1. Welcome to SportsJournalists.com, a friendly forum for discussing all things sports and journalism.

    Your voice is missing! You will need to register for a free account to get access to the following site features:
    • Reply to discussions and create your own threads.
    • Access to private conversations with other members.
    • Fewer ads.

    We hope to see you as a part of our community soon!

Bribery, greed: All for a little bit of Ivy League

Discussion in 'Sports and News' started by CD Boogie, Mar 12, 2019.

  1. MTM

    MTM Well-Known Member

    While we benefit from the prestige and the “their son goes to Cal” admiration, the decision to attend was all in on him. He wants the Berkeley education and what comes with it.

    My wife and I are both state college grads and I told him he probably could have got a better financial package from other schools that wanted students with his record, but he wanted the big name school on his resume. He’ll pay for it with massive student loan debt when he graduates.
     
    exmediahack likes this.
  2. britwrit

    britwrit Well-Known Member

    Even with the qualifier, I like what you've done there.
     
  3. WriteThinking

    WriteThinking Well-Known Member


    It is, but it's not supposed to be. That's why this is shocking people more than it might otherwise.

    Even though colleges/universities are businesses in terms of it taking money to run/maintain them, they are supposed to be, and are perceived to be, places of development, preparation, enrichment, growth, etc., not the making/getting of money. In other words, it's a matter of this case following the letter of the "law," maybe, but not the spirit of it. The priority of college is not supposed to be the business of it, whereas the primary function of business is, and always will be, business/money, and no one is ever surprised when something untoward happens in the raising or earning of it.
     
    HanSenSE likes this.
  4. exmediahack

    exmediahack Well-Known Member

    We’re in that battle.

    A school in Colorado that he loves but would give him 100k in loans at age 22.

    Or... state schools that aren’t in the “public ivy echelon” where he could emerge with $0 debt and an engineering degree and, after graduation, be able to live in one of those trendy millennial cities and live well with little overhead.

    For now... he’s leaning to the no debt option. For now.
     
    OscarMadison likes this.
  5. Neutral Corner

    Neutral Corner Well-Known Member

    Not only is this despicable on its face, it makes things harder for those who have legitimate disabilities.

     
  6. Neutral Corner

    Neutral Corner Well-Known Member

    Even if things are not pushed as far toward outright bribery and cheating, affluent kids have a lot of advantages. SAT courses and tutors, for example, are commonplace. I attended a prep school that *required* all students to take the PSAT in 9th and 10th grades, and the SAT in 11th and 12th. By the time seniors took it, they were very accustomed to how it worked, what to expect on test day, and they were completely unintimidated by the SAT process. Damn few other HS kids had that advantage.

    I moved back to the public high school that had I started out in for my senior year. I promptly recorded the highest SAT on record there. I was called out of class to the office (What for!?! I didn't DO anything!) and was told that I was going to be this year's STAR student from my school. That was a program where each school picked one student, who competed against others state wide, and who also picked the school's STAR teacher. I got called back to the office a couple of days later and was told "You can't be STAR student! Your GPA is barely a B and besides, you've been suspended this quarter! I was like, "So? You didn't know that two days ago?" I mean, the guidance counselor and the Asst. Principal who suspended me were both in the room that day...

    LOL. I was riding high with my outcast friends for a day or two there, though. Good times.
     
  7. micropolitan guy

    micropolitan guy Well-Known Member

    Smart move.
     
  8. qtlaw

    qtlaw Well-Known Member

    I went to such a great academic hotbed that when I got to college, I didn’t know what was an AP course; seriously. But the football uniforms were top notch. We would’ve killed my wife’s HS in DC burbs that started AP courses in 10th grade.

    The disparities have been there throughout our history, it’s been better (in 90’s) but this just highlights how bad the disparity it can get.

    My buddies and I were discussing and said how stupid this was; everyone knows who’s the fraud in the school eventually. I bet Loughlin’s daughter was already labeled a fraud.
     
  9. heyabbott

    heyabbott Well-Known Member

    and the damn schools knew what was going on or they willfully avoided knowing. or like USC, had a string of knuckleheads as ADs who couldn't care less. It was going on for over 20 years at USC, they all can't be stone stupid.
     
  10. The Big Ragu

    The Big Ragu Moderator Staff Member

    What constitutes a legitimate disability?

    Either the SAT is a standardized test that can be used to compare student A to student B. ... or it isn't. If you agree with that (to me, obvious) supposition, the question would be whether a time limit is essential to what the test supposedly measures. If the time limit isn't essential, there would be no time limit for anyone, not just a kid whose parents got a psychologist to give a subjective diagnosis of something.

    But if a time limit is essential to measuring scholastic aptitude--and you would assume they believe it is essential, because they actually do have a time limit on the test--then outside forces have made a mess of it.

    Really, though, it is one or the other. It can't be in between.

    My understanding is that that whole thing has run amok over the last 10, 15 years, and the number of kids given extra time on the test has doubled in the last 5 to 10 years alone. When you got lawsuits that essentially forced the College Board to, first, not be allowed to notify schools that a taker had been given extra time, and then politicians regulating these issues into stupidity, what has happened should have been predictable.

    To answer my own question, there is no such thing as a "legitimate disability." It is notoriously subjective, because that legitimate disability can not possibly be defined in a practical way. We're not talking about cut-and-dried things like, "Jenny has no hands, so she can't write down the answers."

    Give kid A an exemption, and not kid B, and you face a lawsuit. It's the American way. And then of course, idiotic politicians stepping in regulate it based on their subjective (and usually corrupt) notions of who needs their favor. The DOJ hit the College Board a few years ago with a mandate to make it easier to get exemptions because they decided in their politicized wisdom that the approval process--proving that you had a "legitimate disability"-- was too difficult. I believe it now gets left up to individual school districts to decide which kids can have extra time. And there is absolutely no standardization to it. But you do get quick approvals, no questions.

    Not surprisingly, what constitutes a "legitimate disability" is pretty simple. It's how involved the parents in the local school are, and how much they are willing to be pains in the ass to the local school district (who will acquiesce and take the path of least resistance) and advocate for their kids to get special treatment. For me, it's an obvious example of reaping what you sowed. I am sure there were naysayers who pointed out what was going to happen with the regulation. I am sure the College Board argued that the validity of their prized product was being put in jeopardy. And I will go out on a limb and say that they were dismissed and shouted down. The arsonists set yet another fire in the name of fixing something ... and I am sure they will be riding in on the fire truck to put it out soon.
     
    heyabbott likes this.
  11. BTExpress

    BTExpress Well-Known Member

    Well, it seems you did DO something. :)
     
  12. heyabbott

    heyabbott Well-Known Member

    yeah or rich people bought psychologists to find something in DSM V that allows a HS junior to get extra time on the SATs. Its been a while since my SATs, which I did shitty on because I didn't have to do well and the LSAT which I had to do well on. The SATs you lost points for a wrong answer. No more. In an untimed test where a right answer gets points and a wrong answer has no consequences, you can maximize your score by answering all the questions. If you don't have to rush and there's no pressure to get to the next question a certain level of stress dissipates. The bar exam is a timed test and not every one gets to every question because of time. And some people rush through the essays. Most people taking the bar finished in the top 15% of their college class and survived law school, which has a decent drop out rate (30%).

    An untimed test for a well prepared student is a serious advantage

    Different rules for privileged people, capitalism
     
Draft saved Draft deleted

Share This Page