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Re: MIT Math Diagnostic for Physics Placement
Posted:
Oct 24, 2012 12:42 AM
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What really is amazing is the percentage of their students,
especially those at Caltech, who have 780+ SAT Math and BC Calculus with a 5.
Wayne
At 05:18 PM 10/22/2012, Haim wrote:
>Dave L. Renfro Posted: Oct 22, 2012 2:06 PM
>
> >I too am rather amazed, but not because they're
> >essentially precalculus level, but because the
> >difficulty level doesn't seem to exceed what shows up on
> >average level precalculus tests.
>
> OK, Dave, so you are amazed and Bob is amazed and we are all
> amazed. Let's draw an inference. Let me suggest one.
>
> About a dozen years ago, I heard Barry Simon
>http://www.math.caltech.edu/people/simon.html
>(scroll down the page for a lovely picture of Simon's one-two punch)
>retired chairman of the math dept at Caltech. He said, at that
>time, that Caltech recently had to re-organize their calculus
>curriculum. He strenuously insisted that the incoming freshmen were
>as bright as ever, but their mathematical preparation had degraded
>significantly.
>
> Clearly, what we are seeing at MIT is all of a piece with
> Caltech's experience and the experience of others. For instance, I
> heard several years ago that national laboratories have had trouble
> filling math and science positions because those positions require
> high skills AND US citizenship. Perhaps the laboratories have
> implemented accommodations since then. If so, I can only wonder
> what they are.
>
> Maybe Paul should send Simon and MIT and the national
> laboratories a few citations to straighten them out.
>
>Haim
>No representation without taxation.
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