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Citing 'severe' math deficits, UC faculty demand a return to SAT tests for STEM

latimes.com

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Re: Citing 'severe' math deficits, UC faculty demand a return to SAT tests for STEM

#131

Post by M3L0NM4N »

ryandrake wrote: post #68
hedora wrote: post #53

This doesn't surprise me at all. From what I can tell, California's education system has moved from "equality" (which I would define as providing similar opportunities to all the kids) to focusing on "equity" (which I think they define as dictating the same outcome for all kids). To get an idea of how off the rails this has gotten, go read up on their statements trying to justify banning high school calculus. They ex…

Measuring (and funding) schools based on student outcome is fraught because a student's performance / preparedness for the "next level" is not entirely a function of the school. There are other significant parameters, including parental upbringing, home life stability, neighborhood safety, friends, hunger/nutrition, various trauma and abuse, the list goes on. I'm sure it's been studied, but I'd bet "school quality" i…

The number 1 predictor of educational outcome is IQ by a long shot, which is hardly affected by any of the factors you listed. Yes, high IQ kids usually have high IQ parents who are likely to prevent those things, partly because they are likely high income, but none of those are as important as how smart the child is.

Re: Citing 'severe' math deficits, UC faculty demand a return to SAT tests for STEM

#132

Post by sparqlittlestar »

layer8 wrote: post #118
snazz wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No matter how you restrict it with MDM profiles, it’s distracting compared to pencil/paper.

Can’t it run restricted to a single application in kiosk mode? Unless the application itself provides distraction, what would be distracting?

The very light it emits, the liquid glass lensing animations, etc

Re: Citing 'severe' math deficits, UC faculty demand a return to SAT tests for STEM

#133

Post by confidantlake »

eunos wrote: post #26

It's very astonishing that sometime I heard folks with very high SAT including math /science/programming accolades failed to get admission in UCs but you have severe math deficit like this.

It is depressing but not surprising.

Re: Citing 'severe' math deficits, UC faculty demand a return to SAT tests for STEM

#134

Post by elteto »

9dev wrote: post #37
JCTheDenthog wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>This is the direct inverse of what's actually asserted by people talking about equity. From the wiki article you linked: >Equity is equality of outcome for all subgroups in society. Equity proponents believe that some are at a larger disadvantage than others and aims to compensate for this to ensure that everyone can attain the same lifestyle.

If you hold a race, but some people start further behind others, they have a longer track to run. I think we can agree that to call it a fair race, we'd want to accommodate for the track length.

Following your analogy, what equity efforts turn in practice is to not only accommodate for track length for those that start behind, but also to cut one leg off of those perceived to be ahead.

Re: Citing 'severe' math deficits, UC faculty demand a return to SAT tests for STEM

#135

Post by ihsw »

Ekaros wrote: post #81
ceejayoz wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Professors who fail large swathes of their classes get in trouble.

Also these are most likely the first classes. You can not block most of your entering cohort. Or even any way significant part. At least in the system these professors exist in. In some other systems like say German where getting in easy and getting rid of some is normal would be different.

[dead]

Re: Citing 'severe' math deficits, UC faculty demand a return to SAT tests for STEM

#136

Post by [deleted] »

hedora wrote: post #53

This doesn't surprise me at all. From what I can tell, California's education system has moved from "equality" (which I would define as providing similar opportunities to all the kids) to focusing on "equity" (which I think they define as dictating the same outcome for all kids). To get an idea of how off the rails this has gotten, go read up on their statements trying to justify banning high school calculus. They ex…

[deleted]

Re: Citing 'severe' math deficits, UC faculty demand a return to SAT tests for STEM

#137

Post by kzz102 »

ceejayoz wrote: post #4
john_strinlai wrote: post #3

> “We now observe preparation gaps so severe that instructors must reteach middle-school mathematics while simultaneously teaching the material students need for sciences, engineering, economics, and other quantitatively demanding fields,” they warned. i dont understand why the teachers would go out of their way to reteach middle-school math. i teach. my courses have prerequisites. if a student somehow makes it into…

Professors who fail large swathes of their classes get in trouble.

