१७ जून, २०१९

"White students in New York City are 10 times as likely as Asian students to have a 504 designation that allows extra time on the specialized high school entrance exams."

"White students are also twice as likely as their black and Hispanic peers to have the designation. Students in poverty are much less likely to have a 504 for extra time.... Students with 504s make up a small percentage of all students who took the specialized school exam with more time. Most students granted extra time are served under laws for students with severe disabilities. Using extra time, students with 504s — and therefore less severe disabilities — performed better than the median test-taker, while students with more severe disabilities performed worse. It sometimes falls to families to request 504s, which are typically granted after an often expensive consultation with a professional.... As the number of students using 504s has ballooned nationally over the last decade, experts have questioned whether the practice has become another way for parents to game standardized tests, including the SAT and ACT."

From "Some Students Get Extra Time for New York’s Elite/High School Entrance Exam. 42% Are White" (NYT).

८७ टिप्पण्या:

JPS म्हणाले...

"experts have questioned whether the practice has become another way for parents to game standardized tests, including the SAT and ACT."

Absolutely not. And, I have a bridge to sell experts.

J. Farmer म्हणाले...

What if the Asian-white achievement gap were treated the same as the white-black gap?

Clyde म्हणाले...

So 42% of the students getting extra time for the test are white. Out of curiosity, what percentage of NYC's students are white? More or less than 42%? I'd check the story to see if it said anything about it, but I can't get the link to work in a regular or InPrivate window.

BarrySanders20 म्हणाले...

There have to be thousands of biracial kids. What box do the race counters put them in? Not to mention the bicameral and bisexual and bicentennial and bicycling kids.

Clyde म्हणाले...

Perhaps a better question might be "what percentage of the students taking the test for the elite schools are white?" I googled the district's demographics and 15% of the 1.1 million students in the district are white.

Kevin म्हणाले...

It sometimes falls to families to request 504s

Sometimes?

There is no one looking out for your kids in the public school system.

Tomorrow's article: white and Asian kids are more likely to receive outside tutoring!

Fen म्हणाले...

Very likely, but the NYTs lost me when they made it a racial thing. Are they trying to say blacks don't care enough about their kids to game the system?

Regardless, I'll pay attention to the NYTs on fairness when they address Affirmative Action and "diversity" quotas. Can't blame whites for finding a way around all that.

Gee, yet another reason to admit on Merit alone - a less corrupt process.

Ann Althouse म्हणाले...

"So 42% of the students getting extra time for the test are white. Out of curiosity, what percentage of NYC's students are white?"

According to the article: "White students make up about 24 percent of the elite schools — larger than their 15 percent share of the public school system — but have not played a large role in that clash." So the number must be somewhat more than 15%.

Fen म्हणाले...

Oh, this is the paper who hired that racist bitch who confessed she gets off torturing white men. Why do you bother with this drek Althouse? Do you still scrub your clothes on a washboard?

William म्हणाले...

conscientious white parents are ten times more likely to expend time and money to give their disabled children a chance at a level playing field. Conscientious black and Hispanic parents are five times more likely to make such efforts than their Asian counterparts. We should make efforts to discover who these impaired Asian kids are, and they should be removed from such negligent homes and put under the care of the state.

Ann Althouse म्हणाले...

"Very likely, but the NYTs lost me when they made it a racial thing. Are they trying to say blacks don't care enough about their kids to game the system?"

I think it's more like: Affluent parents are more aware of the loopholes and able to do what you need to get through them. And: You can't assume that because there's just a test to get into these schools that it's a meritocracy.

Kevin म्हणाले...

As for granting more time to take the test, there is an inherent dichotomy with timed test-taking.

Break the kids into two groups: those who know the material and those who don't.

Now put a time limit on the test.

Some who know the material will now fail. If we make the time short enough, everyone who knows the material will fail.

So is the goal to test understanding? Are we truly interested in what kids know and what they don't so we can adjust our teaching to lift everyone up?

Or has our education system become a tournament, where most kids know they're going to lose by third grade, and whose real objective is to push the "winners" to the most elite colleges and universities?

Fen म्हणाले...

