Live data from Hacker News

New York City to Phase Out Its Gifted and Talented Program

nytimes.com

151–160 of 274 posts

Re: New York City to Phase Out Its Gifted and Talented Program

#151
post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a test. The test, as far as I know, doesn't include the question "are you asian".

HN regularly has threads full of complaints about how whiteboard interviews don't test the right things and unfairly harm a subset of people that doesn't correlate well to programming ability. It doesn't seem that implausible that the test the district is using has similar flaws in selecting gifted students

Sure, but the motivation here is explicit, and it's not about making the test more accurate.

Re: New York City to Phase Out Its Gifted and Talented Program

#152
post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's important to realize that the program is segregated by intent and by design. The segregation is NOT accidental. That's true of many of the gifted-and-talented programs in the US. That's not fundamental, and not true of many of the gifted-and-talented programs worldwide. Worldwide, such programs are meritocratic pathways to socioeconomic mobility. In the US, the story is much more complex. Most such programs were…

This is completely BS. The activists have been trying for decades to bump up the percentage of Blacks and Latinos, and yet it's dominated by Asians. Asians are "stealing" spots from White, Blacks, and Latinos and it makes it hard to justify racism, especially when Asians are not only 40% of the G&T but also the poorest demographic in NYC.

You called this BS, but you haven't refuted anything in it...

Can you be a little more precise, please?

Re: New York City to Phase Out Its Gifted and Talented Program

#153
post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having come out of the gifted and talented programs in question in NYC: The privileged go to private school. Our programs are dominated by first generation immigrants, mostly SE Asian. Even the white component tends to be poor immigrant families. If hard-working and intelligent poor people clawing their way upwards is a stain on equality, something has gone deeply deeply wrong with our conception of equality. It’s al…

You're making it a stain. Equality isn't some attack on your morals. I am saddened, that all the folks frightened by a world more equal immediately resort to imaginary persecution as a first reaction. "Not enough black kids" is "bigotry", right? Or do you argue that black kids are not smart? What is that argument called?

No, my argument isn’t that black kids aren’t smart. And it’s distant enough from what I did write that I hesitate to even call it a straw man.

Re: New York City to Phase Out Its Gifted and Talented Program

#154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

http://www.roosevelthouse.hunter.cuny.edu/?forum-post=resear...

This links to https://www1.nyc.gov/assets/opportunity/pdf/20_poverty_measu... as the original source. On page 28 of this file, you get to the actual statistics. While Asian poverty is certainly high, it is about the same as other minorities, and has been decreasing since 2014.

No, the report says that Asians poverty is underreported in the data.

EDIT: I think that the report shows that Hispanics in 2020 have a higher percentage of poverty than Asians, but it seems like a lot of the articles showing Asians had the highest poverty rates came from before 2017.

It looks like in the last 5 years prior to 2020, Asians had improved the poverty rates.

Regardless even in 2020, Asian poverty in NYC was 22%, Black poverty was 19%, Hispanic poverty was 24% and White poverty was 13%.

Re: New York City to Phase Out Its Gifted and Talented Program

#155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How many of those leadership exercises would realistically carry over into IRL benefit after the students graduate? For that matter, how many G&T students would check out because they're focused on leadership rather than abstract problem solving?

Leadership and management are like riding a bike in that you can teach children to do it, but if you never learned, it's likely you never will. Management training programs for regular teenagers are common in the fast food industry, and it's a differentiating life skill. I think giving that to exceptional 8-12yr olds is more valuable than exploring their creativity in an isolated class away from their peers. Few peop…

This is quite interesting to me. How would you train children for leadership? And are there any successful training methods for adults? In the military, perhaps?

