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Princeton admits record-low 3.98% of applicants

dailyprincetonian.com

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Re: Princeton admits record-low 3.98% of applicants

#31

Post by csa »

purple_ferret wrote: post #21

Parsing through 37,601 (and accepting only 1500) applications without standardized testing sounds incredibly difficult. If I were a teenager trying to get into a top school these days, my anxiety would be through the roof. Can't imagine the extracurricular work you have to put in now.

> Parsing through 37,601 (and accepting only 1500) applications without standardized testing sounds incredibly difficult.

While the task is daunting, it’s not quite as bad as you think when well over half of the applications are almost instant rejections.

> If I were a teenager trying to get into a top school these days, my anxiety would be through the roof. Can't imagine the extracurricular work you have to put in now.

It’s quality not quantity. So many people miss this point.

Re: Princeton admits record-low 3.98% of applicants

#32

Post by endisneigh »

dolni wrote: post #18
endisneigh wrote: post #7

It's a shame that we're here in 2021 and the best we can do is basically just "selection bias." Basically all universities have no statistical proof that they can educate people beyond this. This is not to say that the schools are bad, but most of the education is simply due to the types of peers you have, not really due to the school itself. Princeton and Harvard admit, for the most part, people who already excelled…

It makes sense to group people for education based on ability. If a low performer is in a class of high performers, one of two things will likely happen: * the low performer will be left behind, because the course moves too quickly or sets the bar beyond their abilities * the class will have to be dumbed down so that the low performer can participate, which means that the high performers haven't realized their full p…

I'll have to find the research, but this generally is not true (at least with K-12).

From my recollection in general what happens is that there's a certain ratio in which low performers and high performers interact. If the ratio is stacked towards high performers in general the low performers end up doing significantly better than they would've if they were in a group consisting of people entirely like them.

This would suggest that societally there's some ratio that's optimal such that we intentionally put in "low performers" as a mechanism to raise their performance. As long as this is done very carefully it simultaneously increases the performance of low performers and maintains the potential of high performers.

Conversely if you have too many low performers and put in a high performer, not only is their potential not met, but it's generally detrimental.

In other words there's a sort of "force" pulling everyone to the mean. The "dilution" that results from adding high or low performers to an otherwise low or high performing group depends on how high or low they are and the group itself. With data this can be optimized such that low performers exceed their potential. Given the rate of change for low performers vastly exceeds high performers inherently, this is the societally optimal outcome.

That being said K-12 education isn't like higher ed is that it's lower level (intellectually).

Re: Princeton admits record-low 3.98% of applicants

#33

Post by scarmig »

gnicholas wrote: post #22
zkid18 wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a non-US citizen I was always surprised US universities doesn't require any examination test for the admission.

Huh? In general they do — either the SAT or the ACT. Only a few big universities don't require them (though COVID has led many/most to change their policies at least temporarily).

In other countries, though, the admissions exams are much more heavily weighted. Here they play a minor role. No one is getting into Harvard on the basis of a perfect SAT score, and plenty of people get in on more than a standard deviation below a perfect score.

Re: Princeton admits record-low 3.98% of applicants

#34

Post by throwawayboise »

dolni wrote: post #24
zkid18 wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a non-US citizen I was always surprised US universities doesn't require any examination test for the admission.

Most universities require either an ACT or SAT test score to prove your ability. These are not administered by universities, though.

More and more are making these tests optional. The claim is that they are (unintentionally) culturally biased. My view is, if they think the SAT is culturally biased, they haven't looked very closely at the universities themselves.

Anyway, if applicants opt out of the SAT/ACT they have to submit other evidence of their qualifications.

