Social SAT To add ‘Adversity Score’ to Capture Social and Economic Background

[MikeMcMann]

Even with preparatory privilege those students are still working hard to achieve their goals. Those students should not be punished because they had access to better preparation and tutoring.

SUre but they should not get an automatic benefit either.

Too many are assuming WRONGLY that a focus on the highest grades achieved is, and should be, the defining factor. That is wrong and not the case. Achieving the highest grade only is not indicative of being the best student or practitioner later in the workplace.

Many are operating here on an entirely false premise.

 

[spamking]

Yeah well, maybe those C's would have been A's if we'd had adversity scores and all of this could have been avoided.

Gotta grade on the curve . . . . or something.

 

[MikeMcMann]

Sure. And I'm predicting how this will be used. With Harvard under fire for their policy of racial discrimination against Asians, the diversity industry in higher education needs more cover. This measure will supply it.

Your prediction is not fact so you should be careful to not state it as such as some may point out that is dishonest.

Great you have a guess how it will play out and your issue is not with its design if applied fairly. We can all guess.

 

[Jorge Luis Borges]

Your prediction is not fact so you should be careful to not state it as such as some may point out that is dishonest.

I stated it as "I'm predicting". I think everyone but you can see that this is not a statement of fact, but a prediction, so drop the "some may say" bullshit. If you think it was dishonest say so and offer a better explanation than this as to why.

 

[Zazen]

Lol at everyone who is defending this.

All it does is help people of color and shit on asians and whites.

 

[Swing]

Did you look at the 15 criteria? Household income, highest household education, strength of the high school, housing values of neighborhood all would assist the two examples you mentioned here. I don’t see how any of those criteria they listed inherently favors one race or another. It addresses impoverished areas which any race is capable of being born into.

This is particularly worth emphasizing. I went from being in a remedial math class in the 7th grade to honors in the 8th all because my 7th grade math teacher was competent. If students don't have access to at least some good teachers, then even the hardest working students are going to be fighting an unfairly uphill battle regardless of how diligent they are.

And ultimately, privileged kids aren't going to suffer regardless. They'll get into a good school even if it isn't their first choice.

 

[MikeMcMann]

I stated it as "I'm predicting". I think everyone but you can see that this is not a statement of fact, but a prediction, so drop the "some may say" bullshit. If you think it was dishonest say so and offer a better explanation than this as to why.

Stop lying. This is what you said...

"So does race based discrimination, which is all this will end up being. It's a tool for lefty administrators to favor whoever is currently on top of the oppression pyramid. This won't be used to help poor Chinese kids whose parents toil in a laundry or white kids from Appalachia. It's mainly just a way around stubbornly low SAT scores for black kids."

You added later in a seperate post but nothing in this post suggests opinion. YOu made it as a statement of fact that this is what this will end up being.

Such statements do not to be couched carefully as opinion or called out when they are not.

 

[Jorge Luis Borges]

Stop lying. This is what you said...

"So does race based discrimination, which is all this will end up being. It's a tool for lefty administrators to favor whoever is currently on top of the oppression pyramid. This won't be used to help poor Chinese kids whose parents toil in a laundry or white kids from Appalachia. It's mainly just a way around stubbornly low SAT scores for black kids."

You added later in a seperate post but nothing in this post suggests opinion. YOu made it as a statement of fact that this is what this will end up being.

Such statements do not to be couched carefully as opinion or called out when they are not.

Oh man, not this shit again. I haven't lied Mr McMann. You warned me that "some" might take my prediction as dishonest, since I didn't present it as a prediction. But I literally said "I predict". I don't need to repeat that in every post in this thread. If you have an actual point about how I predicted this adversity score will be used, then I'd love to hear it. But let's try to avoid another ad hominem tantrum, shall we?

