Re: #96
Shades of 1931, when junior IJA officers (successfully) plotted to start a war between Japan and China (Mukden Incident).
This headline and “analysis” is a silly argument.
If those people did not go to college, they may have made even less money.
It is a classic logic fallacy
“I have a headache”
“Did you take an aspirin”
“Yes, but it didn’t work”
“How do you, your headache could have been a lot worse if you didn’t take the aspirin”
@lookingforward “Just applying the formulas” tells me the stuff is too hard for him. You are talking about academic mismatch here. I agree with you that it happens far too frequently. In a WSJ piece published in 2007, Charles Murray said the following:
“In engineering and most of the natural sciences, the demarcation between high-school material and college-level material is brutally obvious. If you cannot handle the math, you cannot pass the courses. In the humanities and social sciences, the demarcation is fuzzier. It is possible for someone with an IQ of 100 to sit in the lectures of Economics 1, read the textbook, and write answers in an examination book. But students who cannot follow complex arguments accurately are not really learning economics. They are taking away a mishmash of half-understood information and outright misunderstandings that probably leave them under the illusion that they know something they do not. (A depressing research literature documents one’s inability to recognize one’s own incompetence.) Traditionally and properly understood, a four-year college education teaches advanced analytic skills and information at a level that exceeds the intellectual capacity of most people.”
I think the passage goes a long way in explaining the switching behaviour noted in the Arcidiacono study at Duke. It also explains why calculus was used as the “invisible sieve” in my jurisdiction. Raised in the British tradition, we were told that a university education is designed for those with IQ scores of 115 or higher. I still remember those comments, decades later.
Of course, analytical skills, even at a high level, may still not be enough to be successful in life.
There are many engineering jobs that either require just a familiarity with the difficult material or are pretty much limited to using canned formulas (or nowadays the software) correctly. Not everyone is inventing a new type of wheel and if you are, you may need to consider getting a MS so that you can study underlying theory rather than equations. If you can get through the engineering classes with say a 3.0 and master enough of the material to do the test questions and a few projects, collaboratively with folks who might be able to get that last 10% of material that requires a “stretch”, you can graduate and perform well at many if not most engineering jobs. At some point, interpersonal skills will take you into management or project management, or you remain in the middle of the pack (some issues nowadays with salary vs. a new hire, but that also explains why salary curve is flat in many fields and for many people).
You need 4 years to gain familiarity with difficult material and master the rather difficult equations (and what to put in for each variable in there).
R&D in many fields is limited and I think computer software capabilities can replace a lot of in the trenches thinking (in other words if my CAD+ program can calculate stresses in a part for 99% of parts correctly, I don’t need 99% of engineers to know how to analyze the other 1%).
I do not agree with the IQ assessment vs the Arcidiacono study, since that clearly marked a lack of pre-college preparation (I would argue that also manifests itself as difficulty in major) as a factor in moving to non-STEM majors. I do not believe anyone other than a few athletes are getting into Duke with an IQ below say 110) and I think the point is that most of these people could have majored in STEM if they had been better prepared. Calculus as an invisible sieve is really selecting for a lot of HS math preparation through at least trig and to be honest in today’s world, many of the STEM graduates have one or two years of HS calculus behind them and they are dominating the curves. Many non-elite high schools likely do not teach advanced math and probably don’t even teach non-advanced math very well. It is very hard to catch up … and that even includes things like high quality in-class discussions in English class in HS that force people to really analyze and think in terms of a piece of literature.
I would argue analytical skills at least keep you away from non-profit schools (why don’t you sign right here for a large on-dischargeable loan from our institution with very poor graduation rates), predatory loans including 20% credit card debt, and maybe enough to help steer you to gainful employment (there are jobs in nursing, why don’t I take a 2 year program in that). It may not guarantee a 6-figure salary, but it falls into the aspirin category of improving outcomes.
I think the income boost in question was based on $25K which is barely over minimum wage.
