation since that is 
> only thing metioned in Rice's article. If Rice used the Chinese, not 
> the Indian, as example and it is true, I can not see why it is an insult.
>    As to cutting average salary of Americans by foreigners' stay, my 
> sympathy goes to Rice. As your TA experience showd that it is true that 
> salaries are ruled by needs and supply no matter you are an citizen or 
> foreigner. But more foreigners' coming definitely puts more weight on 
> the supply side and as a result, an average salary goes down. It's the 
> fact that the foreigner is more willing to accept a lower salary since 
> he (or I) does not have much choice. The fact that the foreiner is not 
> intentionaly choose a lower salary from more than one choices does not 
> dispute Rice's claim that foreiners make average salaries lower. I can 
> give an example: three Chinese with Ph.D hired by a local small company 
                   ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
> and I am sure non of them has the salary higher than an BS holder in 
  ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
> the same field. 
  ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

I am afraid that does not surprise me.  That kind of policy on the part 
of employers is one of the major inequities in the whole affair.  IMO, the 
only way to change that would be legislation .. but the Asian-American 
community would probably (and understandably) stand with the business 
community in opposing any such legislation.  The trade-off is equity 
versus a larger number of positions (even with unfair salaries) for folks 
newly arrived here, or eking out tiny grad student stipends.  I'll be 
damned if I can figure out which consideration should win out.  

>                 The title of this discussion sucks (not Indinan-:) 

Yeah, I agree .. MUCH too inflamatory, especially for groups like SCC or 
SCI where tempers run hotter than a re-entering space shuttle's heat 
shield.  

> but I am glad I learned something from native insider's opinion (I am 
> also gald you did not number your post as Insider 1 of 4..., as Chunde 
>    Shi did-:). Although Rice's suggestions look scary and definitely 
> are bad news for both foreigners present her and potential new comers, 
> I consider his opinions justified from point of American view. 

Well, IMO, _some_ of them are.  Your email provoked me to read the post 
of the Rice article in greater detail than I had the first time.  He 
_does_ single out the deans and the department heads for special censure, 
as he should.  But he also writes ...

Rice>      Two pernicious effects arising from this assumption come     
Rice> immediately to mind. These well trained foreign scientific-       
Rice> engineers return to their homeland, exploit their training (often 
Rice> using cheap home labor to advantage), and quickly capture American
Rice> markets. 

Well, only if we're damn fools enough to let them.  The story of the U.S. 
auto industry is typical .. managerial refusal to innovate .. the TOTAL 
failure of the industry, even as late as 1974 (the year of the oil 
embargo !!) to understand that the market wanted smaller, more fuel-
efficient autos .. shoddy quality control (just _look_ at the Consumer 
Report's frequency-of-repair ratings for used cars .. GM comes in dead 
last .. Toyota's _ENTIRE_ _LINE_ is good-to-excellent).  We _gave_ _away_ 
that industry.  On a _plate_ !  

I also recall a documentary that aired on TV a few months ago, about 
Japanese trade policy.  As I expected, there was a fair amount of Japan-
bashing.  Recessions seem to bring the crypto-racists out of the closet .. 
But the interesting part was the allegation (supported by a fair amount 
of evidence) that the U.S. government tolerated unfair Japanese trade 
practises it _knew_ _about_, for 'diplomatic reasons'.  Sigh.  We don't 
call them 'congress-critters' for no reason ...

Rice also writes ...

Rice>      But, how to do it ? Perhaps the most direct lever for change
Rice> is federal funding. By denying federal funding (fractionally or
Rice> all) to support salaries for foreign nationals, the supply of
Rice> graduate students from other countries will gradually diminish to
Rice> <= 10%. This is sufficient to allow the sought for "cross
Rice> fertilization" of ideas and cultures, but not enough to maintain
Rice> the current hegemony by foreign students. 

I feel this puts the cart before the horse.  The real problem is the 
large number of marginal graduate programs maintained by grant-hungry 
departments trying to break into a rather small 'big science' market.  
Shut these down, returning the faculty to the classroom where they can 
_REALLY_ make a difference, and the problem subsides.  Fewer graduate 
programs means, _MOST_ _IMPORTANTLY_, a smaller supply of relatively 
better-trained scientists and engineers.  Supply-and-demand raises their 
market value, the worst of the vicious infighting in academia dies down, 
science and engineering are seen as more desirable by American 
undergrads, and more American kids enter graduate work in those fields.  

That is the _REAL_ brain drain .. not that so many foreign kids are 
entering our science and engineering graduate schools, but that so few 
of our own are.  It is a symptom of a disease in our higher educational 
system.  And if we want our citizens to remain viable in those fields, 
we had better attack it.  

