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The full paper is available here
Hopefully this thread will elicit a comment and 2nd consecutive daily visit from Obsidian, our resident expert on astrophysics. (or was that astrology?)
The full paper is available here.
It’s all good. As my academic job winds down and I prepare to enter the private sector the shortage of qualified STEM applicants can only help.
There is a certain amount of core coursework you need to master if you want to work in STEM no matter what university/college you go to.
When I was in college I remember a professor complaining that he was reviewing the physics program at Pan-Am University (which I think has changed its name) and found that the students didn’t need to take a single class in quantum mechanics to get a B.A. in physics. At my big state university, you had to take four semesters, which prepared me well for the subject GRE and for grad school.
Albert is almost certainly lying. Schools don’t require four semesters of quantum mechanics to get a B.A. in physics. Universities require one, maybe two courses in quantum mechanics tops, though of course some people might voluntarily take four. If I am in the wrong then Albert can provide a link to his university’s physics department’s degree requirements, and I will be glad to admit my error.
I graduated in the mid-90s so the course structure at UT-Austin has totally changed. The BA may have been more relaxed (I don’t remember), but the BS required 4 semesters of Modern Physics which was almost all quantum mechanics. I think some schools would have broken one of the classes into nuclear/particles physics, but they were all required. In any case, it was more than zero.
The textbooks were:
Brehm – Introdcution to the structure of matter
Park – Introduction to the quantum theory.
Davydov – Quantum Mechanics (taught by one of Weinberg’s post-docs and one of the worst classes I ever took)
Fraufendler and Henley – Subatomic Physics
yep, i am friends with two black kids that dropped out of their STEM programs at top-5 schools. i knew them in high school. i achieved better on standardized tests and took more AP classes, only to see them accepted in better schools. now i am about to be a doctor and one is in nonprofits and the other is becoming a pastor.
@Challo:
So, in the end, it all worked out, right? I mean, neither of those Black students prevented you from becoming a doctor – right? So, what’s the fuss?
O.
@Camlost:
“Hopefully this thread will elicit a comment and 2nd consecutive daily visit from Obsidian, our resident expert on astrophysics. (or was that astrology?)”
O: Ask and ye shall receive, my friend – and as for your parting shot, I would wager a goodly sum that I know about both than you do about “evolutionary traits”.
Shall we test the theory?
O.
Obsidian @ 5:21
The fuss is that those two spots could have gone to students who were a better fit for the program.
Obsidian, I see that you got into a heated argument with Ricky “Joe” Raw and Vigil Kent. You truly are a contrarian.
We show the vast majority of minority students would be more likely to graduate with a science degree and graduate in less time had they attended a lower ranked university.
To be filed under: No shit, Sherlock.
@PA:
“Obsidian, I see that you got into a heated argument with Ricky “Joe” Raw and Vigil Kent. You truly are a contrarian.”
O: Yes, this is true, for I am deeply suspicious of bandwagoneering and clinging to easy arguments. Life has taught me that things rarely workout that way. Plus, I’ve found that most people simply don’t like to actually go through the trouble of thinking things through for themselves.
When it comes to T and VK, well…you saw what I wrote, and what was excised, I posted at my blog.
O.
@Titanium:
“The fuss is that those two spots could have gone to students who were a better fit for the program.”
O: OK< so let's entertain this notion and allow it o play itself out. Let's say that these Blacks went to lesser schools and did well. Both you and I and everyone else knows, that out in the real world, such a thing doesn't look as good on a resume as having gone to a Duke. What's the chances that a Black person going to, say, a Bennett college, going to get a high level prestige job? To ask the question is to answer it.
Mind you, I'm not arguing the veracity of the claim you and others are proferring here; just asking how this is supposed to work in the real world. One of the problems I have with the BD crowd is that they think that Blacks are just supposed to be cool with forever living a lesser life. The HBDers may respond by merely saying that life itself isn't fair and that that's the way the cookie crumbles; but in the world of politics, particularly of the American kind, you have to get enough people to buy into your idea in order for it to work. Simply put, Black people don't want to go back to a time when they had to accept a lesser life, "just because". So, even if they flunk out at a Duke, they want that chance to do it – after all, Whites have been flunking out of such prestigious schools, for decades.
Now before the howling starts – I am deeply ambivalent about Affirmative Action, in large part because I realize that by definition, somebody's gonna be left standing when the music stops. There's just no getting around that fact. Because there's only so many school, contracts and job slots to go around, especially the higher up the foodchain one goes. I get that, and I also get the fact that it is very possible that White Guys would be paying the price to right the scales of justice, as it were. This is why I think the way we as a society have gone about Affirmative Action was all wrong; instead of doing it by executive order or judicial fiat, we instead should have gone through Congressional channels, the most democratic arm or process we have. At least that way, the People will have had the chance to weigh in on the matter either way. As it stands right now, last time I checked, everytime such questions are put to the People by way of referendum, the People have rejected it. Personally, I'm cool with that.
But that's just me.
In any event, at the end of the day, the fellow above's dreams of becoming a doctor weren't deferred because of the two Black guys who had the chance to go to and flunk out from a better school – and that's something else I've always had a problem with in terms of the (usually White Guys) opponents of Affirmative Action – if you're truly talented, nothing is really going to deter you from achieving your goal. What a lot of White Guys don't want to admit, is that more often than not, AA basically puts Blacks and Browns against marginal White Guys – geniuses like, say, Sergey Brin or Mark Zuckerberg, have little to fear from Dontavious or KeyShawn. It's usually say, White firefighters or postmen, who have the most to fear.
