Over 280 University of California STEM faculty members have signed an open letter calling on the UC Board of Regents to

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:"For example, for three consecutive year, 20-30% of UC Berkeley first-semester calculus students who participated in mathematical diagnostic testing displayed severe[b][u] preparation deficits."

Ouch.

How is this going to be fixed by SAT scores if it is the HS math instruction that sucks?

If you only admit students with an SAT math score of 700+ for STEM majors at UCLA/Berkeley, then you will have a well-prepared undergraduate class, regarld of HS teaching quality.

You will eliminate the vast majority of black and hispanic students. The faculty can chirp all they want. Talk of reinstating the SAT is just a fantasy.

The UC Regents outlined the eugenicist origins of standardized testing, arguing the tests were historically designed to validate white superiority and maintain institutional exclusion.

The most progressive state in the country is not going to go back to a test with its roots in white supremacy.

Asians outperform whites on standardized tests by a pretty large margin.

These white supremacists had ONE feking job and they ended up giving all the best test sores to the asians?!?!?!?! WTF!!!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:"For example, for three consecutive year, 20-30% of UC Berkeley first-semester calculus students who participated in mathematical diagnostic testing displayed severe[b][u] preparation deficits."

Ouch.

How is this going to be fixed by SAT scores if it is the HS math instruction that sucks?

If you only admit students with an SAT math score of 700+ for STEM majors at UCLA/Berkeley, then you will have a well-prepared undergraduate class, regarld of HS teaching quality.

You will eliminate the vast majority of black and hispanic students. The faculty can chirp all they want. Talk of reinstating the SAT is just a fantasy.

The UC Regents outlined the eugenicist origins of standardized testing, arguing the tests were historically designed to validate white superiority and maintain institutional exclusion.

The most progressive state in the country is not going to go back to a test with its roots in white supremacy.

Algebra is racist. Testing is racist. And then you wonder why Trump gets elected.

Whehn they say Trump is racist, you can hear them thinking, you mean like algebra and testing?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The SAT is a racist test. There is no reason to go back to it.

The SAT is the best measure to identify and elevate smart and brilliant minority kids who are otherwised overlooked and ignored by test optional.

Test optional specifically benefits mediocre wealthy students of all colors and races.

Can you explain how they’re overlooked? If you don’t have good grades, you are not qualified.

The high SAT kids generally have great grades AND high SATs

Test optional rejects the high performers for the best "narrative" which is exasperated by inflated grades.

SAT scores are the best objective measure to indicate the most qualified students

That doesn’t help still. Poor kids with good grades already get a ton of boosting. The SAT doesn’t do anything special- most have bad sat scores and you’re just going to shave off for the few that don’t.

Well if you hold the kids from Central high school to the same standard as the kids from Harvard Westlaske, sure. But if you are looking for the best kids from Harvard Westlake, a standardized test score is better than a narrative.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Historically, the UC's had mediocre to horrible SAT scores for the lower 25th percentile and even between the 25th and 50th percentile. This was true at the second tier UC's like UC Irvine, Davis and San Diego. It was even true for UC Berkeley and UCLA.

With test blind in place the competency of the lower half of these schools is even worse.

California ranks close to last in the performance of its high school students. Politicians have mandated that UCs open up more admission slots so you are seeing a huge watering down of standards. The sad thing is that there are more than enough high achieving, high scoring students in its public high schools. They just happened to be the wrong race or ethnicity.

I went in the 90s and it wasn't true then.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Historically, the UC's had mediocre to horrible SAT scores for the lower 25th percentile and even between the 25th and 50th percentile. This was true at the second tier UC's like UC Irvine, Davis and San Diego. It was even true for UC Berkeley and UCLA.

With test blind in place the competency of the lower half of these schools is even worse.

California ranks close to last in the performance of its high school students. Politicians have mandated that UCs open up more admission slots so you are seeing a huge watering down of standards. The sad thing is that there are more than enough high achieving, high scoring students in its public high schools. They just happened to be the wrong race or ethnicity.

Thank you for the first paragraph. It really wasn’t until recently that people tried so hard to push this narrative that the UC is elite.

WTF???

Cal has been pretty selective my entire life.
UCLA was pretty selective too.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:"For example, for three consecutive year, 20-30% of UC Berkeley first-semester calculus students who participated in mathematical diagnostic testing displayed severe[b][u] preparation deficits."

