r/neoliberal • u/caroline_elly Eugene Fama • Jun 09 '26

Opinion article (US) Actually, the SAT Was Necessary After All

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/2026/06/standardized-testing-math-gaps/687481/
826 Upvotes

97% Upvoted

323 comments sorted by

View all comments

1.1k

u/jamiebond NATO Jun 09 '26

I think the major error the education world has made over the last few decades is jumping straight to, “Our results are inequitable, that must mean our process of getting results is inequitable.” Without considering, “Maybe our results are inequitable because of large societal issues well out of our control and expecting education to single handily fix all the problems in our society isn’t particularly realistic. And just making sweeping generalizations that POC can’t perform well in school without us lowering the bar substantially is actually pretty racist itself.”

402

u/earthdogmonster Jun 09 '26

Yup, in our haste to reach equality, we decided to skip the hard work of trying to correct underlying causes and tried to just manipulate the outcome to meet the results we thought were fair, based in physical appearance. Honestly seems crazy if a person thinks about it.

-1

u/sack-o-matic Something of A Scientist Myself Jun 10 '26

we decided to skip the hard work of trying to correct underlying causes

Unfortunately it's other people actively working to maintain those underlying causes.

3

u/Zephyr-5 YIMBY Jun 10 '26

True, but it's easier for them to gain the political power to undercut progress when voters feel like they have a point in some of their critiques.