[eikenberry]

Why is a lossy testing filter better than just failing out those who can't make it? Maybe allow for larger freshmen classes and smaller latter classes or adopt community colleges and have all students start there and advance into the UC system sophomore year on. Instead they bring back what is basically an IQ test for admission.

[bigthymer]

From the students' perspective, it is better to not be allowed in than fail out midway through. One test is cheaper than years in college.

[falcor84]

I personally strongly disagree. I think it's much better to be given the opportunity to do the actual work, rather than to be required to do the pre-assessment song and dance. And if there are actual prerequisites that a person hasn't previously passed, they should be allowed to be tested on these specifically.

[zugi]

It depends on a lot of things. If they've also applied to another college that's better suited to their ability, admitting then to a school where they'll likely fail is not really doing them a favor.

[paytonjjones]

Apply the same question to jobs and it's easy to see: why is a lossy [interview] filter better than just [firing] those who can't make it?

This has enormous costs to the institution, the teachers/mentors, and of course to the person failing out.

And that's not even factoring in the social and psychological costs.

[eikenberry]

Disagree. Hiring and firing is better than a bad interview process. The reason we don't have that is due to regulations and litigiousness (and the laws that facilitate it).

IMO failing to get the opportunity is worse than getting the opportunity and failing at it.

[stephenbez]

High graduation rates are an important metric to administrators. If a professor gave a failing grade to 1/3 of the class they would be in hot water.

[stockresearcher]

My wife has a civil engineering degree. There were a number of courses where partial credit was not permitted and the final exam was 2 questions. It was common for students to take those courses 3 or 4 times before passing. Giving a failing grade to only 1/3 of the class might get a professor investigated for making the class too easy.

[collabs]

> High graduation rates are an important metric to administrators. If a professor gave a failing grade to 1/3 of the class they would be in hot water.

I remember practically every single instructor/professor on the first day of class during my freshman year of my undergraduate study said something along the lines of "I have no curves. Your grades depend on you and nobody else. If the whole class does well, everyone can get an A. If nobody does well, everybody can fail."

So I guess this was more motivational to get us to study rather than stating facts?

[falcor84]

I remember a first lecture when I started my CS studies, where the professor said something like "look at the people to your left and to your right, it's likely that at least one of you will drop out by the end of this year; it's ok, this is not for everyone; if you truly believe this is for you, put in the effort and you'll make it"

[andrecarini]

Failing 1/3 of a class if that cohort is genuinely deemed not qualified enough to pass shouldn't be a problem by itself.

But then it raises questions like "are they really unqualified or is the testing methodology inadequate?" and "why was the system unable to provide the necessary growth to such a high slice of the class?". And then the easy way out is to just cherry-pick which students enter the system at all.

[WalterBright]

Caltech did not grade on a curve. I recall one class were half the class failed.

[chasd00]

I’ve had classes like that or ones that start with 75 students and end with 5 and I went to a very easy state school (late 90s)

[lo_zamoyski]

That depends. Some schools actually cap the number of students permitted to continue. They fail a certain fixed number or percentage of students below a threshold, even if the raw score is good.