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Oxford loses top 3 university ranking in the UK

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Re: Oxford loses top 3 university ranking in the UK

#221

Post by lwhi »

patanegra wrote: post #201
lwhi wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What an appalling point of view. Growing up without privilege is (obviously) markedly more difficult than being provided with the best education money can buy throughout childhood. The students aren't necessarily worse; but they will be unaccustomed to the codified approach that other students from independent schools understand. The system has been built to serve the privileged. While you might feel blame can fairly…

It might come over as appalling, given the whole culture has shifted towards: "Nobody is dumber! Every child deserves a medal." Which isn't true, and never was. I get why we do that with kids in Reception and Year 1. With young adults, like University students, the fact of inequality of potentials of individuals, is just a fact anyone has to live with. I am clever, but I am a fat, average looking guy. So that's what…

I understand what you're trying to say, but I think you're making a false equivalence between socio-economic disparity and innate talent.

Imagine the same person, cloned. Clone A is born into an economically challenged household; while clone B is born into an upper-middle class household.

Now consider whether both clones would achieve the same results at A level.

One could expect the child born into the poorer household to experience more challenges, and perhaps achieve worse results as a consequence.

In this instance, how would it be appropriate to call clone A thick or less intelligent than clone B?

Re: Oxford loses top 3 university ranking in the UK

#222

Post by rayiner »

growse wrote: post #195
rayiner wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But we know that it’s true. That’s why we have been using objective metrics like test scores for millennia, across societies are different as China, India, and Britain.

I got six A's at A level, over 20 years ago. Am i objectively smarter than every single other peer who only got 4 As? (I, for one, am confident I know the answer to this question).

Close. If you take a group of 50 people like you, who got six A’s, and a group of 50 people who only got 4 A’s, then the former group will be smarter.

Re: Oxford loses top 3 university ranking in the UK

#223

Post by programjames »

ralph84 wrote: post #198
growse wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The very top aren't applying there any more at all, you don't need to: Stanford, Harvard, MIT, all better. The only people applying to those from the UK are the wealthy. If by "very top" you mean "richest", then maybe. But I'm not sure we care about that?

The network value of knowing a rich person far exceeds the network value of knowing a smart person.

If you're measuring the value in dollars, it would be very surprising if people maxxed on the INT stat rank higher than those on the USD stat. But, for example, if your goal is to secure a professorship at a top university, or do the most cutting-edge research at a national lab, I think the network value of knowing a smart person far exceeds that of a rich person.

Re: Oxford loses top 3 university ranking in the UK

#224

Post by growse »

skippyboxedhero wrote: post #199
growse wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The very top aren't applying there any more at all, you don't need to: Stanford, Harvard, MIT, all better. The only people applying to those from the UK are the wealthy. If by "very top" you mean "richest", then maybe. But I'm not sure we care about that?

No, you can get a scholarship. Again, this is really the best of the best, those with the highest merit. If you have that, why would you study somewhere that has no people of merit? All they had to do was convince a bureaucrat their life was hard (usually based on rather unobjective criteria), everyone else has to pass exams. If you can't get the grades, you don't have merit. Debase the currency, surprised when it ha…

> No, you can get a scholarship

Of course! So easy! What percentage of foreign students applying get aid or scholarships?

> Again, this is really the best of the best, those with the highest merit.

You're assuming that "the best of the best" are applying. This is not true. "The best of the best who are encouraged to apply and/or have the means", apply. This is not the same population.

> All they had to do was convince a bureaucrat their life was hard

I don't know who this "bureaucrat" is. When I interviewed at Cambridge I was seen by 3 fellows, all members of the relevant departments.

> If you can't get the grades, you don't have merit.

Nobody's this naive, surely?

Re: Oxford loses top 3 university ranking in the UK

#225

Post by rayiner »

ceejayoz wrote: post #215
rayiner wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But we know that it’s true. That’s why we have been using objective metrics like test scores for millennia, across societies are different as China, India, and Britain.

We’ve done all sorts of dumb things for thousands of years. It’s one metric of many. We know that paying for a tutor can change test scores. We know that a shitty home life can, too. They’re just harder to measure.

