Though the smallest gender gap in test scores of any racial group you list is for African Americans. If women consistently do better in GPA then African American men will benefit less from test scores than any other group, which seems to align with the relative gender balance for various URM groups listed above by @bouders.
Just got off a long international trip and just now getting caught up on this thread.
Anyway, to be clear to everyone, I do not think that the UCs are technically violating the law as it is written. Instead, the administrators were active in trying to undermine the effect of the law in two ways.
First, they were active in trying to repeal Prop 209 through Prop 16. This is certainly their right, and I respect that they were using the political process available to them.
Second, the administrators successfully created a test blind application process, overruling the recommendations of the UC Academic Senate which wanted to keep the tests. I consider this in violation of the spirit of the law, given the well understood average score differences among different groups. They also went about this in a very circuitous way, first announcing they were going to “replace the SAT and ACT” with a California specific test and later deciding to eliminate testing altogether.
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Not that you want to pay OOS tuition to an UC :-).
It really affects folks that are instate.
As I said, race neutral admissions policies aren’t enough.
The test zealots won’t be satisfied until the colleges are forced to adhere to their narrow understanding of what “qualified” means. And to them it means heavy reliance on standardized tests.
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Why do you feel the need for name calling? You have the intellect to make your case without it.
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You’ve indicated that you want to strip students and families of federal aid if they would prefer to attend a college that values gender balance and racial diversity.
You have also indicated that, while it conforms to the law, the University of California’s race neutral admission policies aren’t good enough for you because the policies are test blind, so want to go after the system’s federal funding and research grants to attack their pocketbook and bring them into line . . . not with Prop 209, but with your version of what race neutral admissions should look like.
To my mind, describing you and your approach as zealous is accurate and appropriate, if a bit understated.
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Huh?
Since you are so good at quoting me, please find where I said that.
In your search, perhaps what you will instead find is that I am opposed to discriminating against any protected class, consistent with the text of Prop 209, and the intent of Equal Protection. I don’t see why colleges that violate this should get taxpayer subsidies.
Sure thing . . .
So, for example, students who want to attend a college that prioritizes gender balance (over your mandate) “should be ineligible for Pell Grants, subsidized student loans, or grants from the state.” 
I see. You have come to the conclusion that those two things are equivalent, i.e. that a college which does not discriminate is incapable of being diverse.
First, I am not convinced that is true. Second, even if true, I don’t see that as being a fundamental right in the same way that freedom of discrimination is.
And with the “no debate” requirement of CC, I will disengage with you.
Funny how posters always want to disengage after their post . . . but rarely before.
It’s not my conclusion, but it sure seems that you view admission practices which value gender balance as legally discriminatory. Otherwise, why would you indicate that colleges seeking some sort of gender balance would be most impacted by your mandate? (“The biggest effect would actually be on sex, not race.”)
If you mean freedom from discrimination, there is no (and never has been a) “fundamental right” for a female applicant to get an admissions spot at a private school over a similarly qualified male applicant just because her SAT score is 20 points higher. There is no fundamental right which requires universities to consider SAT scores at all.
Of course that may change with this current activist SC.
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Ah, the testing argument. To use standardized tests or to not use standardized tests.
It was a standardized test that identified my potential as a young person and gave me the opportunity to leave my terrible elementary school for a magnet school. It was another standardized test that identified that I was floundering in my classes (at the time I was 150th in a class of about 300) in comparison to my test results (3rd highest score in my class), and resources were provided that turned my academic struggles around. My kids have tested very well over there academic careers. But I have also seen standardized tests miss potential (I met only 1 genius level student in college and he did terrible on the SAT/ACT because he had much bigger struggles in his life like food and shelter at the time).
The pros for tests are that a “good test” can identify shortcomings that can be addressed, identify potential that might be overlooked, and show where a student is academically at a specific moment in time.
The cons for tests are that they are not applied equally (some students take standardized tests many times while others only take a test once), they don’t always identify potential being overlooked, and are not able to identify “soft skills” (the gift of public speaking, to network, to read people, to communicate effectively, to connect with people of different worldviews, and to motivate others) that I find my most successful friends and acquaintances have regardless of their standardized tests scores.
My own belief is that standardized testing can help, but I always see 2 main contrasts when people talk about standardized tests (we either believe that they are the most importance thing along with GPA, or say that they have no real inherent value). Since K-12 schools in the US are so vastly different, it would be hard to assess the differences and see which schools are struggling/excelling without some sort of standardized testing. Can colleges go on without standardized testing to select classes? They obviously can, but that takes a lot of resources and skill. Can the SAT/ACT be better? Absolutely, as they are not good enough at predicting overall success in college. I am just glad that I no longer have “any horses in this race”.
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Reminder that per forum rules, CC is not a place for debate. @hebegebe and @mtmind - Please move on or take it to private message. Thank you.
I will assume that the 2 posters engaged in back and forth starting in post 44 have moved on. If not, please do. CC us not a debate society and nobody should feel the need to get in the last word.
Eliminating testing and focusing more on GPA and course rigor will still benefit wealthier applicants, especially at the UCs. The UCLA admit numbers show you need, iirc, about 9 or 10 AP, honors (or equivalent) by end of senior year just to be at the median. The CSUs used to be auto-admit based on gpa and tests, so eliminating scores from their formula will focus more on GPA, rigor and ECs, again favoring students in wealthier districts.
CSUs basically admit frosh by major ranked by HS GPA, with added points for local residency and various supplemental factors. The various factors are shown at https://www.calstate.edu/attend/counselor-resources/Documents/2021%20-%202022%20CSU%20Campus%20Admission%20Factors%20Summary.pdf , with links to campus web sites at https://www.calstate.edu/apply/freshman/Pages/2022-2023-first-time-freshman-supplemental-factors-by-campus.aspx .