Ouch.

How is this going to be fixed by SAT scores if it is the HS math instruction that sucks?

If you only admit students with an SAT math score of 700+ for STEM majors at UCLA/Berkeley, then you will have a well-prepared undergraduate class, regarld of HS teaching quality.

I do think most with low SAT math scores ended up not doing STEM, as they couldn’t pass the “weed out” prerequisites. Many of those kids might have to change their intended majors quite a few times as they move down the list, shattering their confidence in the meanwhile.

Most people with low sat scores aren’t interested in a stem major. The assumption everyone wants to do stem is plaguing this thread. Not everyone needs differential equations; I’d even argue most don’t

The issue is not differential equations or even just elementary calculus. But a subset of these kids can’t even do very basic algebra. The SAT math has always been a bit of a job, even in my generation.

Then your generation took the SAT after 1995

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:And yet some many kids with good GPAs and test scores can’t even get into good state schools. Everyone says it’s because school is too easy but my kids IB public school isn’t giving out free As left and right. I don’t get it.

Your kid is competing against other kids from the same HS or school district. And then there's major, and holistic admissions.

-parent of IB magnet student with super high scores and GPA who got shut out of T20, but then, they are a CS major.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am surprised so few of them signed this letter. Where are the rest? Are they happy with the current state of UC education?

You think 280 STEM professors at Berkeley isn't a lot? That's half the total STEM faculty.

It's 280 all over the UC system, not just Berkeley.

Not all professors agree with this. I don’t know why they’re recommending the SAT when the UC system was supposed to be developing its own rigorous exam designed by UC faculty.

They looked into the CAASPP as an alternative. The CAASPP is California's state-wide academic barometer test given to different grades, like 8th, 11th. The same racial disparities that afflicted the SAT were found in the CAASPP. The use of standardized testing is a very sensitive one in California because there is the belief that white supremacy has infected the entirety of how academic achievement is measured and that whatever path California takes has to be completely distinct from all past iterations.

The UC system looked at developing its own test but decided against it.

And that’s their problem. I don’t doubt UC admissions when they say they have data on each high school spanning decades. Developing their own test means an ability to accurately assess where the skill gaps remain in California public schools and having a quantifiable way to make recommendations rather than throwing out “x% of students failed and aren’t ready.”

Gaps will always exist, because income isn’t uniform across racial lines. We need to get past the inequality part and start solutions. The SAT is alright- it really leaves a lot to be desired in terms of rigor and substance over form.

It's more than income. Black students from the highest earning families score about the same as white students from the lowest earning families on the SAT. If you waved a magic wand and blew away the racial income gap, the SAT gap would narrow slightly but not disappear. The problem is more intractable than most people realize.

When affirmative action was around, liberals tended to support it because they were in denial about how big the gaps actually were, and figured it was just a small thumb on the scale. Conservatives tended to oppose it because they were also in denial about how big the gaps actually were, and figured URMs could just work a little harder to pull themselves up by their bootstraps. Both were wrong, and the UC system is finding out the hard way.

There’s a lot of research showing that these gaps close when you have the white and black student in the same school. The gap explains a difference in choices by upper middle class black and white parents, not an inherent gap by race (which would imply black people are dumber).

One can spout all day about how these issues are cultural, but I find this unproductive and divisive. Everyone of every income level can do calculus I, as long as their brains aren’t pan fried by some intellectual disability. Learning algebra isn’t unique to white and Asian people; it’s something we should all feel comfortable doing, but don’t because we’ve been fed divisive lies about ability, talent, and yes victimhood.
-black person whose major required calculus in every course.

+1. Reminds me of a talk I went to by Glenn Loury

The only message conservatives have figured out to tell the black mother living off food assistant and public housing is “BE ASIAN! BE JEWISH”…are you serious? No wonder they hate you

I don't know about Jews but Asians generally think that a lot of academic ability comes down to effort and sacrifice. The people in America seem to think academic ability is inborn and color coded.

Nigerian immigrants also value education a lot and tend to do really well academically.

Which really shows in the successful nation of Nigeria

? Nigerian immigrants don't live in Nigeria. They live here.

-dp

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:"For example, for three consecutive year, 20-30% of UC Berkeley first-semester calculus students who participated in mathematical diagnostic testing displayed severe[b][u] preparation deficits."