Tenured professors do often fail large swathes of the class, and it's not hard to stand their ground because academic freedom is still very important in universities. This is not generally true for non-tenured and adjunct professors, but for a different reason -- their job review rely on a large part on student feedback forms, and failing students are not happy students.

The idea that if only all professors stood their ground then somehow students will be motivated to study doesn't pan out in practice, though. There is already a significant number of students who are perpetually struggling. They are missing basic prerequisites, and instead of catching up on them, they repeated try and fail at learning the same materials, passing only when they got a lenient instructor. The problem compounds because failing brings helplessness and exacerbates their mental issues, which brings more failing. The university cannot sit on their high ground and watch these students struggle, especially if their number reaches a critical mass.

Re: Citing 'severe' math deficits, UC faculty demand a return to SAT tests for STEM

#138

Post by rixed »

valleyer wrote: post #16
ceejayoz wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Preparing for the SAT requires a book and an internet connection. Sports frequently just requires a ball or a place to run. In both scenarios, you can still purchase better equipment/training. There are very expensive, effective SAT prep options out there for the wealthy.

Your analogy works against you, given that tons of professional athletes come from poverty.

According to IA this is mostly a myth though.

Re: Citing 'severe' math deficits, UC faculty demand a return to SAT tests for STEM

#139

Post by amanaplanacanal »

9dev wrote: post #23
Shank wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's kind of like how if you owe the bank $1000, you have a problem, but if you owe a bank $100M, they have a problem. You just can't reasonably ignore a huge portion of the class as a professor without a serious amount of documentation, and proof that you've tried to escalate and solve the issue. Ultimately, people are paying for these courses, and it's probably better to teach something rather than nothing.

Sounds like people are paying for these courses is part of the actual problem, then? Students should not have any kind of entitlement whatsoever to pass classes other than merit.

Well... Maybe. From a customer point of view, they are paying for education. If they aren't getting education that's a problem.

From a future employer point of view, they are looking for credentials. But the future employer isn't paying for it.

Do we just admit that the purpose of school is to provide credentials, and that's what the students are actually paying for?

Re: Citing 'severe' math deficits, UC faculty demand a return to SAT tests for STEM

#140

Post by ncr100 »

collabs wrote: post #38
kleiba2 wrote: post #28

I used to teach high school math. There was a big push for doing everything digitally. And admittedly, for some topics the use of technology in the classroom or at home can really be a benefit, for instance visualizations or interactive exercises. But having a digital device in class was the number one cause of distraction every time. For a lot of things, good old blackboards are just fine as are pen + paper exercise…

I am thinking why not use the iPad simply as a letter pad with infinite pages? the new iPad with the new iPad pencil can do that and I am sure with the right software you can write, erase, rewrite as much as you want? What am I missing?

Human biology likely makes it harder to write on a glass screen with a perceptible Gap in time, latency between where the pen is and where the pixels appear as well as the physical colocation Of the pencil tip and the written line differs more so on a tablet screen than on direct application of matter to paper.

This confuses us, a little tiny teeny tidbit. And that is not helpful!

Plus because glass is slippery you must rely on your visual system nearly entirely for part of the handwriting performance. Because it's not paper you can't measure distances using tension that your nervous system picks up inside your hand, nearly as easily as you can when there's a high friction surface like a piece of paper to rest your hand on.

Also there is visual fatigue of staring into a light, the LED or OLED backlight, which does flicker imperceptibly but it does tend to flicker. This is more of a strain.

Plus there is disorientation... Your tablet can infinitely scroll long past the point at which your body physically dies, whereas if you run out of paper you got to go get some more paper. You write to the end of a sheet and there's no complex thinking involved around virtual viewframes and scrolling and using the scrolling UI.

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