controversial opinions about college
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Anonymous
| That going to highly rejective colleges is better or more prestigious than state schools. |
Anonymous
Best colleges will end up 70% Asian 20% white 3% Hispanic 2% black and 5% other like TJ high school and screams of rage about lack of racial equity will ensue. |
Anonymous
Daughter got 980 on sat. Went to 3rd rate college for elementary education. Doing great teaching at MCPS, very well liked and excellent educator. So STFU. |
Anonymous
Do I count? College graduate but I just barely broke 1000. My guidance counselor’s words still haunt me, “Larla, if your verbal scores matched your math scores, we’d be having a different conversation.” Ended up at a SLAC party school. English degree. I’ve been employed as a recruiter, a contractor administrator, a judicial clerk, an editor and now am in healthcare management, writing policy, editing manuals and teaching protocols. |
Anonymous
And I love when people ask me about my alma mater that they’ve never heard of before. I think they expect to hear something entirely different! Go, Mighty Mice! |
Anonymous
Agree they are both good important and IMO work ethic is a lot more important. The problem I have with your point is that standardized tests measure “innate intelligence.” They don’t. And don’t even claim too. The College Board itself says so. Per a PBS Frontline article: Originally (100 years ago) “the SAT was called the Scholastic Aptitude Test, the word "aptitude" meaning that the test measured an innate ability, rather than knowledge acquired through schooling. Today, the test administered by the College Board is still called SAT, but the name is just an acronym, with the letters no longer standing for anything. This fact illustrates the uncertainty that has surrounded what exactly the SAT measures.” “According to the College Board, the SAT now does not measure any innate ability. Wayne Camara, Director of the Office of research at the College Board told FRONTLINE that the SAT measures "developed reasoning," which he described as the skills that students develop not only in school but also outside of school. He pointed out, for example, that students who read a lot, both in and out of school, are more likely to do well on the SAT and in college. The College Board says that the best way to prepare for the SAT is to read a lot and to take rigorous academic courses.” There is no ONE test that measures “intelligence”. Intelligence is too multifaceted and certain types of skills require different types of intelligence. Architects have different (notice not more or less) intelligence than a pianist, which is again different from an accountant or banker. This confusion is why so many are hung up on the SAT/ACT. They think it validates their children are the special geniuses they want them to be and marks them as “deserving” of the elite college. In reality the difference between a 1400 and 1600 is not meaningful. Almost any high GPA kid who scores 1400 can thrive at any college. It’s best use is as a baseline comparison for anomalies. The 4.0 kid who has an 950 looks like an anomaly. Maybe the school was too easy. But there is no way the SAT/ACT is more predictive of success on the whole than GPA is. The tests can help contextualice the grades at best. |
Anonymous
+1,000 |
Anonymous
| College is basically warehousing children to give their brains time to develop further. It’s training wheels for adulthood. The education received is entirely incidental to that. |
Anonymous
Could not agree with this more. My family had zero involvement other than telling me they weren’t going to help. I survived, but there is no way in hell I’d do that to my kids. |
Anonymous
Um, because the kid has something the school wants. It doesn’t mean the school looks deeply at essays. They’ll overlook GPA or find a way not to count that GPA if they need a certain skill like the best tuba player or soccer goalie. A colleague of mine went to Yale because he was an athlete. He was very insecure about his academic profile. |
Anonymous
Interesting. I’ve spoken to many a WW2 vet. Can’t say any claimed to have enjoyed the killing, dirt, cold, lack of food, etc. Any who say they enjoyed it spoke to people in cushy positions. |
Anonymous
Whoa. This assumes students benefitting from affirmative action don’t have the academics. That’s really…something. Yeah, you definitely should keep this thinking to yourself. Please broaden your circle, because there are many highly qualified POC. |
Anonymous
You can't imagine, but it's true, unless you have unlimited $$$ to spend. For most families with 4 children, when the oldest choses where to go, the fact that there are 3 more coming up is a major consideration. And if one of them has special needs, be it a disability or being a world class cello player, that's part of the decision too. |
Anonymous
But are colleges really admitting URM with much lower stats? Those stats still have to be reported so I doubt schools are admitting students who are very far below in terms of GPA/SATs. |
Anonymous
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The goal of college education is education. All the social engineering and the "college experience" are extras and byproducts of the original goal, and shouldn't be paid much attention or require additional $$$ at all. Oh, and no athletic recruitments - professional athletes belong to professional sports teams, and the colleges assemble their teams from whoever happened to be there because of education.
That's how the schools functioned in my home country in Europe. |