I dated a girl once whose family had a ton of money - think billions. She lived in the ritziest of neighborhoods, went to the best private schools, and had private tutors galore. I was a middle class income kid from a middle class neighborhood. She however, was also unfortunate enough to have early onset M.S. and could not sit comfortably for a very long, no matter how many tutors you gave her, and extra time couldn't overcome the fatigue. If she and I both got the same score, who is more deserving of admiration? I hope you don't say me, because you'd be wrong. The so-called "adversity score" would never capture her private medical struggle.

That's why there are college essays!

I gotta say, people in this discussion are acting as if suddenly colleges will totally forget that they need to admit for the lacrosse team and the rowing team and make sure they get the legacy admits in etc. That will not happen. Those people make money for the college. People who pay full tuition will always statistically have an advantage. You know how I know? I have done admissions scoring for higher ed! I don't decide who gets in, I just read all the letters of rec and the personal statements and look at the transcripts and send in an Excel spreadsheet.

Of course a single numerical score never captures the complexity of students. I really don't understand why HNers think this will make or break admissions. Any college has to meet their budget first. People who pay full price fill those spots. Everyone else is fighting for the remaining spots. Ok, maybe I answered my own question: HNers realize that despite being moderately successful in our current regime, they can't afford to pay full price and so their kids will be scrapping it out with every poor kid who busted their ass too, and it's just less compelling to hear "son/daughter of software engineer from well-off neighborhood, with robotics team experience and high SAT score and hours of tutoring and an internship at a local biotech firm" than "son/daughter of welfare mom, with robotics team experience and high SAT score and an internship at a local bank"....

Rich people can have crappy lives. No doubt about it. But they sure do help a small liberal arts college meet their budget goals more easily anyway.

> The so-called "adversity score" would never capture her private medical struggle.

She's probably gonna mention the MS in her essay, though.

There are always edge cases. That we can't perfectly capture each and every one of them doesn't mean some data on common advantages/disadvantages can't be useful.

(Plus, there's going to be a number of more conventionally disadvantaged kids with MS, too, who don't have the billions of dollars to lean on.)

Imagine you are about to undergo a major surgery. Would you rather get operated by a surgeon that graduated from the medical school with A+, or by someone with a B who got the job instead because they came from a poorer neighborhood?

The old joke is something along the lines of:

Q: What do you call the person who graduated last in their class in medical school? A: Doctor.

Sure, I'd probably prefer the higher performing doctor in this hypothetical scenario, but at the same time, it feels very much artificial (maybe a false dichotomy?). Sure, you always want the best for everything -- that's what "the best" means! Reality is that there are always going to be B students operating on people. If I were to propose my own false dichotomy, I might ask whether you prefer the B student who got tutored to pass the SAT, or one who self studied?

I am merely trying to simplify a complex matter to make it easier to understand/debate. I would say, in reality indeed a certain % of surgeons would be the B students. The problem is that some social policies would increase this %, while others would decrease it. In my opinion, giving points for anything other than raw measurable performance would increase this %.

To answer your question, I would prefer a person who is passionate about what they are doing and capable of thinking outside the box. However, unfortunately, it's not something that could be easily formalized. Sure, self-taught students would likely be better motivated than tutored ones, however once you begin counting it as a part of the score, people would start gaming the system. Someone would lie about not being tutored. Someone else would actually skip taking private lessons and will miss out on learning something important, because doing so would give them a better score. A much better solution, IMO, would be to point out and quantify the traits and skills the self-taught people show, and include them in the test, giving everyone a chance to learn and practice them.

> Would you rather get operated by a surgeon that graduated from the medical school with A+, or by someone with a B who got the job instead because they came from a poorer neighborhood?

Ben Carson is an apparent moron, who thinks the pyramids were for grain storage. He'd fail a history course. He's also apparently a phenomenal brain surgeon.

Clinical skills and raw academic scores can be wildly disparate in a single person. Frankly, if I were picking a surgeon, I'd look for the one who enjoys tinkering with electronics and engines in their spare time.

I would rather get operated by an experienced and successful surgeon. Who in their right minds will ask the grades during operation procedure?

I say this of course from the Computer Science perspective. Students scoring A are not necessarily the best Hackers.

Do you ask to see a surgeon's SAT scores, and their college scores before every operation?

I would bet money the MCATs won't start some ideological BS like this.

Just to get this right - to get a better SAT adversity score for their children, parents should ideally quit their job, survive on tax-payer welfare and live in a high-crime area ? This is now fully incentivized right ?