Columbia is the first Ivy League university to abandon standardized tests in the name of ‘equity.’ It's disadvantaged students like me who will suffer.
I agree any alternative admission criteria is MORE biased towards wealth and privilege- letters of recommendation, extra curriculars , etc.
The real and despicable reason these schools want to get rid of standardized tests is so they can more easily racially discriminate against Asian applicants without being sued.
I laugh my ass off at the "elite" colleges going "test optional". There is one single benefit of attending an elite institution and that is that they screen for IQ, taking the top 3-4% of high school grads. The diploma then marks you for life as a top 3 percenter. The instruction isn't much better (in some cases much worse) than at less prestigious institutions, so they are not improving on the 18 year olds that enter, just passing them through and giving them access to an "elite" brand. So, getting rid of the main way they distinguish the top 3% that they need to continue in existence is inherently self-destructive. It won't be long before students, potential faculty, everyone questions why they still have "elite" status.
Chris, SAT grades are not the secret sauce to Columbia's historical ability to maintain the elite (yes, class-based) status that protects its "elite brand." I'm comfortable saying that the school has a good handle on the outcome of their magic power spread over a stack of resumes and applications, that it generates the Freshman class they want regardless of any stupid test score. The problem has become a growing Asian presence (and stubbornly persistent high-scoring white presence) that (in their opinion, not mine) threatens the demographics (and politics) of their club. Columbia (and other 'prestigious institutions') see eliminating standardized testing as the way to put the mojo back into the secret, magic powder that allow them to hide behind the cover of their 'elite brand' in determining who is and isn't worthy. Standardized testing exposes their bias.
Regardless, as you and I both know, higher-education is not the right battle ground to impact the educational advancement of the under-served or poor. Fix public lower education, more charter schools, empowered private schools... if you want to help this group. We need more/better farmers, electricians, and plumbers (I'm pretty sure my plumber is in your 3%) and fewer hypocritical and over-educated Columbia lawyers, AI engineers, and Gender Study graduates.
Exactly. Standardized testing discrepancies are the evidence of racial discrimination in admissions. Rather than stop the discrimination, elite schools are planning to get rid of the evidence. The Harvard lawsuit has teeth because of the documented scoring differences, get rid of that the suit is essentially worthless.
Yeah sort of, but that presumes a bunch of old white country club elites are running these places. I think it's closer to true the logically challenged socialist mindhive true believers in place in these institutions mean to destroy the cultural underpinnings that made them elite institutions to begin with. Don't care about past or future, only the now, replaced gratitude and humility with their own righteous certitude that they amongst all of human history know what is best and true.
100% agree. However, there is correlation and there are various reasons for that.
There is no way a "regular kid" will have anywhere close to the access to opportunity that Obama's kids, LeBron James' kids, etc....however many on this board disagree. Why? Because it goes against their rose-colored glasses mentality and makes it easier to indict poor people as being poor due to immoral behavior, not working hard, etc.
Plus, more importantly, it allows them to disregard THEIR advantages and claim they got there through their own grit, determination and perseverance.
I would have agreed with you until a few years ago. We helped a young woman coming out of foster care and it was eye opening. Her family situation was horrible and worse, everyone around her had no idea what it takes to succeed. That is a recipe for disaster. However, I don't think the government can't do anything about it. My belief is it would take local organizations to start with kids very young and show them what it takes (work hard in school, graduate high school, don't have kids until you're married etc) to slowly turn that culture of helplessness around.
Important to note that the young woman recieved help. She didn't do it on her own. Also, you are advocation for local organizations to step in - which is completerly different than the author's hypothetical of a kid studying on their own a few hours on the weekend or set aside one day to take a standardized test cold. Yeah, that's a lot of kids for the private sector/charitable organizations to deal with.
Yes, are there rare exceptions. Sure, and we love hearing those, because it reinforces the mythology. But overall, take 100 kids in that situation? 95 aren't going to be making much progress.
Yes, if our society was as altruistic as we like to claim/believe, then 99% of government wouldn't be necessary.
Lol. Have always had it in me. See, you actually really probably disagree, Lynne because our politcal, social, etc. ideologies are diametrically oppossed. See, I believe there is no such thing as access to equal opportunity in America. And go by the data which shows that the overwhelming majority of people will live and die in whatever socio-economic class they were born into....minus the exceptions, which for some reason we mythologize as the norm.
Asian Americans as an ethnic group are the most academically and financially successful group in the country. Culture makes a difference. By your logic they are the most privileged and benefiting the most from white supremacy?
No I do not disagree. I would not have said it if I did not mean it. I on occasion might be wrong but I do not deceive deliberately. I recognize that our ideologies are oppositional but how diametrically I am unsure. am NOT a socialist or proponent thereof. I do not want everyone to have or be the same. How banal. I do not want to be like those luxury belief people either. I want equality of opportunity. For everyone and, in theory, education provides that. I think the myth is that everyone wants to improve their socio-economic class. Or even should want to. Why can't we just celebrate each individual for the beautiful person they are and not judge them for what they do not [have, accomplish, earn . . .]? How much suffering do we generate when we are constantly telling a wide swath of people they are not good enough, rich enough, thin enough, classy enough, educated enough . . .? All while those odious so-called "elites" are gaming the system to further insulate themselves.
This is a great article. I have been a college professor for 40 years. I grew up in a world of violence, drugs and police. As Joe Namath said, I thought my dad was friends with the police they were over so much. I never expected to go to college and figured I would live the criminal life of my father. But the SATs changed that. I did not do great, but I got into a college with them, and I had some pretty terrible grades and no extracurriculars except smoking weed behind the gym, and one juvenile probation. I ultimately discovered Philosophy and eventually got a PhD at a top University. The liberal arts, which the somnambulant woke want to cancel, and the SAT's that the virtue-signalling universities want to eliminate saved my life, no hyperbole there either.
Recruiter told me I could pick any MOS I wanted. Completed my enlistment as an intelligence analyst, finished college debt free on GI Bill, then matriculated into medical school.
Standard tests were my way out. No one cares about a young Caucasian kid from South East Arkansas.
Yes, I’m with you on this one. It was a long time ago, but I was a so-so student who found out via the old ACT that my brain was good at the logic stuff. I was able to rise out of a lower middle class family as a first gen college grad, thanks to a scholarship I got because of that ACT score. After graduating, I took the old civil service exam, which was an IQ test, scored great and began my federal career serving our military and intel communities. I was able to rise to senior executive over the years, not because of my education, but because I could think my way out of a paper bag, get along with people and worked my butt off. I needed that ACT score to pay for a degree that opened doors for me. Frankly, the education I got in those four years was of little value, but the piece of paper at the end was a necessity. I also learned later that when hiring people (because there was no longer such a thing as a test for IQ), I did not give much weight to GPA, but looked at the rigor of the degree program, writing skills and emotional intelligence. The military’s understanding of the importance of IQ is spot on. It’s not the only thing that matters, but without a reasonable level of critical thinking ability the chances for success in many jobs is low. All that circles back to the fact that standardized tests are an important component of ensuring the brightest minds are going into the fields that absolutely must have critical thinkers. AND as Mr. Frank points out (and my own experience) those tests are also a form of opportunity for some.
Progressivism always hurts the poor. Any time wealthy people use “moral judgment” to replace a meritocracy those who could have used merit to change their life situation are replaced by a lottery of uncontrollable biology. Any system that replaces merit with anything is tyranny (I decide what’s right for you - instead of us all agreeing on a testable and provable set of standards used for common evaluation) by another name.
You are correct that a PURE meritocracy has never existed. What you’re replacing is the ideal outcome of the system. No system is perfect, the minute humans are involved everything is fallible. The question is what we’re striving for.
Every systematic failure boils down to this exact same thing. We build the best system we can (and a meritocracy is the best system) and then, because humans are imperfect, we replace it with a suboptimal system that’s dependent on BETTER humans, even though that last system just proved how perfectly imperfect humans are, especially when it comes to systems.
Everyone who’s ever done corporate system work - for large or small companies - has seen this problem, more than any other, destroy companies. When you build a system you launch it at 60% effective and you hope to get it to 80% effective and recognize that the other 20% are outlier problems that should be left to good people to solve (there’s error here) or there legit errors/mistakes or they’re manipulation of the system by bad actors. Each should be dealt with but almost never should the system be further altered because at this point the laws of diminishing returns means the change is all cost and no benefit. And ultimately the minute you start changing it the worse the standard 80% gets.
