How does the existence of standardized testing give everyone the same chance? As an extremely over-exaggerated example example, someone whose home study time is disrupted frequently by gunfire outside is probably not getting the same chance as someone who lives on a 20 acre estate with private tutors for every subject.
How does the existence of a standard hoop height in the NBA give everyone the same chance to play? Shorter players should get lower hoops, and slower runners should get electric scooters. That way, everyone can appear to be equally capable.
I would say that the NBA is explicitly not about giving everyone the same chance. Not everything has to be about giving everyone the same chance. A totally equitable NBA would probably be less entertaining to watch.
But that doesn't mean we can say that standardized testing gives everyone the same chance either...
NBA gives everyone the same chance to get it, just you have to be good at basketball.
If the circumstances of your childhood made it so that you are shit at basketball but hey you were the top performer in your group of terrible players, the NBA is not going to pretend like you are good enough or grade you on a curve because of your circumstances.
Because if the NBA does that, well,
you will get crappy players in the NBA. And can you then say that the NBA gives everyone the same chance to get in anymore. Just move to a neighborhood where everyone is shit at basketball and you suddenly have a much higher chance at getting into the NBA? That’s a much more unfair system than a standardized measure.
This is like saying all furniture must be made waterproof because some people have leaky roofs. No, you fix the roof.
I know my proposition sounds absurd, but it kind of point out the issue with this kind of thinking is that applying some patchwork fixes to complex issues rather than treating the root cause is a bad idea. It's a bad idea in CS and a bad idea in planning social systems.
Neighborhoods should be made safe, or failing that, dorms should be made available for kids (in my country, there are tons of dorms for high schoolers already, who live in the countryside, and want to attend a somewhat better high school).
Alternatively I suggest making this a demand problem - good high schools should compete for talent (which is always in short supply) and should actively take measures to seek out and nurture gifted kids.
As for your rich kid example - what makes you think that in a more holistic system, he won't be able to optimize admissions by exploiting resources?
Just recently there was an article on HN about how the majority of those admitted to US elite college received some 'pity party' points - sounds to me the system is being actively exploited.
But that doesn't mean that as it currently stands you can say that standardized tests gives everyone the same chance in the US. It would in some hypothetical future maybe yes, but not now.
This belief is how UC San Diego ends up with 900 freshman below high school math proficiency. And thus college becomes a remedial education institution.
Hmm. I suppose with modern Flock technology and GPS tracking for whole childhood we could calculate some average of gunshots heard in vicinity to score and give school spots to those with highest total.
Or well, accept that same test is fair enough solution and it is impossible and probably not even sensible to apply some gameable metrics.
The schools that went test-optional already have switched back because this actually gives lower income students the best chance to distinguish themselves. The narrative that lower income students with less opportunities would benefit from not submitting SATs turned out to be false.
“People who say it cannot be done should not interrupt those who are doing it” -Bernard Shaw
I'm pretty tired of progressives insisting that people who grew up in poverty but were able to improve our lot in life through study, doing well on grades, and, yes, on standardized tests, like me, do not exist.
> someone whose home study time is disrupted frequently by gunfire outside is probably not getting the same chance as someone who lives on a 20 acre estate with private tutors for every subject
Is there any world in which the first student, struggling in that context, treads water at a UC?
I used to volunteer to tutor high-school aged students in New York. I gave up and moved to grade schoolers. A refugee who will take the SAT in six months and wants to go to college, but is struggling with basic reading comprehension and symbolic math is just not going to do well in college in a year.
Note: the student who excels in that first setting should absolutely be admitted. But they’re, by definition, already excelling.
Most likely the people living somewhere continuously with gunfire wasn’t ever going to succeed academically either way. There are exceptions of course.
You’d have to basically rebirth and resocialize them in a different culture entirely.
Far too many people already have been educated past their natural state and it’s going to get ugly.
How does the existence of standardized testing give everyone the same chance? As an extremely over-exaggerated example example, someone whose home study time is disrupted frequently by gunfire outside is probably not getting the same chance as someone who lives on a 20 acre estate with private tutors for every subject.