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QUOTE FROM ABOVE, my italics:
The American Bar Association favored dropping standardized tests from law school admissions in a newly released memo approved by the organization's strategic review committee.
The shift in the bar's position to make standardized admissions tests optional could substantially affect how the Law School Admissions Test, which law school applicants are currently required to complete, is used in law school admissions. [end quote]
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You know, in posting news like this, I will usually just post a link, and the link's headline and/or a brief excerpt (as above), but I am now truly wondering whether this IS -- conspiracy theory alert!! -- part of a planned and coordinated attack to destroy the U.S. And this ABA endorsement, btw, is in line with something else that has occurred this year that is relevant to the above. From the same link above, my italics, quote:
In March, the California State University system announced that it would eliminate consideration of the SAT and the ACT in its undergraduate admissions in order to "level the playing field" for admission at the system's universities. Harvard University likewise announced in December that it would no longer require the SAT for admission.
In January, the College Board, which administers the SAT, announced that the college entrance exam would be shortened by an hour and be entirely administered online. The board said the changes would make the SAT "easier to take, easier to give, and more relevant.” [end quote]
I am SO glad that I am a senior citizen and living somewhere that this kind of insanity doesn't affect me all that much!
Just another step in the "dumbing down" of America by the left!
No offense but why do you even care then if it doesn’t concern you? There’s so much outrage on this site. And if not outraged, there are entire websites and other media merely dedicated to being outraged about others’ outrage. It’s like an angry twilight zone episode
And the only reason I care is because people lack of self-awareness really bothers me.
"Outrage" is a bit too strong -- a better word would be "dismayed", although I admit that I am a little angry (irritated and annoyed) at the unfairness of it. I don't know if you have read the entire thread yet, but I explain my position in more detail in Post #29 of this thread.
And, btw, my niece, who is a high school senior with a 4.5 average and very high SAT scores, and who has been very involved in several extracurricular activities of various kinds, was denied admittance to two of her top university choices. Now maybethere were other factors involved that I am not privy to, but I have little doubt that if she was black or Latino instead of white, that would not have happened. (And, btw, her parents are about as middle class as you can imagine; they are not wealthy by California standards.) Again, maybe I am wrong about that, as I don't know everything about this, or anything at all!
And maybe the above paragraph is just my "white privilege" talking -- that I would expect someone with her intelligence, G.P.A., SAT scores, and various talents to entitle her to the college of her choice, and especially if she and her parents were willing to pay for her education (without taking on a lot of debt).
Btw, regarding a couple of the above posts who talk about people being accepted into college but not graduating, here is a link that tells about one study:
QUOTE from above link,, my italics:
"Altogether, 54.8 percent of those students completed a degree or certificate within six years of entering a postsecondary institution, but broken down by race and ethnicity, those rates fluctuate by up to 25 percent.
"White and Asian students completed their programs at similar rates -- 62 percent and 63.2 percent, respectively -- while Hispanic and black students graduated at rates of 45.8 percent and 38 percent, respectively." [end quote]
Now, of course, there are MANY factors that enter into whether or not someone graduates. I will try to find it but a year or two ago, there was a news story about a bright and intelligent young black woman who struggled very much in college despite being valedictorian of her high school class with a 4.0 average. The problem in her case was because her high school had low standards, and so when she got to college, she discovered that she needed remedial help in both English and math. This was NOT her fault, but was due to not having equal standards for passing grades and classes in every elementary school and high school in the U.S (in my opinion).
In short, I am NOT blaming poor kids (black, Latino, white, Asian or whatever) for their lack of academic success and achievement, but I am very much blaming liberal educators who think that they are doing kids a favor by making school easy for them.
If I had my way, every elementary school in the nation would have the exact same student-to-teacher ratio though the eighth grade and be taught from the exact same books, and then at the end of eighth grade, kids would be sorted into those who wanted accelerated (harder) classes and those who didn't. (And for those who didn't, they would have the opportunity to catch up later if they changed their minds.)
Oh, and you notice that I did NOT indicate that the sorting would be done by ability! There was an excellent 1989 movie "Stand and Deliver" about how some very poor and mostly Mexican-American kids aced their high school calculus class because one teacher, Jaime Escalante, believed that they could. An account of the true story can be found in this article: https://www.latimes.com/local/obitua...r31-story.html To summarize, despite accusations that there was cheating involved with made the students had to retake the advanced calculus test, (which was soundly disproved when the kids retook the test with other educators watching). "After that, the numbers of Garfield students taking calculus and other Advanced Placement classes soared. By 1987, only four high schools in the country had more students taking and passing the AP calculus exam than Garfield." [quote from article, italics and bold mine.)
