I’ve been playing catch-up with the news, but I want to know your opinion on the following things:

1. Survivor Tribes to be Divided by Race

This season, the different tribes for the CBS reality show Survivor will be divided by racial/ethnic groups. There will be a White Tribe, an African-American Tribe, a Hispanic Tribe, and an Asian Tribe. This could be interesting. And people are in an uproar about it. I’ve never really watched Survivor, but my classmates are thinking of having a weekly viewing session…so that might put me in the mix.

2. Louisiana Bus Driver forces Blacks to sit in the back

So, there are claims that a Louisiana school bus driver assigned all of the black students to the two back seats of the bus. Apparently the white students on the bus had lots of space, some having seats to themself; while the 9 black students had to sit in the 2 seats with the older children holding the younger children in their laps. I wonder what will become of this. This also makes me think of when I used to ride the bus home from school and my bus drivers (all of whom were black) used to ask us why we would always sit in the back, reminding us that there was a time when we had to sit in the back.

3. George Mason University does away with SAT Scores for high achievers

I was really excited when I read that George Mason University has decided to drop the SAT and other standardized test from their admissions requirements for students who are high achievers. The above article states that students who earn a 3.5 gpa and are in the top 20% of their high school class won’t have to submit those test scores with their applications, because the school feels that these tests are a poor indicator of academic achievement. George Mason might be starting a trend- similar to how UNC did when they decided to make the early decision admission non binding. We’ll see what happens. However, I think it’s interesting that schools are realizing something that a lot of people knew all along- those tests don’t REALLY test what you know.