What's nuts about this how tons of people from all levels of government/society participated in this conspiracy.
It says a lot about the general attitude of Chinese people.
(I'm chinese, btw)
One woman's stolen identity exposed a system of exam fraud
21–30 of 184 posts
Re: One woman's stolen identity exposed a system of exam fraud
#22Earlier quoted context omitted.
In Brazil, you're tested on 10+ subjects, ~half of which are open questions and the other half are multiple choice, plus an essay. Which subject goes in each of those categories depends on the major you're applying for, so you have to decide what you'll want to study in university at age ~17 (or prior to that, really, when you're 15 in High School so you can focus your studies on the harder questions). For instance,…
> Your extracurriculars, who you are as a person, anything on your resume is irrelevant. All that matters is your score. Sounds absolutely brutal. That said, I was caught with the quoted paragraph. Why should your extracurricular hobbies or "you as a person" matter? As far as I see, all that should be considered in university admissions is indeed your test scores.
>Why should your extracurricular hobbies or "you as a person" matter?
They certainly do at elite US schools. The logic is that there's no shortage of students who could handle the academic work but Harvard or even MIT aren't looking just to admit the students who did best on an exam.
Added: The way it at least used to be done (and I assume this still applies at least somewhat) was that quantitative academic scores are used to set something of a floor but, beyond that, they were just one of the factors that went into admissions decisions. (With weights and other considerations doubtless varying by school.)
Re: One woman's stolen identity exposed a system of exam fraud
#23The unstated assumption in this article is that only college graduates deserve to have a decent life.
Something I've heard from Chinese people online about the difference between the US and China is that in America, you could be a plumber/auto mechanic/skilled trades and still have a middle-income lifestyle and a decent amount of societal respect. In China, working with your hands puts you on the lower rungs in society, hence everyone wants to get into college.
The kind of cultural attitude you describe reflects the supply and demand logistics of the economic conditions that were responsible for modern China as it is today.
Modern China was built off the backs of Cheap Manual laborers
Re: One woman's stolen identity exposed a system of exam fraud
#24What's nuts about this how tons of people from all levels of government/society participated in this conspiracy. It says a lot about the general attitude of Chinese people. (I'm chinese, btw)
I think it says a lot about human nature and concentration of power than about Chinese people in particular.
Re: One woman's stolen identity exposed a system of exam fraud
#25What's nuts about this how tons of people from all levels of government/society participated in this conspiracy. It says a lot about the general attitude of Chinese people. (I'm chinese, btw)
I think it says a lot about human nature and concentration of power than about Chinese people in particular.
I think it says both, frankly.
Re: One woman's stolen identity exposed a system of exam fraud
#26Earlier quoted context omitted.
The US has evolved a similar rigging for our privileged. We supply various obscure sports accolades that can be purchased for the children of wealthy families to obtain admission to our leading universities. Unfortunately our schemes have also been exposed and a number of people are being prosecuted. So for the moment one must resort to investing in rather costly facility construction or similar expansion projects wh…
I’m not sure that a fraud committed against the universities that the universities did not know about counts as a rigged system. Or are you talking about something else?
Not the author, but it could be either. For donations 10-40x as large as those in the recent fraud I think you're referencing the Universities are absolutely fine letting students in.
Re: One woman's stolen identity exposed a system of exam fraud
#27Earlier quoted context omitted.
In Brazil, you're tested on 10+ subjects, ~half of which are open questions and the other half are multiple choice, plus an essay. Which subject goes in each of those categories depends on the major you're applying for, so you have to decide what you'll want to study in university at age ~17 (or prior to that, really, when you're 15 in High School so you can focus your studies on the harder questions). For instance,…
> Your extracurriculars, who you are as a person, anything on your resume is irrelevant. All that matters is your score. Sounds absolutely brutal. That said, I was caught with the quoted paragraph. Why should your extracurricular hobbies or "you as a person" matter? As far as I see, all that should be considered in university admissions is indeed your test scores.
You'll see the term "well rounded" thrown around a lot in discussions like this. The idea is that elite schools (or even just good ones) can take their pick of academic high-performers, so they seek out students who are more than just academic high performers.
They become very interested in questions like "does this person have volunteer experience that might have exposed them to a worldview larger than themselves?", "do they have a sport or hobby they enjoy which might provide them a boon in mental health?", "have they done anything which would require practical application of skills or collaboration beyond raw book learning?"
The same kind of thing comes up in job interviews all the time. As a hiring manager, I'm of course most interested in whether the candidate can perform the hard requirements of the job as described. But I'd also like signals about whether you're at risk for burnout, whether you might have empathy for differing points of view, or whether you can think on your feet in non-ideal scenarios or whether you'll crumble if a plan changes or a compromise must be found.
People are complex, and well-roundedness is a worthwhile goal on its own for a complex world. There are relatively few scenarios outside of standardized testing where raw academic or technical ability is the exclusive measure of a person.
Re: One woman's stolen identity exposed a system of exam fraud
#28This story reminds me of the stories that were common on my country of origin in South America. We had free high level education, but there was a system rigged to preserve nepotism. I was in Russia for the World Cup in 2018 and heard the same crap.
The US has evolved a similar rigging for our privileged. We supply various obscure sports accolades that can be purchased for the children of wealthy families to obtain admission to our leading universities. Unfortunately our schemes have also been exposed and a number of people are being prosecuted. So for the moment one must resort to investing in rather costly facility construction or similar expansion projects wh…
It's even simpler than that, the US has a codified system of nepotism in place called legacy admissions, which has been in place for several decades [1].
> In a deposition, Rakesh Khurana, dean of the college, said a legacy preference can foster another kind of diversity: placing people with deep Harvard experience alongside those without it.
They refer to nepotism as "deep Harvard experience", that's the only difference.
[1] https://www.npr.org/2018/11/04/663629750/legacy-admissions-o...
Re: One woman's stolen identity exposed a system of exam fraud
#29Earlier quoted context omitted.
In Brazil, you're tested on 10+ subjects, ~half of which are open questions and the other half are multiple choice, plus an essay. Which subject goes in each of those categories depends on the major you're applying for, so you have to decide what you'll want to study in university at age ~17 (or prior to that, really, when you're 15 in High School so you can focus your studies on the harder questions). For instance,…
> Your extracurriculars, who you are as a person, anything on your resume is irrelevant. All that matters is your score. Sounds absolutely brutal. That said, I was caught with the quoted paragraph. Why should your extracurricular hobbies or "you as a person" matter? As far as I see, all that should be considered in university admissions is indeed your test scores.
Because maybe you did something interesting in your young life that others aspire to achieve like: front a popular rock band[0], star in a popular television series[1] or a few movies[2][3], or even change a professional sport [4]?
[0]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rivers_Cuomo [1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fred_Savage [2]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emma_Watson [3]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reese_Witherspoon [4]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tiger_Woods
Re: One woman's stolen identity exposed a system of exam fraud
#30What's nuts about this how tons of people from all levels of government/society participated in this conspiracy. It says a lot about the general attitude of Chinese people. (I'm chinese, btw)
This is the reverse Chauvinism that I often see online; no I don't think this says "a lot" about the general attitude of Chinese people.
I'm also Chinese.