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I grew up pretty poor, and through a longer story than I want to type here and a confluence of negative voices mostly from my school, was dissuaded from taking

by bane 4y ago

I grew up pretty poor, and through a longer story than I want to type here and a confluence of negative voices mostly from my school, was dissuaded from taking the SATs and even considering college. Years after high school I eventually found my way to community college, then to a 4-year, a grad program and so on. It worked out to be a blessing as I graduated without debt from a major university and entered into a realm of well paying jobs that have put me firmly into a life the rest of my family can barely even comprehend. To me the proof I should continue to a 4-year degree was doing well in my community college courses. I am fortunate to have been given the gift of automatic entry by policy makers who decided long ago that if you graduate from a Community College you can go to a State School no questions asked...and you can go to a Community College by basically walking off the street no questions asked. I graduated my undergrad with a 4.0 and my grad with a 4.0, but to be honest I don't think my SATs would have been worth entry into any college and my high school GPA was around a 2.5. My point is, there are other ways of assessing a child's entire future for entry than a single test, and many alternate paths to attainment. But we act as if there is only one kind of path and one kind of package, a 1600 SAT score, lots of extracurriculars, "differentiator" activities, and an original heart strings pulling letter. Top schools need to get smarter, more creative, and maybe take a page from those "lesser" schools they turn their noses up at.

BobbyJo 4y ago
Doing well in college is a great measure of how well you'll do in college, and subsequently, many good schools will accept mid degree transfers of undergraduate students who might not have done well in high school. I don't think it's viable to use that to replace the SAT and other current evaluation metrics, however.
- bane 4y ago
  I guess my point is, why not just shove all the students into a Community College a-like for the beginning of their undergrad? With the following features: - Open enrollment - Cheap - Can drop out and retry later without any penalty - Entry into the final two years is granted based on first two year performance, state schools are guaranteed entry, and privates get to be selective based on major(s), student performance awards, and GPAs. - CC Associates degrees can be earned in periods much longer than 2 years. Allowing students to work, or retake remedial subjects, or try out multiple majors, without it being a huge deal. The first two years of most undergraduate degrees are fairly similar. IIR there's been studies that show that students who arrive at the universities from CCs do as well as or better than their traditional peers. It helps with student cost and loan problems. Graduates who don't go on to their final 2 or have no plans to can simply treat the CC as a trade education. And many students who do flunk out of school due to partying, immaturity, etc. can simply come and try again when they are ready. Students actually get an education rather than studying for a mostly useless test. Basically the CCs are a softer entry into higher education, and can be the test for performance in a way that actually is meaningful. Since student have to pay to be there, it's not just the same thing as high-school, and CC schedules are usually so flexible students can even enter the workforce while going to CC, or take more time to "figure out" what they want to really major in without it costing hundreds of thousands of dollars. Also, as I've gotten older, and realized that tests like the SAT are just a product offered by a company, and not some Federal standard, I've started to view those kinds of tests as more of a racket than a real filter. People I know in higher education think the test is basically worthless, but also acknowledge that students have basically learned nothing over the pandemic, leaving them with very little to be selective for entry with.
  - BobbyJo 4y ago
    I mean, if the route makes sense for you, it's there right now, and if you want to and are able to get into a bigger school without that, why not do that instead? Is there a benefit from forcing all students to funnel through a CC? It seems to me everything you want kids to do they can do today, they just aren't forced to do it. I got a scholarship for a state U, so it was actually just as cheap for me to do that as opposed to a CC (maybe cheaper since I had dorms available to me at the state school). > Students actually get an education rather than studying for a mostly useless test. I don't think the test is useless. A lot of the things you do on the SAT you have to do in those Gen. Ed. classes, so it seems to me it overlaps considerably with the classes you are proposing they take at a CC. That being said, it's hard for me to imagine the Gen. Ed. classes at a CC aren't as useless as anything else considering my experience with that at the U. I went to. > or take more time to "figure out" what they want to really major in without it costing hundreds of thousands of dollars Plenty of schools are significantly cheaper than that. The university I went to was about the same cost as a CC as my brother went to (granted he went to a CC in California and I went to a U. in Florida). That said, I do think students that are in the boat of wanting to go to a super expensive school, that they'll need loans to attend, should definitely get their Gen. Ed. credits from a cheaper school if possible. It's a waste of money to pay private school prices for "Algebra 1" or "Art History 1". > Also, as I've gotten older, and realized that tests like the SAT are just a product offered by a company, and not some Federal standard, I've started to view those kinds of tests as more of a racket than a real filter. Being offered by a private company doesn't make it a racket. Schools are free to consider it in their admissions process or not since it's private, but most choose to because it's useful in the selection process (as evidenced by this story).

