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

[drstrangelov]

Grades are a better indicator of success anyway, standardized tests for children have their uses, and they aren’t going to be compromised by controlling for adversity.

 

[nac386]

Further proof of racism perpetrated by the New Left.

and LOL at the racist assholes defending this. especially the Mod.

Race is not a factor in the adversity score. Whether you agree with it or not, it’s not race-based and certainly not racist if somebody sees value in it.

 

[Leagon]

I can't believe people defend this tbh.

Two students get the same score. Why should the fact that one student had more challenge (be it self imposed, or "the system") benefit them? If they have the same score they should BOTH be admitted or NEITHER.

Is this for real?

There are tens of thousands of kids that get the same score every year. You saying a university has to recruit all of them? Or none of them? Lol.

 

[newerest]

Is this for real?

There are tens of thousands of kids that get the same score every year. You saying a university has to recruit all of them? Or none of them? Lol.

There shouldn't be any subjective nonsense involved. State schools should have objective standards that guarantee admission when they are met. If there are significantly more applicants than openings, admission is granted from the top on down.

So yes "Lol" this is for real. Better than some bullshit oppression Olympics just designed to hurt Asian people because they do too well.

 

[nac386]

@LogicalInsanity I can give to real world examples of how this would have benefited Asian people that I know.

First, my friend Thuy who is Vietnamese. She grew up in predominately black PG County and attended a black school (over 90%). Her parents are immigrants, speak English but poorly. As a result, she’s at a naturally disadvantage in school since her peers grew up with fluent parents.

Before this score, she’d just be seen as another high achieving Asian female, and her classmates would likely get more looks from colleges assuming similar grades and scores. With this score she’ll be seen as a low income student, from a high crime area, with non-fluent parents and she would absolutely be seen as the academic badass that she really had to be to overcome those challenges.

This score helps her a great deal. It provides context to her achievement. She hates the fact that nobody gives her the same leg-up for overcoming barriers that others receive.

Second example. I’m very close with a Filipino family. Again, immigrant parents, poor English, Tagalog as a first language. The daughter attended a nice private school that ALL of her aunts and uncles helped to pay for. Without this score, she’s another high achieving and likely privileged private school Asian female. But with this score, her scores would be seen in the proper context of a working class family, living in a working class neighborhood, without the privilege of American college educated English fluent parents.

The people calling this racist are completely misguided. It’s not racist, it’s removing race entirely and providing proper context to achievement.

My grandma grew up in dirt poor rural Appalachia. Very smart, but never saw college as an option for obvious reasons. Maybe this score would have shown just how bright she really was to overcome a horrific environment to achieve what she did in school.

So like I said, you can love it or hate it. But calling it racist is dead wrong.

 

[Leagon]

There shouldn't be any subjective nonsense involved. State schools should have objective standards that guarantee admission when they are met. If there are significantly more applicants than openings, admission is granted from the top on down.

So yes "Lol" this is for real. Better than some bullshit oppression Olympics just designed to hurt Asian people because they do too well.

What in the fuck are you talking about? That's exactly how the system works. What's subjective about socioeconomic disparity?

Or did a mod merge threads? It feels like some of yall are having an entirely different conversation. You're referring to the new SAT initiative, right?

 

[Leagon]

@LogicalInsanity I can give to real world examples of how this would have benefited Asian people that I know.

First, my friend Thuy who is Vietnamese. She grew up in predominately black PG County and attended a black school (over 90%). Her parents are immigrants, speak English but poorly. As a result, she’s at a naturally disadvantage in school since her peers grew up with fluent parents.

Before this score, she’d just be seen as another high achieving Asian female, and her classmates would likely get more looks from colleges assuming similar grades and scores. With this score she’ll be seen as a low income student, from a high crime area, with non-fluent parents and she would absolutely be seen as the academic badass that she really had to be to overcome those challenges.

This score helps her a great deal. It provides context to her achievement. She hates the fact that nobody gives her the same leg-up for overcoming barriers that others receive.

Second example. I’m very close with a Filipino family. Again, immigrant parents, poor English, Tagalog as a first language. The daughter attended a nice private school that ALL of her aunts and uncles helped to pay for. Without this score, she’s another high achieving and likely privileged private school Asian female. But with this score, her scores would be seen in the proper context of a working class family, living in a working class neighborhood, without the privilege of American college educated English fluent parents.

The people calling this racist are completely misguided. It’s not racist, it’s removing race entirely and providing proper context to achievement.

My grandma grew up in dirt poor rural Appalachia. Very smart, but never saw college as an option for obvious reasons. Maybe this score would have shown just how bright she really was to overcome a horrific environment to achieve what she did in school.