It attempts to exist in sports perhaps more than anywhere else in the world today, which is why sports gain more relevance and cultural importance every day. Does it actually exist in sports? Well, for decades you couldn't play sports dependent on the melanin in your skin. In certain parts of the world you can't depending on religious affiliation. Here, up until about 10 years ago if you happened to like marijuana you couldn't play pro sports. So do sports attempt, perhaps better than anywhere else in present day to be a meritocracy? Perhaps. But it also proves the point - every single system touched by humans is and will always be imperfect because of humans. For more evidence about this go involve yourself in any youth sports league anywhere and tell me how much of it is a meritocracy and how much of it is bureaucracy and parental popularity contest.
What's sad is that's its valuable in sports, but in the places it's life changing (science, medicine, energy, food production) it stopped being a meritocracy decades ago because merit allows poor people to participate and the entire story of human history is that once taxes concentrate enough wealth to make the powerful infallible, they'll change the rules to ensure the wealthy and powerful control the rules of the game and keep poor people away from them (Steph Curry is one of my favorite basketball players of all time - but as a reminder how little we know/should listen to these people as humans read the letter about how vehement he is about keeping poor people away from his family) and those rules will rely less and less on merit and more and more on personal definitions of "morals"
And we're already going backward with sports. Just ask Kendrick Perkins. Now if you're white it doesn't matter how good you are basketball, you're only popular because you're white. It's almost like I heard the reverse of that argument somewhere not that long ago...
Well, the reality is that no one is eliminating the SAT, ACT, etc.
And, would argue, that America has never been truly interested in meritocracy, let alone "striving" for it. This conversation always seems to come up whenever certain people feel their status, position, etc. in the cultural hierarchy is challenged. All about "meritocracy," then....because that's, OF COURSE, how they got where they are, right?
Don't consider myself a progressive, more of a non rose-colored glasses realist. Think your "summary" might be a bit thin, especially historically.
I’m sure it’s imperfect - by definition. But I’m not attempting to analyze all historical societal shifts. I believe the vast majority of societal construct historically never even attempted a “fair” ideal. That concept has been attempted throughout history and every time corruption by individuals have driven over regulation and over taxation to correct for that corruption/human frailty, and every time the over regulation and Ofer taxation has lead to the demise of that society. We are that society.
That said, that’s still MUCH better than societies that never even attempted a liberty-centric society that strived for equal application of clearly defined rules
The first volume of Fukuyama's "Political Order and Political Decay" set contains an enlightening analysis of most known people's and their political systems from about 3000 B.C., tracing the effects of meritocratic organized groups within states and how their very success seems to lead them to inevitably devolve into corruption devised to consolidate power and privilege within what are effectively tribal arrangements. He also shows how meritocracies naturally arise in military organizations due to"natural selection" and that in the more successful civilizations it has crossed over from there to state administrations. Corruption of these systems arises mostly in long periods of peace when the natural selection process has become detached from reality.
Yes. Any group waving a flag (be it religious , ethnic, star-bellied sneeches, etc.) will have members that, intellectually, fall on a bell curve. Once the wealth becomes concentrated and scarce, the wealthy class will find ways to game the meritocratic system for their offspring. Send their child to the very best k-12 program, with as much individualized instruction as you can afford. Prep ‘lucky-sperm-club’ offspring with instruction on HOW to take a standardized test. Then allow the standardized test to be taken multiple times to ‘learn the test’ and improve score. Finally, send them to a fancy finishing college where they will network with the highest percentage of other lucky students who will help pave the road to their membership in the wealthy class.
You should try looking at individual trees instead of generalizing from the forest. I realize that the forest can be viewed as the generalization of the trees but much is lost in that. I suppose I often find your commentary so off-putting because I you make assumptions about me which are unjustified. IOW you judge me while complaining about those who judge. I am likelyolder than you but I was born in Alabama with bright, bright, bright red hair. At a time when conformity was de riguer. I was in elementary school when schools were integrated. I had no problem with it because well, you know, they could single out red-headed folks next. I will never forget the look on that small black boy's face when he walked into class. It informed me and stays with me to this day. I was always nice to him. Not because I pitied him or to make me feel better about myself ( ugh those types) but because he deserved it.
You had red hair in Alabama? Man, you and the black kid must have had so many similar issues/life experience to talk about re: integration, race, etc.
Yeah, you might want to start considering the forest more, because that's where you probability. The author's scenario is nice and all, but 100 kids in that situation? 95 are bombing the SAT.
I in no way equated having red hair with what that child experienced. Rather I said it gave me insight into being judged on appearance. I don't really understand your forest statement but I guess you mean statistically. I am not a stats person and believe much of what ails our nation is caused by over-reliance thereon. I found Mr. Henderson's articles (this one and the one on luxury beliefs) very informative.
I mean, my family was not poor (financially); we did have some money; but my grades were not stellar (partly because: I signed up for challenging courses in school ... which were harder).
Meanwhile, my public school education did include a lot of practice, in ... learning how to put down the right answers on a standardized test (and usually, one which had a *** time limit. ***).
So, I did well on tests such as the SAT and the GRE.
(... and the NMSQT -- which, way back then, in the 1960s -- was a separate test from the PSAT.)
I probably would not have been found worthy of being accepted for admission to Rice University, just based on my grades.
However, my test scores (and maybe the known reputations of both of the [public!] high schools I attended) helped to "outweigh" the importance of my (um ... ) "disappointing" GPA, and ... I got in.
PS: In college, I again took challenging courses ... which did not wind up enabling me to achieve a very impressive GPA, but ... I was OK with that. I was not planning to impress anyone with my GPA.
Which university or college you actually go to is SO overrated. Colombia vs. SUNY vs UMass vs Georgetown vs Miami vs almost always ends up meaning nothing in your career. Wise up parents and students, stop this madness, then these "elite" universities and the college industrial complex can be deflated and defeated. A stronger economy, less racism, better workforce, fewer progressives are other benefits likely to accrue.
I wish I could remember who I saw interviewed who commented that getting into a great school used to be about getting the best education, but now it’s about saying you went there. I read another article recently about how many students are cheating and using AI to help write their assignments. Since education is no longer the point, it makes perfect sense. On a related note, our organization recently had to submit a business plan for the upcoming year. The CEO decided to feed it into ChatGPT, which told us it was a good start but needed more specific, measurable goals, and for each goal to include language to say how it is tied to our company’s business objectives. VPs beware.
I've been using Bluemail on my Android devices for a number of years. Recently a button showed up in the composer window that looks like the Superman logo but with "AI" instead of "S". I believe it is connected to a ChatGPT engine on their server. Your enter a phrase for it to write about and pick some parameters controlling verbosity and tone (e.g. friendly, formal, argumentative, etc). It produces surprisingly good compositions, including research data if you pose the query right. As an example I told it to compare cost of living in states with and without income taxes. The response was more cogent, readable and well supported than most journalist articles on the subject. (I know - low bar).
I'm writing to compare the cost of living in states with and without income tax. It's an interesting topic that can have a major impact on your finances.
When it comes to income tax, there are seven states that don't have it: Alaska, Florida, Nevada, South Dakota, Texas, Washington, and Wyoming. These states often have lower costs of living compared to states with income taxes. This can be for a variety of reasons, such as lower taxes, lower housing costs, and a lower cost of goods and services.
On the other hand, states with income tax can often offer more services and amenities, such as public transportation, parks, and schools. This can be attractive to those who want to take advantage of these services.
When it comes to deciding which state to live in, it's important to consider the cost of living and the services offered. It's also important to consider the income tax rate, as this can have a major impact on your finances.
I hope this information is helpful in making your decision.
Thanks for posting this ! A fascinating glimpse into the bias programmed into AI responses. The way it casually equates "services" with taxes as being equal in importance is obnoxious. The chatbots have all been "trained" by Berkley social science grads.
I think you can play with it and get it to veer a bit one way or another. You should try it - it's interesting (and alarming). Probably lots of ways to get access to it, but Bluemail has installs for all the major platforms. It's free. You can run it in parallel with other mail clients (I think I have three currently on a Linux laptop). I've been wanting to try having two of them have a conversation with each other via email as an experiment to see if it's unstable in some fashion. Or always converges in some particular slant.
