Posted on 06/21/2021 6:03:32 AM PDT by blam
Random selection is not generally an approach that most people opt for in the selection of doctors or even restaurants or a movie. However, it appears to be the new model for some in higher education. Former Barnard College mathematics professor Cathy O’Neil has written a column calling for “random selection” of all college graduates to guarantee racial diversity. It is ever so simple:
“Never mind optional standardized tests. If you show interest, your name goes in a big hat.”
She is not the only one arguing for blind or random admissions.
Recently, University of California President Janet Napolitano announced that the entire system will no longer base admissions on standardized tests — joining a “test-blind” admissions movement nationally. Others have denounced standardized testing as vehicles for white supremacy. Education officials like Alison Collins, vice president of the San Francisco Board of Education, have declared meritocracy itself to be racist. There is a growing criticism that the problem with higher education is that it relies on merit rather than status as the driving criteria for admissions.
O’Neil and others are arguing not just for blind but actually random selection to achieve true diversity. O’Neil argues that it would also “take the pressure off students to conform to the prevailing definition of the ideal candidate” and allow them “to be kids again, smoking pot and getting laid in between reading Dostoyevsky and writing bad poetry.”
Others have called for purely random selection. In 2019, the liberal New America foundation argued that highly selective colleges and universities should admit students by lottery. Amy Laitinen, Claire McCann, and Rachel Fishman argued that not only should admissions be random but schools “would lose all eligibility not only to Title IV aid but also to federal research dollars.” They argued that this “This would do away with admissions preferences that overwhelmingly favor white and wealthy applicants, including for athletes and legacies.”
In her column, O’Neil admits that there is a “downside” like the fact that “applications to the most selective colleges would soar, causing acceptance rates to plunge and leaving the ‘strongest’ candidates with little chance of getting into their chosen schools.” However, she treats the downside of eliminating the value of actually doing well in high school and tests as just a question of privilege:
“The kids who struggled to get perfect grades, who spent their high school years getting really good at obscure yet in-demand sports, the legacies and the offspring of big donors, would lose their advantages.”
In an earlier column, I noted that the move by California to get rid of standardized tests occurred after California voters rejected an expensive campaign to reintroduce affirmative action in college admissions. The Supreme Court is also considering whether to take the case of Students for Fair Admissions v. President and Fellows of Harvard College. The Court this week asked the Biden Administration to take a position in the case involving allegations that Harvard has discriminated against Asian applicants. Litigants cite a study finding that Asian Americans needed SAT scores that were about 140 points higher than white students; the gap with admitted African American and Hispanic students is even greater.
The case could allow for clarity on the issue after years of conflicting 5-4 decisions that have ruled both for and against such race criteria admissions. There is a concern among universities that the Court could be moving toward a clear decision against the use of race as a criterion. Even the author of the 2003 majority opinion in Grutter v. Bollinger, Associate Justice Sandra Day O’Connor, said she expected “that 25 years from now, the use of racial preferences will no longer be necessary to further the interest approved today.” That was roughly 25 years ago.
I previously noted:
“In the Harvard case, the scores are particularly important because the litigants allege that subjective factors were systemically used to disfavor them on issues such as likability and personality. While the lower courts ruled for Harvard, the trial judge did note that there may have been bias in favor of minority admissions and encouraged Harvard to deal with such “implicit bias” while monitoring ‘any significant race-related statistical disparities in the rating process.’ But what if there are no ‘statistical disparities’ because there are no objective statistics?”
O’Neil argues for blind and random selection precisely because it would prevent such court review.
“Colleges wouldn’t have to worry about fighting claims of racial discrimination in the Supreme Court because by construction the admissions process would be nondiscriminatory. No more “soft” criteria. No more biased tests. Just blind chance.”
Blind selection is the final default position for many schools. Universities have spent decades working around court decisions limiting the reliance on race as an admissions criterion. Many still refuse to disclose the full data on scores and grades for admitted students. If faced with a new decision further limiting (or entirely eliminating) race as a criterion, blind selection would effectively eliminate any basis for judicial review.
It would also destroy any value for the students to work to achieve greater achievement in math, science, and other subjects. O’Neil is right. They would be free to spend their time “smoking pot and getting laid in between reading Dostoyevsky and writing bad poetry.” The new model for admissions would range from Hunter Thompson to Hunter Biden.
The push for blind or random admissions is the ultimate sign of the decadence of society. What O’Neil is describing is a system designed for the intellectual dilettante. Of course, countries like China are moving to dominate the world economy with kids who are not focusing on good sex and bad poetry. Higher education has long been based on intellectual achievement and discovery. Admission to higher ranked schools has been a key motivating factor for millions of students, including the children of many first generation Americans. Their achievement has translated into national advancement in science and the economy. It has served to bring greater opportunities and growth for all Americans.
Now, recognition of such achievement is rejected by writers like O’Neil as “perpetuating the privileges of wealth” and preventing true racial diversity in our schools. So we will eliminate merit-based admissions entirely and reduce higher education to a lottery system based on pure luck.
And, when the world discovers that bad poetry holds the key to the new global economy, we will once again rise as a world power.
Browns fan here. If we had random Super Bowl winners maybe my Brownies would have a few by now. Sorry about that Tom Brady.
Truth hurts. It still must be accepted.
A real question...
Hypothetical..
If a student is promoted through k-12 based on age rather than learning.
And at the end of their High School is functionally illiterate.
They are now able to apply to the elite colleges. And have just as much chance as any other of being admitted.
So, the Illiterate gets into MIT. Does MIT drop their standards in order to retain the student? If 20-30% of their incoming class is NOT academically fit, Do they drop their standards across the board? At which point an “elite” scroll stops being an “elite” school?
Due to lack of ability, and then lack of participation do they stop offering cutting edge courses of study? s they no longer have enough students to warrant offerings?
Throughout history, poverty is the normal condition of man. Advances which permit this norm to be exceeded — here and there, now and then — are the work of an extremely small minority, frequently despised, often condemned, and almost always opposed by all right-thinking people. Whenever this tiny minority is kept from creating, or (as sometimes happens) is driven out of a society, the people then slip back into abject poverty. This is known as “bad luck.” ~ Robert Heinlein
That will do wonders for all K-12 education.
That will do wonders for all K-12 education.
A perfect plan to make sure that countries with merit based STEM education programs succeed. This will greatly advantage China, Russia and India. Who will want anything designed built or medical in nature by a graduate of such an American system?
The winners will be the unions, the teachers, etc. More perks and job security galore.
This is plainly a stupid way to "qualify" for higher education.
However, I think they ARE on to something.
We should elect our politicians this way:
If you fail to show interest, your name goes in a big hat. Then do the random selection.
(Hat Tip - Bill Buckley and the phone book.)
Why not just have a lottery system that awards some high school seniors with a prestigious college degree? They could completely avoid all that tough work of studying and taking exams. It seems only fair.
Elite colleges MUST discriminate in favor of minorities, in order to have any significant number in their student population.
Only 1% of blacks score 700 or above on SAT math, versus 9% of whites, 2% of latinos and 35% of Asians
Idiocracy was a comedy movie not a plan for the future.
Owww, owww, owwww, I know. How about a lottery like the did in the late 60’s early 70’s for the draft. Of course I had already enlisted before they started that and my number would have been like 87th anyway. LOL! :-}
I am totally in favor of random selection for university admissions on one condition:
—All university presidents and administrators and professors must be randomly selected from the population.
—All members of Congress must be randomly selected from the population.
—All members of college and professional sports teams must be randomly selected from the population.
Self-Loathing Socialist Democrats these days would gladly embrace a yearly stoning of a ‘randomly selected’ white person as portrayed in, ‘The Lottery.’ ;)
Just another way for the really (book) smart to demonstrate that common sense is really not so common.
So community college on up through the bottom half of all ranked universities are basically a damn lottery right now. Most state schools offer remedial entry to matriculation. What these pinheads are calling for is the Ivy's to go random, and it will never never never never never never never never never never never happen. For one thing, money, and by that I mean legacy/alumni money; and two, a place like Yale would have to institute a remedial entry/retention plan with 008s and 009s like everyone else lofl.
No, not a chance in hell the top 50 school muttlerize their own population after they've intentionally ruined the rest.
Equality = Equal Opportunity
Equity = Equal Outcome
Randomly selected MDs. What a great idea!
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