Tuba Or Not Tuba
Football is the one with the oblong ball. I want to be clear about my bona fides concerning my comprehensive knowledge of the sport before making a point about college admissions and predictions. I would mention that football players also typically wear helmets, but I don’t want to show off.
There are 32 NFL teams, one of which wins the Super Bowl each year. One divided by 32 equals a tad over three percent. Which is not to say that each team has a 3% chance of winning the Super Bowl. Indeed, some teams—Rams, Ravens, Seahawks, Eagles—have a significantly better than a 3% chance. Whereas other squads, my beloved Miami Dolphins among them, have much closer to a 0% chance.
On January 14, 1973, the Miami Dolphins had a 100% chance of winning Super Bowl VII. Given that the day before, they had actually done so. I admit that it is easier to predict the outcome of games that have already happened, trickier to be certain of contests that have not yet occurred.
Then why do so few people have a similar understanding about who gets admitted to highly rejective colleges? Of course Susie was admitted to Yale. Susie plays tuba! Everybody knows that the Yale marching band needs tuba players. Susie is heading to New Haven in the fall because she sensibly devoted her adolescence to all thing tuba.
And of course William was admitted to all eight Ivy League schools. William is a member of an underrepresented minority. Everyone knows that Ivy League schools are eager to admit students who are underrepresented.
What the journalistic prognosticators, parents in school parking lots, and everbody in general fail to mention or understand is the denominator. Were there by any chance a tuba player or two who were not admitted to Yale? What about a hundred denied tuba players? Were all the tuba players accepted? Susie being admitted to Yale because she is an awesome tuba player becomes less extraordinary and less likely if Susie is the only one of a hundred tuba playing applicants to be admitted. Indeed, given that Yale admits about four percent of its applicants, Susie being a tuba player could be considered a disadvantage if only one in a hundred tuba players are invited to attend, what with one percent being less than four percent.
Which is not to suggest that applicants to Yale increase the likelihood they will be admitted by burning their tubas, only to repeat Yogi Berra’s insight; “it’s hard to make predictions, especially about the future.”
Unlike Richard Feynman, Yogi Berra never won a Nobel Prize in physics. Dr. Feynman’s anecdote about misunderstanding probability regarded seeing a license plate, ARW 357. How extraordinary, he pointed out. What are the odds?
The odds of seeing license plate ARW357 after seeing it differ significantly from the odds of seeing license plate ARW357 before.
The underrepresented minority applicant admitted to all eight Ivy League schools? Same song, different verse. If they were the only underrepresented minority student who applied, then eight acceptances is truly unlikely. But if there were a significant number of underrepresented minority applicants who did not get in to all eight Ivy League schools or were rejected from all eight then the implication—underrepresented minority applicants have an advantage in the admissions process—can be called what it is: the sourest of sour grapes from families of privilege who will somehow have to suffer through life with the wrong bumper sticker.
Rejected from Stanford, my child matriculated at Middlebury and as a result is now living in a cardboard box under an expressway, said no one ever.
Admissions to highly rejective institutions is not completely random. Tommy’s senior year transcript shows a C in Algebra, his admissions essay contains a misspelling of “chickens” in the sentence, “In my spare time I like to bite the heads off live chickenz,” his test scores are modest. Tommy’s chances are Yale are comparable to the likelihood that the New York Jets will win the Super Bowl in 2027, not impossible, but I wouldn’t mortgage the farm.
Robin is graduated first in their class of 800 students, a 1500 SAT, and no mention of masticating poultry in their essay. Her odds at Yale are similar to those of the Seahawks emerging victorious—something better than single digits.
Will Robin be admitted? I am 100% certain of what will happen. I’ll let you know.
Just as soon as the decisions come out.