O.
“It’s usually say, White firefighters or postmen, who have the most to fear.”
A higher crime rate, that’s for sure.
“if you’re truly talented, nothing is really going to deter you from achieving your goal.”
Well there we have it, there’s no need for AA.
@Detroit:
“A higher crime rate, that’s for sure.”
O: Well, crime rates and other dangers are part of the job; no one’s drafting White Guys (or anyone else for that matter) into the police or fire departments. If they’re concerned about the higher crime rates, they don’t have to take the job. Problem solved.
@Well:
“Well there we have it, there’s no need for AA.”
O: Perhaps not; but I was speaking about White Guys who bemoan their supposed displacement as “more deserving” students/applicants by ostensibly lesser qualified Black and Brown students/applicants. In particular, I was responding to the fellow upthread who talked about two Black guys he knew who supposedly got into a prestigous school by way of AA, but flunked out, supposedly ahead of him/taking his place. Yet this same guy has gone on to become a doctor. My point?
That, despite all that he’s said about the supposed predations of AA, that didn’t prevent him from becoming a doctor – and that perhaps those on the White Guy side who make the most noise about AA, might be because they’re the marginal guys for whom AA is a real concern. Again: if you’re Segey Brin or Mark Zuckerberg talented, you have little to fear from JaMarcus or Dante.
Don’t you agree?
O.
>What’s the chances that a Black person going to, say, a Bennett college, going to get a high level prestige job?
Orders of magnitude higher than one who fails out of a top-five program.
On the other hand, there’s a real difference in career potential between graduating from an ivy and graduating from State U. You can become a doctor with a degree from both places, but you won’t have the same career opportunities.
It’s not a zero-sum game: the top level schools only restrict how many they admit, not how many they graduate. In this case, the two black students would have been better off had they gone to a less prestigious school, and Challo would have been better off had he graduated from a better school than the one he did.
@Tom:
“Orders of magnitude higher than one who fails out of a top-five program.”
O: No doubt; but you’re arguing In Mala Fide, and you know it. You knew what I was talking about, but you simply refuse to deal with it and instead distort it into one of your strawman talking points. Not a good look.
“On the other hand, there’s a real difference in career potential between graduating from an ivy and graduating from State U. You can become a doctor with a degree from both places, but you won’t have the same career opportunities.”
O: Why not? If you’re bright and brilliant, you’re bright and brilliant whether you went to Hillsdale or Harvard – right?
“It’s not a zero-sum game: the top level schools only restrict how many they admit, not how many they graduate. In this case, the two black students would have been better off had they gone to a less prestigious school, and Challo would have been better off had he graduated from a better school than the one he did.”
O: We don’t know that – in fact, from what we do know, (White) students attending the Ivies, don’t seem to do all that much better or worse, than their Big State U brethren. On the other hand, what data we do have, tends to suggest that when minorities attend and graduate from the Ivies, they tend to go farther, in aggregate.
And of course it’s a zero-sum game: again, there’s only so many high prestigious slots and spaces to go around. No matter how you slice it, at the end of the day, somebody’s gonna be left standing when the music stops. I’m honest enough about Affirmative Action to freely admit this fact. Too bad you’re not honest enough to argue your position as evenly.
O.
But it’s not a zero sum game. Putting our most talented students in a position where they can network with each other, bounce ideas off each other, and form new companies (or make existing companies more effective), is important for growing the economy.
@HH:
But, what’s preventing the guy’s becoming a doctor from networking etc with his coworkers/colleagues anyway? How is the other two Black guys preventing that? Most people don’t really make their mark until well after school has ended.
O.
I’m not totally in tune with the detailed thrust of this string. But I can and have weighed-in in the past, with the position that, having been a NAM who received a M.A. from a top-tier, perhaps even top-five, university, I can personally attest that there are plenty of whites in that circumstance who could be viewed as ‘not deserving’ and that there is no clear distinction whatsoever between them and the smattering of NAM peers beside them; if anything, the NAMs were more distinct students, as they couldn’t rely on something more typical of their white counterparts, like a rich and actively donating alumni of a parent.
And before I deal with this in retort, let me state now that, yes, my M.A. was in a subjective, non-STEM field, but I knew plenty of NAMs and non-NAMs who were in STEM fields, as well as attending the law school, and what I said above applied there as well.
No Doubt!
Its time for Americans to lose the term “MINORITY”. Its worse than useless, it actively distorts and misrepresents reality.
…as they couldn’t rely on something more typical of their white counterparts, like a rich and actively donating alumni of a parent.
Isn’t that a popular cliche of Hollywood movies about college life – the rich, undeserving snob kids (White people) verses the rag tag groups of smart, tryhard social losers (mostly White with a token black or Asian in the mix)?
“Isn’t that a popular cliche of Hollywood movies about college life – the rich, undeserving snob kids (White people) verses the rag tag groups of smart, tryhard social losers (mostly White with a token black or Asian in the mix)?”
Perhaps so, but it certainly was a evident reality during my time in college….. Still, I’m not saying most ‘privileged’ attendees were low-effort slackers, nor were the ‘ragtags’ social ‘losers’, or for that matter, hyper-sensitive complainers about their relative lower privilege, etc…..I just don’t think the AA college scenario is as flagrant as it’s sometimes portrayed, though I admit my counter-evidence is anecdotal.
Bottom line: I might mention my take, but I ain’t whining about it incessantly either.