University of California system officially drops SAT, ACT scores from use in admissions and scholarships

[quote] Critics of the testing system argued that low-income students of color and those with disabilities were disadvantaged without elite tutors or strategic test prep services.

I was not rich, never had a tutor, nor did I use any prep services, yet I managed to score in the top 5% of both tests. I also managed to score a 4 and a 5 on two AP exams for classes I never took nor did preparation for.

R1 and yet…..

my high school offered ACT Prep as an elective

Terrible. How fucking terrible.

so they're admitting that minorities aren't good enough to be held to high standards like the rest of us?

R5 no they’re saying rich people use their wealth to unfairly game the system.

"NO MORE ASIANS"

R5 without affirmative action the top UC schools would be 80% Asian.

[quote] Critics of the testing system argued that low-income students of color

When did “low income _____” become “low income ____ of color”? Do poor white kids do better on the exams? Genuine question.

if one generally goes to school, they don't have much of a problem when it comes to the SAT or ACT

I also think it’s terrible, especially for Asians. Why waste your time studying?

R10 by your comment I’m guessing you didn’t go to school?

The continued disregard of education.

I scored a 1400 on my SATs. Never went to any prep courses, nor did I study especially for them.

Those tests have been proven to be biased by study after study. It’s time they go the way of slavery and Jim Crow.

[quote]It’s time they go the way of slavery and Jim Crow

Just those two?

Oh please. Biased my ass.

Notice in the language it says “incoming students of color”. However, the “color” does not pertain to Asians because Asians are disproportionately admitted based upon merit testing such as SAT.

Most Asians don’t send their kids to expensive SAT classes. You want to know why generally speaking, Asian kids do well in school hence do well on standardized tests? Because it’s ingrained within the Asian cultures. There’s a strong strain of meritocracy in Chinese, Japanese, Taiwanese, Korean cultures, just to name a few. This, along with tradition of strong family ties, contributes to more stable childhood leading to positive environment for the child to learn. This is generalization but you definitely see evidence this in East Asian families. This focus on education is something that gets passed down from one generation to the next.

Wait until they try to abolish the MCAT using the same bullshit rationale.

[quote]Wait until they try to abolish the MCAT using the same bullshit rationale.

Dr. Lil Pax with tatts all over his face.

One of the main issues here is whether you think it’s fair that children from poor families should get fewer educational opportunities than children from rich families.

R20 There are rich kids who are dumb as fuck and don’t do well on SATs. That was the whole point of that scandal with rich fucks in Hollywood bribing their kids way into college.

I would argue that standardized testing is one way for students from poor socioeconomic backgrounds to get ahead in life. A way out of poverty, but also a way out from your average degree mill, state schools. If you test very high and your grades are also reflective of high intellect, then that’s the way to improve your station in life. This is partly the reason why meritorious admissions to university is such a popular and entrenched aspect of East Asian cultures. It doesn’t matter if your family is poor, you can study hard and win over rich kids by securing a place in university.

Let’s take vote here. How many here had special classes or other educational enhancements so that we could achieve higher scores on SATs or ACTs? How many of here were raised middle class or lower class. I was raised lower class. Talk about the continued dumbing down of people and our education syst.

r18 not to mention a long history of civil examinations

R22 I was raised lower/middle class - but not in the states. I did one class outside school that was a tutor group in a subject that wasn’t available in my school (music). There were private schools (paid tuition) that had smaller class sizes than public schools and since exam results were public info they would publish that the students that went to private schools would achieve higher results. I’m not saying that kids in public education won’t get good results (I did) but you’re less likely to, than a child from a rich family. If you can’t understand that to be unfair (these are children we’re taking about) then idk you’re a lost cause.

r24, since when is a students test score public knowledge? What country is that?

R25 sorry - not attached to names of course. But the breakdown of scores - and then they would be published by school and how they scored generally. Craziness.

As a counselor for over 20 years, I can tell you the most important factor in admissions decisions is the four-year high school transcript, followed by what the applicants have accomplished in their spare time away from school. What they do in everyday life is so important, much more so than test scores.

The bigotry of low expectations continue.

The standardized tests were accused of being culturally biased, so they adjusted the test to reflect that. instead of " Robert's country club membership cost twice that of his gym membership.....", they had " Jamal's country club membership cost twice that of his gym membership."

Without educated people, the country will go to hell. The non-whites and non-Asians are gonna be the end of these states.

R9

Yes, they do. Black kids whose parents make $200k/year have the same SAT scores as white kids whose parents make $20k/year.

I initially scored 1280 on the SATs without studying. I studied from an SAT book I bought over the summer before senior year and got 1410 on my second SAT test. It doesn't take massive amounts of tutoring and studying for a reasonably well-educated kid to do well on the SATs. The issue is that black, Latino, and Native American families, for various reasons, aren't sufficiently educating their kids. The solution for that is to dumb down everyone else, deprive white and Asian kids of the accomplishments they've earned, and deprive those few high-achieving BIPOC kids from getting in to good schools based on their test scores.

As much as the woke lie about this being about "equity", the latter group of kids (for example, black kids who are intrinsically smart and hard-working despite the crabs-in-a-bucket mentality in the black community) will be hurt the most by these policies. It'll be kids who suck up to their teachers for good recommendation letters, who can get make-work jobs at their dad's law firm, who can go on a voluntourism trip over the summer who get in. This is formalizing placing rich kids of any race in these elite schools regardless if they're actually smart.

This has less to do with one’s social class and EVERYTHING to do with how one chooses to apply themselves. You have to study and bust your ass to get scholarships, pass tests, get excellent grades, etcetera. That has nothing to do with how wealthy tour family is, unless the are shady and buying your way into elite schools. Just because some rich turd has a tutor doesn't mean they are going to do better than somebody who is poor or middle class who was without. Life is never going to be fair. There is no way to level the playing field for everyone. Stuff like this is strange and racist, as it means that they are just giving up on poor kids of color and not holding them to the same standards. When you lower expectations you will end up with nothing but entitled ignoramuses.

So if we do this, can we forget about reparations?

Absolutely terrible.

R33 no. This has to do with resources. I don’t know why we even have to debate this. Children from rich families (on average) get better results than the children from poorer backgrounds. This is statistically proven - it’s not up for grabs, and is nothing do to with “applying oneself”. This is a very early step in the cycle of poverty. It’s unfair, we can see that, and there are steps to make the system more fair, it’s important to address that. Blaming poor parents is not a solution, it’s just you being a racist asshole. Which I know is what you probably are though, so I guess you do you.

[quote] so they're admitting that minorities aren't good enough to be held to high standards like the rest of us?

No. Just an overdue acknowledgment of the distinct advantage conferred on those students rich enough for tutors and test prep. The tests are no gauge of intellect or aptitude if you can be trained to score well.

[quote] I scored a 1400 on my SATs. Never went to any prep courses, nor did I study especially for them.

And yet you are here at Datalounge with the rest of us. If you are telling the truth you must be ready to slit your wrists.

And for all of you ancient dusty queens who took the SAT more than 25 years ago, just know that a whole test prep industry has thrived in the intervening years. Today, kids are not scoring in the 90th percentile or better without rigorous test preparation.