"Affluent parents are more aware of the loopholes and able to do what you need to get through them."

Not exactly. I grew up in Highland Park, the wealthiest school district in Texas. I know these people. Affluent parents are more likely to °seek° out loopholes, at great effort and expense.

These are the types of parents that become campaign managers so Sen Smith will snag them a slot in the elite pre-school registration fight.

Meanwhile, 72% of black fathers are absent.

Automatic_Wing म्हणाले...

It seems like the NYT would rather not discuss the most interesting and obvious fact about NYC specialized schools - that they're absolutely dominated by Asians. Instead, they write stories about little factoids like this that apply only to small subset of test takers, because they're stuck in mental rut where all they can write about is white supremacy.

Eleanor म्हणाले...

A 504 Plan is drafted to provide accomodations for kids with disabilities. They're designed to remove barriers for kids, but kids are expected to complete the same curriculum as kids w/o disabilities. So a child might be given more time on a test, but is expected to take the same test. OTOH, an IEP is written for kids who need special education and often includes modifications to the educational requirements. IEPs often include pullouts for kids to take some of their classes with teachers who are specialists in teaching kids with learning disabilities. A kid with ADHD, but an average IQ would most likely have a 504 plan, while a kid with dyslexia would have an IEP. When parents realized they could ask for and get a 504 for a child that wouldn't impact him on anything but getting more time for tests, a lot of them jumped on it. Since no other accomodations are asked for or expected, there isn't much required to justify it. The SAT test sites are already set up to accomodate kids who need more time, and most in school state testing isn't timed anyway.

madAsHell म्हणाले...

For many years, I taught computer science courses to Boeing engineers, and union employees.

Open book vs. closed book. Take as much time as you want. It didn't matter. If you didn't understand the material, then.....guess what.....it's captured in the test.

Concerning the Max-8, and -9?? You don't deliberately mis-configure an aircraft to put bigger engines under the wing, and then expect to fix it in software. I can't believe that kind of thinking was actually implemented, and not well tested.

Full disclosure, I wrote software at Boeing for about 10 years.

Fen म्हणाले...

For example, my parents couldn't afford to live in Highland Park, but they moved there anyway when turned 5. It meant delayed gratification for them - no nice things, no porches, no luxury vacations. They sacrificed a richer quality of life so my brother and I could get the best education money coukd buy.

As for poverty, both were the 1st college graduates in their families, from the poor side of South Oak Cliff.

Maybe their "privilege" was that they couldn't blame all their problems on racism.

The only thing I find curious about this article is why the asian "Tiger Moms" are under-represented. But then, this IS the NYTs, so I may as well be responding to fiction. I suspect that's the case, very likely they are withholding information that harshes their preferred narrative.


themightypuck म्हणाले...

How much extra time do they get. If it's an hour they should probably just let everyone have an extra hour. If the goal is to help out people with disabilities it shouldn't bother anyone that everyone gets the extra time unless you are looking for a Harrison Bergeron solution. In that case just subtract points from the normies like Harvard does with Asians.

Virgil Hilts म्हणाले...

What a crock. If you need a 504 it's because you're less intelligent, and less able to focus and master your thoughts and attention. Deal with it.

themightypuck म्हणाले...

@Fen I have a friend who moved to San Marino (a tiny place with great schools next to Pasadena). She is right on the line and identical houses across the street were like 100K less. This was a while ago and that may have changed with inflation. Or maybe Pasadena's schools are no longer garbage.

James K म्हणाले...

Are they trying to say blacks don't care enough about their kids to game the system?

It costs $1000s to get the shrink to meet with the kid and confer the extra time status on him or her.

It's a scam that persists into college. My response (I teach at a university) is to make my tests not very time sensitive: Either you know it or you don't. If you know it, you can finish in half the time alotted. If you don't, all the time in the world won't help.

Jupiter म्हणाले...

It's pretty obvious, if you think about it, that the educational establishment knows zip-all about education. Fortunately, human beings have a remarkable ability to learn things they need to know, even when they are actively harassed by educrats.

Beasts of England म्हणाले...

'Either you know it or you don't.'

