Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Reinstating our SAT/ACT requirement for future admissions cycles

mitadmissions.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

791–800 of 1001 posts

Re: Reinstating our SAT/ACT requirement for future admissions cycles

#791

Post by lightup »

hs_parent wrote: post #722
lightup wrote: post #553

My son found out 2 days ago he didn't get accepted to his in-state land grant public university. The University of Minnesota. This was his fall back plan. Now he's screwed and may not be able to start college in fall. His sins: - a 35 ACT score (legit with no studying or ACT prep classes) - a 3.8 weighted GPA (because he took multiple AP classes and actually was in college for his junior and senior years through Minn…

I'm sorry this happened to your son. It can be really disheartening for kids who work so hard. Similar thing happened to my kid at University of California this year where test scores are also not even considered. Wasn't as bad - they got into a 2nd tier UC so we are at least thankful for that.

Thanks for the kind words. Usually it works out in the end or to some sort of state where you can look back without regret. Lessons in grit for sure.

Re: Reinstating our SAT/ACT requirement for future admissions cycles

#792

Post by lightup »

johnnyanmac wrote: post #724
lightup wrote: post #586

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And young people on here imagine having 2 children 2 years apart. One of them doesn't get to go to college because of covid and the other doesn't get to go because ability didn't matter for a year. EDIT: I hope this never happens to your kids. Beware of being penalized for trying. Is that a lesson you will teach your kids? I'm not "bummed". Read my post with anger. U of MN was not his first choice. It was _fallback_.…

>Beware of being penalized for trying. Is that a lesson you will teach your kids? Life is going to teach it one way or another, and Picard's words stand even more true as I enter my 30's as they were back when I was an angsty 14YO just trying to stay with my friends before Mom's job forces her out of state... again. Took me a while to realize I wasn't being punished for not studying enough and that this was simply a…

Make it so! Those words?!

Re: Reinstating our SAT/ACT requirement for future admissions cycles

#793

Post by MichaelApproved »

tomatowurst wrote: post #591
MichaelApproved wrote: post #583

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’d say you’ve got more straw men in that loaded question than farmers have in their field. You’re taking poorly summarized opinions and pretending that combination of opinions are held by a group of significant size.

I don't think so ivy league discrimination of asian american applicants despite high standardized test scores is very much a published statistic one that is often met with emotional fervor by groups that seek to continue it. Just my observation as an outsider looking into America. Often sensitive debates that don't follow a certain mainstream narrative are brushed off as strawman or whataboutism. I'm just seeing this…

People who claim “standardized test is systematic racism” are not necessarily the same people who think “asian americans being discriminated at ivy leagues even with good standardized test score is not seen as systematic racism.”

You are taking two different points of views which are made by two different groups, reducing their arguments down to practically nothing, and pretending they’re being made by the same group.

You are mutating the arguments and inventing a boogie man. Textbook straw man argument.

> Often sensitive debates that don't follow a certain mainstream narrative are brushed off as strawman

There’s a reason for that. It has nothing to do with following a mainstream narrative or not. It has to do with the false assumptions in the basis of your questions.

Re: Reinstating our SAT/ACT requirement for future admissions cycles

#794

Post by crackercrews »

colinmhayes wrote: post #519
kragen wrote: post #480

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure but 38% of AP Calculus BC takers get a 5 so it doesn't give you much information.

Taking the Calculus BC test already puts you in the upper echelon of high school math students though. According to a quick google only 15% of high schoolers will take the BC exam, so getting a 5 is something only 5% of students achieve.

15% sounds very high. My quick google showed that only 15% take any calculus. [1]

1: https://www.edweek.org/teaching-learning/calculus-is-the-pea....

Re: Reinstating our SAT/ACT requirement for future admissions cycles

#795

Post by ImaCake »

fsckboy wrote: post #765

as an MIT alum, a wealthy one who thought he would leave his fortune to MIT, I applaud this move, but it doesn't get me back to giving. MIT shouldn't have stopped requiring the tests in the first place, shouldn't have participated in that anti-intellectual "shut down tech" day or whatever that was, and shouldn't have done a dozen other things like cancel speakers to bow to a woke mob. MIT needs to sign up to the Chic…

I read that sentence as they think SAT scores are correlated with but not causal for MIT student success. You would need to do a randomised controlled trial or a mendelian randomisation analysis (requires a lot of genotyping of students) to establish any kind of causality. Those experiments have not been done, so the relationship is correlated.