Ouch.

How is this going to be fixed by SAT scores if it is the HS math instruction that sucks?

If you only admit students with an SAT math score of 700+ for STEM majors at UCLA/Berkeley, then you will have a well-prepared undergraduate class, regarld of HS teaching quality.

You will eliminate the vast majority of black and hispanic students. The faculty can chirp all they want. Talk of reinstating the SAT is just a fantasy.

The UC Regents outlined the eugenicist origins of standardized testing, arguing the tests were historically designed to validate white superiority and maintain institutional exclusion.

The most progressive state in the country is not going to go back to a test with its roots in white supremacy.

Algebra is racist. Testing is racist. And then you wonder why Trump gets elected.

Whehn they say Trump is racist, you can hear them thinking, you mean like algebra and testing?

That probably is something the RWNJs say to each other.

F-ing idiots.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am surprised so few of them signed this letter. Where are the rest? Are they happy with the current state of UC education?

You think 280 STEM professors at Berkeley isn't a lot? That's half the total STEM faculty.

It's 280 all over the UC system, not just Berkeley.

Not all professors agree with this. I don’t know why they’re recommending the SAT when the UC system was supposed to be developing its own rigorous exam designed by UC faculty.

They looked into the CAASPP as an alternative. The CAASPP is California's state-wide academic barometer test given to different grades, like 8th, 11th. The same racial disparities that afflicted the SAT were found in the CAASPP. The use of standardized testing is a very sensitive one in California because there is the belief that white supremacy has infected the entirety of how academic achievement is measured and that whatever path California takes has to be completely distinct from all past iterations.

The UC system looked at developing its own test but decided against it.

And that’s their problem. I don’t doubt UC admissions when they say they have data on each high school spanning decades. Developing their own test means an ability to accurately assess where the skill gaps remain in California public schools and having a quantifiable way to make recommendations rather than throwing out “x% of students failed and aren’t ready.”

Gaps will always exist, because income isn’t uniform across racial lines. We need to get past the inequality part and start solutions. The SAT is alright- it really leaves a lot to be desired in terms of rigor and substance over form.

It's more than income. Black students from the highest earning families score about the same as white students from the lowest earning families on the SAT. If you waved a magic wand and blew away the racial income gap, the SAT gap would narrow slightly but not disappear. The problem is more intractable than most people realize.

When affirmative action was around, liberals tended to support it because they were in denial about how big the gaps actually were, and figured it was just a small thumb on the scale. Conservatives tended to oppose it because they were also in denial about how big the gaps actually were, and figured URMs could just work a little harder to pull themselves up by their bootstraps. Both were wrong, and the UC system is finding out the hard way.

There’s a lot of research showing that these gaps close when you have the white and black student in the same school. The gap explains a difference in choices by upper middle class black and white parents, not an inherent gap by race (which would imply black people are dumber).

One can spout all day about how these issues are cultural, but I find this unproductive and divisive. Everyone of every income level can do calculus I, as long as their brains aren’t pan fried by some intellectual disability. Learning algebra isn’t unique to white and Asian people; it’s something we should all feel comfortable doing, but don’t because we’ve been fed divisive lies about ability, talent, and yes victimhood.
-black person whose major required calculus in every course.

+1. Reminds me of a talk I went to by Glenn Loury

The only message conservatives have figured out to tell the black mother living off food assistant and public housing is “BE ASIAN! BE JEWISH”…are you serious? No wonder they hate you

I don't know about Jews but Asians generally think that a lot of academic ability comes down to effort and sacrifice. The people in America seem to think academic ability is inborn and color coded.

Nigerian immigrants also value education a lot and tend to do really well academically.

Immigrants generally tend to believe in education. Nigeria specifically, has developed a culture that values education and this is the result.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am surprised so few of them signed this letter. Where are the rest? Are they happy with the current state of UC education?

You think 280 STEM professors at Berkeley isn't a lot? That's half the total STEM faculty.

It's 280 all over the UC system, not just Berkeley.

Not all professors agree with this. I don’t know why they’re recommending the SAT when the UC system was supposed to be developing its own rigorous exam designed by UC faculty.

They looked into the CAASPP as an alternative. The CAASPP is California's state-wide academic barometer test given to different grades, like 8th, 11th. The same racial disparities that afflicted the SAT were found in the CAASPP. The use of standardized testing is a very sensitive one in California because there is the belief that white supremacy has infected the entirety of how academic achievement is measured and that whatever path California takes has to be completely distinct from all past iterations.

