SAT to Add ‘Adversity Score’ That Rates Students’ Hardships • Hacker News Board

Re: SAT to Add ‘Adversity Score’ That Rates Students’ Hardships

#711

Post by robotresearcher » Fri, May 17, 2019, 5:40 AM UTC

remote_phone wrote: post #170

Glyptodon wrote: post #18

This seems likely to end up being ugly. For example wealthy people could buy or rent addresses in "adverse" neighborhoods, or charter schools might locate offices there, in order to attempt to improve scores on this metric. At the same time this won't be able to identify many adverse life circumstances like abusive parents, cancer, etc. What it does do is outsource components of admissions decisions the colleges may…

I already talked to my wife about this. I would retire, we would divorce, and I would rent a shitty apartment in East Palo Alto all the while living in our house. If they think they can boil my kids into a single number without bothering to find the context of who my kids are then I will game it to as much as possible. I don’t know why my family should be punished because my wife and I worked our asses off to get ahe…

I understand the feeling, but how about if we rephrase it from another viewpoint:

I don’t know why I should be punished because my parents didn’t succeed financially. I work hard in highschool but don’t have extra private tutoring or parents who can help me with calculus homework. I’m hard working and bright but how can I compete with kids from Saratoga High School where everyone’s parents went to MIT/Penn and work at Apple/Google[1]? I read library books and watch Khan Academy, but no one in my family ever went to college. Why does my parents’ achievement have a fundamental impact on my opportunities?

Somehow we have to aim for equality of opportunity. It’s difficult to achieve but can’t we agree on this as a goal? Opportunity should not be inherited. My kids are as good as yours, as the next person’s, independent of how hard we worked.

[1] hyperbole. Saratoga parents from UCLA/CMU who work at Netflix/NVIDIA I’m talking about you too.

Re: SAT to Add ‘Adversity Score’ That Rates Students’ Hardships

#712

Post by jachee » Fri, May 17, 2019, 5:40 AM UTC

remote_phone wrote: post #488

fzeroracer wrote: post #316

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Giving resources is also a zero-sum game. When you're giving more resources to those that aren't privileged, you are in effect denying those same resources for those that are. For example, school admissions. We can provide more funding for underperforming schools, but that is also less funding going towards better performing schools. At a certain point you will have to accept that to help the poor it will mean cuttin…

No. If I can afford to provide my own resources, I’m okay with this. Just like I’m okay paying for social security but not receiving any when I retire. Those that have more resources can afford to take less than those that don’t have enough resources themselves. What I’m not okay with is adjusting scores and denying opportunity because of economic class warfare.

You seem to be in the minority in that regard.

Those that have more resources have historically spent significant amounts of those resources to ensure that they pay in as little of them to anyone else as possible.

Re: SAT to Add ‘Adversity Score’ That Rates Students’ Hardships

#713

Post by p1esk » Fri, May 17, 2019, 5:41 AM UTC

ryanobjc wrote: post #567

remote_phone wrote: post #551

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People who work hard deserve the fruits of their labor, regardless of their economic status. I have no problems with economically disadvantaged hard working people getting into great colleges, I have problems with equally hardworking people being disadvantaged because their parents are successful.

Wouldn’t you agree that two people who achieve the same score on the test may not have worked equally hard? If someone scored the same as your child, except they didn’t have good security, good quality schools, parents that could help them, etc, I would say that they in fact worked much harder than your children. And by the logic of “those who worked harder deserve it more”, well I think you see where this is going.…

We don’t know if they worked harder or not. It’s almost impossible to determine if the reason for any particular success is good teachers, hard work, or genetics.

Re: SAT to Add ‘Adversity Score’ That Rates Students’ Hardships

#714

Post by systemBuilder » Fri, May 17, 2019, 5:41 AM UTC

I can see a new score based up height and good looks which are correlated with higher incomes and executive success. After all, these colleges care more about polishing their own scores (sat, rejection rates, library volumes, GPA scores, alumni starting salaries) even more than the poor kids trying to gain admission ...

Re: SAT to Add ‘Adversity Score’ That Rates Students’ Hardships

#715

Post by jachee » Fri, May 17, 2019, 5:43 AM UTC

remarkEon wrote: post #498

jachee wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is giving underprivileged people a leg up "punishing" anyone? Privileged people need to start recognizing their inherent pre-rigging of the system. For those in power, equality feels like oppression.

>For those in power, equality feels like oppression. This is a classic Kafka-trap, and I see this rhetorical payload delivered more and more these days. "If you have a problem with changing the status quo, then you're in power and thus deserve to have the status quo changed on you."