The tests are absolutely unfair to poor or nonwhite kids but I think all white kids should be forced to take the SAT because performance on the exam really does indicate who is capable and who is not. I mean, if you have had a privileged life and you still can't get 1000 on the SAT, that is saying something about you. At the same time, if you're a minority kid and you can't achieve an average score, you're probably not going to be able to do college-level work. It's sad but it is true.

[quote] And yet you are here at Datalounge with the rest of us. If you are telling the truth you must be ready to slit your wrists.

Not really. I enjoy my time on the DL. And I don't consider myself above anyone who posts here.

Except you, of course.

R41 not that poster but I think it was a joke. I guess the SATs don’t evaluate humour?

How is getting rid of standardized testing such as SATs going to level the playing field for disadvantaged students? Now you’ll make it easier for rich families with dumb kids to manipulate the system. Extracurricular activities should not form the bulk of consideration for college admissions. Taking away the one neutral qualifier would make the system ripe for abuse. Bribing teachers to give your kids hood grades, check. Bribing administrators and teachers to write glowing recommendation letters, check. Spending $$$ to send your kid to volunteer camps, check.

Why can’t supporters of no-SAT/ ACT admit that taking away standardized testing is just another step towards watering down meritocracy in favor of social engineering towards not equitable treatments but equal outcomes.

Girls!!

r43 a recent opinion piece in the (I think?) NYTimes made this very point

R43 you’re ignorant on two points, firstly that standardized testing is equal, and secondly, that until now we have existed in any sort of meritocracy.

R46 I see instead of offering your opinions you immediately brand someone with a different take as being “ignorant”. That tells me how ignorant you are.

Standardized testing while not perfect, is an equalizer against fraud and manipulation of the admissions system. Secondly, again, standardized testing is rooted in the concept of meritocracy, see earlier link another posted provided, about the history of civil servant exams in China. If you are making the argument that we have a flawed system based upon the outcome (not enough POC/ disadvantaged students admitted), then you need to present how eliminating SATs will improve upon the current system in terms of weeding out undue advantages such as disparities in resources. But you can’t make a cogent argument from that perspective because like I say, this new policy will make it easier for people to buy their way into elite universities. There will no longer be a neutral equalizer component in the admissions process.

R47 first of all I said you were ignorant on those points - not that you’re ignorant as a person (I don’t know you) so calm down and don’t get your feathers in a twist.

Standardized testing *can* be an equalizer against fraud but the SATs are not. I should have worded myself better, standardized testing as it is done in western societies is not protected against fraud in itself and is therefore unequal.

I do not need to present another mechanism because you say so - thanks, and that doesn’t invalidate my point that standardized tests are largely corrupt.

R48 Please put forth evidence which makes standardized testing largely corrupt. Just because you feel it to be corrupt doesn’t make it factually so. I don’t think you’re presenting your arguments well here. It is quite a stretch to argue that standardized testing is not perfect, therefore it should be eliminated as part of the admissions process, to standardized testing is corrupt. In what ways, targeting whom, and why are they promoting the ongoing corruption of standardized testing? Is this a conspiracy theory? Because the word corruption has the connotations of active nefariousness. Conversely, one can make an argument that standardized testing is not necessary or that it doesn’t figure into the traits that university admissions boards are valuing today. But to say standardized testing is corrupt, you’d have to provide factual evidence.

R49 there are enough expensive courses designed to get rich people higher marks that I don’t need to quote them, it’s boring to go over it, but here’s an interesting example.

Last year during covid, a standardized testing algorithm downgraded children from poor schools while increasing scores of kids in rich schools.

Asians do well on standardized tests because they work and study hard. Some of you guys ignorantly assume that Asians are privileged and come from wealthy families. Ha ha. Asians come from poor backgrounds as well, and a number of Asians are English as a Second Language learners. The argument that the standardized tests are biased against poor people of color falls apart quite easily.

The dumbing down of America continues, sadly.

I did crappy on my SAT's because I was not interested in learning math. I was an average student from a poor, white family. I usually had about a 2.8 GPA. Math bored the fuck out of me. But writing, analyzing literature, grammar, music and history were things I did well. I knew I wasn't going to go off to college because my parents thought people who went to college acted like they were better than anyone else and didn't save anything for their four kids to go to college nor could they. My older sister had some grants to go to UCLA and so I decided to take some classes at community college. I spent 5 years supporting myself (parents kicked me out when I turned 18) and did almost all of my GE classes. I finally realized I wasn't going to make more than $13 an hour unless I graduated with a Bachelor's Degree and so I applied to UCLA and was shocked to get in as a film major. My JC counselor actually had told me not to apply because they only accepted 25 students per year so I'm glad I didn't listen to her. I graduated with a BA and it was one of my proudest moments. My SAT's had zero impact on me getting into college after I went to Junior College and did well. The SAT's seemed unfair to me then and still do now so it's nice to see them going the way of the dinosaur.

Ask yourself, what are we measuring? These tests are not reliable measures of what it takes to be successful in navigating the complexities of today.

R36, it has less to do with resources than it does with race. On average, poor white students (and poor Asian students) actually do better on the SAT than middle class blacks.

And most of the black students benefitting from affirmative action at the Ivy Leagues are upper middle class blacks.

Black kids need to apply themselves more or stop looking to college as a way toward upper socioeconomic mobility.

But they were highly reliable in understanding which schools were good and which poor. Now a single teacher who dislikes you can destroy your future.

Not true R53. Those tests were scientifically designed and the outcomes tracked to improve them. They started losing their value when declining scores meant they had to be recalibrated constantly to make them easier because the average kid today is as dumb as a rock.

On the contrary, R53, the tests ARE predictable measures on how students are going to do in their class relative to the median score of that class. There was actually a Duke University study that showed that Hispanic students with lower scores were more likely to drop out of their STEM majors. There was also a study that showed that mismatched students actually made lower wages after finishing college.

And, there’s been a study that showed properly matched black law students had a better chance at passing the Bar Exam than mismatched black students.

Also, HBCUs tend to turn out a higher rate of professional blacks than higher ranking schools.

Overall, people do better when they’re matched at the same learning curve as their peers.

I never studied for one minute for the SAT, and I scored a 1380.

I was also a straight B student and my parents didn’t have a ton of money.

R57 many HBCUs are smaller so students tend to get more one-on-one attention. Also, the “Black Ivies” are very selective.

It may help some students, it will hurt students who are mismatched with the other students in their schools. Years ago I was a college counselor who saw urban kids from poor backgrounds enter Ivy League schools only to drop out. They would have done much better in state or all black schools.

The dropout rates at these colleges, will now go way up. It will be ascribed to racism and any prof who says students are unprepared will be fired or silenced.

Eugenics was also grounded in scientific reasoning. Ask yourself: what are we measuring and why does it matter?

Colleges can have total open enrollment. But some students can’t keep,up,with and drop out. A college education is so watered down (except in STEM) that it probably wouldn’t matter much in the long run. Smart people will educate, themselves and be spared the indoctrination. Maybe the world will have more independent thinkers.

They'll just go by whether you're non-white or not. See? That was easy!

It's not that poor kids are dumber it's that their parents are shitty parents and often dumb themselves. Plenty of them achieve anyway. Dumbing down educational standards is the hallmark of fauxgressive destroyers and always has been.

[quote] Eugenics was also grounded in scientific reasoning. Ask yourself: what are we measuring and why does it matter?