Re: Princeton admits record-low 3.98% of applicants

#35

Post by fullshark »

debacle wrote: post #19
endisneigh wrote: post #7

It's a shame that we're here in 2021 and the best we can do is basically just "selection bias." Basically all universities have no statistical proof that they can educate people beyond this. This is not to say that the schools are bad, but most of the education is simply due to the types of peers you have, not really due to the school itself. Princeton and Harvard admit, for the most part, people who already excelled…

We have too many smart people for capitalism in its current form to support. If you look for them, you will see artificial barriers erected throughout society to stymie real meritocracy.

Agree, we have an abundance of capital and labor but a dearth of opportunities for both. At least compared to the Post WW2 era.

Re: Princeton admits record-low 3.98% of applicants

#36

Post by beforeolives »

endisneigh wrote: post #7

It's a shame that we're here in 2021 and the best we can do is basically just "selection bias." Basically all universities have no statistical proof that they can educate people beyond this. This is not to say that the schools are bad, but most of the education is simply due to the types of peers you have, not really due to the school itself. Princeton and Harvard admit, for the most part, people who already excelled…

> beyond a reasonable doubt the school itself has improved the persons educational prospects.

How many people do genuinely care about this? People go to top schools in order to improve their life prospects, not necessarily to get the best education (but they get that too anyway).

Re: Princeton admits record-low 3.98% of applicants

#37

Post by LudwigNagasena »

huitzitziltzin wrote: post #10
1cvmask wrote: post #4

So when we remove the legacies and school fund donators (roughly half) - about 40 to 50 percent of the class, athletes (affirmative action for rich whites with relatively lower credentials and scores) - about 10-20 percent of the class, and regular affirmative action ( about 15 percent of the class and mainly affluent politically connected blacks and latinos). The remainder is the group based on traditional credentia…

>> and mainly affluent politically connected blacks and latinos Where in the world do you get that idea? I challenge you to provide a good source for the claim that the AA students are either affluent OR politically connected.

I am not sure about being politically connected, but it is known that universities accept rich black immigrants from places like Nigeria and consider it “affirmative action”. In Ivy League unis the percentage of immigrants among the black student body is over 40%, while in the general population it is near 15%.

But I judging how the things are going I am sure this is going to get fixed soon. The colleges will ask you to do a DNA test to determine the purity of your black heritage and a proof of slave ancestors. Hooray, intersectionality.

Re: Princeton admits record-low 3.98% of applicants

#38

Post by nemothekid »

purple_ferret wrote: post #21

Parsing through 37,601 (and accepting only 1500) applications without standardized testing sounds incredibly difficult. If I were a teenager trying to get into a top school these days, my anxiety would be through the roof. Can't imagine the extracurricular work you have to put in now.

I can't imagine standardized testing being anything but a low pass filter for these schools. Roughly 2 million students take the SAT every year, which means 100,000 scores in the top 5%; 20,000 in the top 1%. Whittling down 20,000 high scores to 1500 isn't any easier.

Re: Princeton admits record-low 3.98% of applicants

#39

Post by insert_coin »

endisneigh wrote: post #7

It's a shame that we're here in 2021 and the best we can do is basically just "selection bias." Basically all universities have no statistical proof that they can educate people beyond this. This is not to say that the schools are bad, but most of the education is simply due to the types of peers you have, not really due to the school itself. Princeton and Harvard admit, for the most part, people who already excelled…

This is how it's supposed to work.

Basketball teams do not pick the shortest, weakest players just so they can prove random internet commenters they are the best at turning regular unfit humans into Michael Jordan. They can just pick Michael Jordan.

Re: Princeton admits record-low 3.98% of applicants

#40

Post by perydell »

nemothekid wrote: post #29
zkid18 wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a non-US citizen I was always surprised US universities doesn't require any examination test for the admission.

You may have received some incorrect information - US universities will require an SAT or ACT exam score and some programs will even require subject based exams (ex an SAT Math or Chemistry exam) However at the differences at the top 5 or even 10% are marginal at best, and even the top 5% represent a more than magnitude of students than have slots at elite schools.

Many schools, including Princeton, did not require an SAT or ACT score last year. And they say they will not require it this year either.
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