If the status quo systematically oppresses one group and benefits another, the beneficiaries of said system will perceive any change to the status quo that would reduce the oppression of the former group as an unfair attack.

Re: SAT to Add ‘Adversity Score’ That Rates Students’ Hardships

#716

Post by Papirola » Fri, May 17, 2019, 5:46 AM UTC

lenkite wrote: post #572

GhostVII wrote: post #215

I think instead of trying to lower the bar for low income students, we should work on solving the actual problems causing them to perform more poorly on the SAT (or adjust the SAT so it is more representative of their actual skills). If students are accepted with a lower SAT score because of their background, they are likely going to struggle in University, since they have lower scores than the rest of their class, s…

I believe all the problems you have mentioned can be easily solved. Permit adversity scores to weigh in favour of course grades and graduate honors. Legislation can be passed to ensure adversity scores count towards corporate and government employment to prevent any bumps further down the road. Furthermore, adversity scores should also be counted towards recruitment in elite military units, selection for senior milit…

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harrison_Bergeron

Re: SAT to Add ‘Adversity Score’ That Rates Students’ Hardships

#717

Post by summm » Fri, May 17, 2019, 5:48 AM UTC

How about having lots of decent, desirable universities instead of a few elite ones and many weak ones? Furthermore, one could abolish tuition and provide students with living expenses, either all or those who need them. Furthermore, reverse grade inflation in school such that the final grade is a better predictor for learning aptitude. That would solve the stupid admissions problem once and for all. Btw we had all that here in Germany, but since about 20 years they are trying to shift finances to artificially create few "elite" unis and lots of crap unis in order to emulate the American system.

Re: SAT to Add ‘Adversity Score’ That Rates Students’ Hardships

#718

Post by remarkEon » Fri, May 17, 2019, 5:50 AM UTC

jachee wrote: post #715

remarkEon wrote: post #498

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>For those in power, equality feels like oppression. This is a classic Kafka-trap, and I see this rhetorical payload delivered more and more these days. "If you have a problem with changing the status quo, then you're in power and thus deserve to have the status quo changed on you."

If the status quo systematically oppresses one group and benefits another, the beneficiaries of said system will perceive any change to the status quo that would reduce the oppression of the former group as an unfair attack.

Nope, not going to play this ridiculous game. And this is a game. I don’t know how or why the modern left started employing the rhetorical tactics mastered by Lenin but here we are.

Re: SAT to Add ‘Adversity Score’ That Rates Students’ Hardships

#719

Post by Papirola » Fri, May 17, 2019, 5:52 AM UTC

robotresearcher wrote: post #711

remote_phone wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I already talked to my wife about this. I would retire, we would divorce, and I would rent a shitty apartment in East Palo Alto all the while living in our house. If they think they can boil my kids into a single number without bothering to find the context of who my kids are then I will game it to as much as possible. I don’t know why my family should be punished because my wife and I worked our asses off to get ahe…

I understand the feeling, but how about if we rephrase it from another viewpoint: I don’t know why I should be punished because my parents didn’t succeed financially. I work hard in highschool but don’t have extra private tutoring or parents who can help me with calculus homework. I’m hard working and bright but how can I compete with kids from Saratoga High School where everyone’s parents went to MIT/Penn and work a…

I disagree on this as a goal. Some things take generations: my great-grandparents had a good standing back in pre-war Europe. Then the war came and my grandparents escaped to South America - not great. My parents got up to high school level education. I got a B.Sc. Maybe my kid will go farther.

Play with the cards you were dealt.

Re: SAT to Add ‘Adversity Score’ That Rates Students’ Hardships

#720

Post by snaggletooth » Fri, May 17, 2019, 5:52 AM UTC

ryanobjc wrote: post #567

remote_phone wrote: post #551

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People who work hard deserve the fruits of their labor, regardless of their economic status. I have no problems with economically disadvantaged hard working people getting into great colleges, I have problems with equally hardworking people being disadvantaged because their parents are successful.

Wouldn’t you agree that two people who achieve the same score on the test may not have worked equally hard? If someone scored the same as your child, except they didn’t have good security, good quality schools, parents that could help them, etc, I would say that they in fact worked much harder than your children. And by the logic of “those who worked harder deserve it more”, well I think you see where this is going.…

If this score was unrealistically perfect and able to accurately account for every possible detail, maybe. If instead it just does a cheap job of assuming anyone with a certain set of data points is at a major disadvantage, nope.

The test claims to be measuring a students ability to learn in the first place, not just their current knowledge, so why not aim to make that more accurate instead of bypassing it?