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Best indicator of academic achievement is families socioeconomic status and educational attainment. Race is closely align with academic achievement. If people really supported meritocracy, Harvard would be 40%+ Asian and white would be 20%. People are hypocrites and only make decisions that are self serving, so you see white people outcry the desire for merit base when it comes to black and hispanic while insisting holistic admissions when compared to asian.
Yeah, but again educational attainment and community awareness. Should a kid who grows up in a community that doesn't value education always be trapped into the same community all their life. Are they trapped to being the big fish in a small pond or will you allow them to try the ocean to see how deep they can swim.
We are talking about the top 7% of schools, most kids try hard. You can't really say with absolution that a kid will fail if they were never given the opportunity to try a more difficult class or be taught more advance curriculum. You assume they will not strive to be the top performer as when they were in their previous community they came from. You want to deny them the opportunity simply based on the community they were born to and blame them for being born to the wrong parents. You make it sound like public universities are not mixed ability classes.
I agree with this too.
A lot of people seem to think that kids "deserve" the parents they get. Apart from the specialized schools, kids who don't have parental involvement in the high school choice process are at an enormous disadvantage. It's a daunting process for adults, and it pays to be strategic about it too. At 13 years old, most kids are way too immature to take that on by themselves, but that's what happens for a lot of them. I'd hope the schools could help the kids not fall through the cracks, not just say oh well, too bad your parents don't care...And in certain circumstances the schools can create incredible obstacles for children (here I'm thinking about special needs kids), but that's a whole other thread.
If by doing the following I am a "relic" I accept the designation and fear for my country:
When I went to high school I did moderately well with some honors courses and one pass of an AP test without taking the course;
I graduated from a prestigious college and law school (though in my opinion the law school is overrated);
I have an intact, happy marriage of over 27 years;
I have two children, one of whom graduated with an engineering degree from a prestigious school, one of whom graduated a college for high-functioning children with special needs;
I have a FICO score, depending on which bureau, of 828 or 849;
I earn a decent, not spectacular living; and
I hold the door open for people.
What am I doing or have I done that is a "relic from" a less civilized "past." Does my conduct violate Board v. Board of Education?
What is your point?
I am a person of color.
I was raised by a single mother who was not around due to work, I spent my childhood in school/daycare, and had to teach myself how the education system worked (in the 90's search engines were unreliable).
I graduated top 5% of a magnet high school with an above average SAT score (I only took it once without practice).
I didn't realize how bad the high school was until I got to college when I was asked to take remedial classes. I still received academic scholarships despite it.
I completed a bachelor degree and master degree with honors. My major being Computer Science.
I am married for four year with no children yet and own a townhouse.
My FICO score is 760 after purchasing the townhouse.
My wife and I earn well (top 7% household income in NYC)
I don't have a criminal record.
Somehow I turned out alright despite people like you thinking I am not fit to be in the same classroom. Truth be told my extended family is as dysfunctional as can be, but again you judge me by the circumstance I was born to, not who I am.
As someone who graduated from Teachers College (Columbia University) there's major opposition in ALL of the GRADUATE SCHOOLS of EDUCATION as far as tracking goes.
In part because it is not the job of public schools to prepare just a FEW students to get into Ivy League universities, and certainly not at the expense of depriving ALL other STUDENTS of RESOURCES.
It's obvious that a lot of people on this forum are pretty poor themselves, and dream of getting their kids in these schools as they BELIEVE these schools are their kids only ticket to a worthwhile future. In their process their willing to try to throw the rest of the city under the bus. But we live in a political era in which that just cannot happen.
Just as CUNY was permanently changed, so too will the high school system.
There were NO resources put into the tracking system of the NYC public schools. In fact, since the top class was the largest, it received LESS in the way of resources. Same ancient textbooks. Same amount of virtually NO specials (music was gone, for gym class they threw a ball onto the playground to allow the playing of kickball, still had art once a week I think). They packed 40 kids into the top class. The only "resource" in there was the bright kids themselves.
Tracking is the only way to allow a group of students to progress at their own rate. When we insist that the bright kids be held back to the level of the middle, or low middle, we deprive our country of the potential achievements of its brightest kids - and that especially means bright black and hispanic kids from the inner city.
Why do you think our graduate schools are filled with students from China, India, and other countries? It's because in those places, the brightest kids are allowed, nay, encouraged to move ahead as quickly as possible in a competitive system, while USA kids sit bored to tears until they reach high school, where some lucky ones are finally allowed into AP classes where they're actually taught something.
The answer is not racially selective admissions. The answer is to give bright black and hispanic students the opportunity to learn in elementary and middle school, so that more will qualify for selective high schools, while also expanding the number of seats at these high schools, so that ALL intelligent and dedicated students of all races can get a seat in a high school that offers advanced education.
Why do you think our graduate schools are filled with students from China, India, and other countries? It's because in those places, the brightest kids are allowed, nay, encouraged to move ahead as quickly as possible in a competitive system, while USA kids sit bored to tears until they reach high school, where some lucky ones are finally allowed into AP classes where they're actually taught something.