Most of these types of studies are just too broad brush, likely because, due to software and lots of mandatory reporting, it is pretty easy to correlate income to college attended, but harder to know how many people are following their muse vs using their expensive degree to become manager at a McDs because there are no other opportunities (cue also to continuing job availability issues).
“Calculus as an invisible sieve is really selecting for a lot of HS math preparation through at least trig”
There are countries (Japan) where every potentially college-bound high schooler does calculus and beyond, because in those countries, virtually all middle schoolers are doing what the US calls “college prep” math. Calculus is not any harder than advanced algebra or geometry. It doesn’t require a higher IQ. It just requires a thorough grounding in those subjects so that you can apply them. We do a bad job in this country.
Agree with Hanna. Do you want to claim that courses in the History of the Cold War or Totalitarianism are an invisible sieve plucking the best and the brightest? A kid who has not had a decent HS history class is not going to understand day 1 of the reading on the Cold War. A kid who has never heard of the Russian Revolution won’t be able to keep up in a course on Totalitarianism.
Doesn’t mean the kids are dumb. But they are not prepared for college level work in history, political theory, etc.
^^ That. My civil engineer wife got her undergrad degree in physics,* and that gave her an understanding of how to derive formulas in ways that still boggle the minds of many (most?) of the engineers working for her.
Just because something uses [math in this case, but you can insert pretty much any subject heading here] doesn’t mean there’s an actual understanding of that subject involved.
- Leading to all sorts of annoyances when she went up for her PE. Inflexible state engineering boards, we're **still** a bit annoyed at all of you.
Deriving formulas is graduate school engineering, likely excluding places like Caltech.
In 90-99% of our endeavors, we are riding on the shoulders of giants. Newton figured out gravity and now an IQ of 110 will let you take Physics 1 and solve how quickly that apple was going when it hit his head. Matlab can solve the equation. Or you can write a simulation in say Nastran and figure out where the stress points in the apple or the skull are at point of impact. You can make a stronger apple through genetic engineering or design a helmet for those sitting under apple trees (and maybe even write legislation to force apple tree sitters to wear them). Matlab and NASTRAN required experts in numerical analysis and programming. Engineering software is upgraded almost every year, and trust me the changes over say a decade are enormous.
So anyway … 4 year engineering degree that is designed for many fields and many types of jobs will not lead to deep “understanding” of the physics, the math, the apple, or any single aspect of the problem. Most graduates can do most problems. Specialists, those with advanced degrees or math skills or computer rad skills, can both solve hard problems and provide tools for the more average person.
I am sure there are fantastic corollaries in social sciences, certainly in the literary world, or the art world.
Beyond this, it concerns me that there is the presumption that those without an IQ of 110 or without calc skills can’t learn to think … or maybe more broadly contribute to society. We don’t need armies of engineers or sociologists, we do need people who can get things done as part of a company and likely a team.
What it will take to bring a certain individual to that point, whether college or trade school or reading or yoga practice or working fast food until they decide that they would rather work harder and smarter, is hard to know.
What these studies should focus on is how to build an assortment of educational institutions that provide value to certain groups of individuals, and maybe you start with the lowest lying fruit, which I would think are public universities, community colleges, some trade programs, etc.
And some statisticians and social scientists should be able to either data mine or design studies that can do more than just broadbrush stereotype various students and institutions.
Actually the Arcidiacono study you referenced found that SAT score (which you claim to be essentially the same thing as IQ) had little effect on the switching major behavior when considering the available metrics (HS achievement, HS course rigor, etc.). Instead they found the when considering all available metrics, the strongest predictors of switching out of a Nat Sci/Eng/Economics/… major were being female, HS course rigor/preparation, and harshness of individual class grading. Even the college application essay rating had more influence on switching out of the tech majors than test scores. All other studies I am aware of that considered both a measure of HS GPA and HS course rigor came to a similar conclusion that the SAT CR+M score had little influence on academic success in college, including ones at colleges with a wide distribution of test scores.
Charles Murray is an author who sells more of his The Belle Curve type books if he makes controversial statements about IQ. I wouldn’t assume his quotes are gospel. It’s ridiculous to say you need an IQ of 115 (or similar other number) to be successful in college. A huge portion of students are exceptions, and there are much better predictors of academic success in college.