If you’re suggesting that having “a shitty home life” can make people perform badly on tests, but not perform badly in real world tasks, we don’t “know” that. It’s something people want to be true, but there’s not much evidence for it. Meanwhile, there’s reams of evidence that standardized tests scores are highly predictive of performance.

Re: Oxford loses top 3 university ranking in the UK

#226

Post by afavour »

mensetmanusman wrote: post #204
afavour wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My objection was not the student in question being mentioned. It was why he was mentioned: his views on Charlie Kirk, a US culture war topic that has nothing to do with the discussion and nothing to do with the student’s admission grades.

Oxfords name is currently being trashed globally because of this though. It sucks, but it must be dealt with. Celebrating violence against free speech doesn’t make sense for Oxford’s name to stand behind.

> Oxfords name is currently being trashed globally because of this though

Entirely depends on what circles you move in. The vast majority of people, especially those outside the US, are not talking about Charlie Kirk at all. Hence my objection to him being brought up. At bare minimum it has no relevance to the ranking being discussed in this topic.

> Celebrating violence against free speech doesn’t make sense for Oxford’s name to stand behind.

And they do not stand behind it. Oxford does not control the students union. I don’t buy any argument that they should somehow be policing free speech in the name of free speech. Makes no sense at all.

Re: Oxford loses top 3 university ranking in the UK

#228

Post by programjames »

_hark wrote: post #174

I'm a researcher at Oxford, and I've both taught and studied here and in the US. The undergraduate teaching here is phenomenal. It's incredibly labor intensive for the staff, but the depth and breadth students are exposed to in their subject is astonishing. It's difficult to imagine how it can be improved. My favorite study of university rankings comes from faculty hiring markets, which compute implicit rankings by m…

From [1], these are the rankings for CS:

1. Stanford 2. UC Berkeley 3. MIT 4. Caltech 5. Harvard

I'm a little surprised MIT and Caltech are lower than Stanford and UC Berkeley. I know that MIT has a culture of sending its undergraduates to different graduate schools (so, if the top CS students go to MIT for their undergrad and professorships, they often would not have a PhD from MIT, lowering their prestige rating), but that does not explain why Caltech would be lower than Stanford/Berkeley. I know Stanford has a decent CS program, but I'm wondering if there's a gaming network effects thing going on, since both Stanford and Berkeley attract more hustlers.

Re: Oxford loses top 3 university ranking in the UK

#229

Post by checker659 »

skippyboxedhero wrote: post #190
rm445 wrote: post #124

I am a Durham graduate, still somewhat involved with the university via some voluntary roles, and a bit of a 'booster' in the sense that I'll sing its praises to anyone. I also have a postgrad degree from Cambridge and did a little teaching while there. So, I'm quite familiar, and while I'm happy to see Durham get some love, this is bunk. There is a gulf in undergraduate teaching between Oxbridge and the pack. The su…

The time of every bright child having Oxbridge as first university pick ended quite a few years ago. Not accurate that parents are saying this either, the change has largely come from parents who are often people doing hiring and have seen the change over the past few years. The very top aren't applying there any more at all, you don't need to: Stanford, Harvard, MIT, all better. Oxford, in particular, has made their…

> The very top aren't applying there any more at all

Do you have a source to back this claim?

Re: Oxford loses top 3 university ranking in the UK

#230

Post by programjames »

dan-robertson wrote: post #130
onlyrealcuzzo wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Brown is a shit school? That's a level of elitism I don't often encounter.

“Mmm, heck of a school. Weren’t you at Brown Otto?” I think you’re confusing a statement about ranking in a small set (Ivy League schools) for a statement about a bigger set. This isn’t uncommon – iirc there was some big furore a few months ago about admissions to US schools where much of the disagreement seemed to be downstream of different people thinking about different numbers of top or acceptable universities (a…

I think Harvard and MIT students mostly say, "Cambridge," rather than Boston. Then, when the inquirer frowns in confusion, they mumble, "Boston".
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