His emphasis? Well....not everyone arrives at Princeton to get into STEM classes....equally prepared.
I pondered over this for a while, in a long thought process.
One of the top ten things I learned upon leaving the farm in 1977, and over the next five years....there were just a fair number of people who were educationally....unprepared. I'm not saying they were stupid, but that they were given x-amount of education and some of it...stuck, while some of it just dissolved into thin air.
As I reach age forty....this belief got worse. I had the opinion that probably 40-percent of high school kids were arriving in some Air Force job skill....marginally getting some skill after 12 weeks of tech-school.
Today? I'm in full agreement that a fair number (maybe half of America's high school graduates can't handle science, technology, engineering, and mathematics basics. I might even add literature/plain English to the list as well.
But the question is...if you arrived at Princeton and seem to be unable to handle the STEM classes....what's the college to do with you? Lower the expectation? Add a 5th year to bring you up to date? Block you entirely because you aren't that capable?
Then you have the screwed-up problem....if you have Asian kids step up and have the skills....should you deny seats to Princeton to these kids....because of the unfair nature of things?
Personally? The best solution is to make a new second Princeton university....called Princeton-prep. Tell the remarkable kid applying if you don't pass the STEM mandated levels.....no problem, we'll help you improve. For the nifty price of $49,500....we will give you a Princeton-prep situation.....doing real high school level STEM crap. Then to really sell this to the Princeton leadership....I won't hire professors ($90,000 cost per year)...I will hire real plain high school teachers at $55,000 a year.
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