I’m 60 with two college degrees, one in engineering and one in business. I have a good resume and interview well. A head hunter told me I’d need to take a competency test before he could send me to a particular client. It included fractions and logic problems as well as reading comprehension. Most of it was grammar school level with only a handful of problems that were high school level. When I spoke to the head hunter about it he told me that virtually all of the candidates from the local “historically black” college had failed the test. Many others with college degrees had also failed, but in lesser amounts. The test had dramatically reduced the client’s turnover. As an aside he told me that he believed that if the test went to court it would be ruled racially discriminatory.
The entire idea behind public education was to prepare illiterate farm hands to work in the industrial revolution. Even as society has become more complex the education system has dumbed down its product to the point they are not capable of working. All they are capable of doing is filling out welfare forms and voting Democrat.
Most tsets I have taken for employment were usually nothing hig. I am weak on fractions since it’s been a few years since I have had to do much with them.
Me and higher math never got on too well though.
The pre-screen test that I took for where I am now were MCSE caliber ones in areas that I have had little to no exposure.
It was an online exercise. I figured I bombed big time. The recruiter called the next day and I asked for the bad news. I scored about 85 or so percent. High guess factor.
I have gone back to technical school to learn machining, and many of my fellow students have trouble doing simple math, like working with fractions; basic algebra, forget it. It’s painful to see.
We have the “Sud America” contingent in a company I work with. Bright enough youngsters but almost zero problem solving skills. Not just the Sud America bunch but many others from around the globe. Very few WASPs. Most classes look like a contingent from the UN. There are PLENTY of Green Cards for technical fields from what I can see. You lead them into a logical progression of ideas, principles, concept and theory but if you expect them to extend that to the next step in a problem solving way... fugeddaboutit. They vapor lock and start hand wringing. Maybe 15% are what I call “connectors” who can link up principles and experience into new solutions and expanded know-how.
I led a group of them yesterday through a procedure that comes to a fork with two options whereupon I said the easiest of the two was A but there are circumstances where B is appropriate and B is a bolt on of what I had taught them only a couple of weeks before. Lost.
Q: If B is faster why isn’t that preferred?
A: You aren’t ready for it and it has more risk.
Q: How do we do B?
A: Refer to what you were taught two weeks ago.
Q: Why don’t you teach it now? A: Time and need.
Q: But what do we do if we need to use B?
A: Call me, I’ll do it for you.
If it isn’t cookbook and there isn’t a spreadsheet and there isn’t an app .... it is going almost nowhere.