Re: Reinstating our SAT/ACT requirement for future admissions cycles

#796

Post by weekendmodder »

MichaelApproved wrote: post #793
tomatowurst wrote: post #591

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think so ivy league discrimination of asian american applicants despite high standardized test scores is very much a published statistic one that is often met with emotional fervor by groups that seek to continue it. Just my observation as an outsider looking into America. Often sensitive debates that don't follow a certain mainstream narrative are brushed off as strawman or whataboutism. I'm just seeing this…

People who claim “ standardized test is systematic racism ” are not necessarily the same people who think “ asian americans being discriminated at ivy leagues even with good standardized test score is not seen as systematic racism. ” You are taking two different points of views which are made by two different groups, reducing their arguments down to practically nothing, and pretending they’re being made by the same g…

You must write stack overflow responses. Not addressing the root questions, just insult the question and the asker.

Re: Reinstating our SAT/ACT requirement for future admissions cycles

#797

Post by lightup »

SeanLuke wrote: post #625
lightup wrote: post #566

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He applied to [redacted] State, Rice, UNC, Duke, and U of MN - Twin Cities. Accepted at [redacted] State (they have a formula for everyone). He also got their highest out of state "scholarship" - which is more like a break on out of state tuition - no reciprocity with MN. No word from Duke yet but that probably won't happen either. Complete disaster for his future and really a shot to his otherwise happy and optimist…

If his acceptance to Iowa State as a complete disaster, why would he apply there? Iowa State is quite a good school. BTW, it's the home of one of the first computers in history, the ABC ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atanasoff%E2%80%93Berry_comput... ) Surely he'll do well there.

It's a good school but hard to stomach outstate tuition value prop. The "disaster" is having all your choices arbitrarily removed in spite of everything you did to succeed. Let's agree that's some BS.

Re: Reinstating our SAT/ACT requirement for future admissions cycles

#798

Post by naniwaduni »

SeanLuke wrote: post #625
lightup wrote: post #566

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He applied to [redacted] State, Rice, UNC, Duke, and U of MN - Twin Cities. Accepted at [redacted] State (they have a formula for everyone). He also got their highest out of state "scholarship" - which is more like a break on out of state tuition - no reciprocity with MN. No word from Duke yet but that probably won't happen either. Complete disaster for his future and really a shot to his otherwise happy and optimist…

If his acceptance to Iowa State as a complete disaster, why would he apply there? Iowa State is quite a good school. BTW, it's the home of one of the first computers in history, the ABC ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atanasoff%E2%80%93Berry_comput... ) Surely he'll do well there.

GP catastrophizing (they've had two days!) aside, finaid leverage can matter a lot, in both directions.

Re: Reinstating our SAT/ACT requirement for future admissions cycles

#799

Post by hugh-avherald »

stjohnswarts wrote: post #674
aj7 wrote: post #613

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No no no. The thesis topics are in graduate schools are more cutting edge, and the opportunity to interact with real science as an undergraduate are invaluable. I would tend to agree that excelling at a second tier university with a comprehensive program is an acceptable start. It generally gets you to a higher level. Competitiveness is about speed. Anyone can look something up. It’s about knowing things right off th…

It's a trade-off. I'd rather live in a democracy and take my chances with Covid-19 than live under an authoritarian regime. Even authoritarians are correct at least twice a day.

Both democracies and authoritarian regimes can be found among governments that have had laissez-faire policies and both can be found among those that have had strict lockdowns. You can probably find the world's full range of policy responses to COVID-19 within the United States.

Re: Reinstating our SAT/ACT requirement for future admissions cycles

#800

Post by ipaddr »

pishpash wrote: post #725
RC_ITR wrote: post #716

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>The notion of a “well rounded student” who does music, art, and extra curricular activities, is a legacy of blue blood WASP culture Kind of wild to erase centuries of cultural heritage by implying that teaching academics with art is a uniquely Anglo-Saxan ideal.

It's not. Being well rounded is the ideal of the nobility in practically every settled culture, ancient or modern. It's the definition of "cultured". Having said that, it is a class marker, so participants of the dominant culture have a leg up.

It is what a renaissance man aspires to which has roots in other western countries.
Post reply on HN