Maybe a more effective way would be to get the message out to high school counselors at schools that have a lot of low-income students that Chicago has accepted students with SAT scores as low as XYZ and that that’s not a strict minimum, that Chicago doesn’t charge a fee for applying, and that Chicago will probably be cheaper than going to state schools for their students. Send repeat post-cards, maybe? 
"People here are so overthinking this! "
The people who believe the level of discourse on this thread is “overthinking” it probably wouldn’t enjoy their time at UChicago. It’s a bastion of overthought, endless debate over minutia and enjoyment of relentless examination. Should anybody doubt this, head on over to the UChicago subboard to take a look at some of the threads.
Maybe that would be an effective way for UChicago to test for fit - ask applicants how long they’d be willing to discuss and debate the merits of an obscure topic without barfing or strangling the person next to them.
@lookingforward Yes to everything with one minor caveat. you stated
There are some things that simply can’t be learned. They have to be experienced. Adversity and need can be great motivators, prompting kids to stretch in ways that simple ambition often doesn’t. I saw that in my own kids. They were normal, great kids until adversity and necessity prompted them to become something more. They went from kids who halfheartedly did chores around the house, when reminded, to kids who eagerly took on adult responsibilities because the family needed it. Kids know the difference between busy work and making a true contribution. I am in no way saying that adversity, poverty, suffering or any tragedy is an “advantage.” But there are things that you simply can’t emulate.
Certainly, there are wealthy suburban kids doing great things. But I think comfort and ease can make that less organic and less immediate.
In any case, I think the changes are great and I hope they really do help identify those great kids who could truly benefit.
Also, I would be delighted if those kids go on to be teachers, government employees and non-profit heads. The world needs more educated people in those roles. We have plenty of lawyers.
Certainly, if they originally plan to teach, work govt jobs or for a non-profit, etc. I find [this story](http://talk.qa.collegeconfidential.com/discussion/comment/21578502/#Comment_21578502) very interesting
My understanding is that in Asian style college entrance exam system, students rank college/major combinations and each college/major combination has a lowest cutoff score. All reputable medical schools are like US style MS/MD 7 year programs. So the highest cutoff score is most likely to be the medical school cutoff score of the best university.
The US elite school entrance system is unique (other than impacted majors in some state schools). They admit not by majors. But those less prepared students should really understand that if their career dreams require them to be competitive in college regarding SCORES, they really need to think more than twice before going to a particular school. Most kids and their parents have no clue. They might be really disappointed that they can’t pursue their dreams.
How does entrance to Asian med school translate to this thread?
For the bsmd program I know, entry is not based on scores alone. Nor is this thread about med school admissions.
And the stated possible major(s) can absolutely be weighed in evaluating an applicant. Not for scores, but the rest of the traits and record. Eg, show yourself a non collaborative sort and see how far you get with an engineering interest. That’s regardless of whether there’s a COE you apply to.
I don’t expect all kids to know their certain career goals at 17. I do expect openness and willingness to work.
If UC wants more high achieving low income students it might look to the model used by Amherst, Northwestern recently Princeton and a growing list, and for decades, the UC (CA) system.
Go after the best CC student transfers. Test scores are somewhat less relevant for students who have proven themselves for 2 or more years at CC with a high GPA and rigor.
“How does entrance to Asian med school translate to this thread?”
Keep up @lookingforward ! Did you already forget that UChicago is the “North Korea of higher education”?
8-}
“They are looking for creative thinkers and originality of thought … and if anything
the SAT/ACT format tends to screen those students out.”
Hmmm, why do you say that?
I’m not aware of research suggesting such an inverse correlation between SAT/ACT scores and creativity. Which isn’t to say the link between SAT/ACT scores taken at the normal age is necessarily very high.
Excerpts from Scientific American blog (https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/beautiful-minds/does-college-admissions-criteria-capture-creativity/ [citations removed]):
"Creativity and imagination are particularly important skills in this century, considering how quickly this world is changing. …
"Just how much are traditional college entrance procedures missing out on these crucial creative skills? This was a question that motivated a new paper by Jean Pretz from Elizabethtown College and James C. Kaufman from the Neag School of Education at the University of Connecticut, two leaders in the creativity research field. The researchers looked at multiple measures of creativity (performance and self-report) across multiple domains (everyday, scholarly, performance, scientific, and artistic). They also collected data on multiple traditional admissions criteria, including SAT, high school class rank, and interviews. How well do these traditional admissions criteria reflect creativity?
