Justice Scalia Thinks Black Students Belong In 'Slower-Track' Schools

[wmw999 2,121]

That last one was too long, so I'll make another post

I don't think slower-track schools are the answer; they're clearly for people with lesser goals. However, having schools with different goals is entirely appropriate; vo-tech schools, art schools, even things like Jr. Achievement used to do, with students doing internships/apprenticeships in community jobs.

Have each track have a positive goal -- i.e. not "you couldn't get into the top school, but try anyway," instead something like "if you want to graduate from high school and end up working shortly thereafter, this might be a better choice of school/classes. We have that now, but it sure seems like there's a gap between the jobs that people are advertising, even in the trades, and being a high school graduate.

Some unions used to do apprenticeships. Just sayin'

Wendy P.

There is nothing more dangerous than breaking a basic safety rule and getting away with it. It removes fear of the consequences and builds false confidence. (tbrown)

[normiss 622]

Agreed.
Excellent explanation.

[cvfd1399 0]

Quote

I don't think slower-track schools are the answer; they're clearly for people with lesser goals.

I strongly disagree. I know many LSU graduated engineers, IT managers, and others that went to a slower track school (Baton Rouge Community College) to catch up before moving on and transfering to the big leagues.

It certainly wasn't about lesser goals it was cost for some, and catching up for others.

What we really need is less of a focus on EVERYONE needs to go to college, and more options for trade schools for those that know they dont have the drive, or the money and will never make it. That way they are prepared to make a living instead of ending up working fast food or on welfare. The backbone of this country is the welders, carpenters, pipe fitters, electricians, iron workers, etc. and that takes skilled labor.

[billvon 2,397]

>What we really need is less of a focus on EVERYONE needs to go to college,
>and more options for trade schools for those that know they dont have the
>drive, or the money and will never make it.

Agreed. Encourage/promote continuing education after high school, whether traditional college, part time community college OR trade school. In the long run, talent is what makes people successful, and the more talent we as a country have, the better off we are.

[wmw999 2,121]

You're right, I'll admit I was thinking at the high school level; community college is one of the best public education resources that we have. Their job is to try to fill in the spaces that other schools leave empty.

Wendy P.

There is nothing more dangerous than breaking a basic safety rule and getting away with it. It removes fear of the consequences and builds false confidence. (tbrown)

[turtlespeed 212]

wmw999

That last one was too long, so I'll make another post

I don't think slower-track schools are the answer; they're clearly for people with lesser goals. However, having schools with different goals is entirely appropriate; vo-tech schools, art schools, even things like Jr. Achievement used to do, with students doing internships/apprenticeships in community jobs.

Have each track have a positive goal -- i.e. not "you couldn't get into the top school, but try anyway," instead something like "if you want to graduate from high school and end up working shortly thereafter, this might be a better choice of school/classes. We have that now, but it sure seems like there's a gap between the jobs that people are advertising, even in the trades, and being a high school graduate.

Some unions used to do apprenticeships. Just sayin'

Wendy P.

But isn't Vo-tech, and the like, the slower track school that was actually meant?

Oops - that must make you a racist.

At least according to ryoder.

ETA: Didn't want to leave off credit for Billvon jumping on the bandwagon with him.

I'm not usually into the whole 3-way thing, but you got me a little excited with that. - Skymama
BTR #1 / OTB^5 Official #2 / Hellfish #408 / VSCR #108/Tortuga/Orfun

[GeorgiaDon 340]

rehmwa

***What's wrong with offering the same remedial training to everyone, regardless of their race?

WINNER

what's wrong with admissions being based on performance only, regardless of race?

these would seem to go hand in handHow do you judge "performance"? How do you decide who to admit if you have 10 people who fully meet all of the academic criteria for every available seat in the classroom? No matter what you do, you will have to exclude 9 qualified people for every one you admit.