Insanity ^^

I shudder to think what this country is going to look like in another 15 or 20 years.

[quote]The issue is that black, Latino, and Native American families, for various reasons, aren't sufficiently educating their kids.

It's weird that so many people don't know how this works in some places.

Kids from poor neighborhoods test poorly. Why? Because they go to schools that may not have great teachers, are full of drugs and other horrible things. They get books that are falling apart, they don't get the same quality of education as someone from a better neighborhood who went to a well funded school would get. Why do those schools get less money? Because the schools are given funding based upon those same scores. They're also usually in areas with high property values with parents who are also doing pretty well financially.

Why don't kids in that situation have parents that send them to better schools? Because of the remnants of forced busing. Kids from certain areas end up at certain schools and unless they find a way to sneak into a different school with more funding they're screwed. They could also go to private school if the parents could afford it but ... many of the areas with that have kids that go to the worst schools are also the poor areas because parents know that they have to live in certain areas to have their kids go to certain schools unless they can find an out.

I went to a school that was "poor" for a year because I lived on the wrong side of the street. I got into a special program and I got to go to any school I wanted because I tested into it. I went to the other side of town and ended up in the "rich" school. They had everything. I didn't have to worry about being murdered so I focused in school. I joined a bunch of clubs because they had and I learned a lot! I even got to go on field trips. They had computers and printers that worked. I met two of the guys I'd eventually end up working with years later when they visited my school to speak. They had books that were all in one piece that were recent too. The educational standards were a lot higher. The teachers expected more out of everyone. I had trouble adjusting for about a month then I caught up. We were reading two novels a week. I also did programs outside of school that I got from being in that school. I got scholarships from being in that school that I couldn't have gotten at that other one. We had prep courses for the SATs and ACTs built into our regular day.

You're always going to have kids that are smart and test well no matter the situation. Not everyone is like that and I know it's hard for some people to realize this. Some people need guidance and support that you only get from teachers who aren't exhausted from telling half the class to shut up every five minutes. Hell, I learned and loved to appreciate art because I had a teacher that went to a top school herself, had traveled around the world and had the materials to teach us about it in a way that was engaging. I remember the day my parents were confused as to why I was talking about how much I loved Auguste Rodin's work and how my teacher told us she saw The Burghers of Calais in person and something about "drapery."

I would not have had that experience at that other school because a teacher like that would have never taught there.

'Poor kids are just as smart as white kids'

This type of coddling is helping no one.

R66 I was JUST about to say this. Who gets funneled into poorer urban schools with inexperienced teachers teaching their for loan forgiveness before the teachers hightail it off to richer districts? That’s right, kids of color. And why are they living in poorer urban areas? Because people of color are disproportionately lower SES. And why is that? Because they had poorer education, fewer opportunities and resources, and so on.

I teach college classes and see the stark differences in the skills of kids taught in urban vs. suburban schools. It’s sad to see the injustice play out academically.

Then say a person of color gets into a prestigious school where they have very few folks from their own ethnicity as mentors and fellow students—it’s isolating and there’s more pressure to perform, which may lead to decreased performance. Look up “stereotype threat” research if interested.

*teaching there, rather—damn autocorrect!

[quote]Without educated people, the country will go to hell. The non-whites and non-Asians are gonna be the end of these states.

With the help of far-left white liberals. This just perpetuates the stereotype that POC are lazy and entitled. On Broadway, they even consider showing up on time for rehearsals/shows and performing 8 shows a week to be 'white supremacy.' All of this just breeds mediocrity. I now fear that the Democrats (who are in charge of the U.S. media/entertainment industry) are leading us into a Dark Age for the sake of 'diversity.' What they are selling is not progress.

R66

Black kids don't study as much as white kids, and white kids don't study as much as Asian kids. This has been proven with surveys of study habits. Money has been poured into underperforming schools across the country, but, if the kids aren't being held accountable by their own parents, nothing will change. Most of what afflicts the black community can only be solved by the community itself.

R66 and R69, stop blaming the schools and the “poor” teachers at the poor schools. Throwing more money at the poor schools will do little to make a difference without changing the SOCIAL MILIEU of the whole school.

Why do you think students who go to rich private schools like Lakeside end up disproportionately going to the Ivies? You think it’s because the kids came from money? NO! It’s because schools like Lakeside screen the students before accepting them, they don’t accept dumb kids.

If you exchanged the student population of an inner city school with the student population at Lakeside, but kept the same teachers at each schools, Lakeside would have to dumb down its curriculum, while the new students at the inner city school would still disproportionately go to college.

It’s not the clothes that make the man! It’s the man who makes the man! It’s not the schools that make good students, it’s good students that give the school a good reputation.

I was listening to a podcast the other day with Kenny Xu. He says that in New York, Asians have a higher poverty rate than blacks, yet they still get disproportionately accepted into those gifted schools.

Water seeks its own level. The smart ones in the bad schools will find a way to escape that environment, like you did, R66. Don’t worry about the dumb kids left behind, there was never any hope for them without a change in their culture.

This is to keep the white population afloat.

This thread, not surprisingly, is a racist, classist free-for-all.

One university system dropping certain standardized tests from admissions doesn't affect a single person here. You can come up with all sorts of convoluted ways to claim it'll affect you, but it doesn't.

[quote]I was listening to a podcast the other day with Kenny Xu. He says that in New York, Asians have a higher poverty rate than blacks

He's lying to you, R73, but he's telling you what you want to hear, so you believe it.

Asians and Blacks have similar poverty rates, with Blacks slightly higher.

R45 it can set the ball rolling. California is turning into such a shithole.

R77 no wonder people are leaving in droves.

I don’t know ... I didn’t bother studying and still got 1580 on my SATs.

I meant R75

[quote]Black kids don't study as much as white kids, and white kids don't study as much as Asian kids

"And black kids can't swim! And Asian kids are smart! Italian kids LOVE pizza!" - R72

[quote]they don’t accept dumb kids.

"Black people are stupid!" - R73

[quote]I was listening to a podcast the other day with Kenny Xu.

HE'S A RIGHT WING WRITER WHO WRITES FOR THE DAILY SIGNAL, THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER AND THE FEDERALIST.

You really TRIED IT. Why do you people KEEP TRYING IT! Take your Trump loving ass somewhere else!

I KNEW as soon as I started reading you were going to go here. I just can't believe you went here so quickly! Did you even put any thought into that? Do you know that people can use Google?

R8, California doesn't have Affirmative Action. . Instead, the UCs have certain workarounds--giving bonus points to kids who are first-generation to go to college. Class rank has become an increasingly important factor.

That said, the article says the SATs will be optional. What that really means is optional for kids who are from underrepresented minorities. Asians, Whites and anyone from a high-performing school district will continue to take the test. And need to.

Yes, test scores correlate with socioeconomic status. So do essays. So do most things. It's not an even playing field. Ironically, all the adjustments the colleges make so as to admit more poor BIPOC kids ends up creating a situation where they struggle in college, simply because at the elite schools the requirements for admission for the Asian/white kids is so much more stringent. The test gaps and the difference in curriculum rigor is huge, particularly for unhooked kids (not a legacy/donor kid/star athlete/URM)

Ironically, I think the UCs actually had a reasonable system going, though hard on middle-class kids who didn't have the money for counselors who clued them in on how the current game is played. The top UCs are heavily Asian. The bottom ones are heavily Hispanic and the white kids are in the middle. Black kids who do well enough to get into Berkeley are getting a free ride elsewhere. But all the UCs are good and the graduation rates for poorer kids have been improving. The demographics more or less look like the state's.

