Can Americans ‘Handle the Truth’ About Individual Achievement Differences?

James G. Martin Center for Academic Renewal ^ | May 29, 2019 | George Leef

[reaganaut1]

In the 1992 movie “A Few Good Men,” there is a courtroom scene where the prosecuting attorney (played by Tom Cruise) tells the defendant Marine officer Nathan Jessup (played by Jack Nicholson) that he wants the truth. To that, Jessup shouts back, “You can’t handle the truth.”

What brings that to mind is the recent revelation that the College Board (CB) has begun calculating an “adversity score” for each student who takes its aptitude test, the SAT. Apparently, the people running the CB don’t believe that we can handle the truth that individual students vary in their academic abilities, and therefore their actual SAT scores must be adjusted (“put in context”) to supposedly reflect the circumstances of the test taker.

Schools will receive adversity scores that boost the actual scores of students to the degree that the CB thinks they have faced adversity in their lives. How well students are actually prepared for academic work will now be hidden behind an egalitarian gauze that is supposed to make things more fair.

Strangely, the news about this change in the SAT was not trumpeted by the CB itself but rather was revealed in the Wall Street Journal. Author Douglas Belkin explained that the CB “has worried about income inequality influencing test results for years” and he quotes CB chief executive David Coleman, “We can’t sit on our hands and ignore the disparities of wealth reflected in the SAT.”

The “adversity score” for each test taker will depend on 15 factors relating to the area of the student’s high school, such as poverty levels and crime rates. What counts is the area, not specifics about the student and his or her family.

[G Larry]

Keep destroying personal motivation and promoting the entitlement mentality and then wait for improved results in the workplace.

[SMARTY]

Ha-Actually we had, Latino, Romanian, Spanish, African American, Slavic, Irish, Greek, Italian, Hungarian, etc....even a girl I remember distinctly, who was a gypsy. She had a large family and sometimes came to class and sometimes didn't.

It was a working class neighborhood and all the kids were about first or second generation American and had family members who spoke other languages at home. Oddly enough-THOSE kids did better than anyone. They had a very strong motivation to be ‘educated’. Their families came from places where being ‘educated’ was the highest compliment you could pay to anyone-AND a tremendous stigma was associated with illiteracy and academic failure.

[metmom]

The whiny snowflake generation we’ve raised can’t.

Real Americans, like the ones who built this country, can.

[bk1000]

“Can Americans ‘Handle the Truth’ About Individual Achievement Differences?”

Many can’t even seem to handle the truth that boys and girls are different and not interchangeable.

[DoodleBob]

Comedian Bill Burr noted that the rich kids whose parents paid for faked scores for elite schools didn't fail out. This means that the schools aren't that hard after all (or maybe the rich kids weren't dumb).

I have a different take on all this hoopla over American kids being dumber than other nations' kids: this scandal over bribery and test scores is a lot like the NFL draft. As Hall of Famer/Super Bowl champion Shannon Sharpe said, how high or low you're drafted doesn't matter...it is what you do AFTER the draft for which they'll remember you.

As such, I'm not a huge test score/SAT/GPA/"what school did you go to?" guy. Yea sure I want my accountant to be able to add and my lawyer to know the difference between civil and criminal law.

But if we are soooo dumb, then why is it that our nation accounts for 4% of the world's population but 24% of GDP?

Because we WORK harder...our work ethic kicks ass.

I'm more interested in how you think and solve problems NOW - give me a guy or gal from Whatever College or Unheardof Tech - or that didn't go to college - that will hustle any day.

Maybe the whole test score thing is an elitist ploy to keep the "wrong people" out.

[tbw2]

“If you cannot achieve equality of performance among people born to the same parents and raised under the same roof, how realistic is it to expect to achieve it across broader and deeper social divisions?” Thomas Sowell.

[tbw2]

It is unfair for a score to be used for or against you without you knowing what it is.

That’s why people have the right to a free copy of their credit report each year, knowing the basic criteria to determine it, and the right to challenge incorrect information in it.

[tbw2]

The company that manages the SAT was the one that developed the very liberal Common Core program.

[dp0622]

I did not even think about that. Can you not get a copy of this ridiculous report?

If not, boy are you onto something.

[willyd]

When i returned from europe in 8th grade I was almost 2 years ahead in every subject. Did they let me progress at my level? No, they insisted that I take American History for the fourth time and follow along with everyone else.

When I asked too many questions, I was pulled aside and asked not to dominate the class room or ask too many questions that distracted the other kids. (The teacher spent most of the time explaining rudimentary concepts to the dumbest kids in the class)

I learned that Americans in my grade in the 80’s (I am a US Citizen) didn’t value ideas or education, they talked about TV shows and what was for sale at the mall.

Since I lived overseas with absolutely no television, I feel that I had a great advantage. My father called the tv the boob tube or the idiot box. He was right.

[SMARTY]

We do have a kick ass work-ethic... but THAT’S a big part of how you get high scores in school.... you work your a%# off

[Jim Noble]

E Gad! They BETTER

STOP IT! Americans can't even accept the fact that there are two sexes, and that which you are is determined at conception.

[Jim Noble]

the very fact that the boards use an “adversity score” to level the so-called playing field is, like quotas and similar efforts, racist in and of itself. It presumes that “people of color”...can’t make it without help

Can you define "racist" in a way that makes what you posted make sense?

They don't "presume" anything. They are dealing with fifty years of highly reliable data, and drawing a conclusion.

[dfwgator]

Because we WORK harder...our work ethic kicks ass.

On the other hand, those who came before this generation are primarily responsible for that GDP, and we are simply living off of what they did.

[DoodleBob]

My HS' best and brightest did indeed put in long hours to get good grades. And many of them went on to get doctorates. But many of the "votech" guys and gals went in to the trades and did very well for themselves...and don't have school loans and a few have their own businesses.

Reagan and Trump weren't exactly Rhodes Scholars but they were great leaders. Clinton et al were scholars blah blah blah. Again, I'm not saying that we should encourage sloth but maybe focusing on grades vs work ethic and maybe chutzpah is misplaced energy.

[SMARTY]

“Intellect doesn’t have anything to do with ‘fitness for the job’ “.

Winston Churchill

And-since he had a tremendous intellect and was totally ‘fit for the job’-he ought to know!

[DoodleBob]

Fair point, but as I've written before, every older generation sees the youths as losers. It happened with the Boomers being hippies, GenX being depressed grungers, and now Millenials are projected by the MSM as being pod-eating snowflakes. Of course there are a fair number of them that are losers but they tend to be concentrated in cities (where the MSM live).

Most of the Millenials I see and talk to have jobs, actually work really hard, and increasingly hate their lazy Antifa brethren...they are tired of being slimed by proxy via the losers. I believe our future is bright IF we get enough on the Trump Train that vote.

[JimRed]

When spoken about the “protected” classes, TRUTH is the new HATE SPEECH.

[litehaus]

“My grade school had lots of minority students. The same books, the same classroom instruction, the same teacher, the same homework, the same class time...etc.”

My grade school had very few minority students. The same books, the same classroom instruction, the same teacher, the same homework, the same class time—

BUT! 3 different lunch times...first lunch = dumb ...second= average-—third=smartest

[litehaus]

Ain’t it odd-—The ‘Big Red One’ shows up again...

(based on the meter for length and the kilogram for mass, that was adopted in France in 1795 and is now used officially in almost all countries.)

AND, it managed to put a man on the moon ahead of all those METRIC countries beside being #1 ??