Maybe you can choose to go strictly based on high school grades. There are a few problems with this, however. Not all schools are exactly the same with regard to testing and rigor. We have all heard of grade inflation. Is it a good idea to accept lots of students from school A, where the culture is to make tests a bit easier or to inflate grades, and deny a lot of students from school B whose grades are marginally lower because the courses are more rigorous?

How about the student who has a high GPA because they took mostly (or all) basic CP (college prep) courses, versus the student with a slightly lower GPA who took mostly ACP (advanced college prep) courses, which are significantly harder than CP.

Who is better prepared for success in college, the student who took the bare minimum level courses and excelled, or the student who challenged herself with tougher courses and got 1 or 2 "B" grades along the way?

In a quest to be "objective" many universities turned to standardized testing such as the SATs. It is widely recognized that scores on these tests are not correlated with academic performance in university past the first year of undergraduate studies. Does it make sense to choose one candidate over another because they scored 0.001% better on a test that does nothing to predict future academic success? Also bear in mind that kids from wealthy families can afford expensive private courses (such as the Kaplan courses) that are geared to prepping students specifically to take the test.

Many universities also look to extracurricular activities to help rank students. How do you decide (for example) if ROTC is more valuable in this regard than volunteering at a soup kitchen? Is it reasonable to knock the student who had to work in their parent's store on weekends and prefer the student who had weekends free to volunteer somewhere?

It is easy to focus on learning the textbook as the sole point of a college degree. One of the supreme court justices did this when they asked if the laws of physics are different for students of different races. This perspective completely overlooks the fact that much of what students learn (or should learn) at university is basic life skills such as how to prioritize in the face of competing demands for your time and attention, and how to productively work with other people. The latter demands that you learn to value other people's opinions and knowledge, be able to receive and give constructive criticism, pull your weight and live up to your commitments, and on and on. This is done through living with roommates, working on group projects, actively participating in classroom discussions, and so on. You don't take a class on "working with people", you learn it by doing it, over and over in different classes.

Now suppose everyone you meet at University is drawn from the same socioeconomic background as you are. Everyone got in because they went to a school with the best teachers, the best facilities, small classes (lots of personal attention from the teachers), because that school was in a district with lots of $1,000,000 homes so the school had plenty of cash to work with. Everyone you meet had high SATs because their parents could send them to private prep courses. In the US, economic realities being what they are, that means the people you meet and have a chance to interact with will disproportionately be Caucasian, with a smattering of Asians and people from other ethnic backgrounds. Do you think that experience will prepare students for the real world?

I think universities are caught in a real catch-22 here. They are expected to prepare students to excel in the real world. This necessarily means those students must be prepared to work together with people of differing backgrounds, experiences, and perspectives. At the same time they are under pressure to only use criteria that are highly correlated with wealth in choosing who to admit, and at present in the US wealth (or lack of it) is still highly correlated with race. You can't have it both ways.

The long term solution is to eliminate the economic structures in society that cause wealth (and so race) to be correlated with educational opportunity. Unfortunately I don't see that happening, at least for a long time, in the US. There are too many fundamental assumptions about "fairness" that would have to change. For example, pretty much universally people from wealthy communities complain that it is "unfair" when their tax dollars are used to support schools in poorer districts. In British Columbia (Canada), where I lived before moving to the US, school taxes are just part of your provincial (equivalent to State) income taxes; the money is collected by the province and then sent to the school districts according to a formula based mostly on numbers of students. How well do you think that would be accepted in the US?

When I moved to Arizona there was a story in the news about a school district there that had built a domed football stadium! They could afford to do this because the district included a power plant that paid a lot in property taxes. At the same time, there are school districts where three or four students have to share textbooks printed when Clinton was president. Legal battles over education spending go back decades, but state legislators still resist abiding by the state constitution, which mandates that each school district should have a similar amount of per-student funding. The feeling seems to be that equal educational opportunity is a communist idea. Actually, many legislators seem to believe that publicly funded education is a communist idea.

