A reader writes:
The whole idea that there is one useful intellectual skill set and that the SAT Verbal measures it is alluring false. I would rather have a kindergarten teacher who is kind and patient and loving and knows how to motivate children to learn the building blocks of language and mathematics than one who is "brilliant" in the narrow way defined here.
Another writes:
The SAT does not judge intelligence. It judges scholarly accomplishment, hence the name change from the Scholastic Aptitude Test to the Scholastic Assessment Test several years ago. It tests what you have learned, not what you are capable of learning. And that graph is ridiculous. For one thing, it is impossible to compare scores from 1994 to an average from today (see here for information on recentering); the average score in 1994 on the verbal exam was 452, not 543.
But let the main point stand: Gym teachers did less well on the SAT. Perhaps that is because they often had other skills (say, athletic talent) that would help get them into college, so they focused less on maximizing their SAT score than the average student and focused more on winning state championships. Judging gym teachers on their high school SAT scores seems silly. If you want to judge them, have them take an IQ test today and compare that to other teachers – then you can call them 'dumber'.
Razib Khan, who wrote the controversial post, responds to his critics below. But first another reader:
The SAT test is eminently coachable. I say that because for the last ten years I've made a comfortable income off coaching students. As long as you cram a student's head full with vocab words, and force them to read, read, read, then they will become much better at the test. This is best understood by looking at teachers themselves: when I took my PSAT at the age of 15, I got around a 500 on Verbal. I studied my ass off, and got a 620 a year later. I took even more time to cram for the third test and got a 700. Apparently I became more intelligent by memorizing obsolete vocabulary words like "ingenue".
Once I got into the industry, though, the scales really fell from my eyes. Full-time test prep instructors spend a good portion of every day with the content of the test. After a few months of doing it, I was able to get a *perfect score* on the SAT. Not just the verbal either – the math section too. Every single goddamn test, practice or real. And this is normal for test prep instructors – sometimes we play a game where we try to finish practice tests with a perfect score using the least amount of time, e.g. finish in half the time allocated. It becomes pretty easy with repetition. ETS attempted to address this problem in 2005, which is why your data stops there, by restructuring the test – but it really didn't work.
Whatever the "intelligence" of me and my students, the SAT is clearly a poor measure of it. The more we prep for it, the better we do. Wealthy enough to hire private tutors? Enjoy tailored lesson plans from virtuosos? Anyone who thinks the SAT is a measure of intelligence and compares college grads to their test performance five or six years earlier as high school juniors has no credibility on education issues.
Another:
As an education professor and former elementary teacher, I have to take issue with Razib's concept of intelligence. Although, for some reason he uses the SAT to point out the relative "intelligence" of teachers, the SAT is not and never has been a measure of intelligence. In fact, many of us in this century see so called measures of intelligence as antiquated and quantitatively biased. Howard Gardner's work on multiple intellegences, for example, has expanded our view that there is more than one way to be "smart" (bodily-kinesthetic, inter-personal, musical, spatial, etc.).
As a former teacher and a current teacher educator, I have studied exemplary teachers all over the world. I liken the best ones to Jedi masters. They have this otherworldly intuition that could NEVER be assessed on any form of standardized test. To be great, you have to know each of your student's skills, weaknesses, interests, passions, and vulnerabilities. You have to be profoundly empathetic and savvy with how you use that information to motivate each of them. And, in classes with 20-35 students, you have to be an exceptional multi-tasker, because you must constantly monitor and adjust what you are saying and modeling to fit each of your student's needs and interests. This requires stamina, flexibility, courage, empathy, and, yes, an intellect that can process all of that information and deliver the goods, on your feet, seven hours straight, five days a week. I don't know any item on the SAT that can come close to measuring that.
Full disclosure: I made a 440, on my SAT verbal. A 440! Look at the chart – I'm not even on the chart! So, let's cut the bullshit and stop pretending like these tests even come close to measuring human capacity, let alone "intelligence." It's ridiculous.
Here's Khan:
The post below on teachers elicited some strange responses. Its ultimate aim was to show that teachers are not as dull as the average education major may imply to you. Instead many people were highly offended at the idea that physical education teachers may not be the sharpest tools in the shed due to their weak standardized test scores. On average. It turns out that the idea of average, and the reality of variation, is so novel that unless you elaborate in exquisite detail all the common sense qualifications, people feel the need to emphasize exceptions to the rule.
The Dish 