"Not so well.
"On the whole, the measures of creativity were only weakly related to the traditional college admissions criteria. SAT and interview scores showed no relationship whatsoever to test items such as “I am good at coming up with new ideas”, “I have a lot of good ideas”, and “I have a good imagination”. In fact, these items were even negatively related to high school class rank. This suggests that those students who are more academically successfully in high school tend to consider themselves as less creative than other students.
“Traditional measures of college entrance were also completely unrelated to self-report measures of everyday creativity (e.g., “Choosing the best solution to a problem”, “Thinking of new ways to help people”, “Being able to work through my personal problems in a healthy way”, “Maintaining a good balance between my work and my personal life”) and artistic creativity (“Making a sculpture or piece of pottery”, “Appreciating a beautiful painting”, “Enjoying an art museum”, “Sketching a person or object”).
"To be sure, traditional criteria for college admissions weren’t entirely irrelevant to creativity. The SAT did significantly predict the more academically-oriented measures of creativity, including self-reported scholarly and scientific creativity, an essay asking students to describe their dream project relating to an academic field or intended career path, and performance on an on-the-spot test requiring students to write a creative caption for an ambiguous photograph. Interview scores predicted self-reported scholarly, scientific, and performance forms of creativity as well as on-the-spot creative thinking. High school rank was weakly related to essay writing creativity and scholarly creativity.
"Out of all of the traditional measures of college admissions, SAT scores were a better predictor of academically-oriented measures of creativity than high school rank or interview scores. Unsurprisingly, the strongest unique relationship (considering all of the traditional criteria at once) was between SAT Math scores and self-reported creativity in science.
"So where does this analysis leave us? On the one hand, this is consistent with the analysis conducted by Nathan Kunzel and colleagues showing that standardized measures of cognitive ability are somewhat predictive of creativity. These results are also consistent with recent research showing some overlap between the kinds of cognitive skills required to do well on an IQ test (working memory, concentration, pattern reasoning) and the kinds of skills necessary to do well on tests of on-the-spot creative thinking.
"On the other hand, there is plenty of non-overlap between standardized test performance and creativity, especially when you look beyond brief, on-the-spot tests of general creative thinking to creativity within specific domains and creativity assessed over many years of deep immersion in a specific body of knowledge. Also, it is troublesome that in the Pretz and Kaufman study, students with better high school grades reported lower confidence in their ability to be creative.
…
“This doesn’t mean we need to throw out all of the traditional college entrance criteria-- indeed, if you have absolutely no other information to go with, the SAT does somewhat predict on-the-spot creative thinking-- but this analysis does point to the importance of broadening our criteria for college admissions and being more flexible in the weighting of factors if we truly care about predicting lifelong creativity and personal fulfillment.”
In anything, this description seems to suggest that class rank is more likely to be inversely correlated with creativity than SAT scores, at least the pre-2016 ones. As I’ve said before, there is research showing that teachers often don’t like creative kids. And the more our society emphasizes scores on really badly designed, low level state-mandated tests that reflect rote memorization and have less “head room” than the SAT/ACT (No Child Left Behind, Race to the Top, Every Child Succeeds Act), the more classroom instruction is geared to those tests and thus away from anything allowing any amount of exercise or assessment of creativity. This is a terrible thing in itself. But it also means that overreliance on grades and class rank can to some degree select for the wrong students if what you want is creative students.
See also: Lubinski, et al, “Top 1 in 10,000: A 10-Year Follow-Up of the Profoundly Gifted” in Journal of Applied Psychology (2001), describing the real-world scholastic and creative accomplishments of students testing in the top 0.01% of SAT score for their age, below age 13 (630 on pre-re-centered SAT verbal and/or 700 on SAT math); note limitations on relevance here: this was the SAT in the early 80s (more g-loaded), testing pre-teen children (so head room not a problem, the way it is for SAT in students taking it in junior or senior year).