 

[BassAckwards]

There’s quite a few criteria there that would benefit different Asian students. Not all Asians are rich, live in wealthy areas, or go to a good school. If anything, I bet this would make many of their scores look better. I’d have to look at more data but the point is all those criteria aren’t race based and you all are foolishly equating this with affirmative action when it’s actually a step away from that.

you are wrong. many asians score high on the SATs despite not being rich, living in wealthy areas, or going to good schools. yet despite their academic scores, arent accepted into the top colleges. all the while black and hispanics can have a low score, less achievements and still get accepted. top colleges already look for soft reasons to discriminate against asians; adding the adversity requirement is very subjective and will all the more help remove asians from the pool of applicants.

https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2018/06/harvard-admissions-personality/563198/

One of the most striking revelations pertains to Harvard’s consideration of applicants’ soft skills—things like “likability,” “helpfulness,” “integrity,” and “courage”—in determining their acceptance. Despite boasting higher test scores, better grades, and stronger extracurricular resumes than applicants of any other racial group, Asian American applicants consistently received lower rankings on those personality traits, according to a statistical analysis conducted on behalf of SFFA of more than 160,000 student records. This emphasis on personality, the analysis concludes, significantly undermined otherwise-qualified Asian Americans’ chances of getting in.

https://www.vox.com/2018/3/28/17031460/affirmative-action-asian-discrimination-admissions
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/02/us/affirmative-action-battle-has-a-new-focus-asian-americans.html
https://www.insidehighered.com/admi...ts-about-asian-americans-and-admissions-elite
http://samv91khoyt2i553a2t1s05i-wpe...18/06/Doc-415-1-Arcidiacono-Expert-Report.pdf

 

[Happy Man]

Lol at everyone who is defending this.

All it does is help people of color and shit on asians and whites.

It’s pathetic.

People might as well just say that some people are just inherently better human beings and then Hitler would be proud.

 

[BassAckwards]

It’s pathetic.

People might as well just say that some people are just inherently better human beings and then Hitler would be proud.

it's basically punishing you for growing up white/asian in a traditional family with married non-lgbq parents in a middle class neighborhood, being a great student, and not screwing up and getting someone pregnant or breaking the law.

 

[Lead]

you are wrong. many asians score high on the SATs despite not being rich, living in wealthy areas, or going to good schools. yet despite their academic scores, arent accepted into the top colleges. all the while black and hispanics can have a low score, less achievements and still get accepted. top colleges already look for soft reasons to discriminate against asians; adding the adversity requirement is very subjective and will all the more help remove asians from the pool of applicants.

https://www.theatlantic.com/education/archive/2018/06/harvard-admissions-personality/563198/



https://www.vox.com/2018/3/28/17031460/affirmative-action-asian-discrimination-admissions
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/02/us/affirmative-action-battle-has-a-new-focus-asian-americans.html
https://www.insidehighered.com/admi...ts-about-asian-americans-and-admissions-elite
http://samv91khoyt2i553a2t1s05i-wpe...18/06/Doc-415-1-Arcidiacono-Expert-Report.pdf

Christ...

Like seriously here....

This is like the 10th poster showing an inability to distinguish between the OP adversity score vs affirmative action/ college admissions. They are not the same thing or necessarily interdependent on each other. Do you acknowledge that? Like can we talk at all about this score without someone reminding me about affirmative action and college admission boards as if they are addressing anything I said or that they are somehow enlightening me that Asians are disprortionately rejected in terms of academic performance? I know. That’s why this story is a good conversation on how can we shift off a race based quota system to one that looking more specifically at the individual and their disadvantaged REGARDLESS of race.

Now this isn’t necessarily your fault but I’m not going to keep conversation going if the poster fails to show that SAT administrators and college admission boards aren’t the same collective entity, just as this new score isn’t the same as the affirmative action system. I don’t expect you to have read all of the thread but if you have seen my exchanges, you might see some of the frustration here.

