Posted on 01/19/2016 11:44:10 AM PST by Citizen Zed
A growing number of colleges have made the SAT or ACT optional. And late last year, more than 80 colleges, including all eight in the Ivy League, announced the formation of the Coalition for Access, Affordability and Success, which is developing a website and application process intended in part to diversify student bodies.
Colleges are becoming more conscious of their roles - too frequently neglected - in social mobility. They're recognizing how many admissions measures favor students from affluent families.
They're realizing that many kids admitted into top schools are emotional wrecks or slavish adherents to soulless scripts that forbid the exploration of genuine passions. And they're acknowledging the extent to which the admissions process has contributed to this.
But they still need to stop filling so much of each freshman class with specially tagged legacy cases and athletes and to quit worrying about rankings like those of U.S. News and World Report. Only then will the tide fully turn.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
‘ignoring SAT/ACT scores will just result in more kids getting in over their head at the better schools..
I did well on the SAT/ACT test, and did not have to take some Freshman courses.
Besides the SAT and ACT I took The Architectural Aptitude Test.
Glad I got through the system before it became the joke it currently resembles.
First, students should pass an emotional maturity test - what percent of time will the prosective student require a safe room, crayons and stuffed animals and what percent will they be in class vs whining about diversity.
Second, a life skills test - do they know how to study, do their laundry and make ramen noodles or is their only goal to party hearty.
If they pass those, then take the SAT.
Dat be rayciss!
I don't remember my son (the architect) taking that one!
Took it in ‘64.
“Sorry, but ignoring SAT/ACT scores will just result in more kids getting in over their head at the better schools.”
Just treat them like sports players and just pass them on through.
$$$$$$$$$ Maybe Big School $$$$$$$ is getting concerned over a future decline $$$$$$$ in the number of cashcows, errr, students enrolling.
Exactly - this is backdoor affirmative action or quotas.
Diversity is the opposite of excellence.
You can have one, but you can’t have both.
‘they just want to be able to admit whomever they want, refuse whomever they want, and not to have to adhere to any objective, consistent standards of admissions.’
That’s really it - you nailed it. Duke and other schools are being sued already by kids with higher SATs and GPAs getting passed over by admissions for “others”
Plus they want to dumb down colleges just like they’ve already done to the grade schools. Also this year they are “changing” SAYs to be more common whore friendly ie confuse, dumb down, except wrong answers for some if they meant well in their solution!
Message, study hard, work hard and you’ll just be thrown in the hopper with all - illegals, immigrants, others not willing to work but looking for another few years of a free ride...hey...you can even become president by taking that low road...proven FACT!
“wrecks or slavish adherents to soulless scripts that forbid the exploration of genuine passions”
What rubbish.
“Diversity is the opposite of excellence.”
Actually it depends on the trait that you are judging.
If you are talking about traits that can be ranked from best to worst, then obviously one would always choose the best. For example one would choose the best doctor, or the most reliable car, or the best teacher, etc.
However there are traits that cannot be ranked from best to worst. Things like colors for example. In that case having diverse colors is what is best - there is no objective “best color”. It’s for those types of traits that diversity is a plus, is best.
So for example when choosing a car, it’s much better to have a variety of colors to choose from than only one. Similarly if you go to a restaurant it’s much better to have a variety of foods, than just one. Or if you go to a store looking for clothes, it’s much better if they have a varied selection of colors, sizes and styles.
So diversity can be good, but only for the things for which there is no objective rank of best to worst. I couldn’t care less about diversity when it comes to choosing a doctor, a school, a handyman, but I do care about it if I’m choosing the color of a car or of a shirt.
So the fallacy about “diversity is our strength”, is in forcing diversity in fields or things where one can objectively rank the “goodness” of the item or person in question. And in trying to force it into everything for its own surreptitious agenda, the left has succeeded in giving “diversity” a bad rep.
When I say ‘Diversity is the opposite of excellence’ I should more clear and stated “the pursuit of diversity (in the politically correct sense) is the opposite of the pursuit of excellence”.
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