Sure, but is it an open book exam? ;)

Fernandinande म्हणाले...

42% Are White" (NYT).

According to the most recent ACS, the racial composition of New York City was: White: 42.78%

Hagar म्हणाले...

"White" students are at 15% in the public schools and 24% in the private schools?
What percentage of the general population of New York City is "white" then?
Do "white" parents send their kids clear out of town? Out of state?

effinayright म्हणाले...

Your parents gamed their lives for the system. Meh.
I'd be more impressed if you had attended your local school (in a neighborhood your parents could actually afford) and gotten the best education there, and then some, on your own initiative and talents.

Sounds like your folks just paid up front in a different way than the Lori Laughlin's of the world. (Did you row crew, or sail in an artificial Texas lake at your Highland Park prep school?)
******************

Why the SNOT?

How is giving up your own comfort for your children "gaming the system"?

Dave म्हणाले...

Poor, disabled, white men are not oppressed. Rich, elite, white women...like our wonderful professor...are the most oppressed. She didn't make the rules, but that's what they are.

Titus म्हणाले...

I am surrounded by Asians on the t right now. They are everywhere here. They are taking over!

Dave म्हणाले...

In other words, you don't care who your government hurts...just keep those checks coming in.

Titus म्हणाले...

So many at the gym too. And they are rude!

Titus म्हणाले...

Don’t get me started with their haircuts and hair dye jobs

Otto म्हणाले...

You all realize this is all a set-up by the NYT abetted by Ann to eliminate NYC specialized schools as proposed by DiBlasio.
"You can't assume that because there's just a test to get into these schools that it's a meritocracy." BS
I went to Stuyvesant in the early fifties and i guarantee you the 50 % of my football teammates would have been valedictorian before Ann if they attended her HS. One of my classmates won a Nobel prize in chemistry. Two of my teammates had doctors degrees in EE, one was a federal judge , one was a renowned heart specialist in CA and numerous lawyers. And that was the football team!. In the 50s Stuyvesant had more Alumni that had doctors degrees than any other HS in the USA.
Go look at the accomplishment of Stuyvesant alumni and then come back and say it's not meritocracy.

Dave म्हणाले...

The General Municipal Law Section 50-(e) is the controlling statute in a claim against an NYC School District. The School District is considered by law to be a Public and a Municipal Corporation and if you are going to sue them the lawsuit must be filed in the New York State Supreme Court or local County Court.

If you were to prevail the law DOES NOT provide for an award of damages for Mental Anguish to a 3rd party. You would therefore be precluded from receiving compensation.

https://www.injuryclaimcoach.com/questions/can-i-sue-the-school-district-for-emotional-distress.html

Dave म्हणाले...

And we can see by Ms. Mary's last comment, no she doesn't care about disabilities. Just getting her way.

chuck म्हणाले...

What percentage of young people in NYC are white? Wikipedia says 44.6% of all ages.

Birkel म्हणाले...

My parents didn't game shit. I just went to the local inner city high school. I crushed the grades, discounted for poorness and inner-city-ness and was a solid citizen. Then I crushed it in college.

Be best, bitches.

Quit being second rate.

Henry म्हणाले...

Althouse said...
Affluent parents are more aware of the loopholes and able to do what you need to get through them.

My oldest son has a severe learning disability. Forget finding the loopholes. Just jumping through the hoops is a full time job.

Public schools can be incredibly resistant to serve kids even with obvious impairments because they have limited special education budgets. If a kid has a learning disability that doesn't map to specialist already on staff (auditory processing, speech impairment, dyslexia) school districts will stonewall to the end of time rather than admit the student's diagnosis.

The kids that are going to get legally-required services are kids with two involved parents and an income that allows one parent to forego significant earnings to deal with the system. You must get evidence from outside specialists to beat down the resistance of the school. Even if you have health insurance, the specialists that deal with children's mental disabilities are rare; they are almost never in network and health insurance companies hate to pay for them. So that parent that spends hours and hours a week fighting the school must also spend hours and hours a week fighting the insurance company.

Then comes the hours of taking your kid to appointments.

Richard Dillman म्हणाले...