Couldn't agree more. The story I've told over and over again to anyone who will listen is this: I was the head of a very large group of science-types (110 ppl) for several years. Most had undergrads in a hard science, several PharmDs and a handful of PhDs. One asian man was hired by one of my managers...he had: a BS from Berkley, a DDS from Columbia, a JD from Buffalo and an MPH from Buffalo. He was, by far, one of the lowest performers. When I left the company, I 'stole' a few of my staff to come with me (all women, I might add!): one had no degree, one had a semi-non-relevant degree, and the third has a totally non-relevant degree that she spent 10 yrs getting via night school while raising two kids and working full time. Talk about motivated, hard-working, self-taught....like nothing I've ever seen. It's NOT about the college pedigree, it's about work ethic, problem-solving and coming to work with a damn good attitude!
I have noticed that different colleges treat the same subjects in different ways. In my field of chemical engineering some colleges focus on mastering the calculations that are used in industry, while others seem to focus on the theory behind the calculations, with only a little time spent on the use of the theories.
It probably has to do with whether the professors are more oriented toward teaching or research. Way back when I went to school, the professors with tenure who had written books were the worst teachers. They only cared about research and were only teaching because the school required them to do it. The younger professors who were there because they loved the subjects and loved teaching were the best teachers.
Yup. I’m an upper middle class homeschool mom with a graduate degree. Before my oldest started high school, I started reading all the books on “holistic admissions” and hanging out on all the websites in order to help my high school daughter play the game. As a result of the insight I’ve gained, I’ve helped her map out an academic plan that involves several AP courses, several dual enrollment courses, and four years of all five academic subjects (as opposed to the much lower graduation requirements most states have).
With my awareness of the “holistic” game, I’ve also tracked down multiple long-term volunteer and other extracurricular activities that align with her academic goals. I’ve guided her in starting a club and finding a certification program for a professional interest that will allow her to start her own business. I’ve helped her strategically plan her summers. I spend hours every week driving her all over the place for a travel soccer team. We will also be sending her overseas for an exchange program. I’m making sure to help her choose opportunities that will allow her to build relationships that will yield strong letters of recommendation. She will be taking an entire 6-week course to help her craft her application essay.
Do you think kids growing up like this writer have parents—or anyone—guiding them through this nonsense? I live on the Upper West Side. All the privileged kids around me are doing these same things. They’re talking about it with their peers and teachers. Their parents are talking about it with each other. I very often think about kids who have no such guidance (like me—my working class parents didn’t go to college, we lived in a low-income neighborhood, and I had NO CLUE). They have no clue what they’re supposed to be doing. The SAT is the equalizer for them. It doesn’t take years of strategic planning. It’s just one test (which I agree should be administered to every student, during the school day).
I didn’t make the rules. I didn’t set up this ridiculous admissions system.
But I will say this. I used to think it was just about jumping through hoops and checking boxes to please admissions officers. And as a person who chose home education 15 years ago explicitly as a rejection of our conventional education system, in an effort to give my kids a tailor-made, joy-filled learning experience, the idea was particularly off-putting. But what I’m seeing is that a kid who racks up all these courses and extracurriculars isn’t just checking boxes. She’s growing and learning and stretching herself in ways she may not have otherwise. And she’s still pursuing her own interests and goals. So it’s actually not ridiculous to me that colleges like kids who jump through these hoops. These kids are hard-working and ambitious. They have solid hard-earned academic skills. They’ve developed leadership skills. They’ve contributed hundreds of hours to their communities.
But yeah, it takes A LOT of understanding, planning, and effort. I know many parents don’t have the time or bandwidth to guide their kid through this rigamarole. That’s literally the point of my post. My child is admittedly very privileged. The less privileged kids are hurt by holistic admissions and the elimination of a simple, one-day test.
Adrienne I'm just throwing my support your way. I wish I could make the choice you did with regards to homeschooling as I think my children would learn so much more and enjoy the process. It sounds like you've done it the right way for your daughter, not just to merely check off the boxes.
Thank you. This child spent most of her childhood playing in the woods, building forts, catching toads, writing and putting on plays with her three younger siblings (complete with costumes she made herself), playing music, and making art. When she got to high school, we did change things up a bit, but she’s adjusted well, as I expect her younger siblings will do when they get there. I regret nothing about the gentle, pressure-free way she was able to grow for the first 14 years. And I make no apologies for helping her challenge herself and pursue opportunities to grow and learn as she prepares for college and adulthood.
Of course there are unfair differences in privilege, but it’s bananas to expect privileged parents to hinder their kids’ education and future success because it’s “not fair.”
How is it gaming the system for a kid to meet all the expectations of selective colleges? She’s doing the work. She’s taking the classes. She’s checking the boxes. All I’m doing is showing her what she needs to do. But she’s the one doing it. That’s not gaming a system. It’s literally just following the system’s rules.
Don’t hate the player, hate the game. Adrienne, you are clearly committed to giving your daughter what you as her mother feels is the best and most enriching environment. You are putting in the time, she is putting in the work. I hope it all pays off.
You are savvy and leveraging your time and resources to secure a prominent place among the elites.
Personally, I would not aspire to have my child attend an elite institution precisely because it is filled with kids whose parents have carefully crafted their entire childhood and put them through all the rigmarole you detailed.
I’m a middle class working mom and her description overwhelms me. I mean who has the physical and mental time to do all of this! Yet living in the Northeast,I know she is not alone in her efforts to give her child every advantage to get into college outside of the standardized tests; because all of those activities she described is what the elite institutions want to see. The only thing that gives me hope is hearing about many companies who have gotten so frustrated with the ability of Ivy League graduates to actually be able to perform in the workplace, that they are favoring kids from state schools.
Selfish? Haha. Yes, how dare I give my kid a rigorous education? How dare I help her pursue her interests through volunteering and apprenticing? I’m such a monster.
No. How dare you exploit a system via your privilege and harm untold numbers of those less fortunate than you and your child. Your daughter is not earning her own way. You are earning it for her. Which is disgusting.
Um, I’m not the one taking and passing the courses and tests. I’m not the one putting in hundreds of hours of volunteer work. I’m not the one developing leadership, public speaking, and management skills. I’m not the one spending 10 hours a week at soccer training. SHE is. SHE is the person doing the work, and SHE is the person gaining the knowledge, skills, and character.
Her privilege is that she has a mother who understands the system and knows how to guide her. And I do acknowledge that IS a privilege. (Again, it’s the whole point of my original comment.) But she’s still doing the work and earning her own way.
Well written and informative. I am gobsmacked over the statement that 8/10 17-24 yr olds would not be eligible for the armed services...how is this possible in America? Couldn't read the NYT article as I don't subscribe to that rag. Such a disturbing stat.
I have two children, both have graduate degrees in the math/sciences, one from an ivy and other from a PA state school. So my 'study' has an N of only 2, but I can tell you that the quality of education from the state school was hands down better. Here's one example that still has me steamed...the ivy required my daughter to have an internship of X hours in order to graduate. They provided literally 0 support, advice, connections, etc. ZERO. She applied to at least 25-30 internships via LinkedIn, other online services and got one interview. As a last resort, I told her to hit up her advisor and offer her FREE services to do anything that she could in the summer. Of course, they found work for her to do because she was FREE (and eventually offered her a job upon graduation). In return, we were paying $65K/year. Kinda sickens me that we got sucked into the "OMG, you got into COLUMBIA!!!!...how could you NOT go?". Well, she could've NOT gone.
I've lost confidence and respect in higher education and would love to see some seriously big changes, but that will never happen because of how much money is at stake.
Yep...spend millions of taxpayer $$s on preventable diabetes and heart disease due to lifelong obesity, but don't you dare whisper that someone is seriously fat because that might make them feel bad. :((
"A study at Stanford found that family income is more highly correlated with admissions essay content than with SAT scores."
Exactly. Stanford doesn’t release the numbers of those successfully admitted without SAT tests, but recently conceded it rejects about 70% of those with perfect SAT scores.
It tells us that merit really isn’t valued. All that is valued is that the admission officer sees himself or herself as the applicant or condescends to take the disadvantaged . But the disadvantaged person that is accepted never seems to be the one with the IQ necessary to get to the top rung at that school. I wonder (thought Alice) why that is.