 

[Deleted member 363827]

Rip Asian-Americans lol

Also House Dem just pass equality act which legitimizes transathletes competing in women's sports, so let's just all watch the US of A burn.

 

[Whippy McGee]

Somehow, someway, the Leftists are the antithesis of what Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. wanted.

When "merit" becomes a bad word, you live in a fucked up society.

 

[DIDM]

I have no issues with this since "race" is not a factor, its location and there are plenty of areas with poor white people that live in violent parts of the nation along with everyone else.

This silly

Statistics for shootings definitely include race

 

[BassAckwards]

Christ...

Like seriously here....

This is like the 10th poster showing an inability to distinguish between the OP adversity score vs affirmative action/ college admissions. They are not the same thing or necessarily interdependent on each other. Do you acknowledge that? Like can we talk at all about this score without someone reminding me about affirmative action and college admission boards as if they are addressing anything I said or that they are somehow enlightening me that Asians are disprortionately rejected in terms of academic performance? I know. That’s why this story is a good conversation on how can we shift off a race based quota system to one that looking more specifically at the individual and their disadvantaged REGARDLESS of race.

Now this isn’t necessarily your fault but I’m not going to keep conversation going if the poster fails to show that SAT administrators and college admission boards aren’t the same collective entity, just as this new score isn’t the same as the affirmative action system. I don’t expect you to have read all of the thread but if you have seen my exchanges, you might see some of the frustration here.

now this isnt your fault, but it does go hand in hand. the intent of adding the adversity score is supposed to help by showing other criterias of the student demographic (social and economic background). imo, its not needed. SATs are to test mathematics, critical reading and writing....so why does a students adversity demographic matter? they say the adversity score shines a light on students who have demonstrated remarkable resourcefulness to overcome challenges and achieve more with less. this is stupid and it's coddling. adding that criteria further enables college admissions to discriminate because they can see the adversity scores, allowing them to pick and choose the minorities and demographics they want. it wont help the struggling white kid that grew up in a trailer park. it wont help the middle class white/asian kids; in fact it will hurt that demographic the most.

 

[Lead]

now this isnt your fault, but it does go hand in hand. the intent of adding the adversity score is supposed to help by showing other criterias of the student demographic (social and economic background). imo, its not needed. SATs are to test mathematics, critical reading and writing....so why does a students adversity demographic matter? they say the adversity score shines a light on students who have demonstrated remarkable resourcefulness to overcome challenges and achieve more with less. this is stupid and it's coddling.

So up to this point of the post, I’m not necessarily in disagreement with you. My positive outlook on it mostly comes from if it becomes a stepping stone away from just directly making decisions based on race and quotas. What I thought when I came into this thread would be a debate about whether you can adequately curve a score based on socio-economic factors like this and also whether we even should. I haven’t heard too much of that but can see the point for not having it.

adding that criteria further enables college admissions to discriminate because they can see the adversity scores, allowing them to pick and choose the minorities and demographics they want. it wont help the struggling white kid that grew up in a trailer park. it wont help the middle class white/asian kids; in fact it will hurt that demographic the most.

The issue there to you though seems to be the admissions department picking and choosing what they want. If you pin this down to just the score itself, it does indeed help the struggling white kid in a trailer park. That’s the entire reason I have a more postive look at this score because it’s a shift from a race centralized focus to a discussion about disadvantaged people in society regardless of their race. We can complain about the admissions criteria or whatever but I think they are independent of one another.

 

[ocfightfan]

Well they gave Obama a Nobel Peace Prize right after he got elected, and they want to steal money from successful people for bums.

 

[panamaican]

...the intent of adding the adversity score is supposed to help by showing other criterias of the student demographic (social and economic background). imo, its not needed. SATs are to test mathematics, critical reading and writing....so why does a students adversity demographic matter? ...

The reason it matters the SAT's have been shown to not primarily reflect ability anymore. They've been highly influenced by the economic status of the students taking the exam. And because the SAT's are capturing economic advantage and not ability, they've become less predictive of who will make good/influential students during and after college.

