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SAT score distributions in Michigan

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Re: SAT score distributions in Michigan

#221

Post by sweezyjeezy »

thwayunion wrote: post #210
sweezyjeezy wrote: post #205

Is it reasonable to assume that an African American with SAT score in the top band(s) would probably get accepted to a better college than Michigan? There are loads of kids here with pretty low scores, so clearly this is not representative of the highest performing students in the US, nor that the race breakdowns are representative of the highest performing students in each race. This only seems to give us informatio…

For CS, getting into Michigan is incredibly competitive. They are tied (at #11) with places like CIT in CS and way above a lot of ivies and elite technical schools. Michigan CS is like Carnegie Mellon CS -- getting into the school for non-CS is waaay easier than getting into the school with the intention to major in CS, and the filter starts at admissions. Michigan is closer to an ivy than a "state school" for CS.

My question was specific to African Americans, and not specific to CS.

Re: SAT score distributions in Michigan

#223

Post by thwayunion »

mberning wrote: post #52
fny wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure... but I went to a public high school, got a 1590, and did not spend day and night studying nor did my parents have any expectation of me to perform well in school. I was just really lucky to go public schools with teachers who cared and peers that cared. It makes a huge difference.

You’re an outlier. That’s great. Most people are not scoring that high without a lot of effort, and a basic public school education, regardless of the quality, is not going to get them there. They will need additional resources within the home and outside of normal schooling.

Also, "public school" doesn't mean anything in the US in terms of educational quality. Some public schools are better resourced with more blue blood attendees than any but the richest of private schools.

Re: SAT score distributions in Michigan

#224

Post by bcrosby95 »

wjnc wrote: post #49
aabajian wrote: post #11

The SATs, particularly the mathematics score, is very much a reflection of your parents' willingness to push you academically. The stratification is more granular than Asian versus Black or White versus Native America. For example, Jewish students excel beyond the Caucasian average while Cambodian and other Southeast Asian Immigrants perform significantly below the national average for Asian Americans. The challenge…

Just a quick note on the word 'push'. We all now the 'tiger parenting' trope. Those parents exists and it makes a difference (with clear 'pushing', which I see as a negative). But with maths I think it's a bit more subtle. Just the tiny things (even just 'talk' math) you do in early education can make a massive return later. There is no 'mean' in maths education even in ages 4-10 (my kids). We live in the Netherlands…

Part of the struggle, at least in the US, is you have parents trying to help their kids with math being taught in ways they never learned.

My wife literally cannot help our 7 year old with her math because we were raised in a school system that taught rote memorization. I was too, but I suck at memorization and have had to rely on fundamental understanding in order to survive in math. So luckily I can help with things.

And parent involvement helps a ton. When our kid got 50% on the practice test I spent a few hours going over the material she didn't understand. She ended up getting 100% on the real test.

Re: SAT score distributions in Michigan

#225

Post by RetpolineDrama »

prottog wrote: post #117
davidn20 wrote: post #29

I think as a society we need to admit different race, in general, have different culture, values, and strengths. I don't even think that's a radical idea, but somehow it is. I have been watching this football competition youtube channel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UrbljwLslYI The fun and athleticism you see is awe-inspiring, but I haven't seen a single Asian person competing or even at the event. My guess is a m…

Exactly. I've made this point before in this forum, but there's no reason at all to believe that the distribution of interests, values, and strengths between different ethnic and cultural groups should be identical. The classical liberal idea that "all men are created equal" is a beautiful one, and should not be perverted to mean that everyone is literally equal to each other in every respect.

>The classical liberal idea that "all men are created equal" is a beautiful one

Is it even really "classical liberal"? I'm fairly certain it's religious in nature. If the sky daddy made us all 6,000 years ago then we are in fact all the same.

The problem arrises when science discovers that humans co-evolved over millions of years and that we are a hybrid of multiple species _with no single common ancestor_. Even "modern" humans have had geographic isolation for tens of thousands of years in very different climates/selective pressures.

