4 ms·

The adversity score, as far as I can see, gives high scores to students who succeed in worse school districts. While none of the sites reporting on this bother

The adversity score, as far as I can see, gives high scores to students who succeed in worse school districts. While none of the sites reporting on this bothered to link to any kind of official announcement, it looks like this may be a refinement of the tool announced here in 2016: https://secure-media.collegeboard.org/digitalServices/pdf/professionals/data-driven-models-to-understand-environmental-context.pdf https://secure-media.collegeboard.org/digitalServices/pdf/pr... From the college board's description of the tool, it weights applicant scores by the quality of their neighborhood and high school. So a disadvantaged student whose family focused on moving to a neighborhood/school where lots of students succeed is not given a high score in this analysis. The OP had the same opportunity, but because they did the traditional things for a poorer family to encourage their students to succeed (moving to a good school district and sacrificing on the commute) they will be considered a privileged student in this analysis.

learc83 7y ago
>The OP had the same opportunity, but because they did the traditional things for a poorer family to encourage their students to succeed (moving to a good school district and sacrificing on the commute) they will be considered a privileged student in this analysis. Compared to the poor students whose parents didn't make those sacrifices, they are privileged.
- danmaz74 7y ago
  In general, if you make a sacrifice to earn something, that something isn't a privilege.
  - learc83 7y ago
    Your parents making a sacrifice isn't the same thing as you making a sacrifice. If my dad makes a sacrifice by working 100 hours a week to buy me a Maserati, the car is definitely a privilege not something I earned. And yeah, I may have lost out on spending time with my dad, but that wasn't a choice I made, so while it cost me something it wasn't a sacrifice on my part.
    - solveit 7y ago
      I agree, but do we really want to disincentivise parents sacrificing for their children's education? I'm fine with taxing Maseratis at whatever rate, not so fine with this.
      - learc83 7y ago
        For society as a whole I don't think it is particularly beneficial to encourage people to move to rich neighborhoods/better school districts. The other factors are so far removed from most individual's control that I don't think we'll see much of an impact on behavior.
    - cljs-js-eval 7y ago
      Sometimes it's hard to see the second order effects of our actions, but it seems pretty clear cut how society will be affected if you punish people willing to invest in their childrens' education.
      - learc83 7y ago
        I don't think that encouraging people to move to rich neighborhoods with better schools is necessarily beneficial for society as a whole.
    - lenkite 7y ago
      For many Asian-American's their children's education is a dream that they plan out and sacrifice for so that their kin can have better opportunity than what they managed for themselves. Many are tightly knit families where children look after parents or other close family members later in life. To penalise and denigrate the efforts of such families as "privilege" is awful.
      - learc83 7y ago
        Many White, Black, and Hispanic families do the same thing. It's not denigrating that sacrifice to acknowledge that being born into cohesive, supportive family that values hard work is a privilege that many poor children do not have.
  - cardine 7y ago
    The student is not making the sacrifice, the parent is. The student has the privilege of benefiting from their parents' sacrifices.
    - Bendingo 7y ago
      > The student has the privilege of benefiting from their parents' sacrifices And that sacrifice will be for nought, due to adversity scoring. This is a very bad idea.
      - cardine 7y ago
        How would the sacrifice be for naught? The kid is presumably smarter and harder working and better prepared for success no matter what college they go to. But for college admissions, I don't think it is unreasonable to judge a kid for how well they did relative to the advantages they were given.
  - spamizbad 7y ago
    How does a child earn hard-working parents? They don't: they won the genetic lottery.

learc83 7y ago

>The OP had the same opportunity, but because they did the traditional things for a poorer family to encourage their students to succeed (moving to a good school district and sacrificing on the commute) they will be considered a privileged student in this analysis. Compared to the poor students whose parents didn't make those sacrifices, they are privileged.

danmaz74 7y ago
In general, if you make a sacrifice to earn something, that something isn't a privilege.
- learc83 7y ago
  Your parents making a sacrifice isn't the same thing as you making a sacrifice. If my dad makes a sacrifice by working 100 hours a week to buy me a Maserati, the car is definitely a privilege not something I earned. And yeah, I may have lost out on spending time with my dad, but that wasn't a choice I made, so while it cost me something it wasn't a sacrifice on my part.
  - solveit 7y ago
    I agree, but do we really want to disincentivise parents sacrificing for their children's education? I'm fine with taxing Maseratis at whatever rate, not so fine with this.
    - learc83 7y ago
      For society as a whole I don't think it is particularly beneficial to encourage people to move to rich neighborhoods/better school districts. The other factors are so far removed from most individual's control that I don't think we'll see much of an impact on behavior.
  - cljs-js-eval 7y ago
    Sometimes it's hard to see the second order effects of our actions, but it seems pretty clear cut how society will be affected if you punish people willing to invest in their childrens' education.
    - learc83 7y ago
      I don't think that encouraging people to move to rich neighborhoods with better schools is necessarily beneficial for society as a whole.
  - lenkite 7y ago
    For many Asian-American's their children's education is a dream that they plan out and sacrifice for so that their kin can have better opportunity than what they managed for themselves. Many are tightly knit families where children look after parents or other close family members later in life. To penalise and denigrate the efforts of such families as "privilege" is awful.
    - learc83 7y ago
      Many White, Black, and Hispanic families do the same thing. It's not denigrating that sacrifice to acknowledge that being born into cohesive, supportive family that values hard work is a privilege that many poor children do not have.
- cardine 7y ago
  The student is not making the sacrifice, the parent is. The student has the privilege of benefiting from their parents' sacrifices.
  - Bendingo 7y ago
    > The student has the privilege of benefiting from their parents' sacrifices And that sacrifice will be for nought, due to adversity scoring. This is a very bad idea.
    - cardine 7y ago
      How would the sacrifice be for naught? The kid is presumably smarter and harder working and better prepared for success no matter what college they go to. But for college admissions, I don't think it is unreasonable to judge a kid for how well they did relative to the advantages they were given.
- spamizbad 7y ago
  How does a child earn hard-working parents? They don't: they won the genetic lottery.