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The bright children of the upper middle class going on to have great life outcomes are the core of inequality in America. Schools that nurture and socialize the

The bright children of the upper middle class going on to have great life outcomes are the core of inequality in America. Schools that nurture and socialize these kids with each other are an important mechanism in that outperformance. If you intend to reduce inequality, then that is exactly what you want to disrupt. Secret racism is too easy a copout. This goes right to the core of defining relative inequality (vs. absolute outcomes) as the important issue.

refurb 7y ago
Wait, are you arguing we shouldn’t provide opportunities for gifted kids because it reduces inequality?
- garmaine 7y ago
  He is saying we should have more equal opportunities regardless of socio-economic background.
  - quotemstr 7y ago
    Which is meaningless, especially with respect to this discussion
- RobertoG 7y ago
  I think he is saying that they don't get the opportunities because they are gifted kids, but because they are upper-middle class.
  - Viliam1234 7y ago
    It can be both. To be smart is an advantage. To be born in a rich family is also an advantage. Life can be unfair in many ways simultaneously. Ironically, if you deny the importance of IQ, it mostly hurts the smart kids from poor families. Because the rich parents will find ways for their kids to realize their full potential -- whether it is a full potential of an average child, or a full potential of a gifted child. It is the gifted child born in a poor family who won't have a private tutor because their parents can't afford it, but also will be denied by the system because "IQ doesn't mean anything". Smart kids from poor families need even more help than smart kids from rich families, and we deny it to them in the name of fighting inequality. It's no child left behind the minimum requirements of the school system, but many children left miles behind their true potential; especially the poor ones.
    - gowld 7y ago
      IQ doesn't matter. Every child deserves opportunities to learn and grow, opportunities that match their aptitude. There's no need for an IQ test when providing that. IQ testing is just used for gatekeeping.
      - Viliam1234 7y ago
        In theory, as long as we have some reliable way to measure the aptitude, and we provide the corresponding opportunities, I don't really mind if we avoid mentioning the word "intelligence". But, you know, the offensive thing about IQ is exactly that it demonstrates that different people have different aptitude. So, in practice, I find it difficult to believe that people fighting against the concept of IQ would be willing to provide sufficient opportunities to children with high IQ. Sadly, many people's instinctive reaction to a gifted child is throwing some obstacles in the child's way, to "prove" that the child "was actually not that smart". (This is even more likely, if the child is a minority, or autistic, or different in some other visible way.) Some of those people are teachers. I know stories... Like, there is a girl I know who did math olympiads at elementary school. For some reason, this rubbed her math teacher the wrong way, so the teacher started bullying her in the classroom. Two years later, the girl had phobia of math, and was unable to do even school-level math. Then her parents intervened and transferred her to another school, and with some private tutoring (by me; that's how I know the story) she became a straight A student again, and later successfully completed a university that required a lot of math. She never got back to the competition level, though, because the wasted time made a difference. This story is less rare than you might hope. Quite many gifted kids, unless they also have superior social skills, are bullied either by their peers or by adults. People are bad at tolerating difference; twice so, if the difference suggests that the different person is somehow superior. And the gifted kids with superior social skills aren't winners here either; when they tell you "I was interested in many things, but I was careful never to mention it in front of my classmates", it makes you wonder what they could have achieved if they were allowed to follow their interests freely.
      - sokoloff 7y ago
        IQ matters in terms of determining the spectrum of offerings that a funding-limited school system (which is all of them, just to different degrees) should provide. If you measure achievement based on "percent reading at grade level and passing MCAS", then all high-IQ students are, in effect, "left behind". I agree strongly with your 2nd sentence, but disagree strongly with the first and fourth.
- lowiqengineer 7y ago
  I don’t know if it is, but i fully agree if that is OPs interpretation. They don’t need any help.
  - gowld 7y ago
    Education is good for society, not just the educated.
- closeparen 7y ago
  I think reducing inequality is a terrible goal because it commits you to positions like de Blasio's. But his actions are entirely consistent with his stated values. Gifted & talented programs push people into the right tail of the distribution, which increases its variance, which is exactly what "rising inequality" is.
gowld 7y ago
You're being downvoted by people who don't like the truth or haven't seen a public school "equity" document recently. A better solution is to raise taxes on those rich families, not handicap education.
TheBobinator 7y ago
We're talking about people in the ~155-180 IQ band; In a city the size of Chicago you have 20 or so people in that band. The reason it's called "Gifted" is because you get born with it, just like your skin color. I didn't choose to have a high IQ. Frankly, with the way people have treated me in life and all the pain I've gone through due to it, I'm not so sure I'd want to be this way. I'm sure you know that feeling. You want to explain performance differences in racial groups, look at complex trauma and cultural phenomina. Conduct an similar ACE study in the south-side and see what you get. I think what you're going to find is 50% of the population has generational complex trauma they are trying to escape, and their outcomes would be improved draumatically by specialist intervention and I think one that is done, you are going to find out IQ isn't altogether different between racial groups in a country like the US.

