Questions like:
Spencer sold 20% of his high commodity index funds to make renovations on his 30 foot yacht.
If he purchased them at the beginning of polo season, on the weekend of which leg of the triple crown would he need to sell them to clear the average yield?
Explain how standardized tests are biased
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In ny, a higher vocabulary requires prep and $.
Using the same words in q and a helps those with visual memory. Without knowing English, they can quickly find location in passage and guess.
To combat the Asians and prep, they got rid of the vocabulary and same words.
Now, it's a lot of poetry and analogies that echo American childhood. This prevents mindless memorization of vocabulary lists.
Using analogous words also force the student to understand the context of the word which requires working knowledge of real rather than broken English. Also, by echoing American early childhood stories, they can use alliteration which is a hurdle for immigrants. -
Because Asians and whites outscore blacks and Hispanics.
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I think it is not so much the *test* is "biased", its that:
1. The education system is tilted toward White/Asian/wealthy-er people.
who
2. Are able (as wealthier people) to dedicate resources to their child's education and/or have
3. A cultural (or individual) predisposition to value education.
The test might have some bias but the bigger issue is that it EXPOSES bias in the system and in society.
Some of these biases are bad...poors often grow up in situations that can't/don't/won't prioritize education. Many never have a chance.
Some of these biases are not "bad"...the Asian/White/Wealthy tendency to be "all in" on education is not bad (some may take it too far) but its admirable in general. -
true answer wrote:
Because Asians and whites outscore blacks and Hispanics.
This. People use statistics to back what they want to believe. So since blacks score worse it’s biased, instead of blacks and Hispanics not taking education seriously. In fact, blacks have the easiest route to a better education. The majority go to low performing schools which receive more funding, which can pay teachers better and recruit better teachers, because it’s low performing it’s easier to graduate in the top 10%, or become valedictorian since there is less competition , they qualify for additional grants and scholarships to proceed to higher education, but it’s easier to play the victim -
Yes. Whites and Asians are able to dedicate more resources to their childrens' educations because they are more intelligent and hardworking than the Karen's of minorities. It is a terrible cycle that benefits the smarter and harder working.
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That was parents of minorities.
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The original SAT was developed by Carl Brigham, an Army psychologist who had some peculiar ideas about intelligence. He in fact wrote a book called "A Study of American Intelligence," still widely available, explaining how the Nordic races possessed superior intelligence to the Mediterranean and Eastern European races, in turn superior to the Asian and African races. His test seemed to bear out these claims. Years later he recanted his claims, and wrote several detailed analyses (back in the 1930's) of ways he had very skillfully built bias into the test, but his recantation fell on deaf ears and the test has lived on.
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do you seriously think schools in poorer neighborhoods get better teachers? I agree with everything else you're saying but even with more funding the quality of education in these schools is still way worse. Plus the middle and elementary school curriculums leave a lot to be desired for many lower income kids, for example kids not learning how to read, which leads to less interest in actually trying to do well in school because of how much of a struggle it is.
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It is hard to design almost any cognitive test that doesn't produce differential group outcomes. Remember the New Haven Fire Department case? Despite hiring a consulting firm to create a "bias" free test, the test still produced differential race outcomes. Angry white firefighters who put in a lot of study time sued and won after New Haven ditched the test. It appears that some cultures simply value learning more than others (not just white firefighters)- Asian immigrants, Nigerian immigrants, etc, do well no matter where they emigrate. I think that many don't want to say one culture is better than another, although clearly some fit the modern world far better. Since in the US, our discrimination caused some of the damaged culture, it is difficult to say what should be done. Separate but equal never works and it won't work in its second go round-like in the first instance the standards are still lower and the caste continues.
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Rich people can pay for tutors and do - poor kids from poor schools don’t have classes on how to master the sat - and usually can only afford to take them once - where rich people take them several times ...
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* wrote:
Questions like:
Spencer sold 20% of his high commodity index funds to make renovations on his 30 foot yacht.
If he purchased them at the beginning of polo season, on the weekend of which leg of the triple crown would he need to sell them to clear the average yield?
Funny and true. In a test where you are being timed and every second counts, when all the things the test refers to are familiar and typical of a upper- class and Upper middle-class Suburban lifestyle, it's definitely an advantage compared to a poor kid from the inner city.... I mean they've gotten better, I don't think every math question revolves around the dimensions of a squash court, but still the vibe of the tests is more typical for a Suburban kid. I mean when was the last time a standardized tests talked about three card Monte -
they seem fair to me wrote:
I fail to be convinced that this is an actual problem.
Poor kid go to poorly funded school. Poorly funded school has bad teachers and little learn resources. Poor get doesn’t do well on ACT because he doesn’t have resources to learn well or money to get tutor.
