Here's an historical fact that I suggest be held in consciousness as we (that includes me) wax indignant in such cases. It could be put under a few headings, among them TEOMOP, Oh the Irony, and People Are Funny:
In the first several years of the SAT, females achieved higher scores than males on the verbal section. ETS determined that the verbal test needed to be balanced more in favor of males and purposely added questions pertaining to subjects to which males are socialized to pay attention (politics, business, sports). After this change, males have consistently done better than females; yet, no effort has been made to re-balance the questions since then.
I don't pretend to have the answer, but I'd be interested to read people's indignant comments about that 1976 change.
Damn, I shouldn't be here! But I had read about that historical change instituted to eliminate gender bias against, guess who, males, and figured if I could find it on google it would be relevant to the discussion.
How outrageous was that change, everyone? Who votes for going back to questions that produce the same gender-result that the original test questions did?
(I'm not voting. It's too complex an issue for me.) |
