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Students suing elite U.S. colleges seek 'wealth favoritism' information

reuters.com

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Re: Students suing elite U.S. colleges seek 'wealth favoritism' information

#191

Post by juve1996 »

Der_Einzige wrote: post #162
juve1996 wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's ludicrous to suggest that this is an easy outcome. If it were, you wouldn't be making 300k TC.

The reality is that most CS programs even in mid tier state schools weed out the worst to the point that the average grad is definitely making well over 100K per year 2 years out of school. I saw this with my own school. I have a hard time finding any graduates from my program who aren't gainfully employed right now.

Sure, that's the point: most get weeded out. Whether that is in freshman year of college, or kids struggling with calc 1 in their senior year of high school.

CS degrees aren't like business degrees. It's much harder. Hence, many don't do it, despite the huge financial advantages of doing it.

Re: Students suing elite U.S. colleges seek 'wealth favoritism' information

#192

Post by juve1996 »

fallingknife wrote: post #153
juve1996 wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Diminishing returns, really. As you continually test the margins will get smaller and smaller and the outcomes won't change much. Someone scoring >1500 on the SAT will likely just as well graduate from ivy league as someone who scored 1550.

Someone with a 1300 would do fine. But only because thy aren't as difficult as top schools should be because, as we see from their admissions policies, they are status and credentialing gatekeepers to elite status, not really top educational institutions.

Right - so does it really matter?

If wealth is the ultimate playground for everything (capitalism?), then obviously the elite institutions are playing the right game.

Re: Students suing elite U.S. colleges seek 'wealth favoritism' information

#193

Post by matthewdgreen »

janalsncm wrote: post #165
matthewdgreen wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At the levels we’re talking about, the difference between “perfect score” and “still excellent but imperfect score” can be down to one or two errors on the test, basically noise. Given the number of applicants and the willingness to drill testing skills, going by scores would eliminate anyone who makes a minor error. The ability to perform perfectly in high-stress situations is a useful (and learnable) skill - like t…

Yes, and that’s one of the reasons why tests are imperfect. That doesn’t mean that introducing any additional variables is warranted, especially given their associated noise. GPA is garbage, for example, which is why I ignore it on resumes. If the test has unacceptably high variance as you mentioned, the solution is to make the test longer not discount it.

I see no evidence that making tests longer will optimize for the variables that matter in academic performance (which are not 1-dimensional anyway) as opposed to simply optimizing for people who have poured resources into test preparation.

You seem to be coming from the perspective that testing must be the best metric, and then trying to develop a methodology based on that assumption. Purely as a thought exercise: it might be helpful to start from the assumption that testing isn’t an option, and think about what you might do instead.

Re: Students suing elite U.S. colleges seek 'wealth favoritism' information

#194

Post by tdehnel »

antegamisou wrote: post #185
tdehnel wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh knock it off. I’m not wealthy but I’m sick of this trope where we assume rich people are jerks. It’s a lazy, unintelligent critique, and what’s more, your comment shows that even non-wealthy people can be jerks too.

It’s an empirically sound assumption to make, especially when it comes to people who are products of wealthy lineage a few generations back and have barely worked. > It’s a lazy, unintelligent critique I think this is what a subset of people belonging to lower socioeconomic classes tell themselves, and sometimes have heard it from their “superiors”, to better cope with their financial struggle. The poor people are ju…

Your analysis is bad and your desire to judge others is worse.

What percentage of millionaires inherited their wealth? Go Google it. Now tell me if it’s ok to judge any group of people based on that percentage.

Re: Students suing elite U.S. colleges seek 'wealth favoritism' information

#195

Post by AlbertCory »

jonstewart wrote: post #183
AlbertCory wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're certainly right about the routine. If they dumped all the donors over $50,000 for the last 10 years, even on paper, I can't believe it would be that much to go through.

