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...and his point is why should his dad make that sacrifice for his kids if the SAT board is just going to subvert his efforts?

by darawk 7y ago

harryh 7y ago
Because we don't want to live in a society that so strongly encourages "sacrificing vacations and eating out for 12 years (literally ate out 5x max)" and "My dad commuted 4 hours daily instead of moving." I'm all about parents sacrificing for their kids, but when the system is set up to push people that far something about the system is broken.
- darawk 7y ago
  We should absolutely want to live in a society that rewards people for effort and sacrifice. If we do not reward people for doing those things, they won't do them, and you definitely don't want to live in that society.
  - apocalypstyx 7y ago
    I wonder if the opposite is true as well. That is, when theses sorts of discussions come up, I'm always asking: when is it over? When does the sacrifice stop? A person sacrifices for their kid for some nebulous better life, which their kid goes on to do for their kids...ad infinitum? However, through an evolutionary lens it make some sense: an individual doesn't have to have time to enjoy any advantage they've accrued through such previous sacrifice because evolution doesn't care if you're happy, just that you're reproducing successfully, and so far that's instilled (it's arguable) an instinctive sense to socially rise in order to obtain better access to such. So in such a sense there really would be no point of it being over (except for the extinction of the species). So why shouldn't someone in this great chain of sacrifice say no and kick their feet up and enjoy the fruits of all that sacrifice? This would explain why we (society at large and various specific social groups) treat the childless so negatively and use the term anti-natalist as a slur. However, there is another component to it: one's advantage is always relative to others' lack of advantage. This is why equal access education will never be truly supported (no matter what people say); if all kids have the same advantage as their kids, then their kids don't actually have any advantage at all (in social terms).
    - darawk 7y ago
      I think it's just a personal choice everyone makes. How much should they sacrifice now to have more later (either personally, or inter-generationally). We all have different preferences around that, and that's ok. If someone is willing to work harder or sacrifice more, it's reasonable for them to get more reward later on for their efforts. If you prefer to enjoy the present, that's ok too.
  - harryh 7y ago
    "I'm all about parents sacrificing for their kids" <--- Did you skip the part where I wrote this?
    - darawk 7y ago
      Did you skip what I wrote? You say you're all about parents sacrificing for their kids. But why would they bother if their kids won't get any benefit from it?
      - harryh 7y ago
        It's a matter of degree. Some sacrifice = great. Extreme sacrifice = bad.
        darawk 7y ago
        Is not eating out or taking vacations too much sacrifice?
        harryh 7y ago
        It is when combined with "commuted 4 hours daily."
        learc83 7y ago
        I agree. I wouldn't have traded 20 hours a week of time spent with my dad for a better neighborhood.
        pertymcpert 7y ago
        Yes. Really. Your family is not model to be aspirational of. Yours is a warning to others.
        darawk 7y ago
        To be clear, my family did not make those tradeoffs. I'm not the original commenter. But why do you think such a thing is a warning?
rayiner 7y ago
Why should the College Board not recognize that kids in fact have unequal opportunities for reasons totally outside their control?
- darawk 7y ago
  It's fine to recognize it. But if you say, z-score applicants by their 'adversity score' peer group, then you negate the impact of their parents efforts. If you negate their parents efforts, you make it not worthwhile for their parents to make those efforts in the first place. If you make it not worthwhile to make those efforts, they won't be made. And society as a whole will be worse off for it.
  - rayiner 7y ago
    The whole point is to devalue those efforts. I thought OP wanted “equality of opportunity.” You can’t have equality of opportunity if some kids get a head start because of their parents.
    - darawk 7y ago
      In a world where the efforts of parents don't help their kids, parents won't make efforts. This will degrade the educational attainment of all kids. Most people consider this to be a bad thing.
      - harryh 7y ago
        "diminishing the effect outsized parental involvement can have on college admissions" != "efforts of parents don't help their kids"
        darawk 7y ago
        That really depends on how much diminishing you do. Either way, at the margin, you decrease the return to parental investment. At the margin, parents will invest less.
batbomb 7y ago
What would it subvert? You go to a better school, you get a better education, you are more educated and you get a 34 on the ACT. If you go to a crappy school and you get the same score than there's no qualitative difference between the schools and your parents skipped vacations for nothing. But obviously the OP must believe there was value in the better school otherwise they wouldn't mention it. So they would believe they would have got a lower score in a different school, and if that's a proxy for education, then the OP must have ended up with a better education, and is also much more likely to succeed at _any_ college they go to, even if it's not Harvard.
- darawk 7y ago
  I'm not sure what your point is. Nobody mentioned Harvard. This de-values the efforts of parents to improve their kids education. If you devalue something, you get less of it. Simple as that.
  - kaitai 7y ago
    Can you spell out how it devalues the efforts of parents to improve their children's education?
    - darawk 7y ago
      Sure. The adversity score looks at things like the crime rate of the neighborhood you grew up in. That neighborhood is (primarily) a function of two things: Your parents income level, and their ability to prioritize what income they do have to make sure you're in a good neighborhood. The second thing is what's being de-valued. Some parents work really hard and pinch every penny to devote resources to their kid's education. Scoring kids based on adversity partially mitigates those efforts for the purpose of getting into college.
      - jhayward 7y ago
        > Your parents income level, and their ability to prioritize what income they do have to make sure you're in a good neighborhood. The second thing is what's being de-valued. So, you're saying that people who have the misfortune to have parents who can't do those things for them should suffer a handicap, right? How well you are able to compete for a slot in college should depend on who your parents are?

