Reading tea leaves from the podcast linked in this thread Yale Admissions Director Favors Submitting Scores I woudl not be surprised if the Ivies (maybe others) go back to test required after this admissions cycle.
Soon but not quite yet. I think most have stated they will stay TO until at least 2025
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I agree. This number seems very low. Yes, I have heard of the occasional athlete how had too big a case of senioritis, but that hardly makes up 14%. What I have seen (and maybe that is the same as no LL?), though, is a coach assume someone particularly strong will get in on their own, so the coach does not officially support that student - they try to get a free +1 and that backfires.
That’s interesting because, if I’m not mistaken, the NCAA Clearinghouse has dropped the SAT score requirement recently, in the interest of equity.
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I disagree. I think the Ivies will stay TO in the wake of the SC decision. If the SC had upheld the existing system which allowed for consideration of race as one data point I think that they might have moved back towards requiring tests. As that did not happen, the schools are going to opt for the system that allows them the greatest flexibility in assembling a class. Because TO has encouraged more low SES students to apply, there is no chance they get rid of it. None.
Data Dive, Part 2: Standardized Testing - Admissions Beat | Podcast on Spotify
They hint otherwise, but for the reasons you stated I think they will settle on “test preferred/recommended” which was the language used for SAT Subject tests.
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I don’t think there are many high SES kids being accepted TO