<p>
[quote]
I wouldn't waste you time responding to a bitter, socially inept recent alum with an inflated ego.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>I can't tell if this was referring to me or meurtopablo. Care to clarify?</p>
<p>And on what grounds are you concluding this? I guess we've hung out a bunch? And I live on the internet, all 350 posts of mine.</p>
<p>I think the point of this thread is pretty much dead.</p>
<p>Everyone loves everyone.
I mean, who couldn't love a kid named "death to pablo"?
It's just too endearing.</p>
<p>All jokes aside, everyone's special in their own ways. And I'm not alluding to the short bus.
Okay?</p>
<p>Actually, I am very endearing. I'd say between 80-95% of all people I currently know love me in some way.</p>
<p>@ monydad:</p>
<p>
[quote]
Without needing to rely on your attempts to characterize two populations via your unnormed, statistically insignificant sample of only one of them.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>I don't think my sample is statistically insignificant. I attended Cornell for three years and was in the midst of hundreds of engineering students. I worked closely with randomly chosen groups of students in lab, section, and office hours. Anecdotal evidence, while not entirely reliable, usually provides some measure of accuracy. I guess if I went to Arizona State, you wouldn't believe when I told you the girls there were more attractive than at almost any other school. You'd want pictures and surveys, right?</p>
<p>
[quote]
If based on the data, the population of Cornell engineering students is "stupid" in some evaluator's opinion, so be it.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>I never asserted anyone was "stupid" at Cornell engineering. I contended that these students are not worthy of attending one of the nation's best engineering programs. We'll even use your own data. </p>
<p>
[quote]
The mid- 50% SATs of Cornell's engineering college entrants last year were
640-730V, 720-790 M.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>As has been stated many times, half of the coutny doesn't even attend college. Out of those that do, the Ivy League (and similair schools) represent a tiny fraction of the total college population. Thus, the caliber of the students at Ivy League schools should represent the elite nature of the school as a hole. So the Ivy League is, and I've seen people say this, the top 1% of the country's colleges (it might even be more exclusive but let's go with that). Let's define an engineering Ivy League, with SMC, Cornell, Berkeley, OLin College of Engineering, Harvey Mudd, and a couple of other top notch engineering programs that also reside at top schools overall. </p>
<p>Thus, it's safe to assume these engineering students should represent the top 1% or so of engineering students. (Remember we're considering Cornell as one of the very best programs and thus we must characterize the students according to this standard.) But let's not be so harsh, let's say the vast majority of Engineering students should be in the top 3% or so. </p>
<p>Now you've pointed to the supposedly high SAT math scores as evidence that Cornell engineers are qualified for attending such a high caliber engineering program. OK, so let's look at the numbers. You still with me? </p>
<p>A top 3% SAT Math score is around 760, which is now our standard. A top 2% is around 780 and a top 1% is 800. Cornell's average engineering student scores at about 750-760. That means that about half the students score below the standard for attending such a top notch school. In fact, probably almost 20% score below 700 which speaks to how they're utterly lost in such a high level curriculum. </p>
<p>And remember I'm class of 2007, so I imagine the scores have significantly increased since then. And I know the difference between a 720 and an 800 is only 4 questions or so. But those 4 questions are usually the 4 or 5 questions that are ranked hardest on the SAT (collegeboard ranks every question from 1 to 5 on a difficulty scale). Only top notch students are capable of consistently getting those very difficult questions right.</p>
<p>Muerteapablo, if you are still reading this, do a forum search for the name "dulce de leche"</p>
<p>that person is the exact opposite of you (rejected from penn, went to cornell), its pretty funny.</p>
<p>Yeah, I remember that kid. He was so upset about it. Of course, his absurdly negative reaction only reinforced the inferiority complex stereotype and looked great for Penn, but I still felt bad for him.</p>
<p>dontno: </p>
<p>Your rhetoric is consistent only with an experience of a biased sample inordinately drawn from the population's lower tail. </p>
<p>Small samples can be like that.</p>
<p>Fortunately observers can look at data for the actual population, without your sampling bias or your rhetoric.</p>
<p>But every distribution has a tail. Even Penn's.</p>
<p>Perhaps MIT and Stanford are not the closest imaginable proxies for Penn . </p>
<p>show me Penn's distribution.</p>
<p>
[quote]
But let's not be so harsh, let's say the vast majority of Engineering students should be in the top 3% or so.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>These off the cuff assumptions show that you truly don't know what you are talking about. As with your forays into political philosophy, you should really defer to individuals who have studied and are well-acquainted with the issues at hand, rather than expound on your own self-perceived righteousness. </p>
<p>For the last decade, America has graduated around 70,000 bachelors degrees in engineering a year. The top three percent of students would represent 2,100 students a year. The top 1 percent would represent 700 students a year.</p>