The UC system looked at developing its own test but decided against it.

And that’s their problem. I don’t doubt UC admissions when they say they have data on each high school spanning decades. Developing their own test means an ability to accurately assess where the skill gaps remain in California public schools and having a quantifiable way to make recommendations rather than throwing out “x% of students failed and aren’t ready.”

Gaps will always exist, because income isn’t uniform across racial lines. We need to get past the inequality part and start solutions. The SAT is alright- it really leaves a lot to be desired in terms of rigor and substance over form.

It's more than income. Black students from the highest earning families score about the same as white students from the lowest earning families on the SAT. If you waved a magic wand and blew away the racial income gap, the SAT gap would narrow slightly but not disappear. The problem is more intractable than most people realize.

When affirmative action was around, liberals tended to support it because they were in denial about how big the gaps actually were, and figured it was just a small thumb on the scale. Conservatives tended to oppose it because they were also in denial about how big the gaps actually were, and figured URMs could just work a little harder to pull themselves up by their bootstraps. Both were wrong, and the UC system is finding out the hard way.

There’s a lot of research showing that these gaps close when you have the white and black student in the same school. The gap explains a difference in choices by upper middle class black and white parents, not an inherent gap by race (which would imply black people are dumber).

One can spout all day about how these issues are cultural, but I find this unproductive and divisive. Everyone of every income level can do calculus I, as long as their brains aren’t pan fried by some intellectual disability. Learning algebra isn’t unique to white and Asian people; it’s something we should all feel comfortable doing, but don’t because we’ve been fed divisive lies about ability, talent, and yes victimhood.
-black person whose major required calculus in every course.

+1. Reminds me of a talk I went to by Glenn Loury

The only message conservatives have figured out to tell the black mother living off food assistant and public housing is “BE ASIAN! BE JEWISH”…are you serious? No wonder they hate you

I don't know about Jews but Asians generally think that a lot of academic ability comes down to effort and sacrifice. The people in America seem to think academic ability is inborn and color coded.

Nigerian immigrants also value education a lot and tend to do really well academically.

Which really shows in the successful nation of Nigeria

DP

Nigeria is a bit of an economic dynamo. It's economy has seen large gains (5x compared to 25 years ago) despite large brain drains, colonialism, dictatorship...it only became a democracy in 1999.
It is expected to be one of the fastest growing economies for the next 25 years.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Historically, the UC's had mediocre to horrible SAT scores for the lower 25th percentile and even between the 25th and 50th percentile. This was true at the second tier UC's like UC Irvine, Davis and San Diego. It was even true for UC Berkeley and UCLA.

With test blind in place the competency of the lower half of these schools is even worse.

California ranks close to last in the performance of its high school students. Politicians have mandated that UCs open up more admission slots so you are seeing a huge watering down of standards. The sad thing is that there are more than enough high achieving, high scoring students in its public high schools. They just happened to be the wrong race or ethnicity.

Thank you for the first paragraph. It really wasn’t until recently that people tried so hard to push this narrative that the UC is elite.

WTF???

Cal has been pretty selective my entire life.
UCLA was pretty selective too.

It’s a narrative that these are elite undergraduate institutions. UCs weren’t created because California needed a place to dump the Bay Area’s rich kids. It was created for research purposes. Cal is elite in terms of its graduate programs and research resources.

Anything about the undergraduate experience is overhyped nonsense.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am surprised so few of them signed this letter. Where are the rest? Are they happy with the current state of UC education?

You think 280 STEM professors at Berkeley isn't a lot? That's half the total STEM faculty.

It's 280 all over the UC system, not just Berkeley.

Not all professors agree with this. I don’t know why they’re recommending the SAT when the UC system was supposed to be developing its own rigorous exam designed by UC faculty.

They looked into the CAASPP as an alternative. The CAASPP is California's state-wide academic barometer test given to different grades, like 8th, 11th. The same racial disparities that afflicted the SAT were found in the CAASPP. The use of standardized testing is a very sensitive one in California because there is the belief that white supremacy has infected the entirety of how academic achievement is measured and that whatever path California takes has to be completely distinct from all past iterations.

The UC system looked at developing its own test but decided against it.