I think it helps a lot that you can be a Mexican-American kid at UC Riverside and not feel like a token. I think there's a similar dynamic at the HBUCs for Black kids.

Gee, wonder why.

It’s pathetic.

It’s not going to be “optional” beyond admissions for fall 2022.

After fall 2022, they won’t be considered at all even if submitted. It’ll no longer be “optional”—it simply will be ignored.

This is great.

So many of you are full of so much shit that it's getting hard to breathe in here. All standardized tests are good for is measuring how good someone is at taking standardized tests. Do you all work for ETS or something? This is just a profit-making business. As with everything else in America, the almighty dollar has turned what used to simply measure knowledge and thinking skills and turned it solely into a money-making racket. There are only four or five companies that control everything from the making of the tests to the test prep industry to the grading of the tests. It's complete and useless bullshit for lazy educational administrators to lean on so they don't have to strain themselves by looking beyond a single number.

Test scores are shit compared to looking at GPAs. Some of you have been out of high school for 20-30 years and haven't bothered to keep up with anything and it shows.

"Standardized testing while not perfect, is an equalizer against fraud and manipulation of the admissions system."

Sure, why not?

R85, so simplistic. China is the least creative and innovative society on the planet. They can only take what the creative and innovative societies around the world do and copy it, cheaply. The sheer size of their population combined with the growing middle class will destabalize their government within the next ten to fifteen years, if not sooner. The best and brightest in China come to America to study at our universities. China is the equivalent of Mississippi on the world stage.

Make em write essays

Tell yourself whatever it takes to reassure yourself against the numbers (including patent issuances and IQ) and the impending future, r88.

The old tropes are very comforting. Cradle that mug and feel warm and fuzzy.

So in 10 or 20 years California is going to be flooded with loads of people who aren't capable of doing their job, feel insecure due to that and are reactionary... I wonder, which political party benefits the most from reactionary people? Oh that's right, the Republican party. California going to be very red within the next decade thanks to the far left bending over backwards to give blacks an easy ride.

[quote] That said, the article says the SATs will be optional. What that really means is optional for kids who are from underrepresented minorities. Asians, Whites and anyone from a high-performing school district will continue to take the test. And need to.

R82, maybe they’ll take it for applications to non-UC schools, but the UC System won’t consider the exam scores at all after admissions for fall 2022. It’s for the fall 2022 class that it’s optional. After that, it’ll be ignored completely. See, e.g., the article at r84.

[quote] One of the main issues here is whether you think it’s fair that children from poor families should get fewer educational opportunities than children from rich families

Everyone deserves the same. And it doesn't cost a penny to study

The real question is why do poor minority students not apply themselves? Why don't they focus on the importance of their children's education?

R90, you literally said nothing. Do you even know anything about modern China? Obviously not. Go ahead and explain how the worsening authoritarian government will coexist with the growing middle class that will demand better conditions and more freedoms over the next decade or so. You are the one living in some ignorant state where everything in China is just great. You actually believe the Chinese government. Think about that, dear.

Well, there goes their reputations as serious places of higher education. That type of thing should be the slogan of 90% of America's institutions today: "Aim low!"

This whole thread just smacks of "I had to take those shitty fucking tests, so you better have to take them, too!" sentiments.

These tests show nothing. They do not correlate to success in college. They are just used to make money. Two hundred bucks a pop for the test. Thousands of dollars for prep courses. A couple hundred for prep books. Another sixty bucks or more to send your scores to each individual school. They are a money-making scheme. Good riddance. Let admissions departments actually work for their money instead of just sticking test numbers in an algorithm.

Is "I never once studied but scored a 1600 on my SAT and a 36 on my ACT" DL's new "I'm 74 but pass for 22"???

At DL University the supreme criterion is dick size.

[quote]The real question is why do poor minority students not apply themselves? Why don't they focus on the importance of their children's education?

r93, Im a POC and I dont think dropping the tests is a good idea. This is unfair to kids who have bad study habits, but are good test takers and problem solvers. The two are not mutually exclusive.

I was an average student in high school who skipped a ton of classes and did homework here and there, but I still managed to score well on the SAT and ACT. I became a better test taker because I read books, magazines and newspapers all the time. We also had standardized writing and language tests in my state and I was always in the top percentile, which forced my high school to let me graduate with honors even though I cut class practically every other day by the time I was a senior. My statistics teacher wondered how I was acing her tests when I only occasionally came to class.

Some students don't have a home environment that is conducive for a ton of homework, often it's minority students. A lot of it is just cultural differences. I had a part-time night/weekend job at 17 and loved getting a paycheck more than anything else. Waking up at the crack of dawn to get on an overcrowded bus to go to overcrowded classes? Bitch please. That was my attitude at that age.

It's only a matter of time before they drop the English language at Universities for being colonialist and racist. Esperanto 2.0 here we come!

It's a double-edged sword, Eldergays.

On the one hand, the SATs are easily gamed with the help of a good tutor. What many of you "I never studied and got at 1400" posters don't understand is that you are not the issue. Of course there will be kids like you. The issue is the kid who gets an 1100 the first time, the parents hire a high-priced tutor and boom the kid gets a 1400 next time. (I'd also add that due to tutoring and the increasingly crazed admissions process, a 1400 is a B+ level score these days.) At my Manhattan private school the names of these tutors were handed down like state secrets. The good ones only took on a limited number of clients each year and charged hundred of dollars an hour.

The flip side is that admissions committees can use high SAT scores to justify admitting a kid from a middle class or working class high school they're unfamiliar with. They see lots of kids with straight As but the assumption is that an "A" at East Flyoverstan Regional HIgh School is not the same as an "A" at Coastal Country Day--the former being much easier to get--and so a high SAT score can help them justify a kid from outside their comfort zone.

I completely understand. How else can the black kids qualify?

I don't think there's any way to take away the privileges of wealth but I do think there are better ways to equalize the disparity between academic achievement and poverty. That's a tall order, though. It starts with pre-natal health and care, paid parental leave, early childhood reading programs, bridging the internet divide and engaged parenting--all in the first five years. There has to be a mandate or consensus to accomplish this and we have to allocate funding accordingly. Until that happens, colleges will institute quick fixes that cost nothing and are blessed by certain members of the academic community.

[quote]The issue is the kid who gets an 1100 the first time, the parents hire a high-priced tutor and boom the kid gets a 1400 next time.

Most Americans are not hiring their kids a tutor for this and most Americans are not going to elite Manhattan private schools, hence the waning relevancy of these tests. You do not need a 1400 score to get into a state school.

And once the government starts subsidizing the two years of community college, these tests will probably become a thing of the past. Higher education as a whole will totally change as people will certainly take advantage of the more affordable option.

It doesn't have as much to do with black and brown people as racist Datalounge would like to think. This is the result of the gap between the wealthy and poor growing more and more.

Man that white guilt is going to destroy the USA, no wonder it's an easy to manipulate laughing stock to China and Russia now.