...and his point is why should his dad make that sacrifice for his kids if the SAT board is just going to subvert his efforts?

by darawk 7y ago

...and his point is why should his dad make that sacrifice for his kids if the SAT board is just going to subvert his efforts?

harryh 7y ago

Because we don't want to live in a society that so strongly encourages "sacrificing vacations and eating out for 12 years (literally ate out 5x max)" and "My dad commuted 4 hours daily instead of moving." I'm all about parents sacrificing for their kids, but when the system is set up to push people that far something about the system is broken.

darawk 7y ago
We should absolutely want to live in a society that rewards people for effort and sacrifice. If we do not reward people for doing those things, they won't do them, and you definitely don't want to live in that society.
- apocalypstyx 7y ago
  I wonder if the opposite is true as well. That is, when theses sorts of discussions come up, I'm always asking: when is it over? When does the sacrifice stop? A person sacrifices for their kid for some nebulous better life, which their kid goes on to do for their kids...ad infinitum? However, through an evolutionary lens it make some sense: an individual doesn't have to have time to enjoy any advantage they've accrued through such previous sacrifice because evolution doesn't care if you're happy, just that you're reproducing successfully, and so far that's instilled (it's arguable) an instinctive sense to socially rise in order to obtain better access to such. So in such a sense there really would be no point of it being over (except for the extinction of the species). So why shouldn't someone in this great chain of sacrifice say no and kick their feet up and enjoy the fruits of all that sacrifice? This would explain why we (society at large and various specific social groups) treat the childless so negatively and use the term anti-natalist as a slur. However, there is another component to it: one's advantage is always relative to others' lack of advantage. This is why equal access education will never be truly supported (no matter what people say); if all kids have the same advantage as their kids, then their kids don't actually have any advantage at all (in social terms).
  - darawk 7y ago
    I think it's just a personal choice everyone makes. How much should they sacrifice now to have more later (either personally, or inter-generationally). We all have different preferences around that, and that's ok. If someone is willing to work harder or sacrifice more, it's reasonable for them to get more reward later on for their efforts. If you prefer to enjoy the present, that's ok too.
- harryh 7y ago
  "I'm all about parents sacrificing for their kids" <--- Did you skip the part where I wrote this?
  - darawk 7y ago
    Did you skip what I wrote? You say you're all about parents sacrificing for their kids. But why would they bother if their kids won't get any benefit from it?
    - harryh 7y ago
      It's a matter of degree. Some sacrifice = great. Extreme sacrifice = bad.
      - darawk 7y ago
        Is not eating out or taking vacations too much sacrifice?
        harryh 7y ago
        It is when combined with "commuted 4 hours daily."
        learc83 7y ago
        I agree. I wouldn't have traded 20 hours a week of time spent with my dad for a better neighborhood.
        pertymcpert 7y ago
        Yes. Really. Your family is not model to be aspirational of. Yours is a warning to others.
        darawk 7y ago
        To be clear, my family did not make those tradeoffs. I'm not the original commenter. But why do you think such a thing is a warning?

rayiner 7y ago

Why should the College Board not recognize that kids in fact have unequal opportunities for reasons totally outside their control?

darawk 7y ago
It's fine to recognize it. But if you say, z-score applicants by their 'adversity score' peer group, then you negate the impact of their parents efforts. If you negate their parents efforts, you make it not worthwhile for their parents to make those efforts in the first place. If you make it not worthwhile to make those efforts, they won't be made. And society as a whole will be worse off for it.
- rayiner 7y ago
  The whole point is to devalue those efforts. I thought OP wanted “equality of opportunity.” You can’t have equality of opportunity if some kids get a head start because of their parents.
  - darawk 7y ago
    In a world where the efforts of parents don't help their kids, parents won't make efforts. This will degrade the educational attainment of all kids. Most people consider this to be a bad thing.
    - harryh 7y ago
      "diminishing the effect outsized parental involvement can have on college admissions" != "efforts of parents don't help their kids"
      - darawk 7y ago
        That really depends on how much diminishing you do. Either way, at the margin, you decrease the return to parental investment. At the margin, parents will invest less.

batbomb 7y ago

What would it subvert? You go to a better school, you get a better education, you are more educated and you get a 34 on the ACT. If you go to a crappy school and you get the same score than there's no qualitative difference between the schools and your parents skipped vacations for nothing. But obviously the OP must believe there was value in the better school otherwise they wouldn't mention it. So they would believe they would have got a lower score in a different school, and if that's a proxy for education, then the OP must have ended up with a better education, and is also much more likely to succeed at _any_ college they go to, even if it's not Harvard.

darawk 7y ago
I'm not sure what your point is. Nobody mentioned Harvard. This de-values the efforts of parents to improve their kids education. If you devalue something, you get less of it. Simple as that.
- kaitai 7y ago
  Can you spell out how it devalues the efforts of parents to improve their children's education?
  - darawk 7y ago
    Sure. The adversity score looks at things like the crime rate of the neighborhood you grew up in. That neighborhood is (primarily) a function of two things: Your parents income level, and their ability to prioritize what income they do have to make sure you're in a good neighborhood. The second thing is what's being de-valued. Some parents work really hard and pinch every penny to devote resources to their kid's education. Scoring kids based on adversity partially mitigates those efforts for the purpose of getting into college.
    - jhayward 7y ago
      > Your parents income level, and their ability to prioritize what income they do have to make sure you're in a good neighborhood. The second thing is what's being de-valued. So, you're saying that people who have the misfortune to have parents who can't do those things for them should suffer a handicap, right? How well you are able to compete for a slot in college should depend on who your parents are?