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:

Anonymous wrote:280 is a really paltry number for the size of UC. This is simply rage bait for anti CA MAGAs.

1. UCs require placement tests, so the unprepared students aren’t walking into Calculas.
2. UCs focus on conceptual math and don’t allow calculators which is the exact opposite of what is happening in high school. You can get a 750+ on the math SAT, a 5 on AP Calculus, score high enough to place into Calculus and still struggle. This is great and I’m glad they do it this way.
3. Some UCs have math professors and TAs with such strong accents that no one outside their region can understand them.
4. Math courses are weeder courses for STEM and economics. You have top students and cheaters at the top but then #2 /#3 drop too many to the bottom. The school wants a bell curve for distribution but they have a K.

The reality in CA is that there isn’t a bell curve if your class is representative of the geography, race and socioeconomic groups in CA. UCs could reinstate the SAT but that doesn’t mean that they would scrap the geographic and socioeconomic goals. Using the SAT would not reopen seats for high performing Asians and Whites.

Ultimately what needs to happen is there needs to be better math instruction in public schools AND the top students in poor schools need to be separated into honors classes that are not filled with unmotivated students. CA has taken away tracking at many poor schools so the brightest kids are stuck with loser kids who constantly disrupt the class. So who supports detracking and does not believe the top Latino and Black students should be grouped into high performing math classes- yup you guessed it UCSD's School of Education.

UCSD runs a charter middle and high school of 850 students that is on UCSD's campus where 93% of students qualify for Free/Reduced Price Lunch, with Hispanic students making up 57% and African American 22%. There are NO honors math classes at the school. They do NOT even offer AP Calculus (not even AB) only non-honors Calculus. They don't offer true honors English since the ONLY 9th and 10th grade English classes are called Advanced English.

So how does UCSD do teaching this population. Well only 33% of AP exams taken at the school received a score of 3 or higher. Only 13% exceeded math standards in 8th grade and 25% in 12th grade. These students are mixed in the same class as the 65% of students who received scores of not passing (received scores of not met or nearly met) in 8th grade and the 50% who didn't pass in 11th grade. How are smart poor kids supposed to thrive in this environment?

Maybe UCSD should be looking at the high school that is on their campus and realize this model for teaching math doesn't work. How are they not mortified at what is going on?

And how does this compare to the affluent high school by UCSD called La Jolla High School that is 7 miles away? Of course they track students into regular and advanced math. They also offer dual enrollment community college math classes at the high school - MESA COLLEGE MATH 150 CALCULUS WITH ANALYTIC GEOMETY I (Fall) Grades 11-12, MESA COLLEGE MATH 151 CALCULUS WITH ANALYTIC GEOMETY II (Spring) Grades 11-12, MESA COLLEGE MATH 254 (INTRO TO LINEAR ALGEBRA) (Fall)Grades 11-12, and MESA COLLEGE MATH 245 (DISCRETE MATH) (Spring) Grades 11-12. You get a completely different education if you are a top student here.

The other point is how lazy UCSD is about actually teaching the remedial class once they get admitted. Student who are in that class are often the ones who attend horrifically bad high schools in the poorest areas of the state. They never got quality instruction in math. (There was an article about a student who was enrolled in AP Calculus at Lincoln High in San Diego and because they couldn't get enough students to take the class the school dropped the calculus class two weeks before the end of the first semester. The school then enrolled all the students who were in the class into Ceramics. This seems like a crazy story but it is true! This is what the poorest students often face trying to take math.) UCSD instead of actually having a person directly teaching the class they sit the students in front of computers on a curriculum called Aleks and students have to complete work all online. If they have question they can ask the TA proctoring the class but no one is actually teaching the students. And like the post above says, many students really can't understand some TA's due to really strong accents.

UC's could make everyone take a placement exam in April /May and then tell anyone majoring STEM who doesn't pass they need to take a community college class or take an intensive math class over the summer at the UC.