White guilt will destroy America, I agree.

R105 in English, comrade?

R107 You sure you don't want it in Ebonics? That's where the guilt is leading you.

The SATs saved my life. I came from a dysfunctional, poor midwestern trailer trash family, was beat up by my father a lot, school counselor was useless at advice (local branch of our mediocre state university), and my cousins my age have all ODed and died (some then, some now). 1570 and a 35 ACT and I got into a top 10 school on scholarship, Pell grant, and loans, and got a great job in NYC after graduation. I do feel there is some racial bias in our education system, but class bias for poor white kids was and is a thing, too.

But...if you do this, then remove any questions about "race" from the application. Because plenty of white kids have poor or crappy parents who don't push them to do their homework or take them to museums.

Everything to be dumbed down for a generation of lazy, entitled woke idiots.

No country....no SERIOUS country, treats it's talented young like this.

Better start learning Chinese.

The Ivy League dropped them for next years' incoming freshman class and the class is the most diverse ever. If the admissions departments did good jobs, those freshmen will do well. It's an experiment. Let's hope it succeeds.

[quote]No country....no SERIOUS country, treats it's talented young like this.

America is particularly ridiculous. White guilt has nothing to do with making college affordable for families again.

The far left have been pushing a lot of experiments recently and they've all been failing.

The SAT used to be a reasonable proxy for IQ. It’s changed over the years and is more easily influenced by prepping than it used to be. The ACT has four sections and some schools allow kids to “super score.” So kids will take the test as many as ten times, focusing on different sections. Also, in very affluent schools, very significant percentages of the kids get diagnosed with mild learning disabilities, allowing them double time or time and a half. The tests are no longer a way for kids who are innately super bright to demonstrate a spark that their environment had failed to nurture. That opportunity was already gone, so dropping these tests isn’t that big of a deal.

Can you explain further R104-- you seem to be making two contradictory points, saying that SAT tutoring doesn't matter because kids going to second-rate state schools aren't getting tutored and so it's not a problem, and then saying that the problem is the growing gap between rich and poor

I bombed the SATs & got in the 90% of every sunbject except math on my ACTs (I’m not sure how they figure the score out nowadays but back then the test was divided into subjects like history, English language skills, math, etc, and you got a separate score on each subject) . ACT was a completely different test than my SATs. ACT made sense & tested me on my knowledge after 12 years of schooling. SAT was developed to trip people up and give an advantage to those whose families paid for tutoring. And the vocabulary would surely trip up a kid who went to a poor school district or had learned English as a second language. I was a relentless reader and never hear of many of the examples on SAT

—- is to —- as — is to —.

I found that tiresome. But when I took ACTs I said, “Hey, I know all this stuff!”

I think the other part to this story is that the College Board and the ACT company are both in a lot of financial trouble. Standardized testing during the pandemic has been chaotic and both have been scrambling to respond to the new testing climate. If you think DL is hard to use and clunky, you wouldn't believe the College Board's site. I wouldn't be surprised if the ACT goes out of business and I think the College Board's days are numbered too. Probably in ten to twenty years, colleges will administer their own entrance exams. That is how they do it in Japan (I don't know about Europe).

I personally think those are the bigger issues at play here. The tests are unfair, especially in the midst of the pandemic. You don't have to be a SJW to see that, and that's why these big university systems are making adjustments.

Also, the number of students willing and able to pay is decreasing, so doing away with the tests is one way to expand the eligible pool of paying students without obviously lowering standards. "Woke Twitter" has a lot less power than the financial constraints all universities are facing. Those constraints are largely hidden from public view.

The article at the link is from last summer but this past academic year has been no better.

Simpler than that R119

They did away with SAT/ACT for class of 25 because hardly any kids were able to take the tests. Or retake them, as the case may be.

Class of 26 is back on track with the tests.

What will be interesting is to see how much weight they are given going forward.

So admissions will be based on high-school grades, teacher recommendations, and a few written essays--is that how it works? Plus extracurricular activities, as we used to call them...Just trying to understand.

I do worry that--for some kids, anyway--this will lead to being young, gifted, and undereducated.

r117 Im not seeing how its contradictory. If the demand for the traditional four year programs drops off because it's more affordable for students to complete free two year community college first, which is not very competitive, tests like these won't be needed anymore.

The point is that the cost of the traditional four year program is becoming astronomical for most average people, whites included. And like r119 stated people don't want to pay for their kids to even take the ACT and SAT. That is caused by growing division between the classes. If average people are not making enough money at a rate that allows them to save for their kids to go directly into a four year program, they will certainly go for a more affordable free community college option if it becomes available.

It means to get into a good school, you will have to be social and popular. It is definitely directed against Asians.

The Europeans are laughing at us now. Their entering college students are still held to a high standard. British students must take their A levels to get into university and French students must do well on their BAC's to get admitted to good schools.

British Universities are going the same way, it's a slow erosion but it's happening.

"Critics of the testing system argued that low-income students of color and those with disabilities were disadvantaged without elite tutors or strategic test prep services."

Sadly, doing well on an SAT is a pretty good indicator that the testee will be able to do well in college. If a kid from a disadvantaged background is bright but hasn't been exposed to any advanced concept, or the culture of grinding one's way through difficult classes, they're likely to have trouble at the college level, made worse by social disadvantages.

Frankly, there needs to be some sort of crap-high-school-to-college transitional/remedial program for bright kids from disadvantaged backgrounds, that would be a real-world way to work towards equity in education. But of course it won't happen in today's political climate, since the loudmouth idiots would call it "racist" and "discriminatory", even if the program was full of white kids from shitty rural schools.

Now I see R122, but there is enough competition for the top schools that the SAT won't fade away even if the middle classes opt for free community college.

If anything, it will make competition for those top 50 or so colleges even more fierce.

The last part of the article mentions that the UCs will be developing their own tests.

The UCs get insane numbers of applications. They've pretty much been using grades and tests. Dropping the SAT means that class rank and APs will matter more, even though the UCs put an upper limit on how much weighting there can be in a given year.

SAT scores do, in fact, roughly correlate to college performance, but there's a lot of gaming the system--tutors, actual cheating, getting accommodations. Kids who claim a learning disability can get twice as long to take a test and ADA laws mean the schools aren't told.

The original idea of the SAT is that it couldn't be studied for and was, this, fair. But that's no longer the case. It's helpful in that it's a cross-school metric, but so are AP scores.

Maybe a few more kids who wouldn't have gotten in will now do so, but affluent educationally minded parents are still going to find ways to give their kids an edge.

Good essay from 2007 by Charles Murray.

He says the main reason to get rid of the SAT (and replace it with college achievement tests) is to get rid of the perception that “You just got a good SAT score because you came from a rich family and you were able to buy a high SAT score with tutors and prep courses.” He says studies show that tutors don’t make a huge difference compared to the student’s underlying motivation.

“The coaching industry touts the clever test-taking strategies it teaches, but the bulk of the contribution comes from garden-variety preparation that is easily open to any student at no cost.“

“The SAT test isn’t the problem. The children of the well educated and affluent get most of the top scores because they constitute most of the smartest kids. They are smart not because their parents are well educated, but because their parents are smart.“

That's selective use of facts on Murray's part, R129

There are tutors and then there are tutors

To make his point, Murray is combining results from Kaplan style courses and Your Aunt's Neighbor's Kid Who Got A 1580 On The SAT And Wants To Make Extra Money with the much smaller subset of tutors who command $350/hour and up and whose reputations are based on significantly raising scores.