Ideally students from all backgrounds would be equally competitive. However "competitive" is inherently subjective. In the meantime universities are expected to prepare students for success in the real world, and the real world is not exclusively made up of people from wealthy families.

So, all you folks who are opposed to any consideration of any factors other than grades (and who have had the patience to read this far), how would you resolve this dilemma?

Don

_____________________________________
Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996)
“Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

[billvon 2,397]

GeorgiaDon

How do you judge "performance"? How do you decide who to admit if you have 10 people who fully meet all of the academic criteria for every available seat in the classroom? . . .

Maybe you can choose to go strictly based on high school grades. . . .

In a quest to be "objective" many universities turned to standardized testing such as the SATs. . .

Many universities also look to extracurricular activities to help rank students. . . .

Yes, to all of the above - plus a few more. Academic performance, adjusted for difficulty. Standardized testing. Extracurricular activities. Performance in sports. Performance on entrance "exams" whether explicit exams or application essays. Interviews to evaluate whether the person can communicate and interact with others.

What's the exact mix of the above that goes into the final decision? I'd expect it to be different for everyone. At MIT they are going to go primarily by academic performance in math and science, plus SAT math scores. But they're also going to get a few lower performers who won every science fair they ever entered and have awesome interpersonal skills. Yale might lean a lot more heavily on extracurricular activities and sports, with a lesser emphasis on SAT scores - but might also let in a few close-to-perfect scores to keep their student body diverse.

Being able to accurately judge what a given applicant will bring to a school is not an exact science, and is why most schools have a pretty large admissions office. They don't always get it right - but in my experience, most of them try pretty hard.

[turtlespeed 212]

Performance isn't just about grades.

It involves extra curricular activities, community service, volunteerism, and so on.

If the application of extra effort is shown, it should make a difference.

And those that have done the extra work, and gone the extra mile have been denied in the past, and will be denied in the future, simply because of someone's skin color.

That is the worst form of racism there is. Because society is forced, at least at the moment, to accept it.

I'm not usually into the whole 3-way thing, but you got me a little excited with that. - Skymama
BTR #1 / OTB^5 Official #2 / Hellfish #408 / VSCR #108/Tortuga/Orfun

[jakee 1,254]

Quote

It involves extra curricular activities, community service, volunteerism, and so on.

If the application of extra effort is shown, it should make a difference.

Right, Don just mentioned all of those factors, and pointed out the problems with trying to use them to create a gradeable hierarchy of performance.

So when the question is still 'How do you propose to do this' the answer isn't as simple as 'you just do', y'know?

(Fantastic post by Don, BTW. Best thing I've read on here since nerdgirl left)

Do you want to have an ideagasm?

[cvfd1399 0]

Quote

That is the worst form of racism there is. Because society is forced, at least at the moment, to accept it.

Not just accept it. If you dont toe the liberal line they will mock and chastise you for not feeling bad for whatever cause they are trying to circle jerk over.

[billvon 2,397]

>But isn't Vo-tech, and the like, the slower track school that was actually meant?
>Oops - that must make you a racist.

Nope.

"People with lesser goals will do better in slower track schools" - not racist
"People with different goals will do better in alternatives like vocational schools" - not racist
"Blacks do better in slower track schools" - racist

I am sure you can spot the important difference there.

[turtlespeed 212]

billvon

>But isn't Vo-tech, and the like, the slower track school that was actually meant?
>Oops - that must make you a racist.

Nope.

"People with lesser goals will do better in slower track schools" - not racist
"People with different goals will do better in alternatives like vocational schools" - not racist
"Blacks do better in slower track schools" - racist

I am sure you can spot the important difference there.

Poorly worded, not politically correct, but statistically true according to the data.

I'm not usually into the whole 3-way thing, but you got me a little excited with that. - Skymama
BTR #1 / OTB^5 Official #2 / Hellfish #408 / VSCR #108/Tortuga/Orfun

[rehmwa 2]

GeorgiaDon

How do you judge "performance"? How do you ....