La Jolla high school is a majority white school. Compare apples to apples.

So the white students get rigorous classes while the brown kids get access only to remedial classes? How is this fair? If you want to hold all students to the same standard then they all need the same opportunities to advance. In too many poor schools, bright students are not grouped together in honors classes. They are constantly being held back by disruptive students.

UCSD doesn’t control La Jolla High?

Of course it doesn’t! Why would a UC school
Have any control over local public elementary schools?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:280 is a really paltry number for the size of UC. This is simply rage bait for anti CA MAGAs.

1. UCs require placement tests, so the unprepared students aren’t walking into Calculas.
2. UCs focus on conceptual math and don’t allow calculators which is the exact opposite of what is happening in high school. You can get a 750+ on the math SAT, a 5 on AP Calculus, score high enough to place into Calculus and still struggle. This is great and I’m glad they do it this way.
3. Some UCs have math professors and TAs with such strong accents that no one outside their region can understand them.
4. Math courses are weeder courses for STEM and economics. You have top students and cheaters at the top but then #2 /#3 drop too many to the bottom. The school wants a bell curve for distribution but they have a K.

The reality in CA is that there isn’t a bell curve if your class is representative of the geography, race and socioeconomic groups in CA. UCs could reinstate the SAT but that doesn’t mean that they would scrap the geographic and socioeconomic goals. Using the SAT would not reopen seats for high performing Asians and Whites.

Ultimately what needs to happen is there needs to be better math instruction in public schools AND the top students in poor schools need to be separated into honors classes that are not filled with unmotivated students. CA has taken away tracking at many poor schools so the brightest kids are stuck with loser kids who constantly disrupt the class. So who supports detracking and does not believe the top Latino and Black students should be grouped into high performing math classes- yup you guessed it UCSD's School of Education.

UCSD runs a charter middle and high school of 850 students that is on UCSD's campus where 93% of students qualify for Free/Reduced Price Lunch, with Hispanic students making up 57% and African American 22%. There are NO honors math classes at the school. They do NOT even offer AP Calculus (not even AB) only non-honors Calculus. They don't offer true honors English since the ONLY 9th and 10th grade English classes are called Advanced English.

So how does UCSD do teaching this population. Well only 33% of AP exams taken at the school received a score of 3 or higher. Only 13% exceeded math standards in 8th grade and 25% in 12th grade. These students are mixed in the same class as the 65% of students who received scores of not passing (received scores of not met or nearly met) in 8th grade and the 50% who didn't pass in 11th grade. How are smart poor kids supposed to thrive in this environment?

Maybe UCSD should be looking at the high school that is on their campus and realize this model for teaching math doesn't work. How are they not mortified at what is going on?

And how does this compare to the affluent high school by UCSD called La Jolla High School that is 7 miles away? Of course they track students into regular and advanced math. They also offer dual enrollment community college math classes at the high school - MESA COLLEGE MATH 150 CALCULUS WITH ANALYTIC GEOMETY I (Fall) Grades 11-12, MESA COLLEGE MATH 151 CALCULUS WITH ANALYTIC GEOMETY II (Spring) Grades 11-12, MESA COLLEGE MATH 254 (INTRO TO LINEAR ALGEBRA) (Fall)Grades 11-12, and MESA COLLEGE MATH 245 (DISCRETE MATH) (Spring) Grades 11-12. You get a completely different education if you are a top student here.

The other point is how lazy UCSD is about actually teaching the remedial class once they get admitted. Student who are in that class are often the ones who attend horrifically bad high schools in the poorest areas of the state. They never got quality instruction in math. (There was an article about a student who was enrolled in AP Calculus at Lincoln High in San Diego and because they couldn't get enough students to take the class the school dropped the calculus class two weeks before the end of the first semester. The school then enrolled all the students who were in the class into Ceramics. This seems like a crazy story but it is true! This is what the poorest students often face trying to take math.) UCSD instead of actually having a person directly teaching the class they sit the students in front of computers on a curriculum called Aleks and students have to complete work all online. If they have question they can ask the TA proctoring the class but no one is actually teaching the students. And like the post above says, many students really can't understand some TA's due to really strong accents.