[quote]The children of the well educated and affluent get most of the top scores because they constitute most of the smartest kids. They are smart not because their parents are well educated, but because their parents are smart.“

Is this bullshit really what you're going with?

R131, yes. There is a definitely a correlation between IQ and class. That is a fact.

r132 One has NOTHING to do with the other. Some of the most brilliant minds in humanity grew up dirt poor. Many of the elite class are dumb as rocks:

R73 Well, a lot who get into prestigious schools do so because of the influence of money and help from other sources. Of course, if they were doing very terrible they wouldn’t let them in, but it’s easy for people from better off areas and well connected parents and relatives to get into these schools.

R132, they’re not mutually exclusive. However, IQ is heritable. On average, kids aren’t as smart or dumb as their parents, there’s a regression toward the mean.

But if both parents have a hand of Royal Flushes, their offspring is much likelier to have a good hand than the offspring of two parents with an average hand of cards.

And we do live in a society where the ability to do complex work has high monetary reward. So it’s inevitable that one’s ability to do complex work is partly heritable.

R134, I grew up upper middle class, and every higher ranking private school I applied to did not accept me.

[quote]There is a definitely a correlation between IQ and class. That is a fact.

Bullshit.

Many poor countries rank among those with the highest IQs.

How can math be biased?

I'm Black. My family is lower middle class. I got a 32 on the ACT and I attend a top 15 university. There are a lot of racist comments in this comment section.

Overall IQ ranking by country:

"The intelligence scores came from work carried out earlier this decade by Richard Lynn, a British psychologist, and Tatu Vanhanen, a Finnish political scientist, who analysed IQ studies from 113 countries, and from subsequent work by Jelte Wicherts, a Dutch psychologist."

Maybe as a perfect scorer I should take umbrage (yes, I'm bragging), but I'm not super convinced this change will have as big an impact on admissions as some people think. One likely outcome, which I think has been touched on, is the increased reliance on achievement tests, like Advanced Placement and SAT II exams. The students who do well on achievement tests are generally the same students who do well on ability tests. That shouldn't really surprise anyone. So, it seems logical to turn to those exams as the next best standardized thing -- especially since those tests have less of an "IQ" stigma attached to them, despite most of them almost certainly also being correlated with IQ. Now, if schools didn't have any standardized criteria, that would be cause for concern.

One thing that I've always been confused about is why the SAT is such a target regarding the socioeconomic differences. It seems to me that there's not a single aspect of the college application process that doesn't in some way privilege the wealthy. You can hire tutors for the SAT, yes, but you can also hire tutors to help your kids improve their GPAs. You can also hire people to write your kid's college essays and recommendations. Is there any part of the application process that's truly immune? I definitely agree that socioeconomic differences should be considered in the process, but how do you prevent people from lying about that?

No one test should embody the whole of a person. It's ridiculous. If you have a headache the day of the test, your score will most likely be lower because you arent' concentrating the same as you would on a regular day. People don't like having numbers assigned to them for a reason. It's a pretty universal feeling.

It's kind of happening naturally anyway, but we should bifurcate the undergraduate college system into two year chunks across the board. The first two done at community college types of schools. We could focus this level into trade and college-bound schools. Those would act as weed outs for those who can't cut it in college level work and also give kids a chance to mature a bit, make up for screwing around in high school, and find out what they want to do without the huge costs. We'd make it universal, though, so we don't end up with the current system where community colleges are considered second tier. Then, the final two college years where you specialize in your major would be more competitive in nature. The students' grades and accomplishments from the first two years would determine admittance to upper level schools instead of relying on tests taken by high school kids. Then, graduate school would the the third two year block. Each step would weed out people from the next step.

[quote] The real question is why do poor minority students not apply themselves? Why don't they focus on the importance of their children's education?

Money isn’t everything, but not having it is. When you’re poor it’s hard to think much beyond making rent and putting food on the table. This mindset is not easy to escape and adds to the cyclical nature of poverty.

Good for you R139. Therefore, the ACT is meritorious and not dependent on wealth or race, and there’s no need to get rid of it.

R137, what does that have to do with competition WITHIN the United States? Work with higher cognitive demand is nicely rewarded in the United States, therefore, if you have a higher IQ, you have a better chance at succeeding in the United States’ meritocracy.

Bullshit, R163, look at the poor Asians. Stop using poverty as an excuse. If anything, if you were truly smart and capable, poverty would be the motivating factor for you to apply yourself and get out of your circumstances.

R145 thinks America is a meritocracy. Bwahahahaha. That explains his inane posts. Are you a libertarian or a Repug?

to asking banks not to consiser credit scores when handing out loans. That's how capitalism works. The wealthy will have access to better services. But that doesn't mean the poor is without opportunity. And that's what makes America and capitalism great. I would much rather California give away free money to low income students for private tutors, than to do away with the SAT all together.

The banks are giving you their money in a loan, R148. You are paying the universities for the privilege of going there. Why are you so in love with the SAT? Do you work in admissions and don't want to have to actually, ya know, work?

Somehow the first part of comment got deleted. I disagree wholeheartedly with r6. I hate to politicize this but those with money and resources will have access to better services. And that kinda make sense in almost why would it be in other way type of pholosophy. What is the notion of money? What is the notion power and success. Our entire country isnt a commune, you willingly participate and accept more money than the guy serving your fries at McDonalds. The ACT and SAT are a standardized test use to compare a wide of array of students from high-schools with different curriculum. Poor people should have opportunity but you don't get rid of something that works because the wealthy have better access to excel.

R149, Pls tell me your trolling. The sad fact is as beautiful, creative, diverse, modern society has become we still need test. We can't get rid of the Bar exam because Billy Bob passed law school and gave a beautiful speech in college. Are they going to stop looking at report cards because the wealthy have better grades, which they do. I will bet money bar exam rates decline as well as those passing medical school. Watch.

r146, poor Asians do well for two reasons: 1) they have a cultural heritage that prizes formal education; and 2) they are usually children of immigrants who, like nearly all immigrants to this country, are hopeful for their and their children’s future. Hispanic immigrants have the second of these motives but are rather lacking in the first. Black Americans seem to have little of either, but not because they’re shiftless and stupid, but because their history has shown them again and again over generations that it’s all just a game rigged in favor of the white élite. Would you not opt out of a system when you know you’re not going to see much benefit from participating in it?

R147, of course it’s a meritocracy, and many leftists want to get rid of it because meritocracies do lead to inequality in the long run.

Check out this book review of “The Cult of Smart” by socialist Fredrik DeBoer, who acknowledges that IQ and ability is largely heritable. Even if you equalized economic resources, there would still be inequality based on who won the genetic lottery.

[quote]Black Americans seem to have little of either, but not because they’re shiftless and stupid, but because their history has shown them again and again over generations that it’s all just a game rigged in favor of the white élite. Would you not opt out of a system when you know you’re not going to see much benefit from participating in it?

Then whatever the reason, let's call it out for what it ultimately is : a loser mentality. And no one is going to help you out of it except yourself.

