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Comment by PaulHoule | Hacker News Reader

My take is that standardized tests are a road to social mobility. People can bullshit their way to higher grades but there are some rich kids who can't test their way out of a paper bag and the one way we can stop them from laundering their parents accomplishments is standardized testing.

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Except you can buy your way into tutoring too, and pay for test accommodations, and so forth and so on. It might not amount to a huge effect, but if you're on the boundary area, it can make the difference. Someone might also argue that although bullshitting with grades makes a difference, it usually isn't going to turn a D into an A either (speaking as a university professor, with many colleagues at different universities, in those situations it's usually a matter of being pressured to turn an F into a D).

Except you can buy your way into tutoring too, and pay for test accommodations, and so forth and so on.

I don't buy this. It's like saying someone has a remarkable physique or remarkable fitness only because they used PEDs when it actually requires a significant amount of effort and discipline regardless of what's in the gas.

Certainly targeted studying, tutoring, test accommodations, etc. can help. But the difference is at the margins.

It certainly helps to have some familiarity with standardized tests, particularly to take the PSAT and then take the SAT multiple times. Some people "freeze up" in that environment or they don't understand the strategy of "I've eliminated 3 out of 5 options, I should guess one of the other two".

Test prep helps the average person test at their level, but there are some people who can at best make excuses like "I must have skipped a line when I was filling out the form" and for those people the one thing that helps is hiring a ringer to take the test for them.

School on the other hand offers vastly greater options for people to turn financial and social capital into false achievements in terms of chiseling for grades, expensive sports and other activities, etc.

It's the B to B+ and B+ to A chiselers that bug me the most.

> you can buy your way into tutoring

You still have to listen to and understand what the tutor says, though. And it's not as if the tutor is saying anything that's not published in books or on YouTube videos - the only real benefit a private tutor could even theoretically have is that he could potentially find a few different ways to explain a concept until the student understood it.

>the only real benefit a private tutor could even theoretically have is that he could potentially find a few different ways to explain a concept until the student understood it.

Yes that's one benefit. Also with the focus on one student the tutor can gear lessons to best suit their learning style and current knowledge.

Really anyone who can afford a tutor would benefit from one.

studying for standardized tests doesnt work.

You would be surprised at the number of kids who have tutoring... and still can't test their way out of a paper bag

I see it the opposite. You can hire people to prep you for the test and pass it while having done zilch during HS; whereas bs'ing your way to higher grades over a period of several years is harder.

Well, no, because schools have a profound interest in having those students parents pay them for a top notch education.

How does that stop them in any capacity from living off their parent's wealth?

I don't think that's the point the parent post is making

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