Consider the sample source.
Millionaire mind studied successful multi-millionaires right now. Majority of whom are middle-age. Ie they went to College quite a long time ago. I strongly suspect that competition for college admission is much greater today than it was then. I based this simply on that fact that the population is simply so much larger today and hence almost automatically increased competition. Thus I suspect that in 10 maybe 20 years when a new version of the book comes out the scores will be significantly higher. Makes sense to me.
I'm very surprised no one has mentioned what would really happen with these laptops.
First no household on the poverty line in India is going to spend 1/4 of their annual income buying a laptop for a child to tote around, beat-up and lose or break. I know I wouldn't spend that much of my annual income for something so easily destroyed.
So the government could order a bunch of them, and hand them out to the students for free or steep discount. So then what happens?
Why they take them home and sell them on the street for $100, $200, maybe more. Why not make half a years income in a couple of hours.
These are very large numbers of people struggling to meet the needs of basic survival. If I can sell something I got for free and cover half my families food bill for a year I know what I'm doing with the thing.
I'll just tell the school I lost it and they can issue me a new one. If they bill me for it or tell me I don't get another, I can just ignore the bill or fall behind in class. India isn't going to be changing its curriculum to accomodate these new laptops so I can still learn the core material.
These things will move fast. They'll end up on the street vendors stalls overnight.
I don't think people are really getting the scope of the issues of poverty in India. 100s of millions of children live in abject poverty in India. They couldn't make these things fast enough to reach significant numbers of them. So the schools can't modify the curriculum to require the kids to use them. So they could only offer them in special classes for those kids who do have them. So the families will sell them and the kids will stay in the ordinary classes.
Those schools where the children can afford to keep the laptops would already have computers in the home since they can be bought for $200 already.
Not to mention how easy these things are going to be to steal on a regular basis.
Slashdot Mirror
Consider the sample source. Millionaire mind studied successful multi-millionaires right now. Majority of whom are middle-age. Ie they went to College quite a long time ago. I strongly suspect that competition for college admission is much greater today than it was then. I based this simply on that fact that the population is simply so much larger today and hence almost automatically increased competition. Thus I suspect that in 10 maybe 20 years when a new version of the book comes out the scores will be significantly higher. Makes sense to me.
I'm very surprised no one has mentioned what would really happen with these laptops. First no household on the poverty line in India is going to spend 1/4 of their annual income buying a laptop for a child to tote around, beat-up and lose or break. I know I wouldn't spend that much of my annual income for something so easily destroyed. So the government could order a bunch of them, and hand them out to the students for free or steep discount. So then what happens? Why they take them home and sell them on the street for $100, $200, maybe more. Why not make half a years income in a couple of hours. These are very large numbers of people struggling to meet the needs of basic survival. If I can sell something I got for free and cover half my families food bill for a year I know what I'm doing with the thing. I'll just tell the school I lost it and they can issue me a new one. If they bill me for it or tell me I don't get another, I can just ignore the bill or fall behind in class. India isn't going to be changing its curriculum to accomodate these new laptops so I can still learn the core material. These things will move fast. They'll end up on the street vendors stalls overnight. I don't think people are really getting the scope of the issues of poverty in India. 100s of millions of children live in abject poverty in India. They couldn't make these things fast enough to reach significant numbers of them. So the schools can't modify the curriculum to require the kids to use them. So they could only offer them in special classes for those kids who do have them. So the families will sell them and the kids will stay in the ordinary classes. Those schools where the children can afford to keep the laptops would already have computers in the home since they can be bought for $200 already. Not to mention how easy these things are going to be to steal on a regular basis.