I had the same student in two different courses. She had a certified learning disability in the second course, but she was perfectly normal in the first course. In the second course, she was entitled to substantial extra time on exams. She later confessed to gaming the system. There was no guilt since this kind of fraud is regarded as common. She probably took more than three hours to complete a one hour exam.

Birkel म्हणाले...

Oh, and my IQ is more than three standard deviations from the mean.
I highly suggest you have that, too.

Especially if you are born poor.

Richard Dillman म्हणाले...

I had the same student in two different courses. She had a certified learning disability in the second course, but she was perfectly normal in the first course. In the second course, she was entitled to substantial extra time on exams. She later confessed to gaming the system. There was no guilt since this kind of fraud is regarded as common. She probably took more than three hours to complete a one hour exam.

Fen म्हणाले...

Mary: If the kid is smart, the parents need not rearrange their living accomodations at age 5 just to send him to one of the best schools in Texas. Re-read his comment. Does it sound like their sacrifice paid off?

Mary is still upset over a thrashing I gave her last week. She was being a bully, wouldn't get off some guy's back about something, so I asked her nicely to back off. When she refused to be graceful, I shut her down. Now she returns to inflict some petty revenge for being disrespected. Yawn.

And she has no idea what she is talking about. To send your child through the Highland Park school system, you have to reside in that school district.

And the median home value in Highland Park is $1,516,400.

I doubt a smart 5 year-old can swing that.

Birkel म्हणाले...

A smart Anderson Cooper might have swung $1.5MM.

Fen म्हणाले...

Mary: I'd be more impressed if you had attended your local school (in a neighborhood your parents could actually afford) and gotten the best education there, and then some, on your own initiative and talents.

Hi Mary,

Unfortunately for you, the goal was not to get the best education possible in some local school to impress an anonymous cunt on the internet some 30 years later.

The goal was to get their children the best education possible. Highland Park consistently ranked top ten in the nation for 20 years straight.

Thanks for playing. Envy really brings out the color in your eyes. Ha.

effinayright म्हणाले...

Mary: If the kid is smart, the parents need not rearrange their living accomodations at age 5 just to send him to one of the best schools in Texas. Re-read his comment. Does it sound like their sacrifice paid off?
****************

So, which is it...gaming the system, or sacrifice?

What a clueless bitch.

Fen म्हणाले...

Birkel: Oh, and my IQ is more than three standard deviations from the mean. I highly suggest you have that, too.

No argument there. I recognize I am smart enough to realize I'm not the smartest person in the room. You and few others here are constant reminders of that ;)

Fen म्हणाले...

What a clueless bitch.

She's just nursing a grudge.

I take her attention as a compliment, a self-reporting BDA.

effinayright म्हणाले...

Birkel: Oh, and my IQ is more than three standard deviations from the mean. I highly suggest you have that, too.
**************
In which direction?

Birkel म्हणाले...

wholelottasplainin'

More than three standard deviations above the mean.
And half a standard deviation below my sister who is a fuck up.
It's a mixed bag.
But play the odds.

Birkel म्हणाले...

IQ and every other standardized test is marginally predictive.
Taken together they might rise to the level of suggestive.

And if you're smart enough you should know they're not determinative.

So hunker down and work harder than the ass hole beside you.
Focus.
Determination.
Drive.
Consistency.
Native ability.

Fen म्हणाले...
ही टिप्पणी लेखकाना हलविली आहे.
Fen म्हणाले...

More than three standard deviations above the mean.

Does it feel like a curse at times?

Wifey is around 150. She sometimes makes connections she wish she hadn't.

Do you ever find yourself envying the "normals" who seem to stroll through life like children who don't know how precarious the roof over their head is?

Birkel म्हणाले...

Fen,
Be assured I'd take 100 like you and between the 101 of us we'd win the fucking castle.
Smarts is overrated by those who have it and those who don't.
Give me fucking grit and determination, every day.
Give me a country strong son of a bitch who hates to lose.
Give me a hard dick ass hole with an attitude.

Know what I mean?
Ask all those inner city kids why they were scared of me.

Birkel म्हणाले...