So like I said, you can love it or hate it. But calling it racist is dead wrong.

This is literally and obviously the entire point of the initiative. People are willfully missing the point.

 

[nac386]

This is literally and obviously the entire point of the initiative. People are willfully missing the point.

Remember when people complained (rightfully so) that there are poor white kids too? Well this helps the poor white kids. But they don’t actually want that.

 

[Social Distance Warrior]

This is literally and obviously the entire point of the initiative. People are willfully missing the point.

Remember when people complained (rightfully so) that there are poor white kids too? Well this helps the poor white kids. But they don’t actually want that.

maybe I jumped the gun here...

I'm still pissed at what Harvard did and lumped this in with their actions.

 

[panamaican]

Race is not a factor in the adversity score. Whether you agree with it or not, it’s not race-based and certainly not racist if somebody sees value in it.

Listen, do not waste time arguing with people over this. Any read of the criteria is very clear that poor kids of every race will benefit. But their concern isn't if poor kids of all races will benefit. The issue is that for decades people have argued that the environmental circumstances in minority neighborhoods isn't a barrier to their success, it's purely a cultural problem. They've also argued that race considerations are wrong and economic circumstances would be more fair because many of the black kids who get into these schools/programs are coming from better than average economic backgrounds (which is a legitimate point).

Yet when presented with a metric that actually does that - eliminates race but accounts for economic circumstances those same people reject it. Why? Because they realize that a metric that takes economic circumstances into account will still benefit black/brown kids because many of those kids tend to live in lower SES circumstances.

All it demonstrates is that the "race shouldn't be a factor, why not economics?" crowd wasn't genuine about economic circumstances. They don't want a metric that accounts for kids' environmental circumstances - they want a metric that doesn't benefit black/brown kids. THey will argue against every proposal until they find one that does that. Meanwhile poor kids of all types will continue to be harmed by this approach. And this same approach is visible well beyond education.

For example - why would this hurt Asian kids when so many Asian kids live in low income households.

https://prosperitynow.org/blog/racial-wealth-snapshot-asian-americans

 

[newerest]

Listen, do not waste time arguing with people over this. Any read of the criteria is very clear that poor kids of every race will benefit. But their concern isn't if poor kids of all races will benefit. The issue is that for decades people have argued that the environmental circumstances in minority neighborhoods isn't a barrier to their success, it's purely a cultural problem. They've also argued that race considerations are wrong and economic circumstances would be more fair because many of the black kids who get into these schools/programs are coming from better than average economic backgrounds (which is a legitimate point).

Yet when presented with a metric that actually does that - eliminates race but accounts for economic circumstances those same people reject it. Why? Because they realize that a metric that takes economic circumstances into account will still benefit black/brown kids because many of those kids tend to live in lower SES circumstances.

All it demonstrates is that the "race shouldn't be a factor, why not economics?" crowd wasn't genuine about economic circumstances. They don't want a metric that accounts for kids' environmental circumstances - they want a metric that doesn't benefit black/brown kids.

For example - why would this hurt Asian kids when so many Asian kids live in low income households.

https://prosperitynow.org/blog/racial-wealth-snapshot-asian-americans

I can't help but feel you're mis-understanding the people who disagreed with you. I can't imagine the people who actually said race based affirmative action was wrong said "This is the wrong way to do this, it should be based on economics" instead of "This is a really backwards thing to implement, we should only be looking at test scores. Boiling it down to race alone is the wrong thing to do when they are supposedly trying to correct for economic situations"

 

[djacobox372]

I think it's a relevant detail.

Everyone who pays attention to these things knows that there are environmental factors that have effects on the scores. We all discuss it "Joe did XXXX on the SAT/PSAT/ACT but he's been taking prep classes since last year." "Wow, Lucy did XXXX on the SAT/PSAT/ACT and her family has been struggling to afford food on a regular basis."

If everyone is already discussing it casually there's no point pretending that it's not relevant.

The problem with that thinking is that you are ASSUMING that because someone is of a certain race or lives in a certain community that their family life is dysfunctional. Alternately you are ASSUMING that because someone is of a majority race and lives in a wealthy community that their family life is amazing.

This is bigoted IN THE EXACT SAME WAY as police profiling based on race due to high crime rates within that race.

Group statistics should be used to explain other group statistics, but it should NEVER be applied to an individual.

 

[panamaican]

I can't help but feel you're mis-understanding the people who disagreed with you. I can't imagine the people who actually said race based affirmative action was wrong said "This is the wrong way to do this, it should be based on economics" instead of "This is a really backwards thing to implement, we should only be looking at test scores. Boiling it down to race alone is the wrong thing to do when they are supposedly trying to correct for economic situations"

Actually, plenty of people have said exactly that. There is no race based affirmative action in admissions. There are holistic admissions that are allowed to look at race in a very narrow circumstance.

