Word: sophes
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Today it is clear that Soph Standing has been both a success and a failure. As an educational program which experienced almost every trial and pitfall possible, it offers an instructive lesson in how policy is made, and in why it is made...
Sophomore Standing was also designed to improve American education by rewarding schools that gave particularly good preparation. The College's privileges of leadership have given rise to serious and somewhat unpleasant obligations. The Administration feels, for example, that abandoning Soph Standing is absolutely out of the question because it would impair the prestige of the national advanced placement program...
This may help to explain why to little data is available. But a year ago a Senior Tutor did go over the records of Soph Standing students in his House, and concluded that all but one had had unsatisfactory experience with the program. The Dean murmured polite assent to this finding and said he might be interested if more people said the same, but so far there has been no rush of data...
Nobody knows, for example, whether Soph Standing students perform substantially above or below predicted rank list ratings during their careers. Nobody knows whether they change fields more or less often than others, whether they go to graduate school more or less often than others, whether they go to graduate school more than a comparably intelligent group of Freshmen, or whether their personalities change more or less than other undergraduates. Nobody knows, in fact, whether any measure except academic achievement would show Soph Standing students more mature than ordinary Freshmen...
With respect to acceleration, the minority offered three revisions: raising the academic standards for admission to the program; discouraging candidates from accepting Soph Standing unless they have a specific educational plan in mind; and providing early advice about the attitude of the students' anticipated Departments of concentration toward Advanced Standing. It also recommended retaining the option of a fourth year...