“What did they use the test score for, is another question to ask them. If they eliminated based on the score,
that step is now gone. If they found they eliminated the best essay writers by using SAT scores, that could explain
why they don’t want to use SAT scores.”
@Coloradomama UChicago always considered test scores to be associated with the academic quality of the class. When Nondorf took the helm in 2009, he increased the average (old) SAT score about 80 points in only four years (something like 1410 to 1490), primarily by increasing the application numbers and allowing Admissions to pick from a variety of applicants who considered UChicago as a first choice school, rather than the backup school it had become over the prior decades. According to Dean Boyer in his book “University of Chicago: A History”, this higher SAT was a measurement of “a more academically qualified matriculation pool.” At the same time, the yield rate increased significantly and retention increased nine or so points to 99%. It should be noted that the latter was also assisted by significant changes made to the quality of student life at the College. As well, they were continuing the trend, originally begun under the Hannah Gray administration but aggressively pursued beginning with Sonnenschen, of doubling the size of the College.
When you are making that many changes at once, even though they are taking place over a number of years, it’s important to make sure that academic quality isn’t compromised in the least. There were political reasons for the College to ensure this, as a loud faction of faculty opposed to changes in the Core Curriculum along with a very uncomplimentary piece in the NYT in the late 90’s made it appear like the College was dumbing down in order to expand and bring in more revenue. Faculty are satisfied with things like improved SAT/ACT scores. But standardized tests were also a relatively easy way for Admissions to measure academic quality during these changes. Sure, some kids are outliers - but in general the more selective and academically rigorous the school, the higher the average SAT/ACT. This is simply a fact over all colleges and universities. It doesn’t mean that high test scores make you smart, nor do they make you a good student. But Admissions knew, just like any other school knows, that higher standardized scores have been associated with a student pool more likely to get through the program, graduate, and go on to be a successful alum.
So that explains what they used test scores for in the recent past.
Whether they will continue to use test scores to measure academic quality remains to be seen. The guess is “Yes”. If faculty start to complain that the kind of student showing up is less engaged in the work, more likely to struggle, dropping out, etc., and if Admissions loses its 99% retention rate, Nondorf is in trouble. So they aren’t going to let that happen. But, as pointed out, they were already admitting a small number of talented kids who don’t test well. They might be of the opinion that if they can increase the selectivity of this particular pool (“test optional” will bring in more of these types than they tended to see in the past), then they stand to increase quality of the class even further.
“I mean ask U of C Admissions why they are making the tests optional. How many admissions officers does U of Chicago have per applicant? Perhaps its about the admission officer’s time as well as what predicts success for an undergrad at U of C.”
Admissions has always claimed they spend a ton of time on everyone’s app and outlined the process on a blog post somewhere (or similar - can’t recall where I read it) so they could easily be caught in a lie. They most likely aren’t lying. Going test optional isn’t exactly a means of reducing the number of applications nor spending even less time on any particular one. In fact, for those not submitting scores, Admissions will likely be spending MORE time on the application, given that one “easy” metric has been removed.
Regarding what predicts success for an undergraduate at U of C, it’s important to point out that Admissions hasn’t used data from those applying to UChicago - only those already matriculated. It’s no surprise that matriculants will have all sorts of levels of success and that scores simply didn’t predict. But their scores did play into the admission decision in some way (either by revealing something about the applicant, or by confirming it). They really need to go back to applicant (not matriculant) pools and try to re-examine how their admission decisions would have looked had they dropped the testing requirement, then profile that theoretical “new” class to predict how they would have turned out given current data on accepted students who profile similarly, looking at things like college GPA, chosen majors, etc. That’s going to be a much more useful study, and won’t make Nondorf look like he’s selecting his data to fit his conclusions. In fact, they may well have done this and the conclusions might be something like scores below a 27 aren’t submitted (overall reported averages now go up), there’s a wider diversity of major chosen, not just a concentration in Econ and Stem, and they have a wider diversity of SES, demographic, etc. They liked those conclusions, so opted to implement the policy that will get them there.