It’s really very simple. If the results keep dropping, you have to either find a cause that’s acceptable or rid yourself of the SAT and the ACT. Well, what can be the cause? Are the kids different from past generations? Nah. Kids are kids. They (and we) are on a bell curve intellectually. Percentages of those intellectually able to do the work don’t change. Yeah, If you’re always wasted, your genetics don’t matter. But not in these numbers. So, these young adults don’t have the abilities or knowledge of past generations. Why? Ask them. But, that won’t work. These kids (except those of Asian descent) have the highest self esteem on the planet. The parents? They (yes, not all) never pushed their kids. They’ve trained their children that they’re entitled to succeed and will destroy anyone who dares hold their prince or princess to a standard. The teachers? Scared, woke and themselves poorly educated. Just check the curricula at the schools of education. You’ll retch. If the teachers insist on a standard and fail too many ‘scholars’ who do nothing, there goes the job. Would you stand fast or bend? Back to being a barista. The public schools? You don’t need me to write about modern college acceptable knowledge, attitudes, curricula and standards. The colleges and universities? Based on their ideologies they need populations that mirror the general population percentages. Based on their bloated budgets they need paying (many, by government insured loans paid directly to the schools) bodies; and the abilities of the freshmen is, naturally, irrelevant. Need I go on? Goodbye, SAT and ACT.
Fascinating. I teach undergrad at a major public university in MD and graduate school at a private university in Baltimore. Have never heard a discussion re: reflecting the population.
Now, when you talk about Bell Curve, having to "reflect the population"....exactly what type of students are you refering to?
One of the prime arguments of the DEI crowd is that - for equity - everything must reflect the population on race, sex and (for Latinos) ethnicity. That means everything. School, employment, scholarships; you name the thing and it fits, on the basis of required equity. But, since there are too few Trans or other nonbinary folk, they all have to get in; somehow, for equity. - and forget percentages. On the bell curve: all that I meant was that as to intellectual abilities, we’re all on it, somewhere. Poor kids, Black kids, White kids, Asian kids, etc. Not just kids - adults too. If the ability is there, why aren’t many successful? Poverty plays a part. Acknowledged. So? The bell curve is one marker that shows everyone’s humanity, with our natural differences. That’s no reason to do away with the SAT or the ACT exams; which are predictors of successful completion of a bachelor’s course of study.
Great piece, Rob. I was a 2.2 GPA student in high school, scored 115 on my ASVAB for the Army, and graduated from UofMN with a BS mechanical engineering degree at a 3.5 GPA working 40 hours a week while in school.
I was a VFW and therefore didn't have to take the SAT but it should be a requirement at a minimum. Or ASVAB. However, I think they are eliminating it to choose people based on immutable characteristics.
We are seeing this in medicine too. In the name of equity, the USMLE medical boards has moved from a score to pass/no pass, and more medical schools are removing grades and going to P/NP. Now students need to do more visiting away rotations and/or take an additional year of research to set themselves apart. Which socioeconomic group does this favor?
I’m the future when you’re going into surgery, don’t worry…your surgeon “passed.”
And - guess what? - this will end up stratifying the medical communities as well. The elites won't be going to those lower doctors who "just passed". Money and power can always find the best. But the overall quality will surely deteriorate and everyone else will be dealing with that.
Probably depends on doctor's age. For older doctors, you can probably still trust the old "prestigious" names. My biggest piece of advice is --- don't get sick! If 3 years of covid taught us anything is that the field of medicine as a whole is moving backwards, not forward, in their ministrations.
I don't recall "equity" being the driver of the elimination of Step I (which is not the only USMLE). Step I was typically taken after two years of cramming for exams by people who had in many cases never seen a patient. Step II is much more applied, and is taken later on. And yet for reasons arcane to me, Step I was the primary factor deciding what you could get a job in and Step II was not. Now, Step II is still scored and is increased in importance.
(I didn't do well on either due to various personal circumstances and thankfully was not interested in becoming a surgeon).
With regards to surgical specialties, the USMLE doesn't test your manual skills at all and isn't even that heavy on anatomy or surgical questions. It's mainly a test of how much of a gunner you are, and the people who are really hard core are what the surgery programs want.
Personally, I think that specialty boards should establish their own tests for admission. More tests and more costs sucks, but I think a test from the people who are ultimately going to be certifying you would be a far more useful measure, and one that would be harder to game.
Don't get me wrong, the away rotations are costly and doing underpaid research years does favor the rich.
It's a way for colleges to increase prestige. When you remove SAT scores, more kids are going to apply because they think they have a shot. School's acceptance rate goes down so perception is it's a highly selective school. Same with removing application fees. I have 2 in college. During application process, many school's announced they were removing application fees to remove "barriers." They shouldn't have application fees, but again more kids apply, lowering acceptance rate. If they want to remove barriers, they need to lower the price of the education.
And don't get me started on leveling the playing field. SATs are the only way to level it. I know parents who paid someone to write their kid's college essays, spent a boat load of $$ for their kids to spend a week in Africa working for some non-profit so it would look good on their college resumes. Parents want the prestige of their kid going to some highly selective school just as much as the kids.
Love this article. I'm feeling cranky so believe that dropping the SAT is a way to encourage incompetence and it appears to me to be intentional. I want my surgeon to be highly competent. I don't care if he or she is the meanest person to coworkers or anything else. That is what used to make this country great, highly competent people generally succeeding.
I don't believe in affirmative action based on color but I do believe in it for poverty. As this writer correctly points out, there are huge obstacles that may mask people's ability to succeed, so a more rational approach would be to keep the SAT and weight it based on socio-economic situations.
My father had been a grocer who left school after the eighth grade to help support his family. My mother was a high school graduate and proud of it. So, the SAT and the ACT are effectively gone. Every school copies the Ivies (pulling the forelock to their betters) to show that they’re with it - whatever the “it” of the day is. Consider too, the LSAT. As a middling, not very hard working college student, I took the LSAT. I wrote third from the top in my class. No one could have been more shocked than I was. Sixty plus years later - after a local law school took a chance on me and (based on grades) as one of the editors of the school’s law review - I had a decent career in public service (an assistant district attorney) and then private practice. I’m semiretired; which means that I just can’t give it up. Now the LSAT is to become optional. Optional means gone. Next, the MCAT.
I once thought the same. They are. You haven’t been following STEM studies on the college, university and graduate levels. Like a rat from the sewers, DEI snuck in and has been establishing itself. A teacher (assistant, associate, full professor - doesn’t matter) can’t get employment without professing the evil of whiteness and support if DEI. An occasional lawsuit reins it in for a moment; then, like the tide, it’s back.
Also… “Columbia University announced last Wednesday that it is permanently eliminating SAT and ACT test scores as part of the undergraduate admissions process…”
and would do you think this announcement has done to the present value of future earnings of Columbia U grads...? It's destroyed half the prestige that took a century (or more) to build.
MIT on the other hand has affirmed that they are KEEPING the SAT
capitalism is another word for meritocracy. meritocracy is another word for capitalism.
rewards associated with STEM skills are enormous (eg. Elon). These rewards can only be had with genuine skill, actually internalized. If STEM programs aren't selective upfront, they will not be able to teach these skills. if traditional-format universities are truly fallen to DEI, other educational sources will pick up the slack.
DEI is accelerating this process by forcing us all to confront how obsolete traditional education models are. youtube is the best / most effective teacher of math and science that has ever existed. the rise of homeschooling is surely one symptom of this social epiphany.
The current buzz word “equity” is causing a lowering of standards. Instead of asking kids to reach for the stars we’re telling them they are not able nor special in order to make those of lessor abilities “feel” better about themselves. I cannot think of any other society other than the communists like Mao, who threw out intellectuals in to the fields or simply killed them.
What is worse is that those who are climate activists are likely pro equity types. They are effectively killing off the scientists who likely will solve the problem of excess CO2. Luddites who want us using pull cars and bikes to transport items and people. I can’t wait for the solar powered bike....all knowing it would be useless to me after being is a bar after sundown. God, there is such stupidity in the chattering privileged class.
I agree any alternative admission criteria is MORE biased towards wealth and privilege- letters of recommendation, extra curriculars , etc.
The real and despicable reason these schools want to get rid of standardized tests is so they can more easily racially discriminate against Asian applicants without being sued.
I laugh my ass off at the "elite" colleges going "test optional". There is one single benefit of attending an elite institution and that is that they screen for IQ, taking the top 3-4% of high school grads. The diploma then marks you for life as a top 3 percenter. The instruction isn't much better (in some cases much worse) than at less prestigious institutions, so they are not improving on the 18 year olds that enter, just passing them through and giving them access to an "elite" brand. So, getting rid of the main way they distinguish the top 3% that they need to continue in existence is inherently self-destructive. It won't be long before students, potential faculty, everyone questions why they still have "elite" status.