UC's could make everyone take a placement exam in April /May and then tell anyone majoring STEM who doesn't pass they need to take a community college class or take an intensive math class over the summer at the UC.

La Jolla high school is a majority white school. Compare apples to apples.

So the white students get rigorous classes while the brown kids get access only to remedial classes? How is this fair? If you want to hold all students to the same standard then they all need the same opportunities to advance. In too many poor schools, bright students are not grouped together in honors classes. They are constantly being held back by disruptive students.

UCSD doesn’t control La Jolla High?

Of course it doesn’t! Why would a UC school
Have any control over local public elementary schools?

this comment doesn't make any sense.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:Alarmed by rising failure and remediation rates, professors argue that test-blind policies obscure preparation gaps, leading vulnerable students to struggle in rigorous gateway courses.

https://ucstudentsuccess.org/

That's great news and much needed. Wish they had done so before this year. We're in-state and my DS wanted to go to a UC (he would have gone to any out of his top 4-5 choices). He has a 1550 but wasn't able to submit it because of test-blind. He did not get into any of his top 5 UC choices (he was guaranteed a UC since he was in in the top 9% of CA HS seniors by GPA, but only got into UC Riverside and UC Santa Cruz, which aren't great for his intended major). He is going to a private (to a so-called "new ivy") but we're frustrated by UC's test-blind policy and hearing how they have needed to create remedial sections for math at UC San Diego (where my DS didn't get in despite a 790 in math on the SAT and A in AP calculus). We are happy that it might get better for others.

Are you from an upper middle class area? If so, you likely still would have the same issue due to regional admission. UCs aren’t really made to be solely elite kids. That’s what private schools, like the ones your kid is going to, are for.

Actually, they are supposed to be for the academically elite. Community college, Cal State system, UC System, flagship of the UC system. This isn't a regional thing. It is a high school dependent thing. However so few blacks and Hispanics would be selected for UC Berkeley that UC's look at the HIGH SCHOOL instead of the general applicant pool.

Except opportunity isn’t equal across the state. You’d eliminate any poor person or individual born in a rural area from having a top education.

Of all the things on your college application, the item least susceptible to wealth and privilege is your standardized test score.

They’re advocating for the elite, not for standardized exams.

But they say they want to reinstate standardized tests.

Who is your “they.” I don’t think you’re actually keeping up with the thread and it’s causing useless arguments.

DP. The professors. They can’t teach to such a broad band of skill levels. Same happened at MIT. Profs said “we are quitting”. MIT dropped test optional … I think two years ago. Since then all of the elite schools have been quietly dropping it.

I was talking to PP, not about these professors.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:280 is a really paltry number for the size of UC. This is simply rage bait for anti CA MAGAs.

1. UCs require placement tests, so the unprepared students aren’t walking into Calculas.
2. UCs focus on conceptual math and don’t allow calculators which is the exact opposite of what is happening in high school. You can get a 750+ on the math SAT, a 5 on AP Calculus, score high enough to place into Calculus and still struggle. This is great and I’m glad they do it this way.
3. Some UCs have math professors and TAs with such strong accents that no one outside their region can understand them.
4. Math courses are weeder courses for STEM and economics. You have top students and cheaters at the top but then #2 /#3 drop too many to the bottom. The school wants a bell curve for distribution but they have a K.

The reality in CA is that there isn’t a bell curve if your class is representative of the geography, race and socioeconomic groups in CA. UCs could reinstate the SAT but that doesn’t mean that they would scrap the geographic and socioeconomic goals. Using the SAT would not reopen seats for high performing Asians and Whites.

