Yoshie Furuhashi wrote:
>
> _NYT_ September 19, 1999
>
> Help Wanted: The Not-Too-High-Q Standard
>
> By MIKE ALLEN
>
> NEW LONDON, Conn. -- Wanted: a few not-so-bright cops.
>
> That is the official hiring policy in this former whaling village, where
> Police Department officials refused to grant Robert J. Jordan a job
> interview because they considered him to be too smart, then waged a
> three-year court fight to protect their right to favor mediocre applicants.
>
> And won.
>
> The City of New London contends that applicants who score too high on a
> pre-employment test are likely to become bored in patrol jobs, and leave
> the force soon after the city has paid to train them. Similar cutoffs, it
> turns out, are frequently used by employers when they are looking for
> workers who must follow rigid procedures, including bank tellers, customer
> service representatives and security guards.
>
> In 1996 Mr. Jordan scored 33 out of 50 on the exam, which is used by 40,000
> employers across the country, including National Football League teams for
> potential draft choices. That was 6 points too high to qualify for an
> interview with the New London police.
>
> When Mr. Jordan heard about other people being hired even though he hadn't
> been called, he went to the Police Department to protest that he felt sure
> he must have passed. He says he was curtly informed that he did not "fit
> the profile," which litigation revealed was a score of 20 to 27.
>
> "Bob Jordan is exactly the type of guy we would want to screen out," said
> William C. Gavitt, the deputy police chief, who interviews candidates.
>
> "Police work is kind of mundane. We don't deal in gunfights every night.
> There's a personality that can take that."
>
> This month, a Federal judge in New Haven has ruled that the practice was
> constitutional since the city treats all smart would-be officers the same,
> and thus did not discriminate against Mr. Jordan. "Plaintiff may have been
> disqualified unwisely but he was not denied equal protection," Judge Peter
> C. Dorsey of the United States District Court wrote.
>
> Mr. Jordan, 48, is a life-insurance salesman who had dreamed of a second
> career protecting and serving, with an eye on the pension. He said he was
> astounded that he could be shut out on the basis of brain power, but not
> gender, sexual orientation or race.
>
> "Being reasonably intelligent does not make you part of a protected class,"
> he said, chuckling at his new command of legalese. For a certified wise
> man, Mr. Jordan is remarkably modest about his academic achievements,
> volunteering that it took him 26 years to get a bachelor's degree in
> literature from Charter Oak State College in New Britain, Conn. "I'm
> eminently trainable," he said. "I'm not up there with Mozart."
>
> At first the decision was greeted as a great punch line in New London, a
> city of 27,000.
>
> But as the news sunk in, many people said the rule was insulting to their
> police force, and nonsensical at a time when law-enforcement officers must
> deal with complicated social problems.
>
> "Your average dunderhead is not the person you want to try to solve a fight
> between a man and his wife at 2 A.M.," said Nick Checker, 35, a local
> playwright. "I'd rather have them hire the right man or woman for the job
> and keep replacing them than have the same moron for 20 years."
>
> Millie McLaughlin, 82, the lunch lady at Harbor Elementary School, worries
> that pupils will think that "if they study too hard, they won't get a job."
>
> And Gilbert G. Gallegos, the national president of the Fraternal Order of
> Police, said that besides reinforcing keystone kop stereotypes, the city's
> stance was self-defeating. "The better the caliber of the police officer,
> the fewer problems you have in the community."
>
> Mr. Jordan had run afoul of turnover rates, which have been the subject of
> decades of study by management theorists. The publisher of the test,
> Wonderlic Inc. of Libertyville, Ill., has a section in its "User's Manual"
> warning clients about the cost of replacing workers who quit because they
> become dissatisfied with repetitive work. "Simply hiring the highest
> scoring employee can be self-defeating," the manual says.
>
> Wonderlic's president, Charles F. Wonderlic Jr., said variations of the
> 12-minute test used in New London have been given to 125 million people
> since his grandfather founded the company in 1937. Mr. Wonderlic said
> hundreds of employers have used his suggested maximum scores to exclude
> overly qualified applicants for positions where creativity could be a
> detriment.
>
> "You can't decide not to read someone their Miranda rights because you felt
> it would be more efficient, or you thought they knew them already," Mr.
> Wonderlic said.
>
> On the other hand, an expert witness for Mr. Jordan was paid $350 an hour
> for his conclusion that patrol work is "cognitively complex and
> intellectually demanding." The expert, Frank J. Landy, a psychologist in
> Walnut Creek, Calif., pointed to the demands of such modern practices as
> community-oriented policing as an indication of "the range and challenge of
> tasks performed by a typical patrol officer."
>
> Mr. Jordan said he would appeal the ruling if his lawyers are willing to
> continue the case now that he has used up his savings. In the meantime, he
> is supplementing his insurance business by working for $26,000 a year --
> $15,000 less than he would make as a New London patrolman -- as a state
> prison guard.
>
> "In those dormitories, there's 110 inmates and one of you," he said. "Your
> mouth better be connected to your brain."
>
> While those with badges and guns are called New York's finest, they will
> continue to be New London's fair to middling: New London officials say they
> plan to keep using the test to fend off smarty-pants.