Math over metaphor. This is a common experience. Assume a child 99th percentile of age group by intelligence
Elementary school is assigned by geography, so average intelligence is 50th percentile (or fairly close)
By middle school there may not be general tracking for all students, but very low performers have been tracked off (say 20% of students), so average intelligence is 60th percentile
In high school they often have a high and a low track, split the students 50⁄50 and you get average intelligence is 80th percentile
If the student then goes to a college that rejects 90% of applicants (or gets work in a similar selective profession) average intelligence is 98th percentile
and all of a sudden the student is now well socialized and has learned the important skill of cooperating with their peers.
EDIT: the above holds if you track “effectiveness” which is some combination of conscientiousness and intelligence instead of intelligence. In practice I expect most tracking systems capture quite a bit of conscientiousness, but the above reads more cleanly with intelligence in each line than “some combination of conscientiousness and intelligence”
This is a bit off-topic, but I think that the word “competence” effectively conveys the meaning of, “some combination of conscientiousness and intelligence”.
Math over metaphor. This is a common experience. Assume a child 99th percentile of age group by intelligence
Elementary school is assigned by geography, so average intelligence is 50th percentile (or fairly close)
By middle school there may not be general tracking for all students, but very low performers have been tracked off (say 20% of students), so average intelligence is 60th percentile
In high school they often have a high and a low track, split the students 50⁄50 and you get average intelligence is 80th percentile
If the student then goes to a college that rejects 90% of applicants (or gets work in a similar selective profession) average intelligence is 98th percentile
and all of a sudden the student is now well socialized and has learned the important skill of cooperating with their peers.
EDIT: the above holds if you track “effectiveness” which is some combination of conscientiousness and intelligence instead of intelligence. In practice I expect most tracking systems capture quite a bit of conscientiousness, but the above reads more cleanly with intelligence in each line than “some combination of conscientiousness and intelligence”
This is a bit off-topic, but I think that the word “competence” effectively conveys the meaning of, “some combination of conscientiousness and intelligence”.