For all we know, Admissions - if asked - will now let an applicant know whether to submit his/her score. There’s a ton of information in telling a candidate to focus on other aspects of their application vs. saying that a score is probably strong enough to help it.
“At MIT, faculty are involved in evaluating the portfolio, so art professors, music professors or say mechanical engineering professors, if its a maker portfolio.”
- Not surprised. Faculty traditionally have been part of adcoms but that might vary by school.
“MIT throws away the ACT science score by the way. It does not use the ACT composite, it creates its own composite score without the science score, which will hurt some students who score very high on the science portion but lower on the reading portion, at MIT.”
Section scores provide a LOT more info. than a composite. Makes total sense to toss the science section since it’s not really “Science”. They require a science subject test as well and guessing there’s more info. in that.
“…higher SAT was a measurement of ‘a more academically qualified matriculation pool.’” Things evolve. Views and goals shift.
@JBSStillFlying Thanks for those details. I do remember the Chicago Core, as sis gave me her Western Civilization textbook, and I have read it a few times, since my education included only music history and a little history in some political sciences classes I took to satisfy the 8 humanities and social science requirements at my school. (Materials science and physics major ) I totally understood what I was missing, when visited U of C in the early 80s, and got to see what my sis was up against with that Chicago Core. My sis had to take a real math class and a real science class to get a bachelors in Economics in 1985. I believe she had to take a foreign language and speak it! She had to take a LOT of writing classes and she writes so well due to that fine education.
But using the SAT as a measure of academic “quality” how does that work? the SAT has very easy math questions
on it. The reading comprehension questions and vocabulary seem very routine to me. I don’t see what you think it is measuring, while I understand that the U of Chicago had a big emphasis on test scores for a while, so its a shift.
In my mind, U of Chicago is right, so I have no problem with the shift at all but I am only the sister of an alum,
not an actual alum. I appreciate the rigor at U of C. The physics and math is truly world class there. I have visited physics labs over the years in some of my work.
Maybe your post hints at why they are changing this requirement, they are simply realizing that the SAT has no bearing on academic "quality " of someone’s mind!
Maybe you mean IQ, but I don’t think that the SAT measures IQ directly or well.
Here is why I don’t like the SAT. Every kiddo in the top 20% of our high school, who takes MindFish class
gets a perfect SAT score.
And a bunch of those students are really not that smart. So I believe the SAT test is flawed as a measure of anything.
its more of a memorization of vocabulary, and learning to speed read. The math portion is so pathetic, its not worth talking about, but I have not studied the New SAT to learn if its any better.
I agree with @JHS this will not be a huge shift, if you want to major in STEM (or any math emphasis majors) then you had better bring some high scores/GPA. if you want to major in Slavic language and literature you’d better bring a portfolio showing what you have done so far in that area plus a sterling GPA.
As far as the Core goes, there are different levels of the harder areas (math/science, 4 levels of math alone) that students can take and the easiest shouldn’t be a problem for anyone admitted.
Ignore History at Your Own Peril.
I still respect Georgetown University. Despite it ranks lower at one particular ranking, it ranks the same at 11 in High School Counselor Rankings with UChicago. Georgetown University doesn’t play games, doesn’t even participate in Common Apps. Here is its test requirements
Georgetown is doing its old fashioned way of admitting its students. So if UChicago’s new way is good, anyone thinks Georgetown is out of fashion? This [Georgetown Sees Record-Low Acceptance Rate for Class of 2022](http://www.thehoya.com/georgetown-sees-record-low-acceptance-rate-class-2022/) article has some discussion about the new SAT …
The test is so easy now it can’t distinguish the top cohort. So UChicago wants to pretend it doesn’t care about scores despite this “easier” new SAT? Georgetown does not seem to reduce the number of SAT Subject Test requirement. Like in the old days, Georgetown still does not participate in Common Apps. Thumb up, Georgetown !
My D opted not to apply to, or even visit, G-Town, because of the subject test requirement. Anecdote of one but there it is.
