CA ranks 34th for Average SAT Score, 2009 (Montclair, Stanford: elementary school, universities)

[WeakandDizzy]

Originally Posted by bluenoter

The Midwest & South have much higher SAT scores than California and the Northeast. The SAT make the questions biased toward Red States by throwing in references to Garth Brooks, Walmart, tractors, and meth. It is subtle, but it is there!

How can you explain Bill Clinton almost getting a perfect SAT score?

My native Californian father in law ( his family has been in California since about 1870 or so when they sailed over from Europe) is a HUGE country western fan. Meth is not just a Red State problem. Of course maybe all the meth they found ( see link below) in Gilroy was destined for export and none for " domestic consumption". By the way I have shopped at several Walmarts in California. And I guess there are no tractors in the San Joaquin Valley. I think Bill Clinton is just smart. Of course I think the Rhodes scholarship selection process has a Red State Bias as well


www.nbcbayarea.com/.../Gilroy-Meth-Bust-Largest-In-US-History- (broken link) 101501064.html - Cached

[WeakandDizzy]

The point about my father in law is when his grandchildren visit ( many at least twice per week) he is listening to all kinds of country music. All of his grandchildren have been exposed to it from the time they were babies. In fact I would say almost half of my nieces and nephews are country music fans, along with the more contemporary music genres the young prefer. I was listening to one of my daughter's CD's the other day in the car on the way to work and it is a mix of country and rap songs!!

[Gantz]

Originally Posted by bluenoter

The Midwest & South have much higher SAT scores than California and the intellectually proud Northeast. The SAT make the questions biased toward Red States by throwing in references to Garth Brooks, Walmart, tractors, and meth. It is subtle, but it is there!

How can you explain Bill Clinton almost getting a perfect SAT score?

You can't read the chart or something? Look at the "rate" column to see how many students actually take the test....

[bluenoter]

Greg McElroy, the Univ. of Alabama quarterback, is a Rhodes Scholarship finalist. There may also be a bias in the Rhodes Scholarship selection process. It may be a form of Red State affirmative action.

Greg McElroy is a Rhodes Scholarship finalist | al.com

Originally Posted by WeakandDizzy

My native Californian father in law ( his family has been in California since about 1870 or so when they sailed over from Europe) is a HUGE country western fan. Meth is not just a Red State problem. Of course maybe all the meth they found ( see link below) in Gilroy was destined for export and none for " domestic consumption". By the way I have shopped at several Walmarts in California. And I guess there are no tractors in the San Joaquin Valley. I think Bill Clinton is just smart. Of course I think the Rhodes scholarship selection process has a Red State Bias as well


www.nbcbayarea.com/.../Gilroy-Meth-Bust-Largest-In-US-History- 101501064.html - Cached

[nmnita]

Originally Posted by 18Montclair

Could be worse.

Notice that the highest ranking states have very small percentages of students taking the SAT, usually its their best and brightest looking to go to school on one of the coasts.

Best and Worst States: State SAT Scores 2009

this is exactly why I don't pay much attention to these studies. Here you have Ca ranked 34th and another shows 2 of the smartest cities in the country are in Ca.

You are bringing up a very good point. The number of kids that take these tests obviously influence the outcome to some degree.

The same with the study that showed the two smartest cities, they may have the most residence with college degrees, but we don't know what colleges they actually attended.

All polls and studies to are just fun and interesting, but mean very little.

As much as I love AR and and as loyal as I am to the state, I don't for a second think because they rate higher than Ca on SAT scores, the educational system is any better or as good for that matter.

Nita

[WeakandDizzy]

I am not a statistician but there is something known as " regression to the mean". To me, in non statistician layman terms this basically implies that the more often you measure something, the more likely you are to find the " true value" of something. I suspect that if you could test ALL of the children in the country, the majority of states would cluster around some mean SAT score. I'm not sure if it would fit a perfect normal distribution ( bell shaped curve). I suspect the states with a larger proportion of their children in a higher socioeconomic status would probably have a higher median score, but there would be large numbers of stand outs ( high and low scores) on either ends in all states. We are a competitive culture and like to look at various measures that compare one region or state to another. One would predict that areas with lots of highly educated people ( major metro areas) would do better. But if I was broken down in the middle of Kansas in a snowstorm I would bet one of the local farmer's sons would be better equipped mentally to get me safely out of harms way than some Ivy League sophomore. There are all kinds of " smarts" needed in this world and they all cannot be measured by a standardized test.

[stan4]

This is a statistically stupid graph. You can't compare states with 50% of the population taking the SAT with a state that has 3% of the population taking the SAT.

Love,
SAT acer

[18Montclair]

Originally Posted by stan4

This is a statistically stupid graph. You can't compare states with 50% of the population taking the SAT with a state that has 3% of the population taking the SAT.

Love,
SAT acer

I was mainly interested in California(49%) vs Texas(51%).

[bluenoter]

Most likely the people that reside in these 2 smartest cities are not from California, but were recruited from Missouri and Arkansas, or even Asia and India.

Originally Posted by nmnita

Here you have Ca ranked 34th and another shows 2 of the smartest cities in the country are in Ca.

[jkbatca]

Originally Posted by bluenoter

The SAT make the questions biased toward Red States by throwing in references to Garth Brooks, Walmart, tractors, and meth. It is subtle, but it is there!

How can you explain Bill Clinton almost getting a perfect SAT score?

I was actually going to say this in my post, you've read my mind! I was thinking a question like "What is the appropriate George Bush spelling variant of 'nuclear'? "