A nice curated authoritative spreadsheet/database wouldn’t be so much data. What if such a data set doesn’t exist? What if it’s all in the email and word docs for these collegiate development and admissions departments over a decade? How do you tell it apart?

A University "development department" doesn't have a list of their biggest donors anywhere? Somehow I doubt that.

Re: Students suing elite U.S. colleges seek 'wealth favoritism' information

#196

Post by oneoff786 »

mc32 wrote: post #18
oneoff786 wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem with police brutality is not that it’s commonplace, but that there are no repercussions for it. If blatantly abusive cops were held accountable the issue would not be as problematic.

I agree with you. Anywhere where thee is limited due process is a problem including university campuses as well as police departments.

Seems like a stretch to imply holding police accountable for brutality is a due process issue.

Re: Students suing elite U.S. colleges seek 'wealth favoritism' information

#197

Post by tptacek »

rayiner wrote: post #113
leereeves wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

43% of the vote in democratic primaries is quite popular. And Bernie is a great example because identity politics was specifically used against him; his supporters were derided as mostly white male "Bernie Bros". Sounds like exactly what GP was talking about: steering conversations to race and sex to avoid talking about economic inequality.

> And Bernie is a great example because identity politics was specifically used against him; his supporters were derided as mostly white male "Bernie Bros". And the abiding irony of that was that most of the people who did that supported Elizabeth Warren, who had vanishingly little support from actual minorities. She finished behind Tom Steyer in South Carolina and behind Mayor Pete in Nevada (states where the democr…

All that aside, it seems like the original point being made was roughly that Occupy and Bernie were popular causes among young and online people, but not among the broader electorate. And that's basically true, right?

Re: Students suing elite U.S. colleges seek 'wealth favoritism' information

#198

Post by Jcowell »

charlieyu1 wrote: post #177
fsckboy wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 75% of those would not have been admitted w/o that help this not making a claim anywhere near as interesting as it pretends. Since you're using a %, what is the % difference in quality that admitting these 75% makes (assuming it's even true, considering I don't believe much from the Guardian) and how does that (what the author calls "affirmative action") compare with other affirmative actions taken to achieve a bal…

Grades are the only metric that is difficult to cheat even with wealth.

Couldn’t you just bribe people?

Re: Students suing elite U.S. colleges seek 'wealth favoritism' information

#199

Post by Glyptodon »

Ekaros wrote: post #179
Glyptodon wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The sad thing is that students from poorer and racially segregated areas are paying for 18 years of falling behind by the time it comes to college. When some high schools have barely literate graduates betrayed by adverse conditions their whole life, it's hardly shocking that it results in college admission readiness being grossly skewed. Not that I want to oversimplify.

And why not fix this issue? There is multiple options. You could build something like large prisons somewhere. Ship all the kids there from age 6 to 18. And then shuffle them randomly around every 6 months. Thus ensuring everyone gets exactly same experience and education. Equity for everyone!

I'd start with making property tax go to a central pool before getting distributed back to schools instead of letting the wealth stay concentrated in wealthy districts that have often been formed mostly to avoid sharing revenues with less affluent areas.

Re: Students suing elite U.S. colleges seek 'wealth favoritism' information

#200

Post by graphe »

caddemon wrote: post #130
graphe wrote: post #44

> The prospective class action filed last year against 17 schools alleged a price-fixing conspiracy in which schools restricted financial aid, causing a class of potentially more than 200,000 students to over-pay for tuition by tens of millions of dollars. The lawsuit survived an early bid by the schools to dismiss it. What does this mean? They didn't qualify for student aid, they qualifed and were denied, or they we…

No the students did receive aid and they probably received more aid than they would at almost any other school in the country. Of course there are cheaper sticker price options like in-state public universities, but specifically talking about the aid, it is quite good at elite schools. If people want to be mad about kids getting ripped off they should be mad at mediocre private U that has the same sticker price with…

Thanks for this in depth explaination. Seems like they think they'd get more but if they got rid of it they'd get less.
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