It’s fair to point out that SAT scores might have been an easy indicator of quality in a “rapidly” shifting admissions environment. The College is in new territory now in terms of rankings, selectivity, yield, retention, post-graduate prospects for those looking beyond a strict academic career, etc. @lookingforward may indeed be correct that views and goals have shifted and evolved. Obviously Boyer is behind this new policy as he has enthusiastically spoken of the changes and the additional opportunities they expect to provide to many as a result.
However - and this is really important - most of the press has focused on “Test Optional” and not “Empower Initiative”. Nondorf has specifically mentioned the test-optional policy as well, and why it’s ok to employ it, because he was questioned about that specific change. Boyer, however, has not isolated “test optional”; rather, he has described all the policy changes (test-optional is not the only one) within the context of improving access for all who might benefit from a UChicago education, a launch of a new program using the springboard of other “improved access” initiatives including Metcalf, Odyssey, No Barriers, etc. There is no evidence that UChicago will drop testing as an important consideration (as many have pointed out) and there’s no evidence that they view it as irrelevant any more than that they view it as supreme in an admission decision.
This feels a lot like the new admission policies of ED, EDII, EA, etc. They have just expanded the option set even further, knowing that the applicant pool is perfectly capable of figuring out whether to submit their scores or not.
“But using the SAT as a measure of academic “quality” how does that work? the SAT has very easy math questions
on it. The reading comprehension questions and vocabulary seem very routine to me. I don’t see what you think it is measuring, while I understand that the U of Chicago had a big emphasis on test scores for a while, so its a shift.”
@Coloradomama this thinking may be quite mistaken. They aren’t shifting away from test scores. They are allowing another option. Those who believe this change affirms that test scores are irrelevant are simply reading more into the new policy than is actually there. Also, Boyer already provided what they were “measuring” - yield rates, retention, completion of the program, better post-grad outcomes. When the SAT scores went up, so did these other metrics. Not BECAUSE of the SAT but because SAT scores tend to be highly correlated with degree of academic success and qualifications, so a high score tends to reveal a high level of these traits. Not in every case, of course, but generally. Every school knows this.
And if the SAT has very easy math questions on it, surely we’ll continue to see 100% of applicants submit their almost-perfect scores? 
In truth, SAT results aren’t at all like Lake Wobegon, where all the kids are above average. The SAT/ACT tests your ability relative to other testers, not your absolute ability to answer the questions (more on that below).
"Maybe your post hints at why they are changing this requirement, they are simply realizing that the SAT has no bearing on academic “quality " of someone’s mind!”
UChicago has given no indication that they realize anything of the sort. If they thought there was “no bearing” they would eliminate the SAT from consideration altogether. Again, some are reading way more into this decision than the school has acknowledged.
“Here is why I don’t like the SAT. Every kiddo in the top 20% of our high school, who takes MindFish class
gets a perfect SAT score.”
That is NOT the case for Twin Cities schools! But maybe those kids are using the wrong test prep company? LOL.
Not sure what “MindFish” is but the SAT currently encourages prep and has provided Kahn Academy to assist with that. We have had two testers since the new SAT came out (D17 and S19); both used Kahn and did well. By the way, their access to prep was no different from anyone else’s - rich, poor, or in-between. You are given information about Kahn Academy when you register. Not sure how the current SAT is an example of some income groups being advantaged over others.
“And a bunch of those students are really not that smart. So I believe the SAT test is flawed as a measure of anything.
its more of a memorization of vocabulary, and learning to speed read. The math portion is so pathetic, its not worth talking about, but I have not studied the New SAT to learn if its any better.”
As you haven’t looked at the new SAT an informed judgement would be difficult, I imagine. I’ve seen both versions of the SAT as well as the ACT so I’m pretty familiar with the differences between all these tests. The old Math might have been “pathetic” - and it was absolutely learnable - but it was still far more a strategic test than the new one (which is more like a series of story problems and so was tripping up some pretty math’y kids when it first came out). Part of the strategy of the old test was learning which questions to skip and which to try, measuring your odds after eliminating answers, etc. The new test doesn’t penalize for wrong answers so it’s much more straightforward and tests “college readiness” more than anything else - something I’d imagine that UChicago is interested in knowing. The two ends of the distribution might be far less representative of ability than the mid-range, but that seems to be by design. The old test did a better job of differentiating at the top.