And please note: the highest earning income groups in the US are not white.

R152, that’s fundamentally not true that it’s rigged against blacks in favor of white elites. If that were true, there wouldn’t be affirmative action. It is, however, rigged against Asians, who are discriminated against, yet they don’t lose steam. Once again, blacks have no excuse.

“Leaving aside abstract questions of justice and desert, our increasingly complex market systems—though they impose costs—yield obvious payoffs (and not just for “winners”). Like it or not, the economic abundance we currently enjoy, although unevenly distributed, seems increasingly dependent on meritocratic screening and job placement both in matching talent to tasks and in spurring people to do their best.”

“...are we better off now, on balance, than we were before the rise of our ever more ruthless, exacting, and discerning meritocratic regime? That question cannot be answered without detailed instructions on how to transform society to reduce reliance on the best and the brightest and on the devices we have developed for identifying them.”

“But to quote Christopher Caldwell’s The Age of Entitlement, “only a small fraction of people in any society is equipped to do brainwork.” Despite wishful thinking, that fraction is not easily increased. Likewise, finding the best and the brightest—something selective universities are still pretty good at doing—requires both savvy and investment. Finally, there is the challenge of getting the most capable people (or anyone, for that matter) to put their abilities to work.“

“In hierarchies like ours that rely heavily on degrees of competence, not all can improve their status. For those who do, it’s a zero-sum game: the tautological fact is that only one quintile of the population can be in the top quintile. We also don’t know how to alter or counter effectively the generational practices of selective mating, educational investment, and social self-segregation which keep that top quintile on top.“

Its been several decades that the "system" is not rigged against black kids who perform well in school.

Black Americans seem to have little of either, but not because they’re shiftless and stupid, but because their history has shown them again and again over generations that it’s all just a game rigged in favor of the white élite. Would you not opt out of a system when you know you’re not going to see much benefit from participating in it?

Everyone knows that the key to getting a good education is family involvement. With 67% of black children born into one parent homes, the family support is much more difficult. From The National Institute of Health:

Parent involvement in a child's early education is consistently found to be positively associated with a child's academic performance (Hara & Burke, 1998; Hill & Craft, 2003; Marcon, 1999; Stevenson & Baker, 1987). Specifically, children whose parents are more involved in their education have higher levels of academic performance than children whose parents are involved to a lesser degree. The influence of parent involvement on academic success has not only been noted among researchers, but also among policy makers who have integrated efforts aimed at increasing parent involvement into broader educational policy initiatives. Coupled with these findings of the importance of early academic success, a child's academic success has been found to be relatively stable after early elementary school (Entwisle & Hayduk, 1988; Pedersen, Faucher, & Eaton, 1978). Therefore, it is important to examine factors that contribute to early academic success and that are amenable to change.

How about stop having children out of wedlock?

If black families were majority two parents instead of majority single mothers, black achievement in schools would be profoundly affected.. But this has been known for decades and hasn’t really changed. Black students from Africa and the Caribbean are way more successful than AA students. It’s ok to try to increase AA representation in schools but other nonwhite minority groups will continue to do well while AA languish.

The racism in this thread is disgusting.

R158, and the other shallow thinkers who just read things without applying any thinking of their own, your study is biased from the start. Black and Hispanic children are much more likely to grow up in multigenerational housing. Any study that only studies parental involvement is biased toward white nuclear families. It's a funny thing about the social sciences...when whites study blacks, blacks come off worse, when men study women, women come off worse, etc. Much of the history we think we know, all the way back to the infamous hunter/gatherer dichotomy, is bullshit because it was all written only by white males who, not surprisingly, gave all the biggest and best starring roles to other white males, usually of European descent.

Let's study how dangerous the male headed nuclear family is for women and children in this world. Funny how no one looked into that at all until women started getting the access to the education that allowed them to do those studies themselves. Men never bothered to study it. Strange, no?

I cannot wait for them to do the same for med schools asap. Just to increase the "% of Black and Brown (or Black and Latino)" - exact phrase and justification NYC has been using in their attempt to abolish the specialised high school ("racist, segregated") entrance test, too.

Didn't some politician recently talk about the racist healthcare system where 'Black Birthing People' (again, her words) greatly suffer? No more exposure to racist white and Asian doctors.

r162 Asian/Asian American children also often grow up in multi-generational households

There is definitely institutional racism in higher education, but blacks are the beneficiary of it.

I think we need to stop trying to manufacture diversity, let the chips fall where they may, leave blacks to their own devices and stop looking at the Ivies and prestigious universities as areas where there will be proportional representation.

Find a different route for upward mobility for blacks. Stop demanding that they be like white people. Most of them are not interested in that. The diamonds in the rough will be successful.

“If we fail to acknowledge what the SAT measures, we give rise to the claims that it measures privilege or test-taking ability or preparation, instead of the important, complex thinking required to do well in college. If we are willing to accept that the SAT measures intelligence relatively well, and that intelligence is useful in college, then we are able to continue to use the assessment as part of an admissions process that identifies individuals who have a good chance of college success, even if they come from underperforming high schools with comparatively weak curricula. As an added benefit, we may begin to rein in the claims of test preparation companies who have made considerable profits from the widely held but erroneous belief that large increases in scores are likely with costly instruction. Finally, when we understand that the SAT is a reasonable measure of intelligence, we can use SAT scores as a proxy measure for time-consuming and sometimes unavailable traditional intelligence assessments, as dozens of researchers have been doing since 2004.“

R152 nailed it, also, Asians and Hispanics are likely to have an intact nuclear family

Many people are lazy. Asians are not. I run a research grant and 80% of the applicants are Asian. Why? Because the applications take a lot of work. And 95% of the winning applications are from Asians because they do the work.

R150 I think where you’ve gone wrong is to think of the institution of education for children as a ‘service’. Unfair access to education (which you’ve acknowledged it is) is in violation of at least 3 articles of the UN declaration of human rights. That’s what’s happening here. This isn’t adults losing out on something because they can’t afford it for themselves, this is children that have no control over the situation - thinking rich kids deserve better access to education is just desperate, it really is just totally abject and desperate.

A college education alone is not a guarantee you an ultra successful career either. As an LGBT POC I would think people here would understand that the workforce is still full of racism and homophobia. If such a measure were taken to leverage LGBT youths to give them better access to higher education, I bet this conversation would have a totally different tone.

I also think people here are taking this totally out of context. In true Datalounge fashion, you all are being overly dramatic, as if these tests are being discarded entirely by the entire higher education system, and world as we know it may end. Majority of these students, white black asian hispanic or other, are not attending elite schools, but they still need better access to college so they can contribute to society.

America in the 21st century has a terrible pattern of only investing in the ultra gifted and elite, while the rest of society is being left the scraps. And then you all wonder why these kids are opting to show their dicks and assholes on Onlyfans, or sell drugs instead of choosing a career. Until they get some leverage to actually have an opportunity to live a reasonable life the traditional way, more of them will continue to be lured away into fleeting fast money and we all know how that ends up.

R170, education is not a service. Education is something that one does for oneself, not something that is done to you. It’s primarily the social milieu of the community.

Why do white parents send their kids to private schools? The real reason? It’s to keep their kids protected from black kids. Because the white parents know that it’s the quality of students and environment that makes a school good or bad, not all the nice bells and whistles the school offers.