He goes on .. 

Rice>                                           Moreover, the "role
Rice> modeling" effect of American graduate students helping our
Rice> undergraduates will boost morale.

I don't see lack of 'role modeling' as the blow to morale that Rice does.  
IMO (and I have had 10 years of watching my kids to form this opinion), 
the real morale-killer is the increasing gap between what the kids leave 
high school with and what they need to know to handle college.  I have 
seen ENTIRELY too many kids shell-shocked by the demands Calculus 1 made 
on their almost non-existant algebra skills.  

Even though the exercises in most modern Calculus 1 books are _much_ too 
elementary to confer mastery by their solution.  Yeah .. I have Calculus 
books from 25 years ago in my shelves too .. and the modern ones have (for 
the most part) exercise sections that have been watered down.  There _are_ 
good ones being written .. but they rarely get past departmental textbook-
searching committees.  I recall one horror story from my first year at 
Mississippi State .. but I won't go into that.  I just ate lunch, and I 
might throw up on the keyboard ...  

And I must take exception to one of his concluding remarks ...

Rice> And, because of the trickle-down effect in higher education, we may
Rice> also save what is left of our secondary education system.  

If there is any 'trickle-down' effect in secondary education, I have yet 
to see any evidence of it.  What I HAVE seen is the 'trickle-up' effect 
of the failure of secondary education, in universities.  I have had 
_direct_ and _most_ unpleasant experience with it !  Increasingly, kids 
react to the gap between their secondary preparation and what college 
expects of them by putting pressure on the faculty, in various ways, to 
water down their curriculum.  And it _works_ !!  I have seen it, and have 
had frank discussions with faculty who have yielded to this pressure.  I 
really could not blame them too much .. student evaluations are used for 
promotion and tenure evaluation almost universally these days.  Not so 
25 years ago !!  

If we are going to save secondary education, we must 

1: Dump the absurd doctrines the departments of education, with the aid 
   of school district administrators, have been ramming down the throats 
   of our secondary teachers.  One way to do this would be to ABOLISH 
   ANY requirements of education courses for teaching certification.  

2: Reform school systems at the level of district administration.  My 
   mother was a high school teacher for more than 30 years, and the 
   incompetence and corruption in those elites is often beyond words.  I 
   have frequent daydreams of walking down district administration 
   corridors with a firehose, washing $50,000/year vipers in 3-piece 
   suits out into the street ...  

Other than the objections I have cited, it was a pretty good article.  

>                                                                I expect 
> more rational reasoning if the discussion of the topic continues. Since 
> this discussion may relate to such thing called 'Brain Drain', I always 
> wonder how it is calculated or estimated that the USA as a country gets 
> benefits worth of more than several billion dollars from educated 
> foreigners coming. 

Well, it _does_ help with the shortfall we are experiencing with the 
numbers of American undergrads entering the scientific/engineering 
graduate pipeline.  This buys us time to correct the problems that lead 
to that shortfall in the first place.  But we _must_ correct those 
problems !  The results if we don't will be _far_ worse than just a lot 
of foreign-born scientists and engineers !  

 [rest deleted]
===================== end email excerpt =====================

One of the points I am trying to make here is that the presence of so 
many foriegn students in American graduate programs, particularly in 
mathematics, engineering, and the sciences, is not a bad thing in and 
of itself.  A lot of them end up staying here, making up the shortfall 
of American-born engineers and scientists.  _That_ may just save 
America's ass !  

I will admit, the lag time it takes for a non-English speaking person to 
learn the language is a problem.  But I think it is easy to blow that 
problem out of all proportion.  I know a good many immigrants, Indians in 
particular, whose English is _far_ easier for me to understand than the 
more extreme Deep-South or Upper Peninsula ('Finglish' = Finnish English) 
accents.  

Stories say that the kings of Babylon killed messengers who gave them bad 
news.  This mass of foriegn students are not a problem .. they are 
_messengers_ !  They are telling us, by their very numbers, that not only 
our secondary education system, but our university system as well, is in 
_DEEP_, _DEEP_ _TROUBLE_.  

Don't kill the messengers.  Fix the _PROBLEMS_ in OUR system that bring 
them here !  

--
Charles Roten | Hughes-STX, Incorporated | 
  roten@cuba.gsfc.nasa.gov               | 'Use the Source, Luke!'
  7601 Ora-Glen Dr., Greenbelt, MD 20706 | 
  301-513-7805 (w),  301-317-0872 (h)    |            Obi-Wan Stallman
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