Ultimately what needs to happen is there needs to be better math instruction in public schools AND the top students in poor schools need to be separated into honors classes that are not filled with unmotivated students. CA has taken away tracking at many poor schools so the brightest kids are stuck with loser kids who constantly disrupt the class. So who supports detracking and does not believe the top Latino and Black students should be grouped into high performing math classes- yup you guessed it UCSD's School of Education.

UCSD runs a charter middle and high school of 850 students that is on UCSD's campus where 93% of students qualify for Free/Reduced Price Lunch, with Hispanic students making up 57% and African American 22%. There are NO honors math classes at the school. They do NOT even offer AP Calculus (not even AB) only non-honors Calculus. They don't offer true honors English since the ONLY 9th and 10th grade English classes are called Advanced English.

So how does UCSD do teaching this population. Well only 33% of AP exams taken at the school received a score of 3 or higher. Only 13% exceeded math standards in 8th grade and 25% in 12th grade. These students are mixed in the same class as the 65% of students who received scores of not passing (received scores of not met or nearly met) in 8th grade and the 50% who didn't pass in 11th grade. How are smart poor kids supposed to thrive in this environment?

Maybe UCSD should be looking at the high school that is on their campus and realize this model for teaching math doesn't work. How are they not mortified at what is going on?

And how does this compare to the affluent high school by UCSD called La Jolla High School that is 7 miles away? Of course they track students into regular and advanced math. They also offer dual enrollment community college math classes at the high school - MESA COLLEGE MATH 150 CALCULUS WITH ANALYTIC GEOMETY I (Fall) Grades 11-12, MESA COLLEGE MATH 151 CALCULUS WITH ANALYTIC GEOMETY II (Spring) Grades 11-12, MESA COLLEGE MATH 254 (INTRO TO LINEAR ALGEBRA) (Fall)Grades 11-12, and MESA COLLEGE MATH 245 (DISCRETE MATH) (Spring) Grades 11-12. You get a completely different education if you are a top student here.

The other point is how lazy UCSD is about actually teaching the remedial class once they get admitted. Student who are in that class are often the ones who attend horrifically bad high schools in the poorest areas of the state. They never got quality instruction in math. (There was an article about a student who was enrolled in AP Calculus at Lincoln High in San Diego and because they couldn't get enough students to take the class the school dropped the calculus class two weeks before the end of the first semester. The school then enrolled all the students who were in the class into Ceramics. This seems like a crazy story but it is true! This is what the poorest students often face trying to take math.) UCSD instead of actually having a person directly teaching the class they sit the students in front of computers on a curriculum called Aleks and students have to complete work all online. If they have question they can ask the TA proctoring the class but no one is actually teaching the students. And like the post above says, many students really can't understand some TA's due to really strong accents.

UC's could make everyone take a placement exam in April /May and then tell anyone majoring STEM who doesn't pass they need to take a community college class or take an intensive math class over the summer at the UC.

La Jolla high school is a majority white school. Compare apples to apples.

So the white students get rigorous classes while the brown kids get access only to remedial classes? How is this fair? If you want to hold all students to the same standard then they all need the same opportunities to advance. In too many poor schools, bright students are not grouped together in honors classes. They are constantly being held back by disruptive students.

UCSD doesn’t control La Jolla High?

Of course it doesn’t! Why would a UC school
Have any control over local public elementary schools?

this comment doesn't make any sense.

The PP said “UCSD doesn’t control La Jolla high?” Of course it doesn’t

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:280 is a really paltry number for the size of UC. This is simply rage bait for anti CA MAGAs.

1. UCs require placement tests, so the unprepared students aren’t walking into Calculas.
2. UCs focus on conceptual math and don’t allow calculators which is the exact opposite of what is happening in high school. You can get a 750+ on the math SAT, a 5 on AP Calculus, score high enough to place into Calculus and still struggle. This is great and I’m glad they do it this way.
3. Some UCs have math professors and TAs with such strong accents that no one outside their region can understand them.
4. Math courses are weeder courses for STEM and economics. You have top students and cheaters at the top but then #2 /#3 drop too many to the bottom. The school wants a bell curve for distribution but they have a K.