Fen,
I have the distinct advantage of being born dirt poor.
I liked the government peanut butter.
The powdered eggs sucked.

So I never put much stock in smart.
I used smart as a tool.
I used poor as leverage to do better.

I overthink things but I'm grounded by events and a better spouse than I could ever deserve, thank God!

Fen म्हणाले...

Birkel: I used poor as leverage to do better.

I think being hungry for it helped you as much as your intellect.

I fell into the 3rd generation trap. You know the aphorism - Smith creates an empire out of noting, Smith Jr serves as an adequate administer of that empire, Smith III fritters it all away on gambling, booze and hookers.

I'm not sure how you break that cycle. Smith I was not tempted by the same levels of de-motivation and degradation that his grandson will be, so how does he prepare his offspring against it?

You don't really appreciate wealth if you are born into it, it's the status quo.

Amadeus 48 म्हणाले...

A friend who teaches at New Trier tells me that a shocking number of students have allowances for disabilities on exams.

They ought to test the water up there. It's an epidemic. Call the CDC.

Birkel म्हणाले...

Fen,
Seemingly you have the right of it. It's difficult to overcome shirt sleeves to shirt sleeves in 3 generations. That seems to be true across cultures.

Still I believe the hunger for success can be taught by more than deprivation. After all deprivation seems a spotty, at best, predictor of success. I'm not even sure there are decent correlations.

Fen म्हणाले...

Sure Birkel. But I think we are on the same page.

Although I would be interested in hearing your alternatives to deprivation as a motivator for success. I haven't thought it through.

Birkel म्हणाले...

It's the opposite of the current self-esteem bull shit. You praise the behavior because it gets the results. You don't praise the child qua child. To me, that's the key to passing success down the line. Everybody should praise outcomes based on proper bases.

To praise "effort" is to guarantee mediocrity. To praise "trying" guarantees the same.

Parents must demand respect for proper authority. Traditional values.

It's conservatism all the way down. And no Leftist bull shit.

Birkel म्हणाले...
ब्लॉग प्रशासकाने ही टिप्पण्णी हटविली आहे.
Narr म्हणाले...

I do not know my IQ (other than a number reported by a smart friend who worked in the school office in junior high) but I do know that my scores on standardized tests caused teachers and counselors (such as the were) to insist, fruitlessly, that I make better grades. My ACTs and SATs were very high. Ditto GREs (twice, 10+ years apart, better the first time!) and MAT when called for. (Like Dr. Science, I have two masters degrees; should be three, or a PhD, but it's a long storee.)

Was my widowed ma gaming the system for her boys? Only if using the insurance money to pay off the house so we could go to the same newish public schools (walking and biking definitely included) while she worked, counts. No country clubs, sports only if we made our own arrangements, one used car until I bought my own used Beetle, and we could damn well earn money to pay for our own model airplanes and movies.

MY privilege turned out to be precocious literacy; not to be thwarted by well meaning lady librarians, who were sure I'd be better off reading about baseball heroes than war heroes.

If Fen was privileged, bully for him and his bro; he has given back (I hate that phrase).

Narr
Life ain't a standardized test!

RigelDog म्हणाले...

Our 25 year old son had some sort of learning disability, or oddity...he was tested at age 5 and all agreed that something was off but no specific diagnosis. We were able to keep him in the same small, private school through eighth grade, where he flourished. He went on to a large, challenging high school and did very well, yet I had friends who urged me to keep pushing the idea that he was learning disabled because he could then get more time for exams and for SATs. There are kids that really need this accommodation but it was obvious that too many parents were rent-seeking for their kids. His father and I agreed that we didn't want our son to get used to the idea that he could only succeed if given special accommodation.

Birkel म्हणाले...

RigelDog,
I salute your prudence.

Big Mike म्हणाले...

My oldest son has a severe learning disability. Forget finding the loopholes. Just jumping through the hoops is a full time job.

Public schools can be incredibly resistant to serve kids even with obvious impairments because they have limited special education budgets. If a kid has a learning disability that doesn't map to specialist already on staff (auditory processing, speech impairment, dyslexia) school districts will stonewall to the end of time rather than admit the student's diagnosis.


