TIME: Almanac 1993/TIME Almanac 1993.iso/time/032591/0325120.000

Text File | 1992-08-28 | 5.4 KB | 120 lines

                                                                                EDUCATION, Page 64

Kicking the Nerd Syndrome


A new cohort of the best and brightest Asian-American students
is rejecting the science stereotype and the ethic behind it

By SAM ALLIS/BOSTON


    Tohoru Masamune, 31, grew up in a Japanese-American
household distinguished by world-class scientists on both sides
of his family. He graduated from M.I.T. in 1982 with a degree
in chemical engineering. His success in the family tradition
appeared assured. Then everything went haywire. "I realized I
was totally in the wrong line of work," he says. Last year
Masamune stunned his parents by dropping a well-paying job with
a computer company to become an actor, a career he had been
pursuing furtively on a part-time basis. "It was a huge risk,"
he says, "but it is also a huge risk going into something your
heart's not into."

    David Shim, 21, a Harvard senior, made a conscious decision
in high school to shun the science track in college even though
he was brilliant at its disciplines and scored 1580 out of a
possible 1600 on his college boards. "All my teachers were
disappointed that I didn't go to M.I.T.," he says, "but I
really wanted to avoid the stereotype of the science geek."
Shim chose to major in government, and has been accepted at
Harvard Law School.

    America's diverse Asian-American community is awash these
days with stories like those. Increasingly, Asian-American
students and graduates are chafing at the "model-minority
myth." That image depicts them as a group of blinkered
science-oriented achievers -- "the Asian in the M.I.T.
sweatshirt," as Masamune puts it. "It's really frustrating to
score over 1400 on your SATs and learn that society is telling
you they've got you figured out," he says. Hei Wai Chan, 28,
a Ph.D. candidate in electrical engineering at M.I.T. who plans
a career in social work within the Asian-American community,
agrees. "Maybe half of Asian-American students are in conflict
over this."

    Like most stereotypes, the one about Asian-American student
attainment has papered over a very different reality. Four out
of every five such students are in public two- or four-year
institutions rather than elite universities. And plenty are not
particularly good at math or science. At the University of
Massachusetts' Boston campus, the majority of 640
Asian-American students work part time to support their
families while going to school.

    Nonetheless, in the upper reaches of the meritocracy, there
have been glints of truth to the "science nerd" generalization.
Of the 40 finalists in the prestigious Westinghouse Science
Talent Search this year, 18 were Asian American. Yet while
there are no statistics on the shift among Asian Americans away
from the sciences, there is no doubt it is happening. "I can
see a difference in those students just two or three years
younger than me," says Mark Kuo, 22, a Harvard senior who,
along with his two brothers, was a Westinghouse finalist while
at the Bronx High School of Science in New York City. "They're
more interested in public policy and social action than in
what their parents preached about economic security through
medicine and engineering." Kuo left premed at the end of his
freshman year to study comparative literature.

    Such changes in course are often wrenching for
Asian-American youths because of strong parental pressure to
achieve in areas with a high career payoff. "They are raised
to suffer through their problems alone much more than in other
cultures," explains Karen Huang, a clinical psychologist at
Stanford who has counseled many Asian-American students. "Also,
Asian parents are more concerned about guiding their children
and less interested in listening to what they want or need."

    Lewison Lee Lem, a Harvard admissions officer, calls this
parental attitude "the Beida syndrome." Beida, which refers to
Peking University in Mandarin, is shorthand for the push in
Asian countries to be accepted at the top national institution,
a tradition that stems from the Confucian emphasis on
bureaucratic status via education. Once admitted, students are
guaranteed a secure future, and parents feel they have done
their duty.

    "The pressure to achieve remains strong for Asian-American
women too," says Cara Wong, 20, a Harvard-Radcliffe junior who
switched from biochemistry to government studies last year. "I
had such a narrow focus when I came here," she says. "The whole
path to medical school was laid out for me. Then I started
reading history and government here, and I really enjoyed
them." Wong adds that her parents were "not at all happy" with
the change. "My mother was afraid that as a government major
I would end up as a welfare worker," she says.

    The fact that the best and the brightest among Asian
Americans are veering away from programmed patterns of success
may be, in fact, another sign that the over-achievers are
settling into the mainstream. Of course, Asian Americans will
continue to major in math and science in large numbers. But
more will do so because they genuinely enjoy the subjects, and
others, like Tohoru Masamune, will be freer to choose other
paths. "It destabilized my life," he says about his decision
to get out of engineering, "but it was an instability that I'm
comfortable with." That too is achievement.