[getgoingnow]

Take a look at this [1]:

*SAT-Mathematics

White - 534

Black - 429

Asian - 598

Even if Blacks get CS/Engineering degrees, they can still be less competent than Asians/Whites. Tech companies attract the most talented people (e.g. Google gets millions of job applications per year) and they can pick those who are the most competent/best in class. Those are usually Asians and Whites. For example, if 10% of all CS degree holders are Black, you can't expect that there will be 10% of Blacks at tech companies.

[1] https://nces.ed.gov/fastfacts/display.asp?id=171

[slavik81]

Beware representing a distribution with a single number. Individuals disappear entirely and it's easy to make incorrect generalizations.

Your conclusions don't necessarily follow from your statistics, and I think this is something important enough that rigor is necessary.

[williamaadams]

This is hilarious. SAT scores as indicator of competency, rather than merely a measure of how well someone takes a test.

[dlss]

Hilarious or not, that's the (replicated) result from the literature:

> Implications from this study are much the same as those stated by Frey and Detterman, namely, that SAT appears to be a measure of general intelligence and is a useful tool in predicting cognitive functioning

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0191886906...

[getgoingnow]

Yes, it's an indicator of competency in mathematics, which in turn makes a good computer scientist. What else would be a better indicator of math competency than math tests?

[williamaadams]

The hilarity is in how this perpetuates the reasons for excluding a class of individuals from participating in the software creation process.

Good in math probably won't give you the empathy and insights into how technology could help rural Kentuckians.

Additionally, software today is very much a 'poke at the frameworks, and mash it together' sort of affair. When I joined MS 17 years ago, knowing how to use WinDbg was probably a big skill to have. Today, it's more about knowing how to use various JavaScript frameworks.

Math specifically comes into play perhaps when talking about data science specifically, but there's an app for that.

If Math is a stand in for an ability to think critically, and apply the scientific method, then biologists, physicists, and even social scientists, might be just as qualified as any engineer.

So, yah, one more exclusionary myth about the qualifications of engineers, and who's best at it (whites and Asians? really?).

[getgoingnow]

  The hilarity is in how this perpetuates the reasons for excluding a class of individuals from participating in the software creation process.

You are excluded from companies using computer science if you are bad at math. Blacks are worse at math than Whites and Asians, therefore they will be hired less - especially in companies where everyone wants to work.

  Good in math probably won't give you the empathy and insights into how technology could help rural Kentuckians.

Will being bad at math give you that? What does building software have to do with rural Kentuckians and how are black software engineers going to help you with that?

  Additionally, software today is very much a 'poke at the frameworks, and mash it together' sort of affair.

Are you trying to say that Blacks are as good as Whites/Asians at poking at frameworks. If they are bad at math, maybe they are bad at this as well. BTW, I am referring to computer science, not knowing JS frameworks. Computer science requires mathematics.

  So, yah, one more exclusionary myth about the qualifications of engineers, and who's best at it (whites and Asians? really?)

What is mythical about this? I've given you the data that clearly shows that Blacks are worse at math than Whites/Asians. They also perform worse at SAT-Critical reading.

[williamaadams]

Well, I suppose this is fun at a certain level, because there are assumptions, and conclusions, built upon assumptions.

I'll try to clarify my position.

The back of my Microsoft badge says something about helping everyone on the planet.

Such a mission is as much about emotional intelligence and an ability to be empathetic as it is about actual application of technology.

Let's imagine the very high IQ'd high scoring person, who grew up in a certain environment has the task of creating software for someone in a rural community they know nothing about, and they will not visit. They are very clever, and they'll come up with something.

Now, let's imagine a child who grows up in that rural community. By standard testing methods, they don't have the same level of skills as the high SAT scoring individual, so they never get hired into tech, they're never consulted about what might help the needs of their community. They are in fact intelligent, just didn't go to a very good school, nor had the various opportunities that the high scoring SAT person did, so they're out of the loop.

So, in my mind, if I have a mission to help such people, it seems the best way I could do that would be to incoroporate them into my dev team in some way. That might include providing them with additional educational opportunities they might not have otherwise had. It might be a temporary contracting or consulting role rather than full employment.

It does not mean total exclusion from the creation process, which is what occurs today based on things like a test score, or a college affiliation.

This is the argument of why diversity matters in tech. All the SAT scores, college graduation rates, and the like, are just the pieces we're moving around to justify our reasoning for remaining fairly homogenous in our hiring practices.

At this point, you don't know me, my history, ethnicity, nor accomplishments in tech. The full reveal might be enlightening.

[ubernostrum]

What else would be a better indicator of math competency than math tests?

Have you investigated why there's a difference? Your comments seem to be leaning toward dismissing this problem as not in need of an explanation, but the explanation matters a great deal. Do you believe those scores could be changed by changing educational approaches? Do you believe there's something genetically innate causing the lower scores? Do you believe there's some social factor or combination of factors which could be changed?

You don't get to just say "oh, score gap, question answered".