@Henry, tell me about it, brother! My oldest had a pediatric hemorrhagic stroke and lost the use of his dominant hand. With help from a therapist he learned how to draw letters and numbers with his other hand, but it was a slow, painful, process and he absolutely needed extra time to take his exams. Talk about having to fight to fight hard for what was his right by law!

Note to you bitches who are teachers and sons of bitches who are administrators, what he was legally entitled to is not your choice to make. If you don’t want to do your job then don’t go into education.

Yancey Ward म्हणाले...

People gaming systems for their children. Also in the same edition, dog bites man.

Yancey Ward म्हणाले...

And you know what the NYTimes was looking for and didn't find, right.........?

Earnest Prole म्हणाले...

Think of it as Affirmative Action for white people to help them compete with more studious Asians.

Lewis Wetzel म्हणाले...

I wonder if the people who wrote this article know what it means to "beg the question."

Chris N म्हणाले...

I had my Chinese ex boss stop by my desk to sign a petition encouraging Washington state law to be changed in the direction of merit over identity group status.

Sounds good to me. At least it’s a start amongst the deeply entrenched identity/grievance industry around here.

The more objective a field is, the more you either know or know, learn or don’t learn, your next task. If you’re smart enough to realize you don’t know something, and can understand enough to mimic, then study, then understand a skill, then deploy it efficiently and add value, then possibly teach it, you have a fighting chance.

If you play fair, and go a little above to make others look good, playing win/win wherever possible and not making others do what you don’t want, you earn responsibility, and part of your responsibility is to work for the people who happen to work for you on a task.

Avoid the too stupid to know, the assholes, the dishonest when possible and try not to be unnecessarily stupid, assholic or dishonest. No one owes you anything. Life isn’t fair, it’s how you deal with the unfairness that matters.

Aim upwards and keep challenging yourself.

daskol म्हणाले...

Per Yancey, this article is not reportage so much as a piece of propaganda designed to tarnish the image of the special schools, to create the precise impression that they’re not meritocratic I’m significant ways. Notice that the obvious comparisons and statistics that would indicate the scope of the issue are either buried in the article or not presented at all, while ugly ones are featured prominently in misleading ways. These schools lay bare the dichotomy between an old-fashioned, hard edged competition and our softer, participation trophy era of everyone wins. And that makes a lot of people uncomfortable, in particular the affluent educated white people always on the lookout for ways to publicly flog their virtue and highlight the scourge of white privilege. Is that not obvious?

Big Mike म्हणाले...

One disabled child can wipe out a public school's budget for years, if their needs are great and are not being met in the home.

(1) Tough. (2) There are three assertions buried in this sentence that are not true.

Even though it's the law, it hardly seems fair to squeeze the "normal" educational programs for the other children just to provide special accomodations for special-needs students who demand their legal rights even when it cripples taxpayers to try and "equalize" what the non-disabled are also entitled to.

You is breaking my little heart. If you aren’t going to budget to cover for contingencies then do the universe a favor and go kill yourself.

Fernandinande म्हणाले...

I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.

Note the future tense. When he emitted those misleading words, the racist fake "doctor" wanted his four little children, the poor little dears, to be judged by the color of their skin so they could get reparations and race-based social programs.

Robert Cook म्हणाले...

"For many years, I taught computer science courses to Boeing engineers, and union employees.

"Open book vs. closed book. Take as much time as you want. It didn't matter. If you didn't understand the material, then.....guess what.....it's captured in the test.

"Concerning the Max-8, and -9?? You don't deliberately mis-configure an aircraft to put bigger engines under the wing, and then expect to fix it in software. I can't believe that kind of thinking was actually implemented, and not well tested.

"Full disclosure, I wrote software at Boeing for about 10 years."


Do you agree with those who call for Boeing's management to be held criminally liable for the recent disasters?

GRW3 म्हणाले...

Check the zip codes of the 504s and they will be pretty tony. That's revealed by the sentence that says getting the extra time takes a review by an expensive professional. That puts the thumb for the "right" white students. I'm quite sure, while not published for all to see, the "right" people will likely get queued in to ways to lever the adversity index.