Plenty of people on this board and off have said that economics are a better indicator of barriers than race. You may not have said this and I'm not attributing the position to you. But it is a position advocated by many in response to the idea of holistic criteria.

I won't re-hash the test scores only thing because no college has ever admitted solely on test scores/GPAs. Even the places like Harvey Mudd look beyond generic scores to try and identify exceptional students (they call it looking for a good "fit"), they just use fewer non-test based criteria than your standard liberal arts college.

 

[panamaican]

The problem with that thinking is that you are ASSUMING that because someone is of a certain race or lives in a certain community that their family life is dysfunctional. Alternately you are ASSUMING that because someone is of a majority race and lives in a wealthy community that their family life is amazing.

This is bigoted IN THE EXACT SAME WAY as police profiling based on race due to high crime rates within that race.

Group statistics should be used to explain other group statistics, but it should NEVER be applied to an individual.

It has nothing to do with dysfunction. There's no shortage of data on the differences between educational advantages in rich and poor neighborhoods and their relevance to admissions. And none of it assumes a problem in the kids themselves.

 

[newerest]

Actually, plenty of people have said exactly that. There is no race based affirmative action in admissions. There are holistic admissions that are allowed to look at race in a very narrow circumstance.

Plenty of people on this board and off have said that economics are a better indicator of barriers than race. You may not have said this and I'm not attributing the position to you. But it is a position advocated by many in response to the idea of holistic criteria.

I won't re-hash the test scores only thing because no college has ever admitted solely on test scores/GPAs. Even the places like Harvey Mudd look beyond generic scores to try and identify exceptional students (they call it looking for a good "fit"), they just use fewer non-test based criteria than your standard liberal arts college.

Well I don't see these quotes of theirs being placed in context for me to look at. I won't disagree they said it, but again it matters if they actually believe in the process themselves or if this is another case of "I don't want there to be safe spaces, but if liberals get safe spaces so should conservatives" being reduced down to "safe spaces are bullshit but I should get one too" like that one popular youtube video staked its claim on.

I disagree wholeheartedly with state schools having anything less than objective standards. Private university should be allowed to do all of this if they want to.

State schools shouldn't apply different standards to applicants because they come from a bad neighborhood. Think of the weird incentives this will create. I already knew of people that would move to small schools for the last year of high school so they would get into University of Texas because of the top 10% guaranteed admission rule. People will do similar things to game this. The solution to bad neighborhoods raising bad students that are not qualified to get into college is to look at the issues in those areas honestly and not just try and get around it.

as a PoC I sometimes wonder if I get promotions or favorable reviews simply because I am a minority. I hate having to shrug off this feeling of inadequacy because I don't know if behind the scenes some score card has me down as "different".

 

[Lead]

maybe I jumped the gun here...

I'm still pissed at what Harvard did and lumped this in with their actions.

There’s some problems I could see with this but if we are talking about affirmative action or a system like this, I’d pick this every time in the current climate. I actually thought the two scores presented were just going to be the regular score and a weighted type one that tries to factor in the disparity and adjust the score based on data but it sounds like it’s a 1 to 100 scale which isn’t as good imo. At the very least, this can be argued as a stepping stone.

 

[Leagon]

Well I don't see these quotes of theirs being placed in context for me to look at. I won't disagree they said it, but again it matters if they actually believe in the process themselves or if this is another case of "I don't want there to be safe spaces, but if liberals get safe spaces so should conservatives" being reduced down to "safe spaces are bullshit but I should get one too" like that one popular youtube video staked its claim on.

I disagree wholeheartedly with state schools having anything less than objective standards. Private university should be allowed to do all of this if they want to.

State schools shouldn't apply different standards to applicants because they come from a bad neighborhood. Think of the weird incentives this will create. I already knew of people that would move to small schools for the last year of high school so they would get into University of Texas because of the top 10% guaranteed admission rule. People will do similar things to game this. The solution to bad neighborhoods raising bad students that are not qualified to get into college is to look at the issues in those areas honestly and not just try and get around it.

as a PoC I sometimes wonder if I get promotions or favorable reviews simply because I am a minority. I hate having to shrug off this feeling of inadequacy because I don't know if behind the scenes some score card has me down as "different".

I get what you're saying, but I think you, like a lot of minorities, my previous self included, have a total misunderstanding of how America's "meritocracy" works.

