Asian-American Success And The Pitfalls Of Generalization

When first researching into this topic, I wanted to find the roots of the Asian American stereotype, and the reason why people think that Asians are all high-preforming. The article, The Secret to Asian Americans’ Success, discussed how the “achievements of some Asian American groups” were fueled by the U.S immigration law, which favours highly educated, highly skilled immigrant applicants from Asian countries”. The source, Asian-American Success and the Pitfalls of Generalization stated that “the share of well-educated Asian immigrants is in fact higher than the American population average”, and that “there is a clear connection between parental education and the education achievement of their children”. The source also stated that “Asian-Americans are more likely to believe that academic achievement results from greater effort,” which pushes them to work harder.

However, delving deeper into the issue, Asian-American Success and the Pitfalls of Generalization also stated that “these academic performance gaps within the Asian-American population are in fact just as wide as the gaps between white and black Americans”. This was further emphasized in another source which described how “there are other groups like Cambodian, Laotian, and Hmong that have higher high school dropout rates than African Americans and Latinos. Asian Americans represent both extremes of the spectrum...Chinese and Indians are driving the narrative of Asian American outcomes. Because they're the largest and tend, on average, to do very well, they mask the problems and challenges that other Asian ethnic groups” (Fish). This showed how the stereotype that has been put into society actually does not reflect the Asian population, and therefore is untrue, or a