I want one of these jobs…instead they keep expecting me to solve problems (math only be a small part of it) and create (very) complex solutions. Where is my #$@$# canned formula!!
@Gator88NE - lol, I’ve been hearing this from my engineering kid for years!
This is precisely what purists are criticizing. University is supposed to train higher level analytical thinking; it is not supposed to be a glorified trade school. I agree with that sentiment.
Correlations. I would not take them too literally. You sure these metrics are not conflated with test scores?
I don’t know where you get your information from, but ability of standardized testing to predict all sorts of life outcome is well established. They have gone well beyond that now. You are still fighting yesterday’s battle. Here is an example of what I am saying:
http://www.scottbarrykaufman.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/Kaufman-et-al.-2012.pdf
On page 12, under Discussion, second paragraph, the authors said the following:
“Therefore, Binet and Simon (1916) succeeded in their goal of predicting broad academic achievement from tests of general cognitive ability. Even present day tests of general cognitive ability show extremely high correlations with general academic achievement”.
With all due respect, I think you are allowing your political leaning to influence your judgement…
If you inflate the grades enough, and if you offer enough fuzzy majors, you most certainly can create a lot of exceptions. What good is it though if the counterparty (employers) refuses to pay anything for it? As far as predictors of academic success goes, the best I know is SAT + GPA (basically cognitive ability + conscientiousness). Research shows that giving additional information to college councilors will only make the decisions worse. Sometimes in life reality is stranger than fiction. I am deeply amused.
I am hoping to get to my main point in a later post. This is just an aside.
Please define “fuzzy majors”. No, seriously. Particularly since, for example, English majors outearn lots of STEM majors ten years out from graduation—so I have to conclude, since you place weight on what employers are willing so pay for, that you’re not one of those who would characterize the humanities as “fuzzy”.
High school GPA actually works well on its own, you know, completely without standardized tests.
Oh please. “Fuzzy major” is shorthand for “I have no nuance or subtlety in my thinking, I can just regurgitate things that are told to me and I think that makes me smart.” It’s also shorthand for “I wouldn’t do well in these majors because they require skills I don’t have, so rather than acknowledge I don’t have those skills, I’ll denigrate them as a defense mechanism.” Yes, we all know you can add 2 plus 2 and get 4 and there is a correct answer. That doesn’t make fields of study that are more abstract “fuzzy.” It just means it’s calling for a different type of intelligence.
You guys are ignoring the difference between treatment effect and selection effect.
For some professions and jobs, the employer could care less what happens once the kid starts college (absent pathological or criminal behavior). The employer recruits at those colleges because they know enough about the admissions process there to realize that an Adcom has already done the hard part- winnowed the field down to a manageable number. So I’m recruiting for entry level roles at a management training program for a large industrial corporation. Once the new hires complete their rotations, we split them up into functions and businesses- so the “mathier” kids may end up in operations research, and the kids who are great writers and synthesizers of information may end up in strategy or human resources. But as long as everyone walks in with (using this as a proxy only) over 700-ish SAT scores both math and verbal, our program can teach all of them what they need to know. We develop our own curriculum, we have fantastic instructors (some are the top professors at universities), and we know how to teach. We are not set up to do remedial work- so a kid with great math skills who can’t write a three paragraph executive summary of a research report isn’t our target hire. But an overall “strong athlete”- works for us.
Bingo- recruit at Swarthmore and Princeton (or Rice and Pomona or Williams and JHU depending on your geography.) Employer doesn’t care if you majored in history or linguistics or psychology-- the selection effect here. The adcom’s have already screened for what you need.
For other professions and jobs, the content matters quite a bit (i.e. ABET accredited engineering programs). So that’s the treatment effect- what happens once the kid gets to college is very meaningful. So you’re recruiting at MST (formerly U Missouri at Rolla)- a school which the average Joe outside of Missouri may never have heard of. But a top notch Mech E program and extremely rigorous. Sure- the fact that a kid with a 450 SAT isn’t getting into MST is important, so you are relying on the selection effect to some extent. But you care about the content, grade inflation, knowing who the key professors are who track and mentor top talent, etc. far more than your colleague down the block who is happy with virtually any Princeton grad, regardless of major.
