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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

#601

Post by eudamoniac »

bmn__ wrote: post #428
account42 wrote: post #245

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At the university level it should be up to the student to ensure that they learn what they need.

Under the circumstance that the primary and secondary education levels have failed to adequately prepare a student for tertiary level, I think your idea would be unfair.

The university teaches what it teaches; it exists as a place of higher learning. If the student is unprepared for that, they are unprepared to attend. It's not university's job to fix shitty high schools' teachings and redo lower learning. Go get a highschool tutor if you need that.

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

#602

Post by 59percentmore »

hedora wrote: post #398
59percentmore wrote: post #261

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ladies and gentlemen, the modern eugenicist. Meanwhile, an anecdote: 11th Grade: Precalculus, all A's 12th Grade: AP Calculus, C average, one D quarter (in the middle of my parents' divorce, onset of body dysmorphia/dysphoria, college entrance applications, senior research practicum) College Sophomore Year: Applied Calculus, aced, highest final score in the class Post-college self-study: Failure to advance Circumstan…

I'll assume you misread the thread. You're arguing that teaching calculus in public school is a form of eugenics. If that's actually what you're arguing, I'd love to hear more (if only for entertainment value).

>You're arguing that teaching calculus in public school is a form of eugenics.

If that's your assessment, then you are, ironically, yourself proof of the failure of the American education system. (If you were educated in it. If not, you're proof of the failure of whatever system you were educated in.)

There is no reasonable read of the previous message that could lead the to conclusion that that was its argument. None. Zero.

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

#603

Post by pas »

jancsika wrote: post #111
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…

> i dont understand why the teachers would go out of their way to reteach middle-school math. "gaps" implies a critical mass of students who require middle-school math reteaching. > i teach. If you've taught for a non-trivial amount of time, you did one of the following with that class: * graded on a curve so you don't fail half the class * failed half the class, and got suspended (pours one out for my compsci profes…

(at least in Budapest, many moons ago) highly technical programs had some really infamous classes. but people had a lot of chances to pass the exams. each semester about 3. and it was possible to take the class 3 times (the 3rd required a permission, but it was formality, it was granted almost to everyone)

so in the end if someone was unprepared, they had at least a year to get their shit together. (but the exams rarely required real maths mastery, mostly rote memorization of proofs and a few typical problem types with really mechanical solutions.)

it's so strange to read about a professor getting suspended for being too strict.

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

#604

Post by jltsiren »

dyauspitr wrote: post #303
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…

[flagged]

Standardized testing is usually foiled by Goodhart's law. If the outcomes of the tests matter, schools start focusing on test prep, at the expense of actual education. It's probably necessary to have one set of standardized tests for college admission, but otherwise they should be abolished, because they are a terrible idea.

Separation of responsibilities is the actual key to good public schools. At least to the extent politicians and administrators can solve the issue. There should be a central entity that sets most of the curriculum and monitors and audits the entities that run the schools. And it must have the power and the resources to intervene if it determines that a school is not performing as expected.

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

#605

Post by 59percentmore »

akramachamarei wrote: post #368
59percentmore wrote: post #261

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ladies and gentlemen, the modern eugenicist. Meanwhile, an anecdote: 11th Grade: Precalculus, all A's 12th Grade: AP Calculus, C average, one D quarter (in the middle of my parents' divorce, onset of body dysmorphia/dysphoria, college entrance applications, senior research practicum) College Sophomore Year: Applied Calculus, aced, highest final score in the class Post-college self-study: Failure to advance Circumstan…

> Within the wider historical scope In what situations would you attribute effects to concrete, near-term causes instead or abstract, historical ones? In particular, why do you attribute academic success in some areas to historical racism instead of (presumably) modern poverty? In other words, given a cohort of poor kids and not poor kids, which outcomes of each group would you assign to historical racism and why? In…

Wrong premise. Near-term and historical causes are intertwined, inexorably-linked. Both cohorts are the result of historical racism. Hence,

>Even if you're in the group that's being discriminated against, and succeeding despite that.

