I thought tests weren’t supposed to be a level playing field? I thought that is the reason to pass you need above a certain percentage, and not a 100%. Are we to dumb down tests by removing supposed culturally biased questions so everybody can get 100%? Pish, I say. I contend that we put in more culturally biased questions, but from all the subcultures. After all, being a teacher means you should have some idea of the peoples of the different cultures you are teaching.
If the teacher doesn’t know them, they score lower. If they don’t want to score lower, learn some freaking culture, and not just your own, damn insular prick, or else just study the non-cultural biased material harder and only miss that which you refuse to learn.
No, the idea is to protect the hypothesis that people of all races are equally prepared for the test. Therefore, if there’s any disparity, just cry “racism,” without having to prove where the alleged bias is. Of course, the idea that some groups study harder and value education more is verboten, and is to be discarded without thought. Oddly, this alleged “cultural bias” does not seem to affect certain minorities, such as Asians or Jews. I guess they’re basically white, anyway, the oppressing imperialist bastards.
I don’t read it that way at all.
My take on it is as such:
Runner (athlete) is to Marathon (event in which he competes)
and
Oarsman (athlete) is to regatta (event in which he competes)
A particular question will be “biased” only in context.
Tests for tiny tots: there can be bias based on restrictions in tot’s local environment. Not knowing “cookie” in this context is not important because the test is not getting at vocabulary.
SAT tests: test is supposed to show if student can handle college (college in USA in the current year). The SAT may ask about “cookie” because test expects student should know enough vocabulary (student can go beyond local environmental restrictions by reading) to generally succeed in college. There could be bias, however, if, for any reason whatsoever, a subgroup of students has not picked up on “cookie” (“cookie” being only one vocabulary word of many and there being plenty of other vocabulary words that can be used to test whether vocabulary is generally large enough). [Hence regatta–yes, it “should” be picked up through reading but if for some reason a subgroup does not get it, use another equally difficult word that trips up students from all subgroups about equally–there are plenty of these hard (not dumbed-down) words available which should be picked up through reading.]
Teacher tests: test is supposed to show knowledge of specific topics teacher will have to teach. If teacher has to teach “cookie,” teacher has to know “cookie” even if teacher comes from a subgroup that does not naturally learn “cookie” at its mother’s knee. By definition there cannot be bias in asking about “cookie” on this kind of test. (There could be bias however if a question assumes knowledge of “yak herding” in asking about “cookie,” presuming teacher is not being asked to teach “yak herding.”)
There’s no exactly here at all. This is one of the problems with analogies - words have connotations and denotations that make comparisons such as this nowhere near as simple as many people think. To say that there is only one way to read a comparison is foolish. It may be the way that is clearest to you, but you have to remember that, with all of the nuances of words, patterns of similarity may be found in more than one way.
Granted, C is the best choice - but I still do not agree that it is a complete analogy - there is a flaw, possibly a misleading one.
If there were a test that people of different races and backgrounds got similar scores on (ie the AVERAGE score for both groups was the same), would you assume the test is flawed?
And would you think it bad if, say, wooden ladders used by the fire department were replaced with aluminum ones, so the firefighters didn’t have to be as strong to handle them, and the physical fitness requirements were lowered?
Yes, but what does that have to do with analogics? It isn’t about patterns in the sense of what’s the next item in the list. It’s about deriving one particular from another. A referee, for example, is not a participant in a sport in the same way that an athlete is. One particular does not entail the other.
Not at all so long as the standards were equal for all firefighters. Unless female firefighters don’t have to ever lift that latter, or in a situation where the fitness test qualifications that the man had to were required…but i don’t think thats how it works.
Sure, but, an oarsman is not a participant in a regatta in the same way as a runner is a participant in a marathon, either (as JustAnotherGeek was describing in post #122). That’s the difficulty with SAT analogy questions; one isn’t looking for identical relations, but just best matching relations, and there is a semi-subjectivity here.
(Indeed, I’d say there is no such thing as relations between two distinct pairs of objects being exactly the same, but I know you’d cite Kant otherwise)
Ladder raising, as an individual, and as part of a team are uniform without regard for gender or race. I make that statement based upon my knowledge of NFPA 1001, Standard for Firefighter Professional Qualifications, which is used by many departments as a baseline, and also as a PA Firefighter Level 1 & 2 evaluator. If I’m proctoring a skill station, all I expect is complete observance of all safety mandates, and competence. Demonstrate those, and I will pass you.
FWIW-The fire service got away from wooden ladders because they were maintenance extensive. Aluminum is nice because it’s light, but I personally prefer fiberglass for the safety around electricity it offers.
Well are we putting the entire town on a diet, so that the firefighters that only met the new lower standards can carry an unconscious person out of danger? Otherwise if you are endangering the public with the lowering of standards.
Let’s say you have a standard for firefighters that says they have to be able to drag 200lb sack 50 yards to qualify. With this standard, not enough women are passing. So under pressure, this gets changed this to drag 150 lb sack for 25 yards. what happens the first time your new firefighter has to drag a 200lb co-worker 50 yards out of danger, and they do not have the strength to do it? :dubious:
Any department that did that would, of course, be dumb.
OTOH, I recall when women first started applying to be firefighters, the standard was that they were failing to be able to carry a person of a certain weight across their shoulders (where the different body mass between men and women gives men an advantage) and all the screaming that it was not right when women suggested dragging as an option in which they could equally compete. Somehow, after the rules were changed to make dtagging the preferred method, it was “discovered” that dragging was safer, anyway, because it kept the victim below the smoke and less liable to have their head smashed into doorways as the upright fireman bumped his way through the smokefilled house.
Do you put “discovered” in scare quotes because you find the supposed fact dubious and concocted? It doesn’t seem as though you do, but I’m not sure what you intend with the scare quotes otherwise.
I believe the discovery was true. I found it ironic that it only occurred because people had to put aside some of their preconceptions of how carrying out a victim was the manly thing to do. Who knows how many victims would have suffered worse smoke inhalation or suffered more bruises through the 70s and 80s (or later) if there had been no challenge to the masculine way of handling that situation?
I’m already in the process of registering for the next emergency certification training, which will at least get me into a classroom. However, I can’t justify spending the additional time and money (especially money) on more training to get a permanent license. There are ways to go through a sort of back-door process, but again, getting into the classroom is the major hurdle.