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Makes sense. How would you change the incentives to make what you described less viable?

by memexy 6y ago

hindsightbias 6y ago
I think SAT/ACT/AP scores took power away from provosts/admins and there was some accomadation to meritocracy. Underprivileged had a chance, but it was a long shot. It’s too many trying to get into too few colleges. We need more, smaller universities. Federal funds/grants should be reoriented away from the Ivies. Zero Federal funds for schools that don’t have lower than 30:1 class sizes. That would stop admin bloat overnight. The Musks, Gates and Bezos’ of the world should be building new colleges, not dumping more into the olds.
- intended 6y ago
  That would also kill schools that are in places with few resources. Ivies don’t need fed funds - they play a different game since the underlying markets tend to be asymptotic - the upper end of students, the upper end of professors, the upper end of athletes, the upper end of wealthy legacies.
  - hindsightbias 6y ago
    “the average amount of money that the eight Ivy League schools received annually over that time period — $4.31 billion — exceeds the amount of money received by 16 of the 50 states.” Fund those with few resources or create new ones away from the Ivies. You can’t democratize the Ivies but you can give a lot more people a better education. The status quo is that the Ivies have their cake and eat it too. https://www.thedp.com/article/2017/04/ivy-league-tax-report https://www.thedp.com/article/2017/04/ivy-league-tax-report
    - intended 6y ago
      That sounded weasel wordy so I read the article - > full $41.59 billion of the Ivy League’s money could be traced back to taxpayer-funded payments and benefits. Traces back. So part of it is tax breaks to educational institutions- which is natural, they have the biggest endowments combined so the tax benefits will be massive. They point out that major research happens at these institutions so they have more money from that as well. This meshes less with the “have their cake and eat it too” line of thinking and more a result of the distortions from reputation and network effects.

Makes sense. How would you change the incentives to make what you described less viable?

by memexy 6y ago

Makes sense. How would you change the incentives to make what you described less viable?

I think SAT/ACT/AP scores took power away from provosts/admins and there was some accomadation to meritocracy. Underprivileged had a chance, but it was a long shot. It’s too many trying to get into too few colleges. We need more, smaller universities. Federal funds/grants should be reoriented away from the Ivies. Zero Federal funds for schools that don’t have lower than 30:1 class sizes. That would stop admin bloat overnight. The Musks, Gates and Bezos’ of the world should be building new colleges, not dumping more into the olds.

intended 6y ago
That would also kill schools that are in places with few resources. Ivies don’t need fed funds - they play a different game since the underlying markets tend to be asymptotic - the upper end of students, the upper end of professors, the upper end of athletes, the upper end of wealthy legacies.
- hindsightbias 6y ago
  “the average amount of money that the eight Ivy League schools received annually over that time period — $4.31 billion — exceeds the amount of money received by 16 of the 50 states.” Fund those with few resources or create new ones away from the Ivies. You can’t democratize the Ivies but you can give a lot more people a better education. The status quo is that the Ivies have their cake and eat it too. https://www.thedp.com/article/2017/04/ivy-league-tax-report https://www.thedp.com/article/2017/04/ivy-league-tax-report
  - intended 6y ago
    That sounded weasel wordy so I read the article - > full $41.59 billion of the Ivy League’s money could be traced back to taxpayer-funded payments and benefits. Traces back. So part of it is tax breaks to educational institutions- which is natural, they have the biggest endowments combined so the tax benefits will be massive. They point out that major research happens at these institutions so they have more money from that as well. This meshes less with the “have their cake and eat it too” line of thinking and more a result of the distortions from reputation and network effects.