Chris, SAT grades are not the secret sauce to Columbia's historical ability to maintain the elite (yes, class-based) status that protects its "elite brand." I'm comfortable saying that the school has a good handle on the outcome of their magic power spread over a stack of resumes and applications, that it generates the Freshman class they want regardless of any stupid test score. The problem has become a growing Asian presence (and stubbornly persistent high-scoring white presence) that (in their opinion, not mine) threatens the demographics (and politics) of their club. Columbia (and other 'prestigious institutions') see eliminating standardized testing as the way to put the mojo back into the secret, magic powder that allow them to hide behind the cover of their 'elite brand' in determining who is and isn't worthy. Standardized testing exposes their bias.
Regardless, as you and I both know, higher-education is not the right battle ground to impact the educational advancement of the under-served or poor. Fix public lower education, more charter schools, empowered private schools... if you want to help this group. We need more/better farmers, electricians, and plumbers (I'm pretty sure my plumber is in your 3%) and fewer hypocritical and over-educated Columbia lawyers, AI engineers, and Gender Study graduates.
Exactly. Standardized testing discrepancies are the evidence of racial discrimination in admissions. Rather than stop the discrimination, elite schools are planning to get rid of the evidence. The Harvard lawsuit has teeth because of the documented scoring differences, get rid of that the suit is essentially worthless.
Yeah sort of, but that presumes a bunch of old white country club elites are running these places. I think it's closer to true the logically challenged socialist mindhive true believers in place in these institutions mean to destroy the cultural underpinnings that made them elite institutions to begin with. Don't care about past or future, only the now, replaced gratitude and humility with their own righteous certitude that they amongst all of human history know what is best and true.
There is no such thing as privilege. In America, there is equal access to opportunity for everyone.
I do think there's privilege. It's just race doesn't have anything to do with it. It's all about class
Obviously Obama's kids have a lot more privilege than some poor white kid growing up in a trailer park.
100% agree. However, there is correlation and there are various reasons for that.
There is no way a "regular kid" will have anywhere close to the access to opportunity that Obama's kids, LeBron James' kids, etc....however many on this board disagree. Why? Because it goes against their rose-colored glasses mentality and makes it easier to indict poor people as being poor due to immoral behavior, not working hard, etc.
Plus, more importantly, it allows them to disregard THEIR advantages and claim they got there through their own grit, determination and perseverance.
I would have agreed with you until a few years ago. We helped a young woman coming out of foster care and it was eye opening. Her family situation was horrible and worse, everyone around her had no idea what it takes to succeed. That is a recipe for disaster. However, I don't think the government can't do anything about it. My belief is it would take local organizations to start with kids very young and show them what it takes (work hard in school, graduate high school, don't have kids until you're married etc) to slowly turn that culture of helplessness around.
Important to note that the young woman recieved help. She didn't do it on her own. Also, you are advocation for local organizations to step in - which is completerly different than the author's hypothetical of a kid studying on their own a few hours on the weekend or set aside one day to take a standardized test cold. Yeah, that's a lot of kids for the private sector/charitable organizations to deal with.
Yes, are there rare exceptions. Sure, and we love hearing those, because it reinforces the mythology. But overall, take 100 kids in that situation? 95 aren't going to be making much progress.
Yes, if our society was as altruistic as we like to claim/believe, then 99% of government wouldn't be necessary.
Wow CP. Impressive. I knew you had it in you and am really happy to see where you are coming from.
Lol. Have always had it in me. See, you actually really probably disagree, Lynne because our politcal, social, etc. ideologies are diametrically oppossed. See, I believe there is no such thing as access to equal opportunity in America. And go by the data which shows that the overwhelming majority of people will live and die in whatever socio-economic class they were born into....minus the exceptions, which for some reason we mythologize as the norm.
Asian Americans as an ethnic group are the most academically and financially successful group in the country. Culture makes a difference. By your logic they are the most privileged and benefiting the most from white supremacy?
No I do not disagree. I would not have said it if I did not mean it. I on occasion might be wrong but I do not deceive deliberately. I recognize that our ideologies are oppositional but how diametrically I am unsure. am NOT a socialist or proponent thereof. I do not want everyone to have or be the same. How banal. I do not want to be like those luxury belief people either. I want equality of opportunity. For everyone and, in theory, education provides that. I think the myth is that everyone wants to improve their socio-economic class. Or even should want to. Why can't we just celebrate each individual for the beautiful person they are and not judge them for what they do not [have, accomplish, earn . . .]? How much suffering do we generate when we are constantly telling a wide swath of people they are not good enough, rich enough, thin enough, classy enough, educated enough . . .? All while those odious so-called "elites" are gaming the system to further insulate themselves.
For once your sarcasm is warranted. This is all about making selection processes opaque which only benefits elites.
Excellent article and very interesting information regarding ASVAB scores.
This is a great article. I have been a college professor for 40 years. I grew up in a world of violence, drugs and police. As Joe Namath said, I thought my dad was friends with the police they were over so much. I never expected to go to college and figured I would live the criminal life of my father. But the SATs changed that. I did not do great, but I got into a college with them, and I had some pretty terrible grades and no extracurriculars except smoking weed behind the gym, and one juvenile probation. I ultimately discovered Philosophy and eventually got a PhD at a top University. The liberal arts, which the somnambulant woke want to cancel, and the SAT's that the virtue-signalling universities want to eliminate saved my life, no hyperbole there either.
Mirrors someone I know rather well, myself.
Recruiter told me I could pick any MOS I wanted. Completed my enlistment as an intelligence analyst, finished college debt free on GI Bill, then matriculated into medical school.
Standard tests were my way out. No one cares about a young Caucasian kid from South East Arkansas.
Yes, I’m with you on this one. It was a long time ago, but I was a so-so student who found out via the old ACT that my brain was good at the logic stuff. I was able to rise out of a lower middle class family as a first gen college grad, thanks to a scholarship I got because of that ACT score. After graduating, I took the old civil service exam, which was an IQ test, scored great and began my federal career serving our military and intel communities. I was able to rise to senior executive over the years, not because of my education, but because I could think my way out of a paper bag, get along with people and worked my butt off. I needed that ACT score to pay for a degree that opened doors for me. Frankly, the education I got in those four years was of little value, but the piece of paper at the end was a necessity. I also learned later that when hiring people (because there was no longer such a thing as a test for IQ), I did not give much weight to GPA, but looked at the rigor of the degree program, writing skills and emotional intelligence. The military’s understanding of the importance of IQ is spot on. It’s not the only thing that matters, but without a reasonable level of critical thinking ability the chances for success in many jobs is low. All that circles back to the fact that standardized tests are an important component of ensuring the brightest minds are going into the fields that absolutely must have critical thinkers. AND as Mr. Frank points out (and my own experience) those tests are also a form of opportunity for some.
Progressivism always hurts the poor. Any time wealthy people use “moral judgment” to replace a meritocracy those who could have used merit to change their life situation are replaced by a lottery of uncontrollable biology. Any system that replaces merit with anything is tyranny (I decide what’s right for you - instead of us all agreeing on a testable and provable set of standards used for common evaluation) by another name.
How can you replace what has never existed?
You are correct that a PURE meritocracy has never existed. What you’re replacing is the ideal outcome of the system. No system is perfect, the minute humans are involved everything is fallible. The question is what we’re striving for.
Every systematic failure boils down to this exact same thing. We build the best system we can (and a meritocracy is the best system) and then, because humans are imperfect, we replace it with a suboptimal system that’s dependent on BETTER humans, even though that last system just proved how perfectly imperfect humans are, especially when it comes to systems.
Everyone who’s ever done corporate system work - for large or small companies - has seen this problem, more than any other, destroy companies. When you build a system you launch it at 60% effective and you hope to get it to 80% effective and recognize that the other 20% are outlier problems that should be left to good people to solve (there’s error here) or there legit errors/mistakes or they’re manipulation of the system by bad actors. Each should be dealt with but almost never should the system be further altered because at this point the laws of diminishing returns means the change is all cost and no benefit. And ultimately the minute you start changing it the worse the standard 80% gets.
And that, is a quick summary of progressivism
It exists in sports.
It attempts to exist in sports perhaps more than anywhere else in the world today, which is why sports gain more relevance and cultural importance every day. Does it actually exist in sports? Well, for decades you couldn't play sports dependent on the melanin in your skin. In certain parts of the world you can't depending on religious affiliation. Here, up until about 10 years ago if you happened to like marijuana you couldn't play pro sports. So do sports attempt, perhaps better than anywhere else in present day to be a meritocracy? Perhaps. But it also proves the point - every single system touched by humans is and will always be imperfect because of humans. For more evidence about this go involve yourself in any youth sports league anywhere and tell me how much of it is a meritocracy and how much of it is bureaucracy and parental popularity contest.