^^
another good post that mirrors what Wendy was speaking to - all great consideration in assessing performance. none of it really advocated quotas or race too.

but it's a tough question - hopefully the criteria is about 'individual' performance in terms of what they've done and the potential shown.

I think one inference is that overcoming a more difficult situation is worth bonus points. That works if it's a personal assessment. - if it's a broad brush type of bonus or penalty (racist, sexist, etc) then I still think it does a disservice to individuals.

Yeah, I know - treating individuals equally, not demographics equally is a common theme of mine. I try to stay true to it.

rich kids taking prep classes - interesting part where doing more to be ready for college is considered a drawback instead of bonus - I don't really get that point other than an 'it's not 'fair'' type of script. Fair is subjective - preparations tangible. (Now, it would be wrong if Bubba John's little boy is excluded from a prep school that he can pay for just because little Billy Bob has to forego a little dentistry to afford it - that's where a real individual bias would be - change the names and bigotry in the example in any way)

...
Driving is a one dimensional activity - a monkey can do it - being proud of your driving abilities is like being proud of being able to put on pants

[wmw999 2,121]

Statistics are a tool, not a cudgel. Just as it's wrong to use them to lie, it's wrong to use such a limited tool to define someone's options.

I went to a science oriented school. Both of my engineering-major roommates my freshman year had opted out of calculus because their adviser said that girls didn't usually take it.

Good advisers:

know something about the students before they walk in the door

help the student to identify goals they already have and goals they might not have knows about

help the students figure out a path to those goals. Not just one, but a path that allows change as the student grows and matures.

It's a difficult job; not always possible in a big school. But when parents haven't provided too much input, it's one of the ways that the student can figure out what's possible. BTW, the relentlessly poor have less time and energy left over at the end of the day -- worrying takes it out of you. It's not just that everyone who is poor is a loser

Wendy P.

There is nothing more dangerous than breaking a basic safety rule and getting away with it. It removes fear of the consequences and builds false confidence. (tbrown)

[turtlespeed 212]

wmw999

Statistics are a tool, not a cudgel. Just as it's wrong to use them to lie, it's wrong to use such a limited tool to define someone's options.

I went to a science oriented school. Both of my engineering-major roommates my freshman year had opted out of calculus because their adviser said that girls didn't usually take it.

Good advisers:

know something about the students before they walk in the door

help the student to identify goals they already have and goals they might not have knows about

help the students figure out a path to those goals. Not just one, but a path that allows change as the student grows and matures.

It's a difficult job; not always possible in a big school. But when parents haven't provided too much input, it's one of the ways that the student can figure out what's possible. BTW, the relentlessly poor have less time and energy left over at the end of the day -- worrying takes it out of you. It's not just that everyone who is poor is a loser

Wendy P.

And yet statistics is what the main liberal fear monger one platform is based on.
So, I'll have to disagree that it's not a big fat bat.

I'm not usually into the whole 3-way thing, but you got me a little excited with that. - Skymama
BTR #1 / OTB^5 Official #2 / Hellfish #408 / VSCR #108/Tortuga/Orfun

[Bolas 5]

This is not a racial issue. It's a socioeconomic one. The racial breakdown of the statistics is not the important factor and skews the results as those not poor in said race get the advantage too..

Once treated as soley socioeconomic, then the only question is do alternative requirements for them truly help them or just set them up for failure?

Stupidity if left untreated is self-correcting
If ya can't be good, look good, if that fails, make 'em laugh.