Finally, you seem to know a thing or two about math so you’ll get this and I mentioned it above: these tests are not graded on absolute number right or wrong. They are scaled and your performance is RELATIVE to other testers. So ALL the questions might be tricky, super-easy, pathetic, or fantastic. It doesn’t matter. All that matters is how you test compared to those around you. THAT’s the value of standardized testing. It measures relative performance. Everyone might be brilliant in their own special way and that’s very nice and all. But having a standard metric has a ton of informational value to it when you are comparing among individuals. That’s why districts and psychiatric groups and gifted programs and special ed programs and many other groups rely on standardized testing.
^^ This confirms that unlike UChicago’s candidate pool, which has a bunch of free gambler who don’t know their chances are in EDs, Georgetown’s pool is real. Anyone bothers to apply to Georgetown is a real candidate. Look like UChicago’s 57% full pay number matches Brown’s 57% full pay number. But Brown has the majority of its students coming from RD (Brown admits the least amount of ED students among Ivies.) If UChicago has tiny bit of confidence and tries to show tiny bit of honesty and integrity, it would at least announce its admission statistics, not propaganda like National Beverage’s [news release](https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-sec-has-had-its-own-questions-about-lacroix-1530045407). With #634 postings, everyone is overthinking about this. The whole thing is just a fraud. Yes, maybe only one would be admitted test-optional. A billionaire’s son’s development case. Nobody knows.
I think someone should suggest to Nondorf that anyone who reads every post on every thread on the CC UChicago board, submits to a test on it and scores above a certain level should be an auto-admit to UChicago, on the basis of high reading comprehension, diligence and amply demonstrated fit.
The problem is that norm-referenced testing is not valid in the context of a test that can be retaken at close intervals and studied/prepped for. Because some of the students sitting for the test are first-time takers with little test-specific preparation, and some are students taking the test for the nth time, with hours and hours of test prep and practice. And there is no way to sort out which is which.
And I think what most CC’ers don’t understand is that the focus on high-end scores & test prep is largely cultural.
It just wasn’t a thing at my kids’ high schools. My son was at a very diverse high school with an academic-focused program, but not a competitive-entry academic magnet. He took the PSAT once, no prep, junior year and was the only one his school to score high enough to make the NMF cutoff — because no one a the school ever scored that high, it wasn’t even on our radar to think about prep. A few months later he sat for the SAT – again no prep – and scored mid-1400’s. And again, his score was higher than any of his friends in his AP & honors classes. So that was it – one and done. As far as he and I were concerned, he had a great score. And we hadn’t even begun t develop a college list-- as the parent, I had been operating on the assumption that my son would simply attend a UC. (And to add to the cultural factor – the UC admissions index was structured in a way so that any kid with a high GPA didn’t really need to also have super-high SAT scores – so no pressure there, either.)
And when we did come around to developing that college list, my son told me that he didn’t want to attend a college where all the students had super high scores, because he had observed at his high school that several of the smartest and most interesting kids in his class did not score well, and there seemed to be an ethnic/racial bias reflected in results that correlated more to skin tones than to intellect. And he didn’t want to find himself at a college that excluded kids like those. So no problem, after he informed me later in the summer that he wanted to attend a LAC, we found it easy enough to develop a great list of schools. My son considered Chicago, which at the time had at least a 45% admit rate, but in the end decided it was too big and wouldn’t provide the LAC experience he was looking for.
So the point is: there are a lot of kids who aren’t thinking about test prep until it’s too late. They might score 1320 on the SAT or 26 on the ACT and think it’s a great score because it’s well above norm for their school and peer group. And maybe some of those are still students with a strong academic passion who would be a good fit for Chicago-- but would definitely be deterred from applying when they discover later on in the game that their scores aren’t competitive.
I can clearly see early success in this round of propaganda campaign. Judged by the number of people mislead by the news release, Nondorf and his friends can toast a LaCroix drink from National Beverage Corp. to celebrate.