Re: New York City to Phase Out Its Gifted and Talented Program

#156
post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's important to realize that the program is segregated by intent and by design. The segregation is NOT accidental. That's true of many of the gifted-and-talented programs in the US. That's not fundamental, and not true of many of the gifted-and-talented programs worldwide. Worldwide, such programs are meritocratic pathways to socioeconomic mobility. In the US, the story is much more complex. Most such programs were…

This is completely BS. The activists have been trying for decades to bump up the percentage of Blacks and Latinos, and yet it's dominated by Asians. Asians are "stealing" spots from White, Blacks, and Latinos and it makes it hard to justify racism, especially when Asians are not only 40% of the G&T but also the poorest demographic in NYC.

If poverty is not a distinguishing factor, then what is left but racism? I'm confused.

Re: New York City to Phase Out Its Gifted and Talented Program

#157

The inconvenient truth about NYC G&T program is that it is 40% Asian. Asians have dominated the G&T program, even "stealing" spots from white kids where 43% of NYC is white, but only 35% of spots taken by white kids. And Asians are dominating the NYC G&T program NOT because of hundreds of years of systemic racism, NOT because Asians wrote the admissions tests an inbueing cultural bias, and NOT by cheating or bribing…

The real thing about the asians is: There is a whole narrative that people are equal and have same capabilities. Anyone can be a sport start if trains enough or a super scientist if study enough. Then looking at statistics it is not true. The same people with cognitive dissonance claim that because social factors, etc. Usually whites get a better treatment thus because and only because of that they have better repres…

It's not I.Q., it's culture. Asians have a significant cultural focus on education. But then again so do a number of Black African minorities like the Igbo, Ashanti and Yoruba. So even "race" is a complete red herring.

Re: New York City to Phase Out Its Gifted and Talented Program

#158

The inconvenient truth about NYC G&T program is that it is 40% Asian. Asians have dominated the G&T program, even "stealing" spots from white kids where 43% of NYC is white, but only 35% of spots taken by white kids. And Asians are dominating the NYC G&T program NOT because of hundreds of years of systemic racism, NOT because Asians wrote the admissions tests an inbueing cultural bias, and NOT by cheating or bribing…

It seems outrageously unfair.

Re: New York City to Phase Out Its Gifted and Talented Program

#159

The inconvenient truth about NYC G&T program is that it is 40% Asian. Asians have dominated the G&T program, even "stealing" spots from white kids where 43% of NYC is white, but only 35% of spots taken by white kids. And Asians are dominating the NYC G&T program NOT because of hundreds of years of systemic racism, NOT because Asians wrote the admissions tests an inbueing cultural bias, and NOT by cheating or bribing…

The real thing about the asians is: There is a whole narrative that people are equal and have same capabilities. Anyone can be a sport start if trains enough or a super scientist if study enough. Then looking at statistics it is not true. The same people with cognitive dissonance claim that because social factors, etc. Usually whites get a better treatment thus because and only because of that they have better repres…

Asians are not genetically more intelligent than other races. If this were the case, Asia would be more of a powerhouse than just the "factory workers of the world". Only a small amount of innovation is coming out of Asia compared to the US.

Asians in the US are more motivated to study, it's the culture. It doesn't take a lot of dedication to studying to get a major advantage over those that don't study as hard.

Re: New York City to Phase Out Its Gifted and Talented Program

#160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Under your perspective, were NY gifted and talented programs designed to exclude blacks but include Asians (among the poorest demographics in NYC) as the largest plurality? And why?

No. They were designed from a lineage of decisions intended to exclude blacks and to include whites. That's not my perspective; that's a historical fact. That's why I referenced a Dept. of Education OCR report, which in turn references National Academies publications and similar sorts of credible references, all predating the current social justice political climate. How decisions made in the eighties and sixties imp…

> Now, I move away from fact to my perspective.

I mean, the majority of your prose comes after your description of facts, and details your pet theory on how advantageous Asian culture and parenting is an adequate explanation for the effect sizes we're seeing — that a very poor demographic in NYC would come to fulfill the plurality of NYC's gifted and talented program.

And something about how Asians come from 2000 years of test taking, so they're really good at tests (but not necessarily "good")?

Post reply on HN