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Comment by user837387 | Hacker News Reader

I'm really missing the point you are trying to make. People prepare for the SAT to get a better grade and you think it is unfair. WTF? Actually, I do get it I just think it is insane that you think it is a reasonable point, as if it were a moral imperative.

What I do not get is why you think this way. People are simply trying to improve their chances by studying and trying to get a better SAT. It baffles me that you think this is somehow corrupt.

Your point seems to be that poor people cannot prepare for the SAT because they do not have the resources. I agree, but I think you should instead focus on fixing poverty. How? I have no idea.

You cannot stop people from studying or preparing themselves to have an advantage over everybody else, that is just crazy thinking.

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"Preserving the existing class structure" is not a design goal of the SAT, so to the extent that it does so, that is a problem. A test that didn't have this property would be a better test.

However, I don't think all is lost. Most of the wealthy's advantage is the fact that they actually practice taking the test. It's not clear why poor people don't avail themselves of this perfectly attainable advantage (frankly, how can they consider a few hours of their time more valuable than the many tens of thousands of dollars of scholarships on offer?), but they don't seem to do it. To fix this, let's get more poor kids to take the practice tests. I'm doing that in a very small way. When asked for advice, I tell poor kids and family members to practice, practice, practice. I tell rich kids there's nothing they can do...

I agree with you. Poor people not studying for the test is a problem with culture. It is the crappy culture they have learnt from their parents that is keeping them down. The parents don't know any better or don't care and henceforth they never push their kids to prepare for those test.

Oh yeah, I had a conversation with a less-wealthy parent on this topic within the last couple of months. I got the impression she was searching for some sort of secret or hack. I told her that the student should take a couple of practice tests and grade them herself so as to understand what happened. She didn't believe that would do any good, even though she sought my advice specifically because I got 35/36 on ACT several decades ago.

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