Re: SAT score distributions in Michigan

#226

Post by thwayunion »

sweezyjeezy wrote: post #221
thwayunion wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For CS, getting into Michigan is incredibly competitive. They are tied (at #11) with places like CIT in CS and way above a lot of ivies and elite technical schools. Michigan CS is like Carnegie Mellon CS -- getting into the school for non-CS is waaay easier than getting into the school with the intention to major in CS, and the filter starts at admissions. Michigan is closer to an ivy than a "state school" for CS.

My question was specific to African Americans, and not specific to CS.

CS isn't the only field where Michigan is an excellent and highly selective school.

Some state flagships serve as "come all" institutions -- any decent student gets admitted. States like Missouri, Kansas, Minnesota, and I think still Wisconsin come to mind. Michigan doesn't work like that. Lots of their undergraduate programs are extremely competitive, and therefore admissions overall is competitive. Saying "better school than Michigan" is like saying "better school than Carnegie Mellon". The acceptance rate is around 20%. It's not a safety school, for anyone, particularly with an intended major in much of STEM. It's a highly selective institution. Which changes the nature of your question.

Thinking of Michigan as a "median school" is not an accurate mental model. If you want a "median school" use Michigan State instead.

Re: SAT score distributions in Michigan

#227

Post by commandlinefan »

eternalban wrote: post #172
aabajian wrote: post #11

The SATs, particularly the mathematics score, is very much a reflection of your parents' willingness to push you academically. The stratification is more granular than Asian versus Black or White versus Native America. For example, Jewish students excel beyond the Caucasian average while Cambodian and other Southeast Asian Immigrants perform significantly below the national average for Asian Americans. The challenge…

> The SATs, particularly the mathematics score, is very much a reflection of your parents' willingness to push you academically. I scored very high in both. Believe me, as new immigrants we were completely clueless about the heated race to top spots. In my case, credits goes to my makers (mom and dad :) and the fact that Iran had fairly good public schools. Culture is important. Two relevant shockers for me (as a ver…

> disrespect for teachers ... disdain for the smart kids

I've gotten the impression from every high-achieving-country immigrant that I've ever talked to that schools in those countries just kick out the troublemaking kids before they have a chance to disrupt the environment for everybody else. Nobody gets kicked out of US public schools, for any reason - so the kids who don't want to be there and spend all of their time trying to ruin it for everybody else are always there.

Re: SAT score distributions in Michigan

#228

Post by [deleted] »

fasteddie31003 wrote: post #35

"Omitted variable bias" is what is going on here and is a statistical term that everyone needs to understand because it is causing so many race issues in America. The feature that is missing in this simplistic model of intelligence is cultural values. I am definitely not a racist but I am a "culturalist". Some people have a set of personal values (culture) that express themselves as doing better or worse in standardi…

[deleted]

Re: SAT score distributions in Michigan

#229

Post by snarf21 »

Aunche wrote: post #198
aabajian wrote: post #11

The SATs, particularly the mathematics score, is very much a reflection of your parents' willingness to push you academically. The stratification is more granular than Asian versus Black or White versus Native America. For example, Jewish students excel beyond the Caucasian average while Cambodian and other Southeast Asian Immigrants perform significantly below the national average for Asian Americans. The challenge…

I volunteer tutor teens in the SAT and the problem is a bit deeper than just parents. A few of my students have a similar amount of base intelligence as me, and if they studied as much as I did, they would have no problem with finding a path of least resistance to the upper-middle/lower-upper class. The problem is that even if I'm 100% sure this path exists, they are skeptical because it seems like I'm in a entirely…

This is why (imo), test prep should be a class you take at school. Why should it be a separate thing and a multi billion dollar industry? A lot of the SAT/ACT prep for HS students is about understanding how the tests work and how to approach questions.

We already have a bunch of federally mandated AYP testing (no) thanks to No (ALL?) Child Left Behind, why can't this just be old copies of the ACT or SAT. By the time kids are ready to apply for college, it will be second hand and not another extra thing they have to learn.

Re: SAT score distributions in Michigan

#230

Post by treis »

edflsafoiewq wrote: post #149
treis wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My point is that "quality of parents" shouldn't be the way we pick the elite

No they should be picked for "ability", and it's all the same whether that "ability" was inculcated by good parenting or not.

The point is that two kids with equal ability can have dramatically different accomplishments based on things outside their control
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