SAT Scores and Family Income (2013)

Average SAT Scores by Family Income. Source

I know this post might seem totally out of place (well technically nothing is out of place since it's my blog after all ^{arrogant much?}, but I just wanted to share this piece of data with you guys.

r/dataisbeautiful is probably one of my favorite - might I add random - subreddits out there along with r/wheredidthesodago and r/mildlyinteresting. One thing I really enjoy about Reddit comments is no matter how stupid a discussion might seem at first, some Redditor is bound to appear out of nowhere and surprise you with a super profound argument that makes you go "oh shit, this dude is on point!" I know this doesn't really count as one of those times since the discussion at hand wasn't stupid to begin with, but you get my drift.

Although I don't remember much about my SAT days, I still find it satisfying to see other high schoolers suffer - I meant challenge themselves intellectually -  with these exams each year. If you click on the link in the caption, it'll bring you to the actual thread on Reddit; the highest-rated comment at the moment is the one by k-uke (thank god he doesn't have a nsfw username, I don't want to be quoting sashagrey4thewin or bdsm_king):

"Households at the top of the scale could well have better 'family lives', paying tutors, spending more time with their children, more structure and organisation at the home."

I'm gonna add to the list by saying that kids from higher-earning households may have a better idea of how SAT scores affect their future education and career choices; hence their incentive to study. Not to mention healthier diets and various recreational activities like k-uke mentioned in his comment. They might also be expected by their parents to get better grades at school. Again, no one is saying that these so-called "poor kids" don't come from loving families, most of them probably do, but let's not forget that wealthier families are definitely more capable of affording different kinds of resources for their children.

Of course, stats are just stats, but the correlation is strong with this one. Some people actually try to explain the correlation by bringing genetics into the mix, and I, too, find that a little absurd. Though the connection between race and intelligence has always been the center of various debates, there hasn't been any solid evidence that shows a significant connection between the two (you can read more about it on Wikipedia right here).

While I was doing a little bit more digging, I found a New York Times article from 2009, and it really makes me wonder what's going to happen in the next decade, and whether these numbers will stay the same by then. What if something drastic happens and it completely changes the whole system?

Hmm, now I wonder what it might be.