ACT Perfect Scores Have Been Blowing Up

In the two decades between 1998 and 2018, the number of perfect scores on the ACT increased 34x from .01% to .34%.

Have students preparing to enter college suddenly become 34 times smarter? Unlikely

This explosion in perfect test scores is chronicled in an article on the PrepMaven site:

These are still very low numbers – in 2021, only 4,055 students taking the ACT earned a perfect score. However, the percentage of students getting a 36 on the ACT has gone from less than 0.01% to 0.34% in 2020! (There’s a small dip for 2021, which we can likely attribute to the Covid-19 pandemic.)

The makers of the ACT have assured us that this isn’t because the test is getting easier!

Rather, our hypothesis is that the rise in students getting perfect scores is because more high-achieving SAT “superstars” are now also taking the ACT, whereas before they would have only taken the SAT.."

Plausible? SAT superstars migrating to the ACT?

Perhaps.

In another treatment of the subject, Hannah K. Sparling and Dan Horn of the Cincinnati Enquirer put it this way:

"If the test is essentially the same, why are so many more students acing it?

The most likely answer is a booming test-preparation industry that’s built on the hopes and fears of students and parents who are willing to work – and pay – to get an edge.

They see the investment of a few hundred or even a few thousand dollars in a test prep program as worthwhile if it helps land their child at an Ivy League school or secures a big financial aid package."

Plausible? Anxious parents, hyper-competitive students, and increasing billions spent on test prep?

Definitely could be.

On the same subject, the Applerouth Team said the following:

"Perfection can be a tricky thing. Too much of it diminishes value. Think of little league where everyone got a trophy. Or that Earth Science class where the teacher promised an A+ if her students simply did the work. Not everyone deserves the label of “perfect,” and the same is true for the ACT. A composite of 36 should be reserved for a select few, and too much perfection should raise red flags over the difficulty of the test..."

It's worth noting that, despite a recent dip in perfect scores correlating with the Covid years, numbers of perfect ACT scores (at last count) are still 30 times larger than they were a generation ago.

I concur completely with Applerouth. When grades and test scores are no longer seen as trustworthy, they become worthless as means of assessing merit and rewarding talent and hard work. A 30x increase in perfect test scores is unsustainable and unacceptable.

Grade inflation is real problem, and has been for decades. Although merit certainly isn't everything, life is inherently competitive, whether we like it or not – and refusing to hold back failing students is neither helpful nor compassionate.

I hope we come to our senses sooner rather than later. Denial of reality is never a good long-term solution.

Quite the opposite, in fact.

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Toy Box Subscriptions

New parents often wonder what kinds of toys to buy for their infants and toddlers.

When given a choice, little ones seem find everyday objects the most fascinating. Kitchen items are a favorite source of amazement: bowls, cups, pots and pans, silicon cupcake moulds, ice cream scoops, etc. Balls, plain wooden blocks, fabric, toilet paper tubes, and small boxes are other examples of free or low-cost toys that babies love.

Remember to assiduously avoid anything sharp, pointed, small enough to fit all the way inside a young child’s mouth, or painted (unless you know the paint is safe). Remember, until infants are a year old or so, everything goes in the mouth.

Nevertheless, it’s nice to find some fine educational toys to add to the mix. Researching the best options for baby at each age of development can be a chore, however. Fortunately, regular delivery of curated selections of age-appropriate toys is now possible through various subscription services. One of the best of these is Lalo.

Rooted in the Montessori early learning model, boxes of educational toys picked for specific age groups can be purchased individually or through a subscription model. With minimal effort, busy parents can check this task off their to-do list and give themselves more precious family time.

You’ll find other top offerings in Best Baby Toy Subscriptions of 2024 published by U.S. News.

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Copyright © 2006-present: Christopher R. Borland. All rights reserved.

Major for Money, Minor for Love

Once upon a time, in the days when college was affordable for virtually everyone, a simple part-time job was all it took to pay tuition, room, board, books, and fees. In the olden days, the best advice was: “Follow your passion. Study what you love, and the money will follow.” 

Nowadays, that’s bad advice. Undergraduate degrees are beyond expensive, and graduate degrees are even more costly. Stories are rife about college students racking up huge debts chasing degrees that don’t lead to jobs lucrative enough to pay them off.