I hate to sound like a broken record, but if parents REALLY want to help their kids launch, they’d spend more time learning about how real life companies hire- and less time putting forth their own political agendas (like: only a moron pays full freight. You’d have to be a prestige %^&* to pay for Amherst when your kid could attend U Mass Lowell for free. Google doesn’t care where you go to college. It’s better to major in STEM than anything else even if you hate STEM. etc.)
You guys can pontificate all you want but this doesn’t help your kid get a job. (or get into grad school). A neighbor’s kid asked me during the last admissions cycle to write a recommendation for Business School. Kid has no work experience to speak of. I explained that the likelihood of getting admitted to the programs on his list was close to zero- applicants need 2+ years of quality work experience post grad to be considered.
He insisted, I complied, he was rejected everywhere.
This stuff ain’t rocket science, but it also isn’t that hard to do your homework. What a waste of time and cash.
Re #114
So where does that leave graduates of less selective colleges with majors that do not have good major-specific job prospects (e.g. biology)?
There really are differences in the quality of colleges. Many colleges prey on people who did poorly in high school, accept them (they accept everyone) and then put them into debt, even though those people probably shouldn’t have ever gone to college. The classes at these schools are super easy and are intended to just give the graduate a sense of self-worth with a meaningless piece of paper. And I’m not just talking about the for-profit schools, many low-end non-profit colleges provide the same useless piece of appear.
@blossom - It depends on the employer. The last major corporation I worked at generally did not hire straight from school for their professional positions. They would only hire people with experience and a track record. If you looked at the roster of employees, with the exception of the northeast, big state schools were the most represented. The CC ranking of the school did not matter one bit.
Zin- my company doesn’t care about “rankings” in and of themselves, and that was not the point I was trying to make. The general public can ooh and aah that Northwestern is in the top 20 or out of the top 20 or Davidson is an elite school or not an elite school and frankly we don’t care.
Any big company which hires new grads has teams of people who work with the career development teams at many colleges and universities. I may get a press release with a lot of hoopla that some magazine has rated Georgia Tech the number one actuary program in the country. Guess what- my colleague who runs recruiting for a huge financial services company has been sending teams to Georgia Tech for over a decade. And could care less about GT’s ranking.
So Zin- I agree with you, the ratings don’t matter. My point was that depending on what you are hiring-- and if you have a sizable cohort coming straight from campus, you don’t really care what a bunch of parents on CC think. You have a strategy, you have time and resources devoted to your hiring processes, and the fact that someone on CC thinks that HS GPA is a good predictor of whether that person makes a good employee or not, or that someone on CC quotes Laszlo Bock like he’s the second coming…
We don’t really care. And again- if you want to help your kid, learn about reality, not your own deeply held beliefs which may or may not be relevant or even true.
I have a neighbor who is up in arms because her kid- who majored in mass communications at a third tier school, has only had one interview since he graduated in June. His “dream job” is with a major network.
Another neighbors kid just started at a major network. (He majored in history). You can try and explain to neighbor number one how and why companies hire (she claims the kid with the job “can’t even spell media” which is hilarious since media ain’t that tough to spell) but it is of no use. Her kid is unemployed, he’s got loans, they have no Plan B.
Ad agencies hire history majors. TV companies hire history majors. Insurance companies hire history majors. It’s not too tough to suss this stuff out.
“So where does that leave graduates of less selective colleges with majors that do not have good major-specific job prospects (e.g. biology)?”
Sigh. They’re all living in cardboard boxes under bridges, of course. @@
it’s like people on here are so clueless at times that they don’t realize that a) the vast majority of college grads in the US did not go to fancy-schmancy elite schools and yet amazingly b) the majority of them are gainfully employed, and doing more than just flipping burgers!