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Is this a novel lesson for many people? The first thing that comes to mind in terms of significant arbitrary privilege is "being born to wealthy parents." Probably many people would support some balancing against that privilege--trying to recruit students from low-income or first in family to go to college backgrounds is relatively non-controversial--but algorithmically adjusting test scores to correct for parental wealth strikes me as a fringe, though findable, preference.
Similarly, "not having significant developmental or learning disorders." Generally arbitrary, but algorithmically adjusting test scores in this case would defeat much of the sorting purpose of test scores to begin with.
Some people are luckier than others; initial inequality is inevitable. But luck exists across a tremendous number of dimensions; only some of those dimensions can be corrected-for socially; and many fewer of them should be.
I think we can make a distinction between "meritocratic" and "un-meritocratic" privilege-correction.
A learning disorder is unfair, but someone with a learning disorder may struggle to ever be as good a doctor as someone without one.
Whereas the theory behind relative age adjustment is that there are some people who have the potential to become a doctor nonetheless don't because of arbitrary factors holding them back.
That's where a lot of the controversy over affirmative action comes from. Supporters often claim that it's about finding "diamonds in the rough" who have the potential to do just as well as someone with a privileged background, but their scores need to be adjusted to reflect their lack of privilege. Opponents claim that it will result in less capable graduates. Part of the reason why genetic claims of IQ differences are so controversial is that if true they make the "meritocratic privilege correction" argument much less persuasive
Learning disorders are pretty close to being a special case of an IQ differential. Someone with a lower IQ will struggle to ever be as good a doctor as someone with a higher IQ, holding other attributes constant. (Lower IQ does not directly indicate a better bedside manner, or other benefits; that sort of "fairness/balancing/whatever" is for video games, not reality.)
Affirmative action has many problems, and "less capable graduates" barely makes the list. Even if you set aside the naked racial preferences and the reputation hit to successful minorities, you still have the mismatch between students and institutions, leading to much higher minority dropout rates from institutions above their level, when they could have been successful at institutions closer to their testing levels. Testing has a tight correlation with academic performance and graduation rates; when minorities end up thoroughly dominating the lowest quintile in class, it should come as no surprise that they also dominate the list of dropouts. (Of course, when you add in predatory student loans, and the worst case scenario is "loans + no degree," affirmative action starts to look like a perfect storm of how to screw over minorities most efficiently. I guess advocates of affirmative action can rest on their good intentions?)
"Adjusting" is never free; there is always a tradeoff. Even the mere knowledge that "adjusting" is happening generates second-order effects. Sometimes the specific policy is net-positive--the tradeoff was worth it. All too often, though, the effects are net-negative, as with affirmative action.
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