Crippling costs of post-secondary education make it unlikely or impossible for many students to move up the social ladder. Without much (or any) disposable income left over after paying basic expenses and college loan payments, many young adults have little to look forward to in life beyond renting, penny-pinching, and dealing with the stress of living paycheck to paycheck.

For nearly all young people today, I believe the best advice is: Major for money, minor for love. 

Before we go any further, it’s important to understand three SAT words: vocation, avocation, and amateur.

A vocation is a primary job. It’s the work you do to earn a living, a professional pursuit, a step along a rewarding career path.

An avocation is work you do for fun, in your spare time. It’s a hobby, essentially. Something you do for the pure love of doing it.

An amateur is a person who works hard to excel at a beloved activity while receiving no monetary reward for doing so. For many years, the Olympic Games were open only to amateur athletes, those training and competing for no other reason than personal satisfaction and love of their sport.

My advice is to major in a field of study that will pay good money and provide you with a good job that you won’t hate. Find a lucrative field you can excel in, one that doesn’t turn your stomach, and put most of your time into advancing your skills in this direction. At the same time, minor in a different field simply for the sake of immersing yourself in that which fascinates you. In your spare time, recharge your spirit by doing what you truly love. 

Major in accounting, minor in creative writing. Major in business, minor in dance. Major in statistics, minor in Italian. Major in nursing, minor in psychology. Major in AI, minor in art history.

You may not want to turn something you love into a vocation, anyway. Do you really want to make your passion a day-to-day struggle?

Imagine your passion is creative writing. How would you honestly feel about having to deal with marketing hassles, constant criticism and rejection, stifling commercialism, and unforgiving deadlines that fill the lives of professional writers? Do you realize how much competition there is for the vanishingly small number of well-paying spots in such a field? How long it takes to rise through the ranks, earning almost nothing in the meantime? Is it worth it? The stress involved could well destroy your passion for writing.  

Instead, engage in your passion on the side, part-time, as a hobby. Do your own thing on your own terms, simply for the love of doing it. Be an amateur, not a professional. Instead of spending most of your days battling with the many frustrating and soul-crushing aspects of life as a professional writer, join online writing circles, groups of other aspiring amateur writers, and enjoy sharing and improving your work on an informal, part-time basis with an appreciative audience of like-minded people.

Spend most of your time doing something that feeds your wallet, and some regular time on that which feeds your soul. 

You’ll avoid the tremendous stress associated with being chronically debt-ridden and cash-strapped while getting maximum pleasure out of the activity you most enjoy in life.

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Copyright © 2006-present: Christopher R. Borland. All rights reserved.

Patti Smith at Wesleyan 2016

My daughter graduated with degrees in mathematics and computer science from Wesleyan University in 2016. She's now a senior software engineer at Meta, well married, with a healthy and happy first baby, our first grandchild.

Can you tell I'm proud?

I'll never forget her graduation ceremony. Sitting in the audience, I was nervously flipping through the program, not paying much attention to anything in particular. Time passed slowly, as more and more parents and loved ones filled the chairs facing the stage in front of the beautiful Wesleyan library. Eventually, things got under way.

And then ... that voice!

I recognized it instantly as that of a musical hero of mine, the venerable Patti Smith. Not more than a few words into her talk, I knew it was her. What more fitting a way to mark my daughter's college graduation than with the spoken words of this particular poet extraordinaire:

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I was dreaming in my dreaming 

Of an aspect bright and fair

And my sleeping, it was broken


But my dream it lingered near.

In the form of shining valleys

Where the pure air rarified

And my senses newly opened


And I awakened to the cry.

That the people have the power,


The people have the power.

And where there were deserts,

I saw fountains and like cream the waters rise

And we strolled there together


With none to laugh or criticize.

And the leopard and the lamb

Lay together truly bound

I was hoping in my hoping


To recall what I had found.

I was dreaming in my dreaming

God knows a purer view

But as I surrender to my sleeping


I commit my dream to you.

That the people have the power

To redeem the work of fools

Upon the meek the graces shower


It’s decreed the people rule.

And I believe that everything we dream

Can come to pass

Through our union we can turn the world around


We can turn the earth’s revolution.

For the people have the power,


The people of the power.

Graduates, you are the future, and the future is now.

Congratulations.

Thank you.

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Read the article in The Wesleyan Connection and watch the video here.

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Copyright © 2006-present: Christopher R. Borland. All rights reserved.