What's sad is that's its valuable in sports, but in the places it's life changing (science, medicine, energy, food production) it stopped being a meritocracy decades ago because merit allows poor people to participate and the entire story of human history is that once taxes concentrate enough wealth to make the powerful infallible, they'll change the rules to ensure the wealthy and powerful control the rules of the game and keep poor people away from them (Steph Curry is one of my favorite basketball players of all time - but as a reminder how little we know/should listen to these people as humans read the letter about how vehement he is about keeping poor people away from his family) and those rules will rely less and less on merit and more and more on personal definitions of "morals"
And we're already going backward with sports. Just ask Kendrick Perkins. Now if you're white it doesn't matter how good you are basketball, you're only popular because you're white. It's almost like I heard the reverse of that argument somewhere not that long ago...
Well, the reality is that no one is eliminating the SAT, ACT, etc.
And, would argue, that America has never been truly interested in meritocracy, let alone "striving" for it. This conversation always seems to come up whenever certain people feel their status, position, etc. in the cultural hierarchy is challenged. All about "meritocracy," then....because that's, OF COURSE, how they got where they are, right?
Don't consider myself a progressive, more of a non rose-colored glasses realist. Think your "summary" might be a bit thin, especially historically.
I’m sure it’s imperfect - by definition. But I’m not attempting to analyze all historical societal shifts. I believe the vast majority of societal construct historically never even attempted a “fair” ideal. That concept has been attempted throughout history and every time corruption by individuals have driven over regulation and over taxation to correct for that corruption/human frailty, and every time the over regulation and Ofer taxation has lead to the demise of that society. We are that society.
That said, that’s still MUCH better than societies that never even attempted a liberty-centric society that strived for equal application of clearly defined rules
The first volume of Fukuyama's "Political Order and Political Decay" set contains an enlightening analysis of most known people's and their political systems from about 3000 B.C., tracing the effects of meritocratic organized groups within states and how their very success seems to lead them to inevitably devolve into corruption devised to consolidate power and privilege within what are effectively tribal arrangements. He also shows how meritocracies naturally arise in military organizations due to"natural selection" and that in the more successful civilizations it has crossed over from there to state administrations. Corruption of these systems arises mostly in long periods of peace when the natural selection process has become detached from reality.
Yes. Any group waving a flag (be it religious , ethnic, star-bellied sneeches, etc.) will have members that, intellectually, fall on a bell curve. Once the wealth becomes concentrated and scarce, the wealthy class will find ways to game the meritocratic system for their offspring. Send their child to the very best k-12 program, with as much individualized instruction as you can afford. Prep ‘lucky-sperm-club’ offspring with instruction on HOW to take a standardized test. Then allow the standardized test to be taken multiple times to ‘learn the test’ and improve score. Finally, send them to a fancy finishing college where they will network with the highest percentage of other lucky students who will help pave the road to their membership in the wealthy class.
To paraphrase, those who separate their scholars from.their warriors will have neither brave scholars nor wise warriors.
Thank you for the reference. Now I have another book to read.
Sure. Have a cup is better than no cup. No argument there.
You should try looking at individual trees instead of generalizing from the forest. I realize that the forest can be viewed as the generalization of the trees but much is lost in that. I suppose I often find your commentary so off-putting because I you make assumptions about me which are unjustified. IOW you judge me while complaining about those who judge. I am likelyolder than you but I was born in Alabama with bright, bright, bright red hair. At a time when conformity was de riguer. I was in elementary school when schools were integrated. I had no problem with it because well, you know, they could single out red-headed folks next. I will never forget the look on that small black boy's face when he walked into class. It informed me and stays with me to this day. I was always nice to him. Not because I pitied him or to make me feel better about myself ( ugh those types) but because he deserved it.
You had red hair in Alabama? Man, you and the black kid must have had so many similar issues/life experience to talk about re: integration, race, etc.
Yeah, you might want to start considering the forest more, because that's where you probability. The author's scenario is nice and all, but 100 kids in that situation? 95 are bombing the SAT.
I in no way equated having red hair with what that child experienced. Rather I said it gave me insight into being judged on appearance. I don't really understand your forest statement but I guess you mean statistically. I am not a stats person and believe much of what ails our nation is caused by over-reliance thereon. I found Mr. Henderson's articles (this one and the one on luxury beliefs) very informative.
"There are poor kids who get bad grades but find a path upward because of standardized testing."
Very true. I was one.
me too ... (sorta).
I mean, my family was not poor (financially); we did have some money; but my grades were not stellar (partly because: I signed up for challenging courses in school ... which were harder).
Meanwhile, my public school education did include a lot of practice, in ... learning how to put down the right answers on a standardized test (and usually, one which had a *** time limit. ***).
So, I did well on tests such as the SAT and the GRE.
(... and the NMSQT -- which, way back then, in the 1960s -- was a separate test from the PSAT.)
I probably would not have been found worthy of being accepted for admission to Rice University, just based on my grades.
However, my test scores (and maybe the known reputations of both of the [public!] high schools I attended) helped to "outweigh" the importance of my (um ... ) "disappointing" GPA, and ... I got in.
PS: In college, I again took challenging courses ... which did not wind up enabling me to achieve a very impressive GPA, but ... I was OK with that. I was not planning to impress anyone with my GPA.
Which university or college you actually go to is SO overrated. Colombia vs. SUNY vs UMass vs Georgetown vs Miami vs almost always ends up meaning nothing in your career. Wise up parents and students, stop this madness, then these "elite" universities and the college industrial complex can be deflated and defeated. A stronger economy, less racism, better workforce, fewer progressives are other benefits likely to accrue.
I wish I could remember who I saw interviewed who commented that getting into a great school used to be about getting the best education, but now it’s about saying you went there. I read another article recently about how many students are cheating and using AI to help write their assignments. Since education is no longer the point, it makes perfect sense. On a related note, our organization recently had to submit a business plan for the upcoming year. The CEO decided to feed it into ChatGPT, which told us it was a good start but needed more specific, measurable goals, and for each goal to include language to say how it is tied to our company’s business objectives. VPs beware.
I've been using Bluemail on my Android devices for a number of years. Recently a button showed up in the composer window that looks like the Superman logo but with "AI" instead of "S". I believe it is connected to a ChatGPT engine on their server. Your enter a phrase for it to write about and pick some parameters controlling verbosity and tone (e.g. friendly, formal, argumentative, etc). It produces surprisingly good compositions, including research data if you pose the query right. As an example I told it to compare cost of living in states with and without income taxes. The response was more cogent, readable and well supported than most journalist articles on the subject. (I know - low bar).
Here is a sample:
Hello,
I'm writing to compare the cost of living in states with and without income tax. It's an interesting topic that can have a major impact on your finances.
When it comes to income tax, there are seven states that don't have it: Alaska, Florida, Nevada, South Dakota, Texas, Washington, and Wyoming. These states often have lower costs of living compared to states with income taxes. This can be for a variety of reasons, such as lower taxes, lower housing costs, and a lower cost of goods and services.
On the other hand, states with income tax can often offer more services and amenities, such as public transportation, parks, and schools. This can be attractive to those who want to take advantage of these services.
When it comes to deciding which state to live in, it's important to consider the cost of living and the services offered. It's also important to consider the income tax rate, as this can have a major impact on your finances.
I hope this information is helpful in making your decision.
Thanks!
Thanks for posting this ! A fascinating glimpse into the bias programmed into AI responses. The way it casually equates "services" with taxes as being equal in importance is obnoxious. The chatbots have all been "trained" by Berkley social science grads.
I think you can play with it and get it to veer a bit one way or another. You should try it - it's interesting (and alarming). Probably lots of ways to get access to it, but Bluemail has installs for all the major platforms. It's free. You can run it in parallel with other mail clients (I think I have three currently on a Linux laptop). I've been wanting to try having two of them have a conversation with each other via email as an experiment to see if it's unstable in some fashion. Or always converges in some particular slant.
