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Acing the SAT is a piece of cake compared to academic rigor in undergraduate/graduate courses. UT Austin four-year graduation rate was 50% just a few years ago before they had to water down programs and curve the grade. Those 50% kids who cannot even graduate should have been sent to Indian/Chinese SAT tutor camp when they were five. They self-selected to be a disgrace instead.
If acing the SAT is easy compared to college classes how would the test prep help the graduation rate?
Acing the SAT is a piece of cake compared to academic rigor in undergraduate/graduate courses. UT Austin four-year graduation rate was 50% just a few years ago before they had to water down programs and curve the grade. Those 50% kids who cannot even graduate should have been sent to Indian/Chinese SAT tutor camp when they were five. They self-selected to be a disgrace instead.
You'll need to be more specific on that, what's "curve the grade"? Are you talking about grading on a curve? That has been used to avoid grade inflation. Are you suggesting that the predetermined class average grades were raised at some point? In my experience (granted from years ago) UT had much less grade inflation if any compared to top privates.
I think you're misunderstanding my argument. I'm not saying that you can't raise your kid's future SAT score by starting tutoring when they are five. I'm saying it's not worth it, and I suspect the bold above is where we disagree. I don't consider kids getting to be kids "frills," and I just don't think an extra hundred points on the SAT is worth it.
I do also think there is a significant genetic component here. Indians in the US are, by and large, a self-selecting group of successful, intelligent people. I have business in India and am pretty familiar with the process by which Indians end up in the US. In many cases, the various steps weed out all but the best and brightest. Their kids are also likely to be quite bright.
This is far from the truth.. most of the Indians including myself are slightly above average at best and
of course there are exceptions to it. One of the reasons Indian kids do well at school is because of the importance that the parents place on education and the sacrifices that we make for the kids success. I have seen people stay in unhappy/abusive marriages for the sake of kids. Given our genetics we know that we will never succeed in sports/music etc beyond a certain level and our only way out of this to do good in school.
Indian kids also have a lot of peer pressure to do well in school which is totally unhealthy.
This is far from the truth.. most of the Indians including myself are slightly above average at best and
of course there are exceptions to it. One of the reasons Indian kids do well at school is because of the importance that the parents place on education and the sacrifices that we make for the kids success. I have seen people stay in unhappy/abusive marriages for the sake of kids. Given our genetics we know that we will never succeed in sports/music etc beyond a certain level and our only way out of this to do good in school.
Indian kids also have a lot of peer pressure to do well in school which is totally unhealthy.
Saw this quite a bit at UT Dallas.
Indian kids would major in Biology (pre-med track basically), Electrical Engineering, Finance or Accounting when their talent might lend itself to Marketing. Some end up struggling mightily because they're trying to go down a path that doesn't suit their interests or abilities. I think they feel pressure from family and friends to succeed in certain fields and "live up" to the reputation.
This is far from the truth.. most of the Indians including myself are slightly above average at best and
of course there are exceptions to it. One of the reasons Indian kids do well at school is because of the importance that the parents place on education and the sacrifices that we make for the kids success. I have seen people stay in unhappy/abusive marriages for the sake of kids. Given our genetics we know that we will never succeed in sports/music etc beyond a certain level and our only way out of this to do good in school.
Indian kids also have a lot of peer pressure to do well in school which is totally unhealthy.
There's no doubt that removing testing results in larger applicant pools -- kids who didn't have the chops before now think they have a chance. But that doesn't mean the applicant pool is stronger, and colleges now have a big problem. How do they whittle down an even larger applicant pool with fewer criteria at their disposal?
I think most of the colleges that have gone test blind due to Covid will go back. For schools that are test optional, admissions rates are higher for students who submit competitive test scores.
Implicit in your argument here is the idea that two hypothetical student bodies with equal graduation rates from a given school are academically equal, and therefore we should simply prefer the student body that is more diverse. If Harvard could have one group with an average of 1510/4.0 graduate at an 85% rate, or it could have another group with an average of 1380/3.6 graduate at an 85% rate, it should prefer the second group if the second group is more diverse. I don't agree. The graduation rate among Ivy League colleges is over 95%, so it isn't as though elite colleges are difficult to graduate from and the mere fact of graduation is proof of deserving the spot.