<p>Well, MIT graduated 500 engineers last year. Stanford graduated 300. So even some Stanford and MIT grads are definitely not in the top 1 percent. Elsewhere, Georgia Tech graduated 1,400, Purdue graduated 1,200, Michigan and Illinois graduated 1,000 each, Berkeley graduated 800, UCSD graduated 700, RPI graduated 550, CMU and Northwestern graduated 300. Princeton around 125. And finally, CalTech and Harvey Mudd graduated 80 each.</p>
<p>That's around 8,200 students, not including Cornell, earning undergraduate bachelor degrees from institutions that might have a decent claim to offering a "Top 10" engineering education.</p>
<p>And it is your expectation that Cornellians (of which 500 engineers are produced annually) will be uniformly better than 6,200 of these students? Where you have developed such an viewpoint, I don't know, but it doesn't take an eighth grade education, much less a Cornell degree, to figure out that this is a deeply flawed assumption.</p>
<p>No. We didn't actually have to go through these numbers at all. We could have just looked at the SAT scores for Cornell: 25 percent of Cornell engineering students scored less than a 720 on their Math SAT score. That's roughly below the 90th percentile, nationally. Meaning Cornellians actually stretch far below the top 1 percent or 3 percent that you so naively desire.</p>
<p>You might say that these SAT scores are pretty low, but considering that 25 percent of MIT students have a Math SAT score lower than 730, I'm not too concerned. And even at muertapablo's beloved Penn, there's going to be a significant number of kids who don't know how to pronounce Shakespearian words or integrate e^x properly.</p>
<p>So, um, the realization that there would be a distribution of aptitudes at Cornell shouldn't exactly be a surprise to you, and shouldn't exactly be a subject of your criticism given how blatantly unrealistic your expectations are.</p>
<p>I'll come right out and say it, dontno. You have an arrogant and condescending attitude that narcissisticly serves your own delusions of grandeur. As I mentioned before, its a trait that is unfortunately fairly common to engineers. You think you are always right and shrug off the informed judgements of people who actually know what they are talking about. The tendency for know-nothing engineers to shove experts out of the way disgusts me, and it's a large reason why this country is currently facing the financial predicament it is in. </p>
<p>So please don't come on here and talk about things you don't know anything about, even if you do think your anecdotal examples are flashes of your own brilliance.</p>
<p>dontno- just to point out another flaw in your logic. I believe the basis of cayuga's logic lies with the fact that most students take the SAT more than once. the percentiles of the SAT are per exam. So an engineer at say MIT who received a 670 on the math portion the first time he took the SAT practiced non-stop and brought that score up to a 770. That brings them from a 87th ish percentile to a 98th ish percentile. However, this is one human being, not two. So you cannot quantify that a % of students in the top-percentiles of the SAT need to be represented at a top-ranked institution purely because the numerical scale is thrown off by multiple test sittings.Therefore, your proof of how many kids should be in what percent at a top 1% school has been compromised by multiple sittings of one test per test-taker.</p>
<p>Let's just let this thread die, some people obviously have a fetish for inspiring hatred. Let's just forget about them then.</p>
<p>HATE HATE HATE, </p>
<p>bragh hahahahahaha, Hate for everyone,</p>
<p>Just cannot get enough o' that hate</p>
<p>Every school sucks hahahahaha</p>
<p>NOTHING is prestigious ahahahahaha,</p>
<p>PEOPLE are STUPID braaaaaaaagggghghghghghghgh</p>
<p>NOOOOOOO SCHOOL IS RANKED HIGH ENOUGH FOR ME TO ATTEND!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!</p>
<p>@ CayugaRed:</p>
<p>
[quote]
I'll come right out and say it, dontno. You have an arrogant and condescending attitude that narcissisticly serves your own delusions of grandeur. As I mentioned before, its a trait that is unfortunately fairly common to engineers. You think you are always right and shrug off the informed judgements of people who actually know what they are talking about. The tendency for know-nothing engineers to shove experts out of the way disgusts me, and it's a large reason why this country is currently facing the financial predicament it is in.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>I know you're the revered oversser of this forum, so not one person will support any of my comments. I really don't appreciate your deignful tone throughout your response. I also reject the notion that I'm condescending or arrogant. That characterization of my tone, I believe, stems from a fundamental disagreement with my perspective. If I had approached each argument in the same manner, but instead expounded on viewpoints that mesh with yours, you surely wouldn't react so critically. Further, the overwrought proclamation you provide (basically I'm responsible for financial downturn) speaks to the emotional bias contained within your argument. If I have been so sanctimonious and condescending, please point to these instances directly. Yet, others like TrackBabi and s.dot, argue in the same forthright manner, engage in ad hominem attacks, and other below the belt techniques. You refrain from attacking them in such an overt manner as this. </p>
<p>I especially enjoyed the bolded part above, especially in the context of this discussion (which I'll get to below). monydad, on the basis of one SAT statistic, is now an "expert". In fact, my primary experience with current engineering students in an academic setting should make me a far better judge of intellectual capability than you or monydad. In other discourse, while you undoubtedly are more knowledgeable on politics and economic theory than I am, my thoughts are underpinned by other experts, mainly laissez faire economists and conservative thinkers. I'm not naive enough to presume I have all the answers, but I'm confident enough to offer my opinion. Again, ironic that you don't castigate others who clearly have a knowledge base that corresponds with my own. Funny those that avoid your redress all conveniently agree with you.</p>