by bane 4y ago

BobbyJo 4y ago

Doing well in college is a great measure of how well you'll do in college, and subsequently, many good schools will accept mid degree transfers of undergraduate students who might not have done well in high school. I don't think it's viable to use that to replace the SAT and other current evaluation metrics, however.

bane 4y ago
I guess my point is, why not just shove all the students into a Community College a-like for the beginning of their undergrad? With the following features: - Open enrollment - Cheap - Can drop out and retry later without any penalty - Entry into the final two years is granted based on first two year performance, state schools are guaranteed entry, and privates get to be selective based on major(s), student performance awards, and GPAs. - CC Associates degrees can be earned in periods much longer than 2 years. Allowing students to work, or retake remedial subjects, or try out multiple majors, without it being a huge deal. The first two years of most undergraduate degrees are fairly similar. IIR there's been studies that show that students who arrive at the universities from CCs do as well as or better than their traditional peers. It helps with student cost and loan problems. Graduates who don't go on to their final 2 or have no plans to can simply treat the CC as a trade education. And many students who do flunk out of school due to partying, immaturity, etc. can simply come and try again when they are ready. Students actually get an education rather than studying for a mostly useless test. Basically the CCs are a softer entry into higher education, and can be the test for performance in a way that actually is meaningful. Since student have to pay to be there, it's not just the same thing as high-school, and CC schedules are usually so flexible students can even enter the workforce while going to CC, or take more time to "figure out" what they want to really major in without it costing hundreds of thousands of dollars. Also, as I've gotten older, and realized that tests like the SAT are just a product offered by a company, and not some Federal standard, I've started to view those kinds of tests as more of a racket than a real filter. People I know in higher education think the test is basically worthless, but also acknowledge that students have basically learned nothing over the pandemic, leaving them with very little to be selective for entry with.
- BobbyJo 4y ago
  I mean, if the route makes sense for you, it's there right now, and if you want to and are able to get into a bigger school without that, why not do that instead? Is there a benefit from forcing all students to funnel through a CC? It seems to me everything you want kids to do they can do today, they just aren't forced to do it. I got a scholarship for a state U, so it was actually just as cheap for me to do that as opposed to a CC (maybe cheaper since I had dorms available to me at the state school). > Students actually get an education rather than studying for a mostly useless test. I don't think the test is useless. A lot of the things you do on the SAT you have to do in those Gen. Ed. classes, so it seems to me it overlaps considerably with the classes you are proposing they take at a CC. That being said, it's hard for me to imagine the Gen. Ed. classes at a CC aren't as useless as anything else considering my experience with that at the U. I went to. > or take more time to "figure out" what they want to really major in without it costing hundreds of thousands of dollars Plenty of schools are significantly cheaper than that. The university I went to was about the same cost as a CC as my brother went to (granted he went to a CC in California and I went to a U. in Florida). That said, I do think students that are in the boat of wanting to go to a super expensive school, that they'll need loans to attend, should definitely get their Gen. Ed. credits from a cheaper school if possible. It's a waste of money to pay private school prices for "Algebra 1" or "Art History 1". > Also, as I've gotten older, and realized that tests like the SAT are just a product offered by a company, and not some Federal standard, I've started to view those kinds of tests as more of a racket than a real filter. Being offered by a private company doesn't make it a racket. Schools are free to consider it in their admissions process or not since it's private, but most choose to because it's useful in the selection process (as evidenced by this story).