I would expect the continued, sustained, and unburdened efforts to address and undo the effects of the policies and behaviors that make up what we know to be and have been systemic racism are necessary in order to remove historical racism as a cause of contemporary circumstances.

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

#606

Post by solumunus »

swiftcoder wrote: post #170
mlsu wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s definitely actively bad to involve a device in the vast majority of education. And, it’s a purely selfish thing by tech companies to insert themselves into education. A student should not see a computer until college or vocational school unless they are taking e.g a high school programming or electronics class.

> A student should not see a computer until college or vocational school unless they are taking e.g a high school programming or electronics class. Are you really trying to put the genie back in the bottle to the extent of making high schoolers write all their coursework by hand? Or maybe we should bring back the typewriter for distraction-free essay writing...

Genuinely, why not? Seems obvious to me that this would produce better outcomes.

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

#607

Post by dieselgate »

chaidhat wrote: post #13

As a product of the STEM post-SAT UC system (UCLA ‘26), I never personally experienced “middle school math” being taught or a lack of mathematical understanding. I’ve had my fair share of classes which throw you into the deep end and not many which coddle you. Never seen any professor teaching middle school mathematics. A lot of professors started off with a vague idea of prerequisites, covered the basic ideas and us…

Thanks for sharing your post-SAT experience and it's similar to mine (UCD engineering '14). The article mentions "middle school math" for people in first semester calculus but doesn't specify which calculus series. There were at least three when I was in undergrad: engineering/physics/math, biology/life-science, and business/econ series.

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

#608

Post by streptomycin »

lokar wrote: post #112
ceejayoz wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, but these students are likely two groups; those who are never going to be good at math , and those who were never really taught math . The latter may need an opportunity to succeed.

I agree, but they should be admitted into some special program. Like, turn up in July for 3 months of catch-up instruction 4 hrs a day.

That's exactly what they did at my college (non-California state school) 20 years ago. Special program for students from poor high schools who otherwise wouldn't be admitted, where they came in the summer before freshman year and had to pass some prep classes first. IDK what the actual long term results were, but seems like a better idea than nothing.

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

#609

Post by constantius »

jdw64 wrote: post #45

Looking at the world, it seems we all go through similar systemic issues. Naturally, in East Asian cultures where the fervor for education is overheated, this phenomenon tended to manifest much earlier. When specific exams are abolished or watered down under the banner of 'diversity and equal opportunity,' the wealthy actually gain a massive advantage. Of course, the exam system itself inherently favors the rich as w…

Insightful.

I wonder if there will come a time where being conservative is seen as being on the side of the working class, the poor, and the disadvantaged, because inequality is so far gone that any change to the system is too likely to be exploited by the ruling class/the rich and make things worse.

Arguably, some must already feel this way.

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

#610

Post by JuniperMesos »

freediddy wrote: post #412
Catloafdev wrote: post #219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is absurdly problematic. Your solution is basically handicapping the schools with kids that perform worse and then potentially closing them? That doesn't solve the problem, this is just pro-Charter School propaganda that ignores the real-world effects of these positions. You've identified a real issue with the 'equality' vs 'equity' concept, that doesn't lead to 'Close public schools and switch everything to Cha…

You don't live in the Bay Area. Schools around the Bay Area are closing, especially in rich areas like Saratoga and Cupertino. That's because parents who can afford it are moving their children to private schools because of exactly what the OP was saying. Schools are incentivized to focus on struggling kids because test scores are how teachers and schools are evaluated. The kids at the high end of the class are liter…

> Schools around the Bay Area are closing, especially in rich areas like Saratoga and Cupertino. That's because parents who can afford it are moving their children to private schools because of exactly what the OP was saying.

It could also be that fewer of the sorts of people who choose to live (or can afford to live) in places like Saratoga and Cupertino are having children at all.

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