Broadly put, the metric is no longer measuring what it's supposed to be measuring. And that's because economics are skewing the result. We could spend an entire thread on the long term negative effects on brain structure and development caused by poverty but it's not necessary to talk about the broader points of the SAT and the proposed Adversity score.

Plenty of colleges have recognized this and started to move away from requiring the SAT altogether for that very reason. See, the colleges are looking at their numerous applicants and their SAT scores and GPAs and then essentially trying to figure out how much of those 2 factors reflect a legitimately worthy candidate or simply a product of economic investment.

In an attempt to offset the reality of economic influence, the College Board is trying to make the economic component more clear to the schools who still ask for the SAT so that the schools can spend less of their own time trying to parse out ability from economic advantage. The long term goal is to stop the floodgates from opening where colleges just say nope to the SAT.

Now for all of the racial handwringing idiocy. 99% of the "They're underqualified" argument is predicated on looking as SAT scores and GPAs. Now, if schools just scrap the SAT because they no longer believe in it, all of those arguments simply go out the window. Keeping the SAT, with an adversity score, actually does more for ensuring meritocratic admissions than refusing to deal with the reality of how economics have undermined the value of the exam to colleges.

 

[A.S. Deep]

Rip Asian-Americans lol

Also House Dem just pass equality act which legitimizes transathletes competing in women's sports, so let's just all watch the US of A burn.

It's bad for them but good for others. Context: I'm Indian American.

The reason it matters the SAT's have been shown to not primarily reflect ability anymore. They've been highly influenced by the economic status of the students taking the exam. And because the SAT's are capturing economic advantage and not ability, they've become less predictive of who will make good/influential students during and after college.

Broadly put, the metric is no longer measuring what it's supposed to be measuring. And that's because economics are skewing the result. We could spend an entire thread on the long term negative effects on brain structure and development caused by poverty but it's not necessary to talk about the broader points of the SAT and the proposed Adversity score.

Plenty of colleges have recognized this and started to move away from requiring the SAT altogether for that very reason. See, the colleges are looking at their numerous applicants and their SAT scores and GPAs and then essentially trying to figure out how much of those 2 factors reflect a legitimately worthy candidate or simply a product of economic investment.

In an attempt to offset the reality of economic influence, the College Board is trying to make the economic component more clear to the schools who still ask for the SAT so that the schools can spend less of their own time trying to parse out ability from economic advantage. The long term goal is to stop the floodgates from opening where colleges just say nope to the SAT.

Now for all of the racial handwringing idiocy. 99% of the "They're underqualified" argument is predicated on looking as SAT scores and GPAs. Now, if schools just scrap the SAT because they no longer believe in it, all of those arguments simply go out the window. Keeping the SAT, with an adversity score, actually does more for ensuring meritocratic admissions than refusing to deal with the reality of how economics have undermined the value of the exam to colleges.

The SAT should be gotten rid of just based on the fact that it tests how good a student is at the SAT, not overall intelligence. Has there ever been a student who didn't consider it one of the dumbest tests ever content-wise?

SUre but they should not get an automatic benefit either.

Too many are assuming WRONGLY that a focus on the highest grades achieved is, and should be, the defining factor. That is wrong and not the case. Achieving the highest grade only is not indicative of being the best student or practitioner later in the workplace.

Many are operating here on an entirely false premise.

100%. Grades are not the end-all-be-all and they shouldn't be. How well one does memorizing and regurgitating information under an arbitrary time limit doesn't show how competent they'll be in the workforce.

To use a completely anecdotal example: I just graduated with a PharmD near the top of my claas because I'm a good test taker. My fiancee failed nursing school 3x because she's a horrible test taker, even though she'd pass every hands-on skills portion with ease. Knowing myself, I'm gonna make a mediocre pharmacist at best, while my fiancee would've been an extremely competent nurse.