Note that many of the supplemental factors are intended to favor applicants from lower SES backgrounds. First-generation-to-college and application fee waiver qualified are directly favored by most CSU campuses.
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The same happened for me, except I remained in the elementary school but was placed in an “advanced” track within the school. And it was standardized tests that won me that opportunity.
My feeling about such special magnet schools or tracks is the atmosphere creates more competent students. Not that pre-identifying the “most capable” students creates a great school for all such students.
Smaller class sizes, more teacher attention, better teachers and a better curriculum are the keys to a better school/class. What’s at issue here is the vast majority of American school districts cannot afford to have such small class sizes for all schools. These districts cannot afford to only hire the best teachers for all positions. They cannot afford to build more schools to create the space necessary for every class to have smaller classes.
So, they create artificial barriers to allowing the worst districts (or schools in a district) to give an incredibly small percentage of their students an adequate education. Then they justify this by saying they have a magic way to identify “special” or “gifted” or “intelligent” students who are worthy of such enlightened treatment.
I’m thankful for being lucky enough to be engaged in those tracks, but I also know it was luck. I’ve seen students who didn’t get in the elementary track, but made the middle school track and excelled. Or those who didn’t get in until high school, and excelled. Or those who never got chosen for the smart track, yet they excelled in college and life.
I honestly believe nearly every student has the potential to benefit if placed in your magnet school. It’s a shame 96% are locked out because of a misapplied standardized test. Yes you and I were worthy, but all those other kids were too. They were just left behind to wallow in an inefficient education system.
My opinion is, if society will not pay the price to offer such excellent schooling to all, then the way to choose who gets which school is to be 100% lottery. Start with elementary enrollment and once kids are “chosen” for the better elementary schools, they are locked into admittance into the better middle schools and high schools. And those chosen for the lower quality elementary schools are then locked into the lower quality middle and high schools. Short of improving every one, that seems the only fair way. Meanwhile, the true (and extremely few) natural geniuses could be identified via a better standardized test at each grade, and might be moved to a better quality school.
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The result would be that students in the lower quality public schools whose parents have money and care about their kids’ education will pay to enroll them into a private school. So not too different from now, where parent money buys opportunity.
Perhaps part of the problem at the K-6 level is that the schools traditionally tend to be small, and arranged so that students stay with the same teacher the whole day. This makes them less capable of handling outlier students (hard to devote the resources to one or two students), including students who may be outliers in one subject but not others.
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Ah the lottery. How about allowing education funds to be portable and let parents choose where to send their kids? Pressure needs to be applied to schools to improve by (perhaps) focusing like a laser beam on early education. Stick to the basics, remove distractions from classrooms and focus the basics.
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A lottery would still be tough for those without resources. When I got into the magnet middle school, their were 9 other students who also got into that brand new state of the art school, but 7 student stayed in our inner-city school district. For the majority, having the ability to get to school and home from a school about 5 miles away from our neighborhood was too large of a hurdle to climb. My Mom needed a lot of help to get me to school and home and I walked home quite a few times to make it work. I too understand that there was a lot of luck involved in my situation (a teacher or 2 who saw a spark in elementary school, a parent who was willing to sacrifice, and a village that believed in me which was not always the case where I grew up). A lottery based system may be fairer but would still leave a gap that would not help a lot of students.
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Test scores are usually more correlated with wealth than the alternative metrics that you listed. For example, I’ve previous linked to the Ithaca study at https://www.ithaca.edu/wpm_preview/site/ir2/docs/testoptionalpaper.pdf . Using ALANA and first gen as a proxy for SES, in lists the following correlations, ranked from strongest to weakest. Scores appeared more correlated with income than both GPA and measures of course rigor, including number of AP credits.
SAT W: -0.15 fist gen, -0.13 ALANA
SAT (M+V): -0.13 ALANA, -0.08 fist gen
Number of AP Credits: -0.12 ALANA, -0.03 first gen
HS GPA: -0.08 ALANA, +0.01 first gen
Rigor of HS Courses: -0.04 ALANA, +0.05 first gen
Consistent with this, the study of 21 test optional colleges at https://web.archive.org/web/20220309114911/https://www.nacacnet.org/globalassets/documents/publications/research/defining-access-report-2018.pdf found that at all 21 of those colleges test submitters admits average higher income than non-submitter admits at test optional colleges.
However, the degree to which a specific college favors wealthy students in admission usually has more to do with the admission system and goals of that college than whether the college is test required, test optional ,or test blind. For example, if a particular college needs to admit a certain portion of full pay kids and certain portion of high need kids to make finances work, I’d expect the college is going to not deviate far from that goal, regardless of how testing is used in admission. This is straightforward at a need aware college. A need blind college can also manipulate income distribution by choosing to emphasize or give a boost to variables that are correlated with income (either positively or negatively), or favor particular higher paying groups. This can include things like a public increasing number of out-of-state admits, a private increasing number of legacy admits, changing degree of preference for first gen, wait list manipulations, recruiting at certain HSs or among certain groups more than others, estimating income by information on application, preference for EA/ED, changes in FA policies, etc.
You mentioned UCLA. Regarding UCLA specifically, the portion low income students has been dropping over time, and testing changes haven’t stopped that drop. Some specific numbers are below for UCLA. 35% Pell is still quite high compared to nearly any other US college of comparable selectivity, but it’s not as high as it was in the past. Increased selectivity plays a role in this drop, as do many other factors.
% Of UCLA In-state New Freshman Receiving Pell Grants
2017 – 43% Pell
2019 – 38% Pell
2021 – 35% Pell
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