The reality in CA is that there isn’t a bell curve if your class is representative of the geography, race and socioeconomic groups in CA. UCs could reinstate the SAT but that doesn’t mean that they would scrap the geographic and socioeconomic goals. Using the SAT would not reopen seats for high performing Asians and Whites.

Ultimately what needs to happen is there needs to be better math instruction in public schools AND the top students in poor schools need to be separated into honors classes that are not filled with unmotivated students. CA has taken away tracking at many poor schools so the brightest kids are stuck with loser kids who constantly disrupt the class. So who supports detracking and does not believe the top Latino and Black students should be grouped into high performing math classes- yup you guessed it UCSD's School of Education.

UCSD runs a charter middle and high school of 850 students that is on UCSD's campus where 93% of students qualify for Free/Reduced Price Lunch, with Hispanic students making up 57% and African American 22%. There are NO honors math classes at the school. They do NOT even offer AP Calculus (not even AB) only non-honors Calculus. They don't offer true honors English since the ONLY 9th and 10th grade English classes are called Advanced English.

So how does UCSD do teaching this population. Well only 33% of AP exams taken at the school received a score of 3 or higher. Only 13% exceeded math standards in 8th grade and 25% in 12th grade. These students are mixed in the same class as the 65% of students who received scores of not passing (received scores of not met or nearly met) in 8th grade and the 50% who didn't pass in 11th grade. How are smart poor kids supposed to thrive in this environment?

Maybe UCSD should be looking at the high school that is on their campus and realize this model for teaching math doesn't work. How are they not mortified at what is going on?

And how does this compare to the affluent high school by UCSD called La Jolla High School that is 7 miles away? Of course they track students into regular and advanced math. They also offer dual enrollment community college math classes at the high school - MESA COLLEGE MATH 150 CALCULUS WITH ANALYTIC GEOMETY I (Fall) Grades 11-12, MESA COLLEGE MATH 151 CALCULUS WITH ANALYTIC GEOMETY II (Spring) Grades 11-12, MESA COLLEGE MATH 254 (INTRO TO LINEAR ALGEBRA) (Fall)Grades 11-12, and MESA COLLEGE MATH 245 (DISCRETE MATH) (Spring) Grades 11-12. You get a completely different education if you are a top student here.

The other point is how lazy UCSD is about actually teaching the remedial class once they get admitted. Student who are in that class are often the ones who attend horrifically bad high schools in the poorest areas of the state. They never got quality instruction in math. (There was an article about a student who was enrolled in AP Calculus at Lincoln High in San Diego and because they couldn't get enough students to take the class the school dropped the calculus class two weeks before the end of the first semester. The school then enrolled all the students who were in the class into Ceramics. This seems like a crazy story but it is true! This is what the poorest students often face trying to take math.) UCSD instead of actually having a person directly teaching the class they sit the students in front of computers on a curriculum called Aleks and students have to complete work all online. If they have question they can ask the TA proctoring the class but no one is actually teaching the students. And like the post above says, many students really can't understand some TA's due to really strong accents.

UC's could make everyone take a placement exam in April /May and then tell anyone majoring STEM who doesn't pass they need to take a community college class or take an intensive math class over the summer at the UC.

La Jolla high school is a majority white school. Compare apples to apples.

So the white students get rigorous classes while the brown kids get access only to remedial classes? How is this fair? If you want to hold all students to the same standard then they all need the same opportunities to advance. In too many poor schools, bright students are not grouped together in honors classes. They are constantly being held back by disruptive students.

UCSD doesn’t control La Jolla High?

Of course it doesn’t! Why would a UC school
Have any control over local public elementary schools?

this comment doesn't make any sense.

