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

nytimes.com

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

#771

Post by _iyig »

summm wrote: post #717

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 t…

>How about having lots of decent, desirable universities instead of a few elite ones and many weak ones?

In practice, this is pretty much the case. State schools (e.g. the University of Virginia, University of California-Berkeley, Georgia Tech, etc.) are often quite good in terms of the education provided, and offer lower tuition rates to in-state residents. Forbes and U.S. News & World Report maintain rankings of the top 100 or so colleges in the United States; my school was ranked in the 60-70 range for computer science. Having spent a number of years at big (and small) companies in the Bay Area, I feel it more than adequately prepared me for the workplace.

Maybe the sense of “a few elite schools, and lots of bad ones” is reinforced by the popular media? Hollywood tends to focus on just the Ivies and MIT.

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

#772

Post by [deleted] »

WillPostForFood wrote: post #757
robotresearcher wrote: post #711

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

Truth is, college admissions from Saratoga is a blood bath with so many over qualified, over worked, over stressed kids. If you are the oddball kid in a worse school and worse neighborhood and you're motivated enough to watch Khan Academy you are going stand out and do great, whether you end up at SJSU or Stanford.

[deleted]

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

#773

Post by lenkite »

Dylan16807 wrote: post #752
lenkite wrote: post #572

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

Disingenuous mockery doesn't help. (If you actually believe that's where people are trying to go then I have worse insults for you.)

My mockery reflects the progression of reality in other nations where such policies have been implemented. Your anger and threat of "worse insults" matter little to history.

At each stage, the devout proponents of equality will only choose to draw the line further. When students of the 'adversity' quota are unable to get good grades, their grades will be inflated. When they are unable to get jobs, a push will be made for implementing adversity/equality quota in jobs.

Case study: India. In India, every community fights to be included in the backward communities category because the benefits are so frighteningly high. Politicians are elected on the basis that they promise to categorise their communities as backward to improve the opportunities for their children. Other politicians threaten to remove some communities from backward status. Being backward gains you a fantastic advantage towards college admissions, reservation in jobs, and several other free benefits. (including lowered prices, etc). Who will not want to leverage this ?

The US may very well develop the same problem as a natural evolution of this policy with corresponding natural devolution of merit. Where do you draw the final line on adversity ?

If you think this is unrealistic, you are severely mistaken my friend. This simply happens over time. It always starts with "Good Intentions".

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

#774

Post by Causality1 »

cm2187 wrote: post #694
Sebguer wrote: post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you suggest solving a problem that comes down effectively to 'some people have more money and free time'? Not everyone can afford high quality tutoring, and high quality tutoring clearly has an impact on test scores.

Actively pushing and monitoring children's education has probably a lot more to do with academic success than free time. I am not aware that the asian minority has much more money and free time than anyone else.

At the end of the day some children will belong to Culture X which is more compatible with academic achievement that Culture Y. My best friend growing up was a Korean kid whose parents almost tortured him and his siblings to excel in school. His pain and sacrifice deserve to count for something.

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

#775

Post by [deleted] »

cm2187 wrote: post #694
Sebguer wrote: post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you suggest solving a problem that comes down effectively to 'some people have more money and free time'? Not everyone can afford high quality tutoring, and high quality tutoring clearly has an impact on test scores.

Actively pushing and monitoring children's education has probably a lot more to do with academic success than free time. I am not aware that the asian minority has much more money and free time than anyone else.

[deleted]

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

#776

Post by Dylan16807 »

pjscott wrote: post #79
logicx24 wrote: post #44

This, like every other similar attempt made to "equalize" the SAT, is misguided and will accomplish little. If the SAT correlates too strongly with wealth, then Collegeboard should make a better test. Make one that changes significantly every year so direct test-prep is hard. Choose different types of critical reading passages and questions each year, vary the style of the math questions - make the test different eno…

Imagine a perfect SAT that preparation can't affect; for the purposes of the hypothetical, the test just stares into your soul and measures pure scholastic aptitude. If (a) scholastic aptitude has a significant effect on your lifetime income, (b) people tend to marry people of similar social and economic class, and (c) scholastic aptitude is fairly heritable (through genes, environment, whatever)... ... then you woul…

Once you combine all those premises, the "pretty noticeable" correlation might be something like ten percent. So the problem of it correlating too strongly with wealth would be solved.

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

#777

Post by noobermin »

_iyig wrote: post #771
summm wrote: post #717

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 t…

>How about having lots of decent, desirable universities instead of a few elite ones and many weak ones? In practice, this is pretty much the case. State schools (e.g. the University of Virginia, University of California-Berkeley, Georgia Tech, etc.) are often quite good in terms of the education provided, and offer lower tuition rates to in-state residents. Forbes and U.S. News & World Report maintain rankings of th…

They'll have to convince employers who are generally from the elite schools that the state schools are actually good and their graduates are worth hiring.

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

#778

Post by adventist »

lenkite wrote: post #773
Dylan16807 wrote: post #752

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Disingenuous mockery doesn't help. (If you actually believe that's where people are trying to go then I have worse insults for you.)

My mockery reflects the progression of reality in other nations where such policies have been implemented. Your anger and threat of "worse insults" matter little to history. At each stage, the devout proponents of equality will only choose to draw the line further. When students of the 'adversity' quota are unable to get good grades, their grades will be inflated. When they are unable to get jobs, a push will be made…

Dude, I can totally see this heading that way. It sets up a bad precedent.

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

#779

Post by cm2187 »

intenex wrote: post #749
summm wrote: post #717

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 t…

As someone who went to Harvard, I'm pretty sure there are a lot of extremely decent universities that all basically provide the same quality of instruction. People just get unreasonably hung up over the 'best' schools, but there are easily at least like 100+, if not several hundred, that provide easily roughly the same educational experience as far as I'm aware. The peer group may definitely dramatically different fr…

The thing is what makes a university good has more to do with the quality of the recruitment of its students than the teaching. In fact much of the teaching in ellite US colleges is done by researchers that are not particularly good at it.

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

#780

Post by pndy »

This sounds like thing what we had during communistic times in Poland; universities were giving extra points for place of origin of student candidates during entrance exams, adding these to the sum of points obtained for results in individual exams and for grades on the secondary school exit exam aka matura exam. The general idea was to give better chances for young people coming from workers and countryside families
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