America isn't a meritocracy. We have social mobility, yes, but most people have things handed to them that they don't deserve. It's ironic that we're talking about college admissions because in this very same year we learned that entire elaborate networks of wealthy people were illegally buying their dumbass kids into good schools. The only sad thing about that is that there are already plenty of LEGAL ways to buy your dumbass kid into elite schools. The top schools are full of rich kids who cheated and no one in America cares, but the minute some poor kid kicks ass on a test and gets to go to a good school, which will give him access to better jobs, which will help him provide for his future family and enjoy the social mobility that this country has always promised, everyone rages.

The solution to bad neighborhoods raising bad students that are not qualified to get into college is to look at the issues in those areas honestly and not just try and get around it.

Why do people keep saying this? If two kids get a 1400 and the college picks the kid from the bad neighborhood over the kid from the good neighborhood, why is the kid from the bad neighborhood less qualified than the kid from the good neighborhood? Or do you think colleges are gonna start turning down rich kids with perfect scores so they can snatch up crack babies from Flint who got 300s due to water-induced brain damage?

 

[newerest]

I get what you're saying, but I think you, like a lot of minorities, my previous self included, have a total misunderstanding of how America's "meritocracy" works.


Why do people keep saying this? If two kids get a 1400 and the college picks the kid from the bad neighborhood over the kid from the good neighborhood, why is the kid from the bad neighborhood less qualified than the kid from the good neighborhood? Or do you think colleges are gonna start turning down rich kids with perfect scores so they can snatch up crack babies from Flint who got 300s due to water-induced brain damage?

Well, if it really comes down to them being the exact same on the nose score then the leeway becomes waaaaay more acceptable. It's not that one is less qualified than the other, they are supposed to be equally qualified if their scores are equal. If this was purely a tiebreaker score, like we are discussing, I don't know how opposed to it i'd be.

And I don't know how colleges will use this score. I just know that if it's something the students don't even have access to, it's just like the social score that china is using to oppress their people. We will see a lot of trans-racial people. People will do whatever they can to game this system. Who knows if the schools will even ever admit to using this score. The very existence of it makes me concerned for our future.

 

[Leagon]

Well, if it really comes down to them being the exact same on the nose score then the leeway becomes waaaaay more acceptable. It's not that one is less qualified than the other, they are supposed to be equally qualified if their scores are equal. If this was purely a tiebreaker score, like we are discussing, I don't know how opposed to it i'd be.

And I don't know how colleges will use this score. I just know that if it's something the students don't even have access to, it's just like the social score that china is using to oppress their people. We will see a lot of trans-racial people. People will do whatever they can to game this system. Who knows if the schools will even ever admit to using this score. The very existence of it makes me concerned for our future.

This new thing isn't a score. They're just providing colleges with the general context in which each student was educated.

And tied scores are the norm. There are only so many possible scores a student can get, so each score will often be received by thousands--if not tens of thousands--of students. This is why schools look at other factors. The goal isn't to get the students who are best at taking the SAT. The goal is to get the students who are most likely to succeed in college and life, which helps bring prestige and money to the school. This is why schools shell out cash to lure in the best athletes and dancers and violinists and comedians. Not because those people did great on the SATs, but because they have the potential to succeed.

 

[panamaican]

Well I don't see these quotes of theirs being placed in context for me to look at. I won't disagree they said it, but again it matters if they actually believe in the process themselves or if this is another case of "I don't want there to be safe spaces, but if liberals get safe spaces so should conservatives" being reduced down to "safe spaces are bullshit but I should get one too" like that one popular youtube video staked its claim on.

I disagree wholeheartedly with state schools having anything less than objective standards. Private university should be allowed to do all of this if they want to.

State schools shouldn't apply different standards to applicants because they come from a bad neighborhood. Think of the weird incentives this will create. I already knew of people that would move to small schools for the last year of high school so they would get into University of Texas because of the top 10% guaranteed admission rule. People will do similar things to game this. The solution to bad neighborhoods raising bad students that are not qualified to get into college is to look at the issues in those areas honestly and not just try and get around it.

as a PoC I sometimes wonder if I get promotions or favorable reviews simply because I am a minority. I hate having to shrug off this feeling of inadequacy because I don't know if behind the scenes some score card has me down as "different".

What different standards are you talking about? THe only standard is "Do we think this student will succeed in life if provided with an education from our institution?" There have always been incentives in play. Rich guys aren't donating to schools they didn't attend for the feels. They're doing it to improve admissions odds for their kids.

Now if you want to really remove advantages based on economics then we should outlaw test prep courses and tutors. We should ensure identical schools funding on a national level and hold private schools to the same per student expenditure to eliminate any advantages that come from it.

I'm not being facetious but are you truly that committed to removing different standards based on neighborhood? Or are you only thinking about removing any advantages that are applied to bad neighborhoods and letting good ones keep their advantages?