Stop with the myth making. Graduate school is filled with foreigners, because that is the easiest path to immigration and they all have the money to pay for it. A U.S. worker will only need a bachelor degree, but a foreigner needs a master degree for the H-1B visa application.
There were NO resources put into the tracking system of the NYC public schools. In fact, since the top class was the largest, it received LESS in the way of resources. Same ancient textbooks. Same amount of virtually NO specials (music was gone, for gym class they threw a ball onto the playground to allow the playing of kickball, still had art once a week I think). They packed 40 kids into the top class. The only "resource" in there was the bright kids themselves.
Tracking is the only way to allow a group of students to progress at their own rate. When we insist that the bright kids be held back to the level of the middle, or low middle, we deprive our country of the potential achievements of its brightest kids - and that especially means bright black and hispanic kids from the inner city.
Why do you think our graduate schools are filled with students from China, India, and other countries? It's because in those places, the brightest kids are allowed, nay, encouraged to move ahead as quickly as possible in a competitive system, while USA kids sit bored to tears until they reach high school, where some lucky ones are finally allowed into AP classes where they're actually taught something.
The answer is not racially selective admissions. The answer is to give bright black and hispanic students the opportunity to learn in elementary and middle school, so that more will qualify for selective high schools, while also expanding the number of seats at these high schools, so that ALL intelligent and dedicated students of all races can get a seat in a high school that offers advanced education.
"As the economy improved, the percentage of Americans in graduate programs dropped. “Going to grad school became less of a priority for so many students,” said Stuart Zweben, co-author of the survey and professor emeritus of computer science and engineering at Ohio State University. “You had to really be interested in research or something special.”
Oh, two bills in Congress will drastically reduce legal immigration, while severely cracking down on illegal immigration. Graduate schools filled with foreigner students? Trump will take care of that in the most brutal form manner, and that's what he was elected to do by the American public.
And no, I did not vote for him.
Presently Asians as some sort of supernerd population everyone should emulate when xenophobia is at an time high and has become politically correct quite frankly is foolish.
Stop with the myth making. Graduate school is filled with foreigners, because that is the easiest path to immigration and they all have the money to pay for it. A U.S. worker will only need a bachelor degree, but a foreigner needs a master degree for the H-1B visa application.
Also people in PhD programs are severely underpaid and exploited. When I was at Columbia, there were always issues of what happened if foreign students got fired from the RA or TA positions. What would happen is their fellowships got canceled, and they were immediately responsible for Columbia's extremely expensive tuition. If they could not pay, then they basically got deported.
PhD's make far less than people in the private sector and for the majority of Americans, a PhD is a waste of time unless you deliberately want to work in academia.
Academic positions tend to be low paid, people often don't have benefits as adjunct professors, and quite frankly, academia is often an AWFUL place to work at.
You could not pay me to get a PhD at the Ivy League or any other university, after what I have personally seen happen to PhD students, and to adjunct faculty.
At Columbia and other Ivy Leagues, a professor who grades students too harshly at the end of the semester will get harsh student evaluations and complaints from the students. What will happen then is that professor will often get FIRED. Ivy League students expect all As, and a professor that gives out B+s maybe committing employment/career suicide.
I was raised by a single mother who was not around due to work, I spent my childhood in school/daycare, and had to teach myself how the education system worked (in the 90's search engines were unreliable).
I graduated top 5% of a magnet high school with an above average SAT score (I only took it once without practice).
I didn't realize how bad the high school was until I got to college when I was asked to take remedial classes. I still received academic scholarships despite it.
I completed a bachelor degree and master degree with honors. My major being Computer Science.
I am married for four year with no children yet and own a townhouse.
My FICO score is 760 after purchasing the townhouse.
My wife and I earn well (top 7% household income in NYC)
I don't have a criminal record.
Somehow I turned out alright despite people like you thinking I am not fit to be in the same classroom. Truth be told my extended family is as dysfunctional as can be, but again you judge me by the circumstance I was born to, not who I am.
I am, white colombians are the colombian descendants of european (overwhelmingly spanish) and middle eastern (primarily lebanese and syrian) people, who self identify as such. If you go by the one drop rule I won’t be considered white. Obviously, I don’t get as much discrimination as others and helped me transcend the circumstances I grew up in. Being I am not wasp, it is hard for me to feel comfortable with my whiteness.
I am, white colombians are the colombian descendants of european (overwhelmingly spanish) and middle eastern (primarily lebanese and syrian) people, who self identify as such. If you go by the one drop rule I won’t be considered white. Obviously, I don’t get as much discrimination as others and helped me transcend the circumstances I grew up in. Being I am not wasp, it is hard for me to feel comfortable with my whiteness.
Most whites in New York aren't WASPs. Italians and Greek people aren't seen as any less white than WASPs. I hardly even know any true WASPs around here.
I don't think Lebanese and Syrian people are white, though.
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