Or, in most cases, it’s about the parents being able to brag at cocktail parties that their kid goes to (fill in the blank)…
Couldn't agree more. The story I've told over and over again to anyone who will listen is this: I was the head of a very large group of science-types (110 ppl) for several years. Most had undergrads in a hard science, several PharmDs and a handful of PhDs. One asian man was hired by one of my managers...he had: a BS from Berkley, a DDS from Columbia, a JD from Buffalo and an MPH from Buffalo. He was, by far, one of the lowest performers. When I left the company, I 'stole' a few of my staff to come with me (all women, I might add!): one had no degree, one had a semi-non-relevant degree, and the third has a totally non-relevant degree that she spent 10 yrs getting via night school while raising two kids and working full time. Talk about motivated, hard-working, self-taught....like nothing I've ever seen. It's NOT about the college pedigree, it's about work ethic, problem-solving and coming to work with a damn good attitude!
I think this depends on type of career. Connections are everything in many careers (perhaps not yours).
I have noticed that different colleges treat the same subjects in different ways. In my field of chemical engineering some colleges focus on mastering the calculations that are used in industry, while others seem to focus on the theory behind the calculations, with only a little time spent on the use of the theories.
It probably has to do with whether the professors are more oriented toward teaching or research. Way back when I went to school, the professors with tenure who had written books were the worst teachers. They only cared about research and were only teaching because the school required them to do it. The younger professors who were there because they loved the subjects and loved teaching were the best teachers.
Yup. I’m an upper middle class homeschool mom with a graduate degree. Before my oldest started high school, I started reading all the books on “holistic admissions” and hanging out on all the websites in order to help my high school daughter play the game. As a result of the insight I’ve gained, I’ve helped her map out an academic plan that involves several AP courses, several dual enrollment courses, and four years of all five academic subjects (as opposed to the much lower graduation requirements most states have).
With my awareness of the “holistic” game, I’ve also tracked down multiple long-term volunteer and other extracurricular activities that align with her academic goals. I’ve guided her in starting a club and finding a certification program for a professional interest that will allow her to start her own business. I’ve helped her strategically plan her summers. I spend hours every week driving her all over the place for a travel soccer team. We will also be sending her overseas for an exchange program. I’m making sure to help her choose opportunities that will allow her to build relationships that will yield strong letters of recommendation. She will be taking an entire 6-week course to help her craft her application essay.
Do you think kids growing up like this writer have parents—or anyone—guiding them through this nonsense? I live on the Upper West Side. All the privileged kids around me are doing these same things. They’re talking about it with their peers and teachers. Their parents are talking about it with each other. I very often think about kids who have no such guidance (like me—my working class parents didn’t go to college, we lived in a low-income neighborhood, and I had NO CLUE). They have no clue what they’re supposed to be doing. The SAT is the equalizer for them. It doesn’t take years of strategic planning. It’s just one test (which I agree should be administered to every student, during the school day).
With all do respect, and I mean that sincerely, this disgusts me.
I didn’t make the rules. I didn’t set up this ridiculous admissions system.
But I will say this. I used to think it was just about jumping through hoops and checking boxes to please admissions officers. And as a person who chose home education 15 years ago explicitly as a rejection of our conventional education system, in an effort to give my kids a tailor-made, joy-filled learning experience, the idea was particularly off-putting. But what I’m seeing is that a kid who racks up all these courses and extracurriculars isn’t just checking boxes. She’s growing and learning and stretching herself in ways she may not have otherwise. And she’s still pursuing her own interests and goals. So it’s actually not ridiculous to me that colleges like kids who jump through these hoops. These kids are hard-working and ambitious. They have solid hard-earned academic skills. They’ve developed leadership skills. They’ve contributed hundreds of hours to their communities.
But yeah, it takes A LOT of understanding, planning, and effort. I know many parents don’t have the time or bandwidth to guide their kid through this rigamarole. That’s literally the point of my post. My child is admittedly very privileged. The less privileged kids are hurt by holistic admissions and the elimination of a simple, one-day test.
Oh, and it’s “all *due* respect.”
Adrienne I'm just throwing my support your way. I wish I could make the choice you did with regards to homeschooling as I think my children would learn so much more and enjoy the process. It sounds like you've done it the right way for your daughter, not just to merely check off the boxes.
Thank you. This child spent most of her childhood playing in the woods, building forts, catching toads, writing and putting on plays with her three younger siblings (complete with costumes she made herself), playing music, and making art. When she got to high school, we did change things up a bit, but she’s adjusted well, as I expect her younger siblings will do when they get there. I regret nothing about the gentle, pressure-free way she was able to grow for the first 14 years. And I make no apologies for helping her challenge herself and pursue opportunities to grow and learn as she prepares for college and adulthood.
Of course there are unfair differences in privilege, but it’s bananas to expect privileged parents to hinder their kids’ education and future success because it’s “not fair.”
You are gaming the system. Nothing more, nothing less. There is no integrity in doing so.
How is it gaming the system for a kid to meet all the expectations of selective colleges? She’s doing the work. She’s taking the classes. She’s checking the boxes. All I’m doing is showing her what she needs to do. But she’s the one doing it. That’s not gaming a system. It’s literally just following the system’s rules.
Don’t hate the player, hate the game. Adrienne, you are clearly committed to giving your daughter what you as her mother feels is the best and most enriching environment. You are putting in the time, she is putting in the work. I hope it all pays off.
You are savvy and leveraging your time and resources to secure a prominent place among the elites.
Personally, I would not aspire to have my child attend an elite institution precisely because it is filled with kids whose parents have carefully crafted their entire childhood and put them through all the rigmarole you detailed.
I’m a middle class working mom and her description overwhelms me. I mean who has the physical and mental time to do all of this! Yet living in the Northeast,I know she is not alone in her efforts to give her child every advantage to get into college outside of the standardized tests; because all of those activities she described is what the elite institutions want to see. The only thing that gives me hope is hearing about many companies who have gotten so frustrated with the ability of Ivy League graduates to actually be able to perform in the workplace, that they are favoring kids from state schools.
I do not even know what to say. It really rubs me wrong. I guess I see it as selfish.
Selfish? Haha. Yes, how dare I give my kid a rigorous education? How dare I help her pursue her interests through volunteering and apprenticing? I’m such a monster.
No. How dare you exploit a system via your privilege and harm untold numbers of those less fortunate than you and your child. Your daughter is not earning her own way. You are earning it for her. Which is disgusting.
Um, I’m not the one taking and passing the courses and tests. I’m not the one putting in hundreds of hours of volunteer work. I’m not the one developing leadership, public speaking, and management skills. I’m not the one spending 10 hours a week at soccer training. SHE is. SHE is the person doing the work, and SHE is the person gaining the knowledge, skills, and character.
Her privilege is that she has a mother who understands the system and knows how to guide her. And I do acknowledge that IS a privilege. (Again, it’s the whole point of my original comment.) But she’s still doing the work and earning her own way.
Well written and informative. I am gobsmacked over the statement that 8/10 17-24 yr olds would not be eligible for the armed services...how is this possible in America? Couldn't read the NYT article as I don't subscribe to that rag. Such a disturbing stat.
I have two children, both have graduate degrees in the math/sciences, one from an ivy and other from a PA state school. So my 'study' has an N of only 2, but I can tell you that the quality of education from the state school was hands down better. Here's one example that still has me steamed...the ivy required my daughter to have an internship of X hours in order to graduate. They provided literally 0 support, advice, connections, etc. ZERO. She applied to at least 25-30 internships via LinkedIn, other online services and got one interview. As a last resort, I told her to hit up her advisor and offer her FREE services to do anything that she could in the summer. Of course, they found work for her to do because she was FREE (and eventually offered her a job upon graduation). In return, we were paying $65K/year. Kinda sickens me that we got sucked into the "OMG, you got into COLUMBIA!!!!...how could you NOT go?". Well, she could've NOT gone.
I've lost confidence and respect in higher education and would love to see some seriously big changes, but that will never happen because of how much money is at stake.
Keep up the great writing :)
Most people are ineligible for military because they’re fat. The NY Times promotes obesity too as “fat acceptance”
Yep...spend millions of taxpayer $$s on preventable diabetes and heart disease due to lifelong obesity, but don't you dare whisper that someone is seriously fat because that might make them feel bad. :((
"A study at Stanford found that family income is more highly correlated with admissions essay content than with SAT scores."
Exactly. Stanford doesn’t release the numbers of those successfully admitted without SAT tests, but recently conceded it rejects about 70% of those with perfect SAT scores.
https://euphoricrecall.substack.com/p/universities-have-turned-into-illiberal
I too noticed that point.
Hmmm. Interesting. What does that tell us?
It tells us that merit really isn’t valued. All that is valued is that the admission officer sees himself or herself as the applicant or condescends to take the disadvantaged . But the disadvantaged person that is accepted never seems to be the one with the IQ necessary to get to the top rung at that school. I wonder (thought Alice) why that is.