Rich kid go to good funded school. Rich kid has good teachers and lots of resources. Rich kid can get a tutor and get good score.
Poor kid doesn’t get a college scholarship and has to go a different route. Poor kid works a lower paying job because society values college education.
Rich kid gets scholarship money to go to college. Rich kid doesn’t have to spend his own money to go to college. Rich kid gets paid more because of college degree and has saved money from scholarship. -
Sham 69 wrote:
I remembered reading in a book that that different races each have different amounts of intelligence.
Was the book called the Turner diaries? -
drbop wrote:
The original SAT was developed by Carl Brigham, an Army psychologist who had some peculiar ideas about intelligence. He in fact wrote a book called "A Study of American Intelligence," still widely available, explaining how the Nordic races possessed superior intelligence to the Mediterranean and Eastern European races, in turn superior to the Asian and African races. His test seemed to bear out these claims. Years later he recanted his claims, and wrote several detailed analyses (back in the 1930's) of ways he had very skillfully built bias into the test, but his recantation fell on deaf ears and the test has lived on.
This would be relevant if his ghost was still drafting the questions. Since that is unlikely after 90 years, your explanation for any alleged racial bias against blacks in SAT tests is just completely ridiculous. -
They phrase questions in a way that assume you're able to read and figure out what pictures mean. Not fair.
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true answer wrote:
Because Asians and whites outscore blacks and Hispanics.
Imagine we have 2 test questions.
On A whites get it right 90% of the time and blacks get it right 70%
On B whites get it right 70% of the time and blacks get it right 90%
You can only put one of them on the test. What happens when you pick consistently pick A and leave B off the test? You end up with the SAT.
Now you can ask why asians do so much better than whites even with a test not built for them? Because they try like 10x harder:). When black kids start studying 2 hours/day for the SAT, their scores will sky rocket.
Now you could say, well they should start studying and get those test scores. But why should they?
Those higher test scores don't make them smarter or better prepared for college. They make them better at taking a test.
Granted that is only part of the problem. The other part is a nonfunctioning public school system. Kids aren't scoring 700s because of racial bias or low IQ. Thats down at the can't read level but keep getting moved through the system level. -
adsfdasfasfsafadfa wrote:
true answer wrote:
Because Asians and whites outscore blacks and Hispanics.
Imagine we have 2 test questions.
On A whites get it right 90% of the time and blacks get it right 70%
On B whites get it right 70% of the time and blacks get it right 90%
You can only put one of them on the test. What happens when you pick consistently pick A and leave B off the test? You end up with the SAT.
Now you can ask why asians do so much better than whites even with a test not built for them? Because they try like 10x harder:). When black kids start studying 2 hours/day for the SAT, their scores will sky rocket.
Now you could say, well they should start studying and get those test scores. But why should they?
Those higher test scores don't make them smarter or better prepared for college. They make them better at taking a test.
Granted that is only part of the problem. The other part is a nonfunctioning public school system. Kids aren't scoring 700s because of racial bias or low IQ. Thats down at the can't read level but keep getting moved through the system level.
You seem to be arguing that it's even more unfair for the Asians, but that's okay because they deal with on their own instead of complaining.
Help us imagine an SAT question where 70% of whites but 90% of blacks answer correctly. Example? -
Bad Wigins wrote:
adsfdasfasfsafadfa wrote:
true answer wrote:
Because Asians and whites outscore blacks and Hispanics.
Imagine we have 2 test questions.
On A whites get it right 90% of the time and blacks get it right 70%
On B whites get it right 70% of the time and blacks get it right 90%
You can only put one of them on the test. What happens when you pick consistently pick A and leave B off the test? You end up with the SAT.
Now you can ask why asians do so much better than whites even with a test not built for them? Because they try like 10x harder:). When black kids start studying 2 hours/day for the SAT, their scores will sky rocket.
Now you could say, well they should start studying and get those test scores. But why should they?
Those higher test scores don't make them smarter or better prepared for college. They make them better at taking a test.
Granted that is only part of the problem. The other part is a nonfunctioning public school system. Kids aren't scoring 700s because of racial bias or low IQ. Thats down at the can't read level but keep getting moved through the system level.
You seem to be arguing that it's even more unfair for the Asians, but that's okay because they deal with on their own instead of complaining.
Help us imagine an SAT question where 70% of whites but 90% of blacks answer correctly. Example?
"If you don't answer this question correctly, you ain't black" -
Any test that purports to measure verbal intelligence will be biased towards certain cultures because language is deeply linked with culture. By way of example --
fanny : buttocks :: dick : ??
a) penis
b) vagina
c) buttocks
d) backpack
The correct answer will depend on your culture and where you're from.
On the other hand it seems at least possible to construct a math test that is unbiased.
Btw, group differences in scores are not an indicator of bias. They may or may not result from an underlying bias.