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Retracting my prior statements on "CTY", that CTY is gone

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EEVblog:

--- Quote from: tom66 on July 28, 2020, 11:13:33 am ---Hmm - so how do people on here feel about the bakery refusing to serve a gay couple when making a wedding cake?  They might be religious and hold that belief very firmly that gay marriage is immoral.
Private enterprise - fair enough right?  OK, but what if the couple was black?  Is that OK to now discriminate against?

--- End quote ---

Offering a paid service at a general store front to the public is quite different from giving money away, and having a say in who it goes to.
I think it would be wrong to try and conflate the two issues.

sokoloff:

--- Quote from: tom66 on July 28, 2020, 11:13:33 am ---It's a slippery slope to have any form of discrimination IMO - now if it happens that the economic or social aims (improve education in underprivileged groups) happens to target one group more than others, then that is OK, because in principle anyone from a disadvantaged background can apply.    You're not saying "only black applicants" or "only white applicants",  you're saying "poorer applicants from a background that has little higher educational history".

--- End quote ---
I think if you play that out, you'll find it becomes pretty close to a contest to figure out how to describe "only black applicants" or "only white applicants" without actually saying it.

"This scholarship is available to people who are within 7 generations of a blood family relative who was owned as a slave in the Southern United States prior to 1865." That doesn't technically exclude whites, because anyone from that disadvantaged background can apply, but who are we really kidding when we write that?

tom66:
Well yes - that's why it should be just for people from disadvantaged backgrounds.

The media don't like to play it up, but if you remove race from the equation, and just consider socioeconomic status (how rich you are, where you live, and how rich your parents were), in the US:
- poor white and black kids are both about as likely to go to prison or be shot by a police officer
- educational attainments are, in general, similarly poor (in fact white males from a working class background do a lot worse; this is particularly noticeable in the UK too.)
- life expectancy is similar

This isn't black vs white, this is being lucky to be born into a wealthy (or even middle class family) or growing up into a poor family. With many poor families being single parent, lacking a good male role model.

Why are so many black people in this category? It is a reasonable question, but in the USA at least, it is because that is where the slave plantations were, so of course the populations are dominant in those areas.  More connection to family and after slavery was abolished many went to work on the same farms for pay.   These are historically poorer areas: more working class work, less technical.

Whereas white Europeans represent most of white America's history - from educated and wealthy backgrounds in many cases.  Add in a bit of Jim Crow and segregation and we can see why we have ended up in this situation.

I'm not a fan of reparations, because today's white person did nothing to today's black person (generally speaking), it's very much historical.  But helping out people in poorer groups will probably bias more towards certain demographics, that's just life.  That isn't racist or wrong.

Rick Law:

--- Quote from: EEVblog on July 28, 2020, 03:32:55 am ---...
EDIT: I see Rick doesn't have evidence that it's actually changed from two to three requirements.

--- End quote ---

Yeah, I do have no evidence, just my recollection from some years ago.  I had no reason to keep evidence of that nature.

My reason to post was to retract my recommendations to fellow parents.  My basis of recommendation was: Since CTY was pure merit base, it was an alternatives to those tons of other "academic honor/awards" that focused on everything else but merit.  So, in that context, change or not wasn't even in my mind.  Either way, the recommendation needs to be retracted.  I was either wrong from the beginning (not a change), or it no longer apply for present-day (a change).

I know I recommended CTY to fellow members here on this forum.  I know I recommended it an awful lot to other parents, particularly when I was volunteering (some years ago) at a "parent operated" weekend school (not as replacement but as addition to their regular schools).  I volunteered there for over 6 years, every Saturday during regular school year, I interact with many fellow parents and I must have made that recommendation multiple-dozens of times.  I just hope that by now, any of them would have kids beyond youth-age and thus done with CTY by now.  Now, at the school where I volunteered, while many of them would have no problem showing they are financially needed (family income below $75000), almost all were from an "over-represented" group.  A fair number of them were from Hong Kong.

Even at the local public school, when I got into conversation with fellow parents, and whenever they show their disdain to "everything else but merit", I would recommend CTY.  Cheap to part of it (SAT test cost), pure merit based, and good name recognition.  Heck, I even recommended it to my barber...  I think these organizations have no idea how much parents are hungry for pure merit based judgements for academics, and they wonder why they are loosing support.

sokoloff:
I was in CTY and SMPY cohort 3.

I can heartily recommend CTY as I think it was instrumental in harnessing, directing, and deepening my abilities and interest in math/computer science and kept me from being dreadfully bored in those subjects in school. I will very likely have my kids test for participation in the program as well. (They seem to have some natural inclinations in this direction, but having a science PhD mom and an engineer/enginerd dad raise them undoubtedly contributes to that.)

It seems to me like the kerfuffle in this thread is entirely around an adjunct financial aid scholarship aspect to the program, having nothing to do with the core program itself.

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