<p>I’ve been reading a lot of posts saying that statistics like acceptance rate and SAT scores are unfair to large (read: public) universities because they have to take more students than their smaller (read: private) counterparts. </p>
<p>However, I think whether it’s fair or not doesn’t matter. The reason I say this is because regardless of whether it’s fair or not, colleges are essentially practicing a type of pre-selection for future employers. </p>
<p>Let’s say you are an employer and you have two choices about where to recruit students. The two choices are the same except school B’s average SAT score is higher, and its acceptance rate is lower, although school A has a larger undergraduate population. School B is theoretically the best place to recruit at because the job applicants will, on average, be more qualified. </p>
<p>Now you may say that at the larger school the employer would have a larger amount of job applicants. Although this may seem like it would give the employer more choices regarding who to give the job to, it also requires the employer to spend more resources (time) to interview all of the candidates. </p>
<p>Although an employer could try to prevent some of the less qualified job applicants at school A from applying, it is impossible to create a pre-selection system that is as good as a university’s own admissions committee. An employer could set a minimum GPA, but if he sets it too low, it will be meaningless, and if he sets it too high, he will block out people who are potentially the most qualified. The same could happen by requiring certain majors. So really, the best system for an employer is to let the university figure out who the best people are and then bring them all to one spot (the school itself). Theoretically, this is really what it means to attend an elite university; by attending, you are making it easier for employers to recruit you because you and other well-qualified job applicants are all in one place. </p>
<p>Keep in mind that this is all theoretical since I do not have first-hand experience with it. If there is something I have not taken into account, please post about it.</p>
<p>That implies that your level of qualification for any job for the rest of your life is somehow objectively determined by the end of your eleventh grade year, and that nothing you can possibly do in college will ever change your value to an employer. However, I think most employers would agree that one of the main reasons they demand a college degree in fields where it is technically not necessary to perform the job is that a student’s ability to complete college with a good record says much more about him/her than they would ever be able to determine from a high school record alone - it speaks about motivation, self-direction, commitment and interests. Therefore, I would argue that if employers are in fact using the top schools as a screening process, they are doing themselves a disservice because a student’s mere presence at a top school does not say anything about him/her that the employer couldn’t have discovered for themselves from the same student’s high school transcript and test scores.</p>
<p>I agree with the first part of your correlation statement (family income) but I don’t think it necessarily correlates to parents’ educational achievement. There are a lot of rich kids with powerful parents who don’t do very well on the SATs, in spite of many hours of expensive SAT tutoring and prep. Of course, they probably would do much better with the prep (due to high family income) than without it, but I don’t think parents’ educational achievement has that big a role in it than family income.</p>
<p>My parents did not go to graduate school yet still had money to pay for a reasonably priced SAT prep course; in addition to my own studying and private prep, I was able to break 2300 during my second SAT sitting.</p>
<p>Having Harvard-educated parents may place a much bigger emphasis on education and doing well in school in their children’s lives, as opposed to not as well accomplished/educated parents, but that still does not really translate to having excellent SAT scores as family income does.</p>
<p>Family income = money for test prep courses/test prep books = higher scores b/c of knowledge of working SAT strategies and format of test</p>
<p>hotasice,
I agree with your point. Berkeley and the UC system have published statistics on SAT scores for applicants/admittees/enrollees…you can select by parents educational level and have it sorted…</p>
The difference though is that admissions committees can take into account ECs, special circumstances, etc. Not only that, but it’s easier for the employer if he doesn’t have to look at the transcript/scores and just know that because the student is merely at the university, he/she is a good candidate.<br>
Regardless, they’re the best statistic we’ve got. Colleges can decide if someone scored really high on the SAT despite coming from a low-income background and then admit them. That’s right, I’m assuming colleges practice fair admissions and not just number-based admissions, because if they did, the employers wouldn’t look too kindly upon it.</p>
<p>Intelligence is mostly genetic. After that, having good parents when you are little makes a difference. It doesn’t cost money to be a good parent.</p>
<p>The reason SATs and test scores correlate with family income is because the parent’s intelligence and motivation led them to higher income.</p>
<p>Intellectual ability causes higher income, not vice versa.</p>
<p>Intelligence is not necessarily genetic. The G factor theory has been at least half debunked. Heredity of intelligence is explained and debunked (in large part) by evolutionary biologist Stephen Jay Gould in "The Mismeasure of Man.</p>