Statistically standardized tests like the SAT are great predictors of college success and provide an easy metric for comparison. There are exceptions, but the glaring trend is reality.
This is about denying basic math statistics in the name of equity, because it is easier to lower ourselves to be PC than to bring people up.
People on the left are pushing us towards idiocracy.
Yeah, the idea there's a whole back bench full of people who would be great jurists if only they hadn't been denied entry to the club because they scored a 148 on their LSAT is a head-scratcher.
The only reason to dumb down the LSAT is to force unqualified people into the profession. What a farce. These people will, in great numbers, flunk the various state bar exams and never practice law.
Until...there is a demand to dumb down the bar exam. That's how it works!
The only thing is that having taken the LSAT done poorly and yet did amazingly in actual law school -- a top law school -- the LSAT does not do anything but provide another way to keep people from gaining access to a powerful profession.
I ended up serving on my law school admissions counsel and the LSAT provided an easy way to kick people immediately however, I found out later that if you were "connected" your file was taken out of the ones that I put in the "rejection" bin and you were admitted.
A lot more people need to be kicked from law school admission as it is. The job field is severely overcrowded.
How are you supposed to tell if a person has the necessary reading skills for law school without the LSAT? A 3.3 gpa in sociology from a no-name college tells you nothing of the kind. I suspect, though, that your "access to a powerful profession" line show your entire thoughts on the matter.
I have to side with Arya here. I am a lawyer who went through the LSAT many moons ago when I finally decided I wanted to pursue law. Unlike some of my competition, I could only afford very basic prep assistance which, as I recall, was a fairly short pre-read on tips to how to approach the LSAT and a couple of practice tests with answer keys. I did it, took the LSAT and prayed for the best. Others had access to professional prep courses, sometimes one on one, geared towards making your able to take the test - not geared toward making you a good lawyer, etc. Thankfully I was able to do well enough to at least get into a good school, but who knows what I could have done had I been able to afford professional preparation? And then, once you get into law school, you realize the LSAT really doesn't;t have much to do with the practice of law or how well you will ultimately do.
So, while I agree that we shouldn't do away with testing just for the sake of inclusiveness, there are examples where the cards are stacked against those without means in a way that isn't indicative of future performance, and this may be one of them.
I dunno. The only studying that I did for the LSAT was by taking old exams. I scored a 164, a score at the 90th percentile. Whether or not the LSAT is relevant to the practice of law depends on what type of law you practice, I suppose. If you're doing personal injury or criminal law, it's probably not that relevant. But people doing corporate or real estate law, or anything to do with contracts, will be doing a whole lot of difficult reading.
Why would you judge someone on a 2 hour test, when you have 4 years of course work that better tells you who the student is ?
As other stated, there are people who do poorly on the LSAT, but then Ace every class, and vice versa, get a high score on the LSAT and then flunk out of Law school.
So this comes down to you saying you want a good test taker(which multiple school systems have proven they can fool the system) vs the person who actually has shown they will put in the work.
Are you a lawyer? As I said above, there isn't much undergraduate coursework that is similar to law school. Someone getting a B+ in Intro to Psychology or Intermediate Spanish doesn't tell you anything about whether or not that person will be good at law school/will be able to pass the bar. The "good test takers" that you mention are people who have demonstrated that they do well at spending several hours reading and comprehending complex material.
I am SO glad that I am a senior citizen and living somewhere that this kind of insanity doesn't affect me all that much!
Yup, they can't destroy the US fast enough.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Arya Stark
The only thing is that having taken the LSAT done poorly and yet did amazingly in actual law school -- a top law school -- the LSAT does not do anything but provide another way to keep people from gaining access to a powerful profession.
Um, no.
The LSAT is about one's ability to reason logically.
If one cannot handle an if/then/else statement then there's no way one can correctly parse a statute or regulation.
It's also about deductive reasoning.
Gotta wonder how many innocent people will end up in prison now due to sub-standard people practicing law.
The people who shouldn't be in law school never pass the bar exam, but obviously they'll plan on doing away with that, too.
The whole purpose of law school is to learn how to identify causes of action. The primary reason pro se plaintiffs --- oh, excuse me.....in this kindler gentler world of ours they are now called "self-represented parties" -- cases get dismissed is because they failed to state a claim for which relief can be granted because they do not understand the meaning of "cause of action" and cannot logically deduce it.
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