refurb 7y ago

Wait, are you arguing we shouldn’t provide opportunities for gifted kids because it reduces inequality?

garmaine 7y ago
He is saying we should have more equal opportunities regardless of socio-economic background.
- quotemstr 7y ago
  Which is meaningless, especially with respect to this discussion
RobertoG 7y ago
I think he is saying that they don't get the opportunities because they are gifted kids, but because they are upper-middle class.
- Viliam1234 7y ago
  It can be both. To be smart is an advantage. To be born in a rich family is also an advantage. Life can be unfair in many ways simultaneously. Ironically, if you deny the importance of IQ, it mostly hurts the smart kids from poor families. Because the rich parents will find ways for their kids to realize their full potential -- whether it is a full potential of an average child, or a full potential of a gifted child. It is the gifted child born in a poor family who won't have a private tutor because their parents can't afford it, but also will be denied by the system because "IQ doesn't mean anything". Smart kids from poor families need even more help than smart kids from rich families, and we deny it to them in the name of fighting inequality. It's no child left behind the minimum requirements of the school system, but many children left miles behind their true potential; especially the poor ones.
  - gowld 7y ago
    IQ doesn't matter. Every child deserves opportunities to learn and grow, opportunities that match their aptitude. There's no need for an IQ test when providing that. IQ testing is just used for gatekeeping.
    - Viliam1234 7y ago
      In theory, as long as we have some reliable way to measure the aptitude, and we provide the corresponding opportunities, I don't really mind if we avoid mentioning the word "intelligence". But, you know, the offensive thing about IQ is exactly that it demonstrates that different people have different aptitude. So, in practice, I find it difficult to believe that people fighting against the concept of IQ would be willing to provide sufficient opportunities to children with high IQ. Sadly, many people's instinctive reaction to a gifted child is throwing some obstacles in the child's way, to "prove" that the child "was actually not that smart". (This is even more likely, if the child is a minority, or autistic, or different in some other visible way.) Some of those people are teachers. I know stories... Like, there is a girl I know who did math olympiads at elementary school. For some reason, this rubbed her math teacher the wrong way, so the teacher started bullying her in the classroom. Two years later, the girl had phobia of math, and was unable to do even school-level math. Then her parents intervened and transferred her to another school, and with some private tutoring (by me; that's how I know the story) she became a straight A student again, and later successfully completed a university that required a lot of math. She never got back to the competition level, though, because the wasted time made a difference. This story is less rare than you might hope. Quite many gifted kids, unless they also have superior social skills, are bullied either by their peers or by adults. People are bad at tolerating difference; twice so, if the difference suggests that the different person is somehow superior. And the gifted kids with superior social skills aren't winners here either; when they tell you "I was interested in many things, but I was careful never to mention it in front of my classmates", it makes you wonder what they could have achieved if they were allowed to follow their interests freely.
    - sokoloff 7y ago
      IQ matters in terms of determining the spectrum of offerings that a funding-limited school system (which is all of them, just to different degrees) should provide. If you measure achievement based on "percent reading at grade level and passing MCAS", then all high-IQ students are, in effect, "left behind". I agree strongly with your 2nd sentence, but disagree strongly with the first and fourth.
lowiqengineer 7y ago
I don’t know if it is, but i fully agree if that is OPs interpretation. They don’t need any help.
- gowld 7y ago
  Education is good for society, not just the educated.
closeparen 7y ago
I think reducing inequality is a terrible goal because it commits you to positions like de Blasio's. But his actions are entirely consistent with his stated values. Gifted & talented programs push people into the right tail of the distribution, which increases its variance, which is exactly what "rising inequality" is.

gowld 7y ago

You're being downvoted by people who don't like the truth or haven't seen a public school "equity" document recently. A better solution is to raise taxes on those rich families, not handicap education.

TheBobinator 7y ago

We're talking about people in the ~155-180 IQ band; In a city the size of Chicago you have 20 or so people in that band. The reason it's called "Gifted" is because you get born with it, just like your skin color. I didn't choose to have a high IQ. Frankly, with the way people have treated me in life and all the pain I've gone through due to it, I'm not so sure I'd want to be this way. I'm sure you know that feeling. You want to explain performance differences in racial groups, look at complex trauma and cultural phenomina. Conduct an similar ACE study in the south-side and see what you get. I think what you're going to find is 50% of the population has generational complex trauma they are trying to escape, and their outcomes would be improved draumatically by specialist intervention and I think one that is done, you are going to find out IQ isn't altogether different between racial groups in a country like the US.