R171, I don’t see that LGBT have poor access to higher education. I just finished law school, and during my last two years, LGBT made up between 17-19% of the student population. Actually, I would think LGBT tend to be over represented in higher education, since marginalized students often have more time to focus on schoolwork since they’re not distracted with the drinking and parties that the popular kids go to.

As for good jobs, that is a problem. Even the legal market is oversaturated with lawyers. There just aren’t enough good jobs for everybody. How do you solve that?

“…the controversy over college entrance examinations stems not from the examinations themselves, but from the fact that they reveal profound differences in human capital that make progressives uncomfortable. The SATs don’t create inequality. They reveal inequality.”

“The rush to rid the world of the SAT is based on this dynamic. Because Black and white students are not equal in academic preparedness, and because we have failed to close the gap in a half-century of concerted policy effort to do so, we must eliminate the tools that reveal it, such as the SAT. Similarly, the movement to shutter gifted and talented programs4, due to the racial inequalities therein, demonstrates an attempt to shut down those structures that make educational inequality visible. It should go without saying that this will not doing anything to close the gap in actual ability.

Of course, if eliminating entrance examinations is an effort to improve the standing of Black students, it is necessarily also an effort to hurt the standing of students from certain other races. (When we’re talking about changing relative performance - or, really, perception of relative performance - everything is zero sum. For some to rise, others must fall, by definition.) In today’s political climate, hurting white kids to benefit Black is not a hard pull, politically, at least in academia. But claims that the SAT is an artifact of white supremacy, which are common these days, are hard to square with the fact that Asian Americans handily outperform white, even when controlling for income band. Asian test takers on average score 100 points higher than white, and are 3.5 times more likely to score in the 1400-1600 range than white. (Data.) Whatever else the effort to eliminate entrance testing may be, it is absolutely, undeniably, objectively an effort to disadvantage Asian students. If people want to fight this battle, fine, but anyone who does so without acknowledging its negative effects on Asian American applicants is a propagandist.”

^^^

left-of-center political movements, from center-left to radically socialist, cannot achieve the goal of the greater good for everyone, including greater political and economic equality, while pretending that we believe in equality of human ability. The only way to intelligently address various social, economic, and political equalities related to differences in human potential is to acknowledge that those differences exist. The current rending of garments regarding inequalities within our education system has led to certifiably bizarre situations like the movement, currently gathering steam, to teach math as if it is as subjective as literature or art. But this won’t make Black kids or poor kids or girls or anyone else actually better at math. And if the universities really give up their function of creating an academic hierarchy for political reasons, employers will find new systems that do that, or a lot of people will get hired and quickly fired for not being competent. This is not an intelligent policy approach. Getting rid of the SATs won’t make unprepared kids prepared. It won’t make naturally untalented students naturally talented. It won’t make kids who aren’t smart into smart kids. All it will do is hide the reality of those unpleasant inequalities.

Trying to fight educational inequality by getting rid of the SAT is like trying to fight climate change by getting rid of thermometers.

^^^

In general, progressive and left types routinely overstate the power of the relationship between family wealth and academic performance on all manner of educational outcomes. The political logic is obvious: if you generally want to redistribute money (as I do) then the claim that educational problems are really economic problems provides ammo for your position. But the fact that there is a generic socioeconomic effect does not mean that giving people money will improve their educational outcomes very much, particularly if richer people are actually mildly but consistently better at school than poorer for sorting reasons that are not the direct product of differences in income. That is, what correlation does exist between SES and academic indicators might simply be the metrics accurately measuring the constructs they were designed to measure.

And throwing money at our educational problems, while noble in intent, hasn’t worked. (People react violently to this, but for example poorer and Blacker public schools receive significantly higher per-pupil funding than richer and whiter schools, which should not be a surprise given that the policy apparatus has been shoveling money at the racial performance gap for 40 years.) All manner of major interventions in student socioeconomic status, including adoption into dramatically different home and family conditions, have failed to produce the benefits you’d expect if academic outcomes were a simple function of money. I believe in redistribution as a way to ameliorate the consequences of poor academic performance. There is no reason to think that redistribution will ameliorate poor academic performance itself.

Harvard submitted its brief to the Supreme Court today, in its attempt to have the court pass on taking the case after platiffs’ appeal. They had an extension, and just filed it.

Four of the judges must agree to take the case.

R76, you’re wrong. Page 2. In NYC Asians have a higher poverty rate.

R76, the piece you linked to uses data from 2011 to 2015. Here’s 2019.

Hadn't seen that. Thanks r177

[quote] Those tests have been proven to be biased by study after study.

How? Is this one of those math I’d racist things?

[quote]Those tests have been proven to be biased by study after study.

Link please.

Funny, those tests are so biased but Asians do so well. Are they biased in favor of Asians? How does that work exactly?

The UCs are getting rid of the SATs, however no one has mentioned the dirty little secret that they’ll be phasing in their own version of an aptitude exam in the next five years. It’s purely a money making scheme on their part, nothing to do with racial score discrepancies or any other woke reason.

Second, to the person way above who claimed to be a college counselor. The top factors in admissions are GPA, standardized test scores, strength of schedule and class rank. Extracurricular are nice and desired, but when they are received 100K+ applications, the first step weeding out the applications are those four factors. Each university has a regional specialist who knows the ins and outs of each high school in their region. So while they aren’t supposed to look at race, they will consider the 3.0 student from Compton and dismiss the 4.0 student from Beverly Hills based on that.

Also, I grew up in an Asian heavy neighborhood, (low to middle class) with a fair number of Latinos and whites. You want to know how the Asians excelled? I’ll tell you:

Afterschool, instead of going to the mall or skateboarding, the kids ran home to do their homework right away. Many of these kids were latchkey kids and knew they’d be in trouble for loitering around. After homework, they reviewed what they learned, followed by reading ahead to preview what was going to be taught. Weekends were spent at Chinese school, learning the language and getting tutored by “aunties and uncles” who had a grasp on the subjects. By sixth grade, they’re starting to prep for the SAT by learning vocab words and math drills. As high schoolers, weekends are spent doing practice SATs and reviewing the answers. Same in the summer, all summer. Most Asian kids I knew bought the textbooks from school to keep as reference.

I know test prep services like Kaplan and Princeton review tout “test-taking strategies.” Go to an Asian test prep center, and they’ll tell you one thing, “It’s all about practice, practice, practice.” They don’t bullshit you with tricks. Literally, their courses are nothing but practice tests, literally photocopied from SAT prep books. If you don’t have the money for a prep course, buy or borrow from your library the big, fat SAT books and get cracking.

Of course, no one wants to hear that. It’s easier to dumb down the playing field because certain populations have a terrible work ethic or game the system if you’re rich.

Most people are just lazy. I'm not what I would consider to be naturally "gifted." I did the work because I wanted to make something of myself. I work very hard at my job at a fortune 500 company. I am in an executive position usually occupied by people with advanced degrees (PhD). I run circles around my colleague who has a PhD.

We are making it too easy for people to be lazy and too hard for companies to fire inept employees without fears of lawsuits. I'm constantly amazed by how lazy people skate by, and I have seen how executives are starting to lower the bar on what is considered good / meets expectations standards from people.