Robert Cook म्हणाले...

"Do you ever find yourself envying the 'normals' who seem to stroll through life like children who don't know how precarious the roof over their head is?"

Ah...'tis a terrible burden living as one of humanity's superbeings! It drove Raskolnikov mad, it did!

Tina Trent म्हणाले...

Children of all races who received extra time got in more frequently, not just the white ones.

The number of children getting more time has not ballooned. It is a tiny percentage of the thousands of children taking the tests. Raw numbers would illustrate that, so the Times stuck to percentages to make it look significant.

Easy solution: eliminate the perk.

h म्हणाले...

Two imaginery conversations:

White mom #1: I'm worried that junior may have a learning disability, and I understand he might qualify for more time on exams.
White mom #2: I've heard Dr. Althome is very good with learning disabilities. Susie Smith used him for her daughter Frances.

Black mom #1: I'm worried that junior may have a learning disability, and I understand he might qualify for more time on exams.
Black mom #2: What?

I think you will find that the extra time is awarded in a great majority of cases for diagnoses of ADHD or some related "disability". Here's how that diagnosis happens:

Parent: "I'm concerned that my child has ADHD. He seems easily distracted, and doesn't always concentrate on boring tasks the teacher assigns."

Doctor: "My diagnosis is that your child has ADHD. We'll prescribe drugs and if his behavior "improves" that will confirm my diagnosis."

Parent: "What if he takes the drugs and his behavior does not "Improve"? Does that mean he doesn't have ADHD?

Doctor: "No. That just means we didn't get the right drug, or the right strength. Oh, and here's a letter so that your child gets extra time on the exam."

Tina Trent म्हणाले...

Also, sure, this perk is probably abused by some. Probably it's also used for good reasons. But does that mean IQ tests don't measure intelligence and ability?

That's ridiculous.

Look at the LSATs and the Bar exam. One tests raw intelligence. One rewards diligence. Both are needed to succeed as a lawyer, I'd say. I know some pretty foolish lawyers but they tend to be well disciplined people.

Henry म्हणाले...
ही टिप्पणी लेखकाना हलविली आहे.
Henry म्हणाले...

h said...

Here's how that diagnosis happens...

Here's a different scenario:

Teacher: "I'm concerned that your child has ADHD. He is easily distracted and interrupts class"

Parent: "He is a very active kid. Perhaps he can be given small breaks times to get up from his desk, perhaps run an errand to the front office, that kind of thing. If he's placed toward the front of the room and away from his friends, he will be less distracted.*"

Teacher: "He sometimes crawls beneath his desk and won't come out. Other times he climbs on top of his desk and talks to his friends across the room. He will tear off pieces of his in-class work until it's torn in pieces and doesn't remember doing it."

*Standard 504 recommendations.

Known Unknown म्हणाले...

"A 504 Plan is drafted to provide accommodations for kids with disabilities."

Eleanor has this correct. We are not in New York, but my daughter has learning disabilities and she gets extra time on tests. It IS so she can complete the same curriculum as kids at her same grade level without the disabilities. She has what is called an IEP -- an Individual Education Program that affords her certain benefits that maybe mainstreamed kids don't get - but there's a catch. She's often pulled out of classes to work on specialized work but still has to do the classwork she misses. So, sometimes she is actually doing 2x the work of a regular student.

Birkel म्हणाले...

See, Robert Cook, I don't concern myself with a terrible burden because I am a conservative. I'm not in charge of other people. I don't want power over them. I don't seek control. I live and let live even with nasty old commies like you.

Now, if I had a penchant for Leftist Collectivist thinking we'd all have a right to be worried. Me most of all, if I had that sort of over-regard for myself. Never you worry. I see my flaws and know that nobody has the answers. We're all better off with distributed decision making forsterd by increased freedom and free markets.

You're welcome, pissant.

Caligula म्हणाले...

"Concerning the Max-8, and -9?? You don't deliberately mis-configure an aircraft to put bigger engines under the wing, and then expect to fix it in software."