<p>OK so now the argument at hand.</p>
<p>
[quote]
For the last decade, America has graduated around 70,000 bachelors degrees in engineering a year. The top three percent of students would represent 2,100 students a year. The top 1 percent would represent 700 students a year.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>This is the main flaw/assumption of your argument. You only take into account those that finished their degree. Engineering, especially at lower level schools, is notorious for dropout rate. At many lower level schools, the dropout rate exceeds 70%. From what I found from a quick Google search, the national average dropout average is about 50%.</p>
<p>So in fact, about 140,000 are accepted each year into an engineering curiculum. OK looking good so far. Futher, in my opinion, almost exclusively at higher level schools, engineering professors are wary of failing anyone. One of my sophomore engineering courses had, out of 140 students, only 5 F's. That's inexcusable. Schools which require lkarge tuition expenses are wary of giving out too many D's and F's due to what would result: an immensity of complaining from helicopter parents. One of my friends completed only half the homework for a class and, rightly so, recieved an F. He begged the professor to let him make up the homework during winter break. The professor acquiesced and his grade was unfarily raised to a D-. So it's not inconceivable, that something like 10-15% of engineering graduates are completing a degree, yet haven't fully understand the basic concepts which that degree should symbolize. A person who acheieves a C- average achieved primarily on the strength of homework completion and a stringent curve.</p>
<p>In my estimation, there are 140,000 people who enter engineering programs per year. 70,000 complete the programs, but only about 60,000 actually deserve the honor.</p>
<p>Also, your number is at 8200. Some of those schools have unbelievably high acceptance rate, despite having top notch programs, including GT, Purdue, and RPI. I'd be wary of including them in the statistic. Replacing them with Cornell and even kepping half of their populations, you probably get around 8000 kids who should represent the top notch students. Taking away 10% b/c they probably didn't deserve the degree, you get about 7000 students.</p>
<p>That's top 5%. So I admit I was a little harsh. But top 5% is around 740 SAT math. So a huge chunk, probably around 40% score below that standard. Another 20% or so score below 700 which is simply unacceptable. Other schools, like SMC, unabashedly practice affirmative action, especially for females in engineering. Is it any surprise that these schools have significant amounts of students far below the standard, these students who were not accepted on the basis of their intellectual merit. These students are generally welcome b/c they support the curve, but they're clearly not qualified to attend or intellectually capable of understanding a rigorous curiculum.</p>
<p>
[quote]
So, um, the realization that there would be a distribution of aptitudes at Cornell shouldn't exactly be a surprise to you, and shouldn't exactly be a subject of your criticism given how blatantly unrealistic your expectations are.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>I don't think my expectations are unrealistic as I've just shown. I understand a distribution exists, but I don't believe one should, as I've shown.</p>
<p>Was this argument a bit of hand-waving? Probably, but I don't think it was too far fetched. I wouldn't publish it, but I think it suffices for an online forum.</p>
<p>"I know you're the revered oversser of this forum"</p>
<p>actually... he/she just makes sense...</p>
<p>i think you have 'some' valid arguments, but overall i don't agree that test scores (even though in this sense I think the argument is beyond flawed) correlate directly with success in academia. </p>
<p>"In my estimation... 70,000 complete the programs, but only about 60,000 actually deserve the honor."</p>
<p>I wish I could make estimations of honor like that...</p>
<p>^
no, the real reason why no one disagrees with Cayuga is because he always praises Cornell. No one on this forum is going to disagree lol. If there is even a slight hint of dissension, there will be hell to pay...</p>
<p>Ivy League graduates being jackasses - correlation or causation?</p>
<p>You be the judge...</p>
<p>Sorry those paragraphs were a little too massive for me to want to read..</p>
<p>Tell me if/ when he posts Penn Engineering's 25-50%ile.</p>
<p>Then I'll look.</p>
<p>Till then, killed enough time here, relapse over. See you in two years. Unless something comes up. LIke those %iles.</p>
<p>Ta-Ta.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Tell me if/ when he posts Penn Engineering's 25-50%ile.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Who said anything about Penn Engineering? Everyone knows it's worse than Cornell and MIT/Stanford/Caltech. It's probably around the level of Columbia Engineering, which is still pretty crappy on the engineering totem pole.</p>
<p>Penn pwns Cornell in CAS and Wharton; not engineering. Wharton is on HYP level, CAS is on Columbia/Brown/Dartmouth level, engineering is... I don't really know. I'll start a thread on Penn's forum asking.</p>
<p>@ monydad:</p>
<p>Come on man. I spend 25 minutes writing a response to you and you refuse to even look at it. I split them up pretty well. If you want to get an arbridged version, skip the paragraph beg with: "So in fact..." then start again with paragraph beginning: "Also, your number..."</p>
<p>@hallowarts- people have disagreed far and wide before. of course there are people who will be faithful to cornell's praises, but there are also people who can accept the facts when they are there.</p>