Posted on 12/14/2015 12:42:52 PM PST by jazusamo
Among the many sad signs of our time are the current political and media attacks on Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, for speaking the plain truth on a subject where lies have been the norm for years.
The case before the High Court is whether the use of race as a basis for admitting students to the University of Texas at Austin is a violation of the 14th Amendment's requirement for government institutions to provide "equal protection of the laws" to all.
Affirmative action is supposed to be a benefit to black and other minority students admitted with lower academic qualifications than some white students who are rejected. But Justice Scalia questioned whether being admitted to an institution geared to students with higher-powered academic records was a real benefit.
Despite much media spin, the issue is not whether blacks in general should be admitted to higher ranked or lower ranked institutions. The issue is whether a given black student, with given academic qualifications, should be admitted to a college or university where he would not be admitted if he were white.
Much empirical research over the years has confirmed Justice Scalia's concern that admitting black students to institutions for which their academic preparation is not sufficient can be making them worse off instead of better off.
I became painfully aware of this problem more than 40 years ago, when I was teaching at Cornell University, and discovered that half the black students there were on some form of academic probation.
These students were not stupid or uneducable. On the contrary, the average black student at Cornell at that time scored at the 75th percentile on scholastic tests. Their academic qualifications were better than those of three-quarters of all American students who took those tests.
(Excerpt) Read more at creators.com ...
BTTT...Can’t wait to read. This is gonna be good!
Send this to Trump.
Clearly we should not ask or tell race in determining admission; we should just see if the student’s info means they would be a good match. Test scores, grades, experience.
During my career of university teaching, I always asked my students if they wanted a “hard scale” of 100-90 = A, 80-80 = B, and so on, or graded on a normally distributed curve: 10% A’s 20% B’s, 50% C’s, etc. They always went for grading on a curve. I then pointed out that meant that 10% of them would fail and 20% would get D’s, they still went for the curve. They were willing to see 70% of them get a C or less than work hard and, perhaps, everyone get an A.
At one school, which is a well-known basketball school, I was teaching Intro to Econ and 3 ball players came in about two weeks before the final exam and said they were there for the final. When I pointed out that the exam wasn’t for 2 more weeks, they said they knew that, but they wanted their copy of the exam to study. I was new, but still couldn’t believe it. I said no. Less than a minute later, one of my (insanely) liberal colleagues came down and read me the riot act. I still refused, telling him that if we just hand out degrees, how long did he think it would be before prospective employers discovered that graduates from this school knew nothing even though their grades were good. He stomped out of my office. I never had another student athlete in any of my classes.
Those on the left can’t handle the truth, that’s why they strive for the unattainable Utopia.
Great story and not surprising.
After that encounter you didn’t have to put up with the lib system and maintained your self respect.
When a part-time professor, fully 1/3 of my students (introductory & early courses on the subject) simply did not have the wherewithal to do the work. No amount of complaints about “access” or “opportunity” applied, as every chance & resource was available. It simply came down to about 1/4 of students simply not doing the work (I even made clear to at least hand in a paper saying “I don’t know” and we’d work it out from there), leaving nearly 10% of students apparently willing to work but incapable of grasping a subject which, frankly, not everyone can (sorry, not everyone can grok object-oriented programming in C++). Easing entry for the less capable is NOT doing them a favor - unless they either have the affinity for the subject, or the tenacity to learn it come he11 or high water, they’re not going to comprehend the material in the limited time available regardless of access & resources.
“they wanted their copy of the exam to study”
I had 3 (albeit small) classes in a row where every student failed. Everything was clearly documented. Every time, I called the dean and informed him of the looming massacre. Every time, he asked “did each student get the grade he deserved?” “Yes.” “Then do what needs to be done.”
The answers are the facts and the fate of minority students don't mater, but we all know that. Dr. Sowell politely left the questions as rhetorical.
Sowell for Common Sense Czar in the next administration.
Time for the Trump supporters to trow Thomas Sowell under the bus since this was Supreme Court Justice Tony’s Crux of his argument.
I ate lunch alone a lot, but saw no reason to forego what I thought was right. Truth be told, I even think the liberal colleague kinda respected my decision.
bttt
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