[Cornel West] DeSantis’s Revolutionary Defense of the Classics

@txtony We seen to have some agreement in principle.

CLT offers a boost from just relying on SAT scores alone.

Is your premise that because CLT overemphasizes one area you feel limiting, we're better off not having it at all and default to an admissions status quo everyone feels limiting (from what I've seen in other education threads) and underserves our current and future workforce?

 

No, not exactly. CLT emphasizing in one area is still okay, but what's lacking is the other areas (excluded). This results in an overall overemphasis in one area.

 

Which is fair given that admissions still have the prerogative to determine whether the CLT score is weighted higher than SAT and other admissions criteria.

I mean I don't know how rds will roll out curriculum to support this measure. Without details, anything can go t*** up. I just don't think that just because rds brought out the measure automatically invalidates it as a bad idea.

Hot social media hyper-polarized take, I know...

 

Yea, never said it's a bad idea. It's a terrible idea if he eliminates the much more common entry exams and forces students to only take that test. Doubt he's that crazy, but he's proven me wrong plenty of times.

 

My issue is that they are giving scholarships from public money based on a test that is admittingly designed to represent Christian values.

 

The test was designed to represent Christian values - this is a direct quote from the creator. To me that disqualifies it from receiving public money.

 

Damn yall let Os lol yall on mothers day

 

Ignoring how RDS went about this all the wrong way, they are adding the CLT while still accepting the ACT and SAT for the Florida Bright Futures scholarship program. Effectively, this means that home-schooled and privately-schooled students who follow the Western tradition can choose to take the CLT instead of the ACT or SAT. However, this likely only affects a small subset of students. Most privately-schooled kids probably choose private universities, so this change will likely impact home-schooled Christian students the most. Overall, I don't see it as that big of an issue.

Regarding RDS, this all started because of his war with the College Board, not because he wanted to give home-school kids an alternative. But even more significant is what he is doing to the universities in Florida. He will end up driving away good professors, and those schools will suffer.

 

The Indians, Chinese, Japanese, etc. are kicking our students asses. I bet is because of all that education they receive about the Bible and Western Civilization.

 

It's balm for his ego.

 

It introduces bias. The ACT and SAT are already biased by the content they used - if you don't have English as your first language for example, you are probably at a disadvantage. But now, people who are specifically just focused on Christian and "white" culture get their own test to help them do better. So you are giving a handicap to the very people who don't need it, while giving nothing to the underprivileged. If you want CLT, then you should give a test for Native Americans and Blacks as well - so that they can have a test that is tailored for them to do well too.

 

As usual religious institutions always try take credit for the advancement in humanistic values when it's usually the opposite.

I actually didn't see it this way.

It basically gives a in for students with poor math and reasoning skills(low IQ) to get good college entrance exam scores if they concentrated on western lit which quite frankly is a narrow selection of probably only white students. Not many inner city poor black kids who would do poor on a SAT but decent on a CLT.


So if you want equity here you should provide a test like CLT along with a test that centers around something like "African American literature exam".

 

Bias in standardized testing is a significant topic, and I'm generally against standardized testing. If we are to do 'standardized' testing, it should actually be non-standardized, meaning it should adapt to the student. However, we don't have the technology to be there yet, so we have to work with what we have. That's why the ACT/SAT is not the only criterion for scholarships or admissions. In my opinion, testing for scholarships should ultimately aim to include individuals who typically cannot afford higher education, usually those from disadvantaged backgrounds, as it benefits society to provide them with opportunities.

Regarding the CLT, I'm unsure if it truly helps certain students perform better. From what I've read, the test utilizes more passages from classical Western literature, but it doesn't test knowledge of the literature itself. Instead, it assesses comprehension and interpretation of the provided passages. The content used is not as important as the type of questions being asked. If the test primarily evaluates 'memorized' knowledge, there is a higher chance of bias compared to assessing comprehension. Caveat - I have only seen a few sample questions.

 

So the narrow selection of students that benefit from this are students who would perform poorly on the SAT which has a strong correlation with IQ as it's a reasoning test and not a knowledge test unless you think the SAT is testing middle school algebra and geometry while doing well a knowledge based test that tests knowledge on western lit.

The only students that would fit that narrow filter would probably be white suburban kids.

 

Is the word Christian truly offensive to you? I’m a Christian and it is the most beautiful word in the English language!

 

IQ is another thing I don't care for. It might actually benefit non-Christian students, but I'm unsure. However, only a few students would choose it. It's still a very new college entrance test that isn't widely accepted.

From what I've read, it is a reasoning test with some math knowledge.

https://www.mometrix.com/academy/clt-practice-test/