131–140 of 157 posts
A smaller subset of this problem is paying people to take standardized tests for you. I graduated from an ivy and had a couple peers who got a perfect score on their SAT's but could only speak broken English. If you're willing to pay someone to cheat on standardized tests, I'm not surprised you're willing to bribe someone to gain admissions also.
The discussion about 'who deserves a spot at a prestigious university x' misses the issue. Acceptance at one of these universities is not based on who is the most intelligent, hardworking, or accomplished. These universities, just like any other institutions, have their own goals and agenda. They accept you not because you deserve it or you have earned it, but because accepting you promotes the kind of ideals that th…
The question that always occurs to me when these kinds of discussions come up is why there is such a huge disparity between educational institutions in this country in the first place. If schools were funded to meet a certain level of performance, instead of based on who was attending or on past performance - like the military is funded - maybe that would be a step in the right direction.
Meritocracy for thee, but not for me. As the upper echelons continue to cordon off segments of the economy and education for just themselves, will the "Bootstraps and Personal Responsibility" mythology finally start to die out?
This scandal tells me is that a bunch of rich people are sad that the ordinary methods of a gamed system already highly in their favor isn't good enough for them. The privilege they have isn't enough, they needed different and additional ladders to get even more, as if this is innovation and is itself merit, that's how brazen it was.
Bill McGlashan, CEO of TPG private equity, was indicted in this scandal, charged with both the college entrance exam cheating scheme and recruitment scheme. As reported, even his son's exam answers would be changed (corrected) without his knowledge. How would meritocracy before this scandal have evaluated McGlashan? I think rather highly considering his actions and work with Bono, etc. And yet here he is saying that system isn't good enough for him and his son, he had to corrupt it, to get what he really wanted. It's a stunning indictment of the meritocracy we actually have.
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I could be wrong, but I don't think Jews get much of an affirmative action boost either.
think twice http://www.unz.com/runz/the-myth-of-american-meritocracy/
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Wait is non calibrated scoring the norm now? When I was in school (a terribly long time ago) classes were judged by the people that took the classes. That is the % were based in the people that took the tests.
You mean curved? It depends on the class I think? And what if like, you end up with a difference between A and B being 2%.
Basically every class I had in college was graded amongst your cohort. Is that odd?
From the article: "It may be legal to pledge $2.5 million to Harvard just as your son is applying — which is what Jared Kushner’s father did for him — and illegal to bribe a coach to the tune of hundreds of thousands of dollars, but how much of a difference is there, really? Both elevate money over accomplishment."
How about completely blind job admissions, school admissions, etc. No names, no race, no age, etc. Just raw test scores. Test them against problem solving skills objectively, etc.
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Then why do European universities, many of them very prestigious and much, much older than American ones, base their admission on grades and tests? Given that in most European countries (I think, it'd definitely the case in Germany) tuition isn't a thing either, one can reasonably conclude that admission to an elite university is linked to academic prowess, at least to a higher degree than American universities. I we…
Have to admit my American ignorance here, but outside of music schools I cannot think of any major elite universities outside of maybe oxford and Cambridge? I’m curious if Europeans could name a few Ivy League American universities? Maybe I’m the uncultured exception, but I don’t think most Americans even talk about foreign universities (I have no doubt to our own disadvantage)
I didn't pick contemporary names because the closer you get to today, the less likely you are to know such names unless you are specifically interested into their specific field. You can look them up, though.
No doubt American universities are not less prestigious, but to think that nothing of relevance happens outside of the US, well... You might have heard of CERN at least. ;)
This is why, to me, the entire debate about affirmative action at elite colleges is a complete red herring. The amount of kids, regardless of race, who can be considered "deserving" of a spot has been reduced more so by legacy admissions and these bribes than by any effort of individual institutions to even out racial or gender demographics.
These universities don't have the prestige without the legacy admissions (and alumni donors). There are tons of universities, but it's hard to say anyone "deserves" a spot over someone's family who helped build it.
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You mean curved? It depends on the class I think? And what if like, you end up with a difference between A and B being 2%.
Then you had a bad time & you commiserate over drinks? Basically every class I had in college was graded amongst your cohort. Is that odd?
The dynamics are a lot more complicated than you make it seem.
> Basically every class I had in college was graded amongst your cohort. Is that odd?
I've also had classes that were graded on a curve. But that doesn't fully capture the dynamics.
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I know you are referring to Chinese students. But the reality is that SAT and GRE are stupidly easy, especially math. Almost every Chinese student I know achieved full score in GRE math, and yes, more than half of them spoke broken English.
I'm in no way implying my anecdata is conclusive, but I'm mainly suspicious of the verbal scores. And, if the verbal section of the SAT is stupidly easy, I guess I'm stupid, shucks :(.
On a side note, the notion that a private company conducts all these tests for profit in order for students to get admission into schools quite bizarre and laughable to say the least.