The PP said “UCSD doesn’t control La Jolla high?” Of course it doesn’t

You're really struggling with reading. it's because the PP's comment didn't make sense. Why are they talking about fairness of classes when La Jolla is an independent high school (why did you say public elementary school?) and has nothing to do with UCSD's charter public high school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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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

Nigeria has been experiencing a lot of brain drain which is a consideration when you see how they are just crushing it acasdemically here.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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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.

Says the guy who thinks math and standardized tests are racist.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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.

I don't know about elite but it was pretty selective

[Anonymous]

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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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?

What does that mean and what does that have to do with anything?

They literally just started democracy a generation ago.

[Anonymous]

The LA Times is expounding on the crisis facing the UC system.

https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2026-05-27/uc-math-professors-demand-return-of-sat-for-stem-admissions

Work group members advocated for a “systemwide reexamination of standardized testing, as many peer institutions have already done.”
Zvezda Stankova, a teaching professor in the Berkeley mathematics department who is one of the letter’s lead organizers, said the impetus to publicly speak out came in part from her own classrooms. She described a challenging spring 2023 calculus II class, which stood out in her nearly 30 years of teaching.

“Something had changed drastically. The bottom was taken out, and there were 25 to 30% of the students who were in free fall. There was nothing you could do for them. They were just not prepared.”

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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.

That's about where Cornell was. That's pretty selective and UCLA has an entering class twice as big as cornell.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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!

Brown people have had calculus for a long time, maybe not your kind of brown people but brown all ther same.

What they are saying is that it was theater, noone actually learned calculus in that scenario.

[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:

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?

What does that mean and what does that have to do with anything?

They literally just started democracy a generation ago.

Name a competitive internationally recognized Nigerian institution
You know what all of those words mean. Name one. Stop being a coward.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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!

Brown people have had calculus for a long time, maybe not your kind of brown people but brown all ther same.

What they are saying is that it was theater, noone actually learned calculus in that scenario.

What a weird thing to type. People here are really off topic and using it to justify some strange comments.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:To all those saying "don't bring back the SAT, just fix the education system!" - what specific reforms do you have in mind, and what kind of time frame are we talking? Because the UC system is bleeding reputation day by day by day... Tick tick.

The UC system is fine. I’m serious. Most posters here have no connection to California and obsess over prestige when it comes to the UC system. What they don’t realize is for decades the attrition was multiples of what it is now. Almost every student who entered the UC leaves with a degree.

Now, California has so many issues in its k-12 system that it find a perfect solution may well take a few decades. For one, we as a country messed up by making tracking illegal. But the quickest reform that could be made and financially supported (40% of the state budget is education btw) is holding students back. But to do that, we need standards in the first place. The integrated math curriculum needs to be eliminated. The UC system should develop a standardized exam in line with whatever new California standards are created. Invest more in a rural teachers program. Every school in the state should have calculus and other liberal arts advanced courses. Cities with schools that fail to deliver so should be threatened and show persistent effort in hiring. Give less power to parents and more power to teachers in terms of behavior. Evaluate grading with standardized testing performance and evaluate teachers with strong standard deviation issues. Raise the hell out of the bar for minimum “meets grade” and advanced achievement on state exams. Institute a minimum state exam score to apply to the UC system.

Graduation rates are up at UCs despite reading and math levels at the 8th grade level? That says something about the value of those degrees.

Academic tracking isn't illegal. Why would you say that?

Alabama started holding students back and standards improved and the number of held back students shrank to 1-2%

Rural education is important, yes, but inner city education is a shambles.

Tracking is essentially illegal. You get hit with a quick civil rights act case. Of course, with Trump’s squad decimating the CRA, districts may feel more emboldened.

DP

WTF are you talking about?

I would guess the majority of districts have some form of tracking.

Tracking becomes illegal if it racially segregates a school. People here are either so uninformed they shouldn’t be speaking on this subject or willingly disingenuous

Tracking definitely exists and it definitely creates segregation. It's literally everywhere.