On the other hand, here in the UK our elite universities Oxford and Cambridge have an unofficial policy of holding applicants from elite schools to a higher standard than ones in impoverished areas.
Why? Because there are a bunch of expensive (and almost entirely white) private and state schools that are very good at teaching their students to do well in exams and interviews and the other factors Oxbridge use to assess candidates. What they're not so good at is teaching them the underlying skills and aptitudes required to succeed there, and those are rather hard to measure directly. So by biasing their application process based on the background of the applicants, they'll hopefully get a less biased selection of the actual top students.
Isn't a large part of the problem with oxford/cambridge that there just are not enough applicants from state schools.
I think that implies that most of the problem is not in the application process but rather the alienating effect the elitism of such institutions has. I really think that in their case a selection bias is not the solution.
Why? Because there are a bunch of expensive (and almost entirely white) private and state schools that are very good at teaching their students to do well in exams and interviews and the other factors Oxbridge use to assess candidates. What they're not so good at is teaching them the underlying skills and aptitudes required to succeed there, and those are rather hard to measure directly. So by biasing their application process based on the background of the applicants, they'll hopefully get a less biased selection of the actual top students.