While I agree that diversity is important, creating a less-credentialed student body is a bad idea. Spots at elite universities should go to the most qualified students, with consideration also being given to the obstacles a student faced on their way to becoming high-achieving. We should also remember that highly-selective universities already have enough high-achieving students from diverse backgrounds in their applicant pool. Black students are overrepresented at Harvard. To whatever extent minorities are underrepresented at elite universities, it isn't because kids who would get a 1050 on the SAT are scared to apply.
If elite colleges are committed to have student bodies that reflect the population in general, a quota system that uses as much available information as possible is far better. If you want 13% of your student body to be black, you should want to know which black students in your applicant pool are most deserving of those spots. The SAT and ACT are objective measures that contribute to this, and in an era of grade inflation, I think it's clear that GPA/class rank + SAT provides a clearer picture than simply GPA/class rank. I'm not necessarily saying that I think the quota system is a good system (as we've discussed in this thread, some cultures are very academically-driven and may deserve to be overrepresented), but the SAT and ACT aren't preventing this kind of approach.
SAT/ACT IMO, is sort of like the NFL Scouting Combine that takes place every spring after the Super Bowl.
NFL teams will evaluate college prospects on how fast they can run 40 yards, how many times they can bench press 225 lbs consecutively, the size of their hands, length of their arms, standing vertical leap, standing broad jump, overall musculature and body type ("high cut" vs low center of gravity or lean athlete with a large frame to gain extra weight) etc.
The combine, like the standardized tests.......can provide a lot of information that can be useful in projecting potential performance. SAT/ACT seems like a good measure of natural intelligence combined with rigorous test prep. Those scoring the highest often have at least a modest amount of test prepping in their background.
Having said that, the tests seem to evaluate potential more than actual performance and must be used in conjunction with other factors and not as the sole or even most important factor. A 1500+ on the SAT is like a college running back with a 4.25-40 yard dash time. It suggests amazing pro potential/upside but you don't really know what you're going to get until the lights come on.
The tests don't measure how hard you're going to study, how much you'll be involved in campus life, how you may use that education for the betterment of others etc. Ivy League schools could have nothing but East Asian Type A high achievers with 1550 SAT scores and straight A's on every report card since 1st grade....especially if they cut out the mostly white legacy admits that we tend to not talk about when discussing Ivies. The schools clearly feel that a student body with a bit more diversity of race, life experience, talents etc., is preferable to a more homogeneous environment. Not sure there's a "right" way to do it, but I respect their ambitions.
SAT/ACT IMO, is sort of like the NFL Scouting Combine that takes place every spring after the Super Bowl.
NFL teams will evaluate college prospects on how fast they can run 40 yards, how many times they can bench press 225 lbs consecutively, the size of their hands, length of their arms, standing vertical leap, standing broad jump, overall musculature and body type ("high cut" vs low center of gravity or lean athlete with a large frame to gain extra weight) etc.
The combine, like the standardized tests.......can provide a lot of information that can be useful in projecting potential performance. SAT/ACT seems like a good measure of natural intelligence combined with rigorous test prep. Those scoring the highest often have at least a modest amount of test prepping in their background.
Having said that, the tests seem to evaluate potential more than actual performance and must be used in conjunction with other factors and not as the sole or even most important factor. A 1500+ on the SAT is like a college running back with a 4.25-40 yard dash time. It suggests amazing pro potential/upside but you don't really know what you're going to get until the lights come on.
The tests don't measure how hard you're going to study, how much you'll be involved in campus life, how you may use that education for the betterment of others etc. Ivy League schools could have nothing but East Asian Type A high achievers with 1550 SAT scores and straight A's on every report card since 1st grade....especially if they cut out the mostly white legacy admits that we tend to not talk about when discussing Ivies. The schools clearly feel that a student body with a bit more diversity of race, life experience, talents etc., is preferable to a more homogeneous environment. Not sure there's a "right" way to do it, but I respect their ambitions.