Why do you think it is Sid?
It’s really very simple. If the results keep dropping, you have to either find a cause that’s acceptable or rid yourself of the SAT and the ACT. Well, what can be the cause? Are the kids different from past generations? Nah. Kids are kids. They (and we) are on a bell curve intellectually. Percentages of those intellectually able to do the work don’t change. Yeah, If you’re always wasted, your genetics don’t matter. But not in these numbers. So, these young adults don’t have the abilities or knowledge of past generations. Why? Ask them. But, that won’t work. These kids (except those of Asian descent) have the highest self esteem on the planet. The parents? They (yes, not all) never pushed their kids. They’ve trained their children that they’re entitled to succeed and will destroy anyone who dares hold their prince or princess to a standard. The teachers? Scared, woke and themselves poorly educated. Just check the curricula at the schools of education. You’ll retch. If the teachers insist on a standard and fail too many ‘scholars’ who do nothing, there goes the job. Would you stand fast or bend? Back to being a barista. The public schools? You don’t need me to write about modern college acceptable knowledge, attitudes, curricula and standards. The colleges and universities? Based on their ideologies they need populations that mirror the general population percentages. Based on their bloated budgets they need paying (many, by government insured loans paid directly to the schools) bodies; and the abilities of the freshmen is, naturally, irrelevant. Need I go on? Goodbye, SAT and ACT.
Fascinating. I teach undergrad at a major public university in MD and graduate school at a private university in Baltimore. Have never heard a discussion re: reflecting the population.
Now, when you talk about Bell Curve, having to "reflect the population"....exactly what type of students are you refering to?
One of the prime arguments of the DEI crowd is that - for equity - everything must reflect the population on race, sex and (for Latinos) ethnicity. That means everything. School, employment, scholarships; you name the thing and it fits, on the basis of required equity. But, since there are too few Trans or other nonbinary folk, they all have to get in; somehow, for equity. - and forget percentages. On the bell curve: all that I meant was that as to intellectual abilities, we’re all on it, somewhere. Poor kids, Black kids, White kids, Asian kids, etc. Not just kids - adults too. If the ability is there, why aren’t many successful? Poverty plays a part. Acknowledged. So? The bell curve is one marker that shows everyone’s humanity, with our natural differences. That’s no reason to do away with the SAT or the ACT exams; which are predictors of successful completion of a bachelor’s course of study.
very interesting.
Great piece, Rob. I was a 2.2 GPA student in high school, scored 115 on my ASVAB for the Army, and graduated from UofMN with a BS mechanical engineering degree at a 3.5 GPA working 40 hours a week while in school.
I was a VFW and therefore didn't have to take the SAT but it should be a requirement at a minimum. Or ASVAB. However, I think they are eliminating it to choose people based on immutable characteristics.
We are seeing this in medicine too. In the name of equity, the USMLE medical boards has moved from a score to pass/no pass, and more medical schools are removing grades and going to P/NP. Now students need to do more visiting away rotations and/or take an additional year of research to set themselves apart. Which socioeconomic group does this favor?
I’m the future when you’re going into surgery, don’t worry…your surgeon “passed.”
And - guess what? - this will end up stratifying the medical communities as well. The elites won't be going to those lower doctors who "just passed". Money and power can always find the best. But the overall quality will surely deteriorate and everyone else will be dealing with that.
I would like to know how to screen for the better doctors right now.
Probably depends on doctor's age. For older doctors, you can probably still trust the old "prestigious" names. My biggest piece of advice is --- don't get sick! If 3 years of covid taught us anything is that the field of medicine as a whole is moving backwards, not forward, in their ministrations.
so my advice is, don't get sick!
I don't recall "equity" being the driver of the elimination of Step I (which is not the only USMLE). Step I was typically taken after two years of cramming for exams by people who had in many cases never seen a patient. Step II is much more applied, and is taken later on. And yet for reasons arcane to me, Step I was the primary factor deciding what you could get a job in and Step II was not. Now, Step II is still scored and is increased in importance.
(I didn't do well on either due to various personal circumstances and thankfully was not interested in becoming a surgeon).
With regards to surgical specialties, the USMLE doesn't test your manual skills at all and isn't even that heavy on anatomy or surgical questions. It's mainly a test of how much of a gunner you are, and the people who are really hard core are what the surgery programs want.
Personally, I think that specialty boards should establish their own tests for admission. More tests and more costs sucks, but I think a test from the people who are ultimately going to be certifying you would be a far more useful measure, and one that would be harder to game.
Don't get me wrong, the away rotations are costly and doing underpaid research years does favor the rich.
It's a way for colleges to increase prestige. When you remove SAT scores, more kids are going to apply because they think they have a shot. School's acceptance rate goes down so perception is it's a highly selective school. Same with removing application fees. I have 2 in college. During application process, many school's announced they were removing application fees to remove "barriers." They shouldn't have application fees, but again more kids apply, lowering acceptance rate. If they want to remove barriers, they need to lower the price of the education.
And don't get me started on leveling the playing field. SATs are the only way to level it. I know parents who paid someone to write their kid's college essays, spent a boat load of $$ for their kids to spend a week in Africa working for some non-profit so it would look good on their college resumes. Parents want the prestige of their kid going to some highly selective school just as much as the kids.
Love this article. I'm feeling cranky so believe that dropping the SAT is a way to encourage incompetence and it appears to me to be intentional. I want my surgeon to be highly competent. I don't care if he or she is the meanest person to coworkers or anything else. That is what used to make this country great, highly competent people generally succeeding.
I don't believe in affirmative action based on color but I do believe in it for poverty. As this writer correctly points out, there are huge obstacles that may mask people's ability to succeed, so a more rational approach would be to keep the SAT and weight it based on socio-economic situations.
Poverty is a great motivator.
My father had been a grocer who left school after the eighth grade to help support his family. My mother was a high school graduate and proud of it. So, the SAT and the ACT are effectively gone. Every school copies the Ivies (pulling the forelock to their betters) to show that they’re with it - whatever the “it” of the day is. Consider too, the LSAT. As a middling, not very hard working college student, I took the LSAT. I wrote third from the top in my class. No one could have been more shocked than I was. Sixty plus years later - after a local law school took a chance on me and (based on grades) as one of the editors of the school’s law review - I had a decent career in public service (an assistant district attorney) and then private practice. I’m semiretired; which means that I just can’t give it up. Now the LSAT is to become optional. Optional means gone. Next, the MCAT.
I doubt that "optional means gone" in case of SAT. Engineering / stem programs cannot do away with it.
this will make it easier to parse out which schools are worth applying for, hiring from, etc.
I once thought the same. They are. You haven’t been following STEM studies on the college, university and graduate levels. Like a rat from the sewers, DEI snuck in and has been establishing itself. A teacher (assistant, associate, full professor - doesn’t matter) can’t get employment without professing the evil of whiteness and support if DEI. An occasional lawsuit reins it in for a moment; then, like the tide, it’s back.
Also… “Columbia University announced last Wednesday that it is permanently eliminating SAT and ACT test scores as part of the undergraduate admissions process…”
and would do you think this announcement has done to the present value of future earnings of Columbia U grads...? It's destroyed half the prestige that took a century (or more) to build.
MIT on the other hand has affirmed that they are KEEPING the SAT
capitalism is another word for meritocracy. meritocracy is another word for capitalism.
rewards associated with STEM skills are enormous (eg. Elon). These rewards can only be had with genuine skill, actually internalized. If STEM programs aren't selective upfront, they will not be able to teach these skills. if traditional-format universities are truly fallen to DEI, other educational sources will pick up the slack.
DEI is accelerating this process by forcing us all to confront how obsolete traditional education models are. youtube is the best / most effective teacher of math and science that has ever existed. the rise of homeschooling is surely one symptom of this social epiphany.
The current buzz word “equity” is causing a lowering of standards. Instead of asking kids to reach for the stars we’re telling them they are not able nor special in order to make those of lessor abilities “feel” better about themselves. I cannot think of any other society other than the communists like Mao, who threw out intellectuals in to the fields or simply killed them.
What is worse is that those who are climate activists are likely pro equity types. They are effectively killing off the scientists who likely will solve the problem of excess CO2. Luddites who want us using pull cars and bikes to transport items and people. I can’t wait for the solar powered bike....all knowing it would be useless to me after being is a bar after sundown. God, there is such stupidity in the chattering privileged class.