And that’s their problem. I don’t doubt UC admissions when they say they have data on each high school spanning decades. Developing their own test means an ability to accurately assess where the skill gaps remain in California public schools and having a quantifiable way to make recommendations rather than throwing out “x% of students failed and aren’t ready.”

Gaps will always exist, because income isn’t uniform across racial lines. We need to get past the inequality part and start solutions. The SAT is alright- it really leaves a lot to be desired in terms of rigor and substance over form.

It's more than income. Black students from the highest earning families score about the same as white students from the lowest earning families on the SAT. If you waved a magic wand and blew away the racial income gap, the SAT gap would narrow slightly but not disappear. The problem is more intractable than most people realize.

When affirmative action was around, liberals tended to support it because they were in denial about how big the gaps actually were, and figured it was just a small thumb on the scale. Conservatives tended to oppose it because they were also in denial about how big the gaps actually were, and figured URMs could just work a little harder to pull themselves up by their bootstraps. Both were wrong, and the UC system is finding out the hard way.

There’s a lot of research showing that these gaps close when you have the white and black student in the same school. The gap explains a difference in choices by upper middle class black and white parents, not an inherent gap by race (which would imply black people are dumber).

One can spout all day about how these issues are cultural, but I find this unproductive and divisive. Everyone of every income level can do calculus I, as long as their brains aren’t pan fried by some intellectual disability. Learning algebra isn’t unique to white and Asian people; it’s something we should all feel comfortable doing, but don’t because we’ve been fed divisive lies about ability, talent, and yes victimhood.
-black person whose major required calculus in every course.

+1. Reminds me of a talk I went to by Glenn Loury

The only message conservatives have figured out to tell the black mother living off food assistant and public housing is “BE ASIAN! BE JEWISH”…are you serious? No wonder they hate you

I don't know about Jews but Asians generally think that a lot of academic ability comes down to effort and sacrifice. The people in America seem to think academic ability is inborn and color coded.

Nigerian immigrants also value education a lot and tend to do really well academically.

Immigrants generally tend to believe in education. Nigeria specifically, has developed a culture that values education and this is the result.

Name a competitive internationally recognized Nigerian institution?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Historically, the UC's had mediocre to horrible SAT scores for the lower 25th percentile and even between the 25th and 50th percentile. This was true at the second tier UC's like UC Irvine, Davis and San Diego. It was even true for UC Berkeley and UCLA.

With test blind in place the competency of the lower half of these schools is even worse.

California ranks close to last in the performance of its high school students. Politicians have mandated that UCs open up more admission slots so you are seeing a huge watering down of standards. The sad thing is that there are more than enough high achieving, high scoring students in its public high schools. They just happened to be the wrong race or ethnicity.

Thank you for the first paragraph. It really wasn’t until recently that people tried so hard to push this narrative that the UC is elite.

WTF???

Cal has been pretty selective my entire life.
UCLA was pretty selective too.

UCLA had like a 30% acceptance rate back in the early 2000s. Wasn’t exactly that difficult.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Math is the only subject that has this massive genius expectation. It’s the only subject where people are constantly trying to push students to the maximum and accelerate them. Imagine how much better our country would be if we put 1/10th of this energy into science education.

Or reading/writing.

It's a stupid race to nowhere.

+1, can we get kids who understand statistics and history? This obsession with 2 subjects that are tested to death and the emphasis of your entire k-12 education is crowding out that there’s more to life than taking Linear Algebra in high school.

Forget linear alg in HS. Some of these kids can barely do Alg 1.

And that’s because of this obsessive thinking towards advanced advanced advanced. A significant amount of the UCSD students who failed that easy algebra 1 exam had taken “calculus” in high school. While kids have been performing worse and worse year over year, there has been a rise in expectations for elementary and middle school education across the country. We simply need to go back to the basics and make it required for the kids to understand the basics.

No, it's because of grade inflation and DEI policies that allow students to progress even if they don't understand the concepts - things like 50% rule and retakes.

There's nothing wrong with providing advanced math. My kids took it, but they also understand the math. One of my kids absolutely needed the advanced math track. They just graduated as a dual STEM major, one in math, summa cum laude in both STEM degrees. They took MVC in HS and passed with an easy A. They just find math really easy. These are the types of kids who should be taking advanced math.

DEI gave brown people calculus. What a horrific thing!