There is no denying of value of diversity and homogeneity, even legacy and development (children of wealthy, famous and powerful) bring unique value to the mix. Private colleges doesn’t try to collect the strongest but picking a collection of different strengths, it can be IQ, academics, athletics, race, religion, geography, family connections, wealth, fame, underprivileged, international, unique experiences, talent. They want some of every type, if they already had 50 of what they needed from your category, quota gets marked as fulfilled. It doesn’t matter how amazing you are, they just don’t need more of it. I doubt there is an official plan but an unwritten understanding guiding selection.
No one should take rejection from these schools personally. Are these practices fair to applicants? No. These colleges are run like private businesses, trying to maintain their brand name and meet bottom line. One multimillionaire admit can bring a donation big enough to pay financial aid of 50 poor admits or grants for 5 research projects. One presidential admit can bring connections to get 50 students placed into coveted internships. One royal prince/son of a prime minister/CEO can connect school with a country/kingdom/corporation who can offer everything from money, opportunities, connections, contracts to students, faculty, administration and alumni.
SAT/ACT IMO, is sort of like the NFL Scouting Combine that takes place every spring after the Super Bowl.
NFL teams will evaluate college prospects on how fast they can run 40 yards, how many times they can bench press 225 lbs consecutively, the size of their hands, length of their arms, standing vertical leap, standing broad jump, overall musculature and body type ("high cut" vs low center of gravity or lean athlete with a large frame to gain extra weight) etc.
The combine, like the standardized tests.......can provide a lot of information that can be useful in projecting potential performance. SAT/ACT seems like a good measure of natural intelligence combined with rigorous test prep. Those scoring the highest often have at least a modest amount of test prepping in their background.
Having said that, the tests seem to evaluate potential more than actual performance and must be used in conjunction with other factors and not as the sole or even most important factor. A 1500+ on the SAT is like a college running back with a 4.25-40 yard dash time. It suggests amazing pro potential/upside but you don't really know what you're going to get until the lights come on.
The tests don't measure how hard you're going to study, how much you'll be involved in campus life, how you may use that education for the betterment of others etc. Ivy League schools could have nothing but East Asian Type A high achievers with 1550 SAT scores and straight A's on every report card since 1st grade....especially if they cut out the mostly white legacy admits that we tend to not talk about when discussing Ivies. The schools clearly feel that a student body with a bit more diversity of race, life experience, talents etc., is preferable to a more homogeneous environment. Not sure there's a "right" way to do it, but I respect their ambitions.
I think this is a good analogy. I also think one underappreciated aspect of standardized tests is that kids who are very intelligent and have high potential but didn't have their act together when they were 15 or 16 can still have an opportunity. I'm probably biased in that direction because I was that kid, but it's not an uncommon situation.
This is far from the truth.. most of the Indians including myself are slightly above average at best and
of course there are exceptions to it. One of the reasons Indian kids do well at school is because of the importance that the parents place on education and the sacrifices that we make for the kids success. I have seen people stay in unhappy/abusive marriages for the sake of kids. Given our genetics we know that we will never succeed in sports/music etc beyond a certain level and our only way out of this to do good in school.
Indian kids also have a lot of peer pressure to do well in school which is totally unhealthy.
I'm certainly not saying there isn't a strong cultural tendency toward academic success. There is, and I've mentioned that multiple times in this thread. But I think you're discounting the possibility that there is an IQ advantage, too. The path to the US from India favors the intelligent, and most Indian Americans are first, second or third generation immigrants. In other words, if their first generation parents or grandparents were intelligent, there is a good likelihood they are intelligent.
I'm not saying all Indian Americans are geniuses. But even just a difference of fifteen IQ points is one standard deviation, and that would mean Indian Americans are in the top 2.3% of intelligence at a rate that is about six times that of the general population (this follows from the 68-95-99.7 rule for normal distributions).
To be clear, I'm not actually saying that I think this is the case. To my knowledge, there hasn't been any primary research done on this (Steve Sailer has written about it, but he's a white supremacist). I'm just saying that I don't think the possibility can be dismissed outright.
If acing the SAT is easy compared to college classes how would the test prep help the graduation rate?
Exactly.
The last year that I can find data for the number of perfect SAT scores is 2014, and there were 583 perfect scores out of about 1.7 million test takers. That's about 1 in 3,000 test takers. The idea that it is harder to graduate from UT than it is to get a perfect SAT score is just silly.
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