Why not? One could say that "build it crooked and then bend it back straight" engineering lacks esthetic elegance, perhaps. Yet military stealth aircraft are so unstable that they could not be flown without computer assist, as human reflexes are just not fast enough to control it. But, if you insist that an aircraft be flyable without that computer assistance you'd have to give up much of the stealthiness.

If a civilian fly-by-wire aircraft is so unstable as to be unflyable without the computer mediation, so what? Perhaps the instability provides other benefits, and, if the only way to fly it is through the computer mediation anyway, then what is lost?

Of course, little of this applies to Boeings' 737 MAX, which is not fly-by-wire and far from state-of-the-art. And (in hindsight) perhaps Boeing should have started a program to replace the 737 with a newer design (if not clean-sheet, then perhaps starting with a scaled-down, updated 757?) twenty years ago. But, it didn't.

Nonetheless, the availability of massive computing power combined with advances in AI and elsewhere in computer science seem likely to produce a great many more complex systems that simply can't and won't work without the computers (and, of course, their software). And these (even if lacking elegance in some way) may well be safer and perform better than systems which are required (by regulation, perhaps) to be stable without software mediation.


(As for the extra-test-time "disability" scam, is it even possible to ever put that evil Genie back in the bottle? Or must we simply be resigned to tolerate such corruption indefinitely?)

Char Char Binks, Esq. म्हणाले...

Some people just can't accept that their children are untalented. Others believe that their lack of talent corresponds with better character, probably greater “likeability,” “courage”, “kindness,” and being "well-respected" than those robotic, personality-less eggheads.

Narr म्हणाले...

I'll add, from the university teaching end, that only a few students (possibly 2 out of hundreds) ever presented me with an extended-time request, all properly attested.

One of them barely needed it; the other needed it, and a lot more personalized attention than she was going to get from me, which she seemed to have been led to expect.

Narr
Regular grade-grubbers were bad enough

JAORE म्हणाले...

"It costs $1000s to get the shrink to meet with the kid and confer the extra time status on him or her. "

I sense a cottage industry opportunity.

Fen म्हणाले...

You don't deliberately mis-configure an aircraft to put bigger engines under the wing, and then expect to fix it in software."

A month or so ago there was a very good article by someone retired from that field who said that's been going on for quite some time now. The new normal. Although the software engineers were getting tired of being asked to make "software shortcuts".

From my faulty memory, the catalyst was concern over fuel consumption. Bigger engines min-maxed efficiency but had to be mounted to the frame higher up and forward (?) to avoid scraping the ground.

Oh, here it is:

...the 737 engines used too much fuel, so they decided to install more efficient engines with bigger fans and make the 737MAX.

They wanted to use the 737 airframe for economic reasons, but needed more ground clearance with bigger engines. The 737 design can't be practically modified to have taller main landing gear. The solution was to mount them higher & more forward.

The airframe with the engines mounted differently did not have adequately stable handling at high AoA to be certifiable. Boeing decided to create the MCAS system to electronically correct for the aircraft's handling deficiencies.

...I'm a software engineer, and we're sometimes called on to fix the deficiencies of mechanical or aero or electrical engineering, because the metal has already been cut or the molds have already been made or the chip has already been fabed, and so that problem can't be solved.

But the software can always be pushed to the update server or reflashed. When the software band-aid comes off in a 500mph wind, it's tempting to just blame the band-aid.

Linda Fox म्हणाले...

Retired teacher of racially diverse student population, and grandmother of an ADD kid.

ADD is a real thing. Other than school, it may not have all that much effect on life.

MOST of the kids with average to above-average IQs who have ADD do get diagnosed and accommodated. Those kids with below-average IQs, not always. Such kids have bigger problems - intellectual deficits - that may well mask their ADD.

The schools could - if a certain doctor or group of doctors are gaming the system - require their own expert to re-test and evaluate those kids. They don't, because it's expensive, and likely to trigger a lawsuit. The schools fold under pressure.

On the other hand, if your kid does NOT have ADD, but could only qualify for colleges based on an unearned accommodation - well, that kid is likely to be one of the many underperformers whose post-college life is disappointing.