Cart Before Horse

Students in marginalized groups are not doing well in math, and this is hampering upward mobility. But the solution provided in the recently adopted California Mathematics Framework (CMF) doesn’t serve the laudable goal of improving mathematical fluency in under-represented populations. 

In a 11/29/21 article by Joe Hong in Cal Matters, Tom Loveless, a retired math education expert puts it in a nutshell: “The way you get social justice in mathematics is to teach the kids math … not by dressing up mathematics in social justice.”

In the original draft of the CMF, central author and instigator Jo Boaler actually went so far as to write that mathematical talent isn't a thing, that it doesn't exist. Of course, to say such a thing is nuts. It's ridiculous. Nevertheless, differentiated advanced instruction for gifted students was condemned, at best, in early drafts of the CMF. Palo Alto parent Avery Wang makes the point clear. “Holding back high achievers makes them achieve more? That’s exactly the same philosophy that’s being promoted in the math framework.”

But this is the inevitable, illogical conclusion of woke ideology in math education, and woke ideology, generally: “Our personal differences are of central importance, but despite real differences, we should all achieve equally.”

The CMF is the culmination of a decades-long crusade within math education circles to teach math “constructively" by "discovery” and make math “more relevant” and “more fun." As a long-time member of the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics, a trade group for math educators that took a leading role in promoting constructivisism the late 1980s, I’ve watched this movement gain steam in recent decades.

Music Theory is not “Music Appreciation.” Those are two entirely different courses. Likewise, “Precalculus” and “Recreational Mathematics” are utterly dissimilar in purpose, method, and scope.

In the article, Michael Malone, parent and math tutor, puts it well: “They’re changing math to make it math appreciation. A part of math is learning things that are not authentic to life.” He then opines that the CMF “does a disservice to historically marginalized student groups by offering them a simplified version of math that fails to prepare them for the challenges of a career in science, tech, engineering or math.” Finally, Malone correctly concludes: “Math is gonna be hard for students who don’t enjoy it as much.”

[Thank you, Captain Obvious.]

In a separate Cal Matters article, UC professor Svetlana Jitomirskaya expresses her exasperation by the decision of the authors of the CMF not to seek much input from from STEM experts who naturally have first-hand awareness of the level of mathematical maturity and training incoming undergrads must have. “The process should have definitely involved STEM faculty from top CA universities with direct knowledge of what is needed for success as STEM majors,” she emailed. “It is absurd this was not done.” 

Jitomirskaya further criticizes the CMF for emphasizing “exploration at the expense of skills development,” and says there’s a “mountain of evidence that similar ideas have consistently failed when implemented at scale, and a rigorous approach — teaching students to back up answers with logic — is the only method known to decrease the [mathematics achievement] gap.”

This has been my own experience as a professional math educator for 45+ years. Sure, it would be nice if each student could reinvent the wheel, and in an ideal world, constructivism would be the best approach to take in teaching mathematics. In a very small class with a genius teacher, highly motivated and gifted students, and two math periods a day, constructivism could play a key role and be an important and highly productive part of the mix. But how many American math classrooms does this describe? As the professor points out, the constructivist idea doesn't scale. It's good in theory, bad in practice. Although both are important ideally, in reality, acquiring mathematical skill is more important than discovering mathematics.

Citing CMF-styled math exercises, Professor Jitomirskaya shows how these problems are illogical, poorly formed, and could introduce "a wrong idea of what it means to solve a problem — something that college professors struggle to undo."

Jitomirskaya states “It is irresponsible to make the entire state a laboratory for very controversial educational theories ..." and concludes that "Social justice, while desirable and necessary, will not come about by abandoning mathematical rigor."

I couldn't agree more. If one is concerned about upward mobility, getting good grades in math isn't what counts. What does count is having genuine mathematical skill and intuition, which cannot be developed simply by watering-down curricula so that struggling students are able to show better marks on their report cards. Masking problems doesn't make them go away. Pretending students are accomplished isn't helpful, and it isn't compassionate. Eventually, the rubber will actually hit the road. Again, quoting Tom Loveless: "The way you get social justice in mathematics is to teach the kids math."

Whatever one thinks of the "social justice" movement, math is still math and chemistry is still chemistry. The derivative of 6x^2 and the atomic weight of boron have nothing to do with “diversity, equity, and inclusion.”

If we're smart as a society, we'll make sure the horse precedes the cart.

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Copyright © 2006-present: Christopher R. Borland. All rights reserved.