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AFFIRMATIVE REACTION

"Well, son, what's the story?"

"I got a list of all the scholarships, Pops."

"Great."

"Yeah ... there's quite a few of 'em, but most of the big high ticket stuff is for basketball and football players."

"Hm. I guess we got to keep them Jack Rabbits in the play- offs, son."

"Right, but I'm 5'2" and 130 lbs. and I did not notice any ping pong payoff for the playoffs."

"Well, that's just the way it is, son."

"What I don't understand is, what does the ability to play football or shoot hoop have to do with the purposes of a college or university?"

"Son, - those ball games generate a lot of revenue ... a lot of ink for the old Alma Mater. We're talking the glory of the game!"

Wrong ... we're talking preferences here. That's what we're talking. A preference is a value system dictating selection for admission. Colleges value athletes. They also "prefer" folks who score highly on socio/ethnically skewed tests, students from widely dispersed geographic areas etc.

The entire process of admission to college, hiring in the real world, what have you, is driven by preferences ... each preference producing an affirmative action towards some designated person or group.

In discussing affirmative action and preferences we should do so knowing that eliminating them is not an option. All we can do is decide on the value system that drives a given affirmative action.

It's a lot easier for me to get behind placing a high value on getting people of color into Universities in proportion to the population, than to reward people who weigh 200 or more pounds, are substantially over 6 feet tall and demonstrate adroitness in the manipulation of an inflated leather bladder.

The real bottom line on affirmative action, however, is the test used by schools to make the affirmative decisions. Studies of the SAT have often revealed that it is not a good predictor of who will do well in college anyway. Secondly, of course, it is culturally biased.

OK. What do we need for a test?

We'll make a big jump. Let's say that a test of what we instinctively recognize as intelligence - power of mind - would be the surest indicator of a person who will fare well in an environment focused on use of mental functions.

Yet intelligence tests are probably as culturally biased as the SAT tests.

We want, therefore, a definition and measure of intelligence that could be applied equally to a Crip and a young Exeter student whose family have attended Harvard for five generations. The new test should determine accurately which person has greater "mind power."

As to a more specific definition of intelligence, it would appear, it has two components:

The ability to decode one's environment
Speed, accuracy and imaginativeness in using the decoded data to create totally original alternatives and solutions

So now, assuming that intelligence is a basic human quality, when we institute the new intelligence/admittance test equally across all ethnic and social groups, lo and behold, we should find we are admitting a fair proportion of Crips and Boston Brahmins.

Presumably everyone will be happy ... except the dumb descendant of five Harvard grads who got 32 out of 200 on the test. It may be a bit artistocraticist, but he's going to inherit the family business anyway, so who cares.