[GeorgiaDon 340]

Quote

rich kids taking prep classes - interesting part where doing more to be ready for college is considered a drawback instead of bonus - I don't really get that point other than an 'it's not 'fair'' type of script. Fair is subjective - preparations tangible. (Now, it would be wrong if Bubba John's little boy is excluded from a prep school that he can pay for just because little Billy Bob has to forego a little dentistry to afford it - that's where a real individual bias would be - change the names and bigotry in the example in any way)

I didn't explain that very well. The courses are focused on prepping kids to take the SAT. There are similar courses for the MCAT (for medical school) and other standardized tests. Basically, they take old tests and walk through them. They discuss how to improve your chances of guessing correctly by eliminating wrong answers, they show patterns of how things are phrased that indicate right and wrong answers, and so on. Obviously if you know the answer, that's straightforward. If you don't, there are tricks you can learn to figure out which answer is probably right. Then the kids spend a lot of time on practice tests. This reduces test anxiety, so by the time they take the real test it's old hat. The point is, it's mostly about how to take the test, not prepping for actual college. There is some review of the material, which could be helpful I suppose. Prepping for a test is not the same as prepping for actual college, obviously.

These tests do a poor job of predicting how students will do (except during the first year) because success in university is a function of many skills. You can be great at memorizing lots of info, or you can have great abstract reasoning skills, but if you can't organize and manage your time you'll soon be lost. If you can't work with other people you'll flounder. If you aren't highly self-motivated you'll be lost in an environment where you don't have some adult telling you to go to class or get that assignment done. It's very telling that these "soft" life skills are as or more important than having a Mensa IQ. This is why it's not uncommon for students who were perhaps not at the top of the class in high school, but had to deal with lots of distractions or complications (like working in their parents store, or babysitting siblings so Mom could go to work the late shift), can excel at college: they have already mastered the skills of focus, self discipline, and time management.

I agree very much about looking at people as individuals. That means you can't reduce people to one data point, such as a GPA or SAT score. You have to look at lots of things, some not reducible to a number on some scale, that gives a picture of what they have accomplished, what they had to overcome to accomplish that, what all that says about the chances of success in college, and what they bring to the table to enhance the spirit of inquiry that the college experience should be all about. College is not all a one-way information dump from professors to students. Students are expected to challenge assumptions and dogmas. I very much enjoy interacting with students, because they constantly push me to reexamine my understanding, just as (I hope) I push them.

It's not all about taking tests, that's for sure.

Don

_____________________________________
Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996)
“Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

[cvfd1399 0]

With online degrees becoming widespread it is about taking tests. The students never see a classroom.

[wmw999 2,121]

That's only if your motivation is degree, and not education. There's a difference

Wendy P.

There is nothing more dangerous than breaking a basic safety rule and getting away with it. It removes fear of the consequences and builds false confidence. (tbrown)

[cvfd1399 0]

Disagree, there is a huge disconnect from any real discussion when you are hundreds if not thousands of miles from the professor, using forums for "participation credits" to discuss a subject.

It's not the same as an in person in classroom debate about a topic. The main things missing are timing, emotions, voice inflection, eye contact, facial expressions etc.

You can't tell me an online degree can be 100% the personal experience as someone who lived on campus and had all the other experiences and hard times that helped mold them into who they are 4 years later.

[normiss 622]

Major difference.
On-line degrees are almost a joke.

[GeorgiaDon 340]

I think you misunderstood Wendy's post. She basically said the same thing you did.

Don

_____________________________________
Tolerance is the cost we must pay for our adventure in liberty. (Dworkin, 1996)
“Education is not filling a bucket, but lighting a fire.” (Yeats)

[turtlespeed 212]

GeorgiaDon

I think you misunderstood Wendy's post. She basically said the same thing you did.

Don

Is that allowed?

I'm not usually into the whole 3-way thing, but you got me a little excited with that. - Skymama
BTR #1 / OTB^5 Official #2 / Hellfish #408 / VSCR #108/Tortuga/Orfun

[kallend 1,623]

cvfd1399

With online degrees becoming widespread it is about taking tests. The students never see a classroom.

My school won't allow undergraduate students to take online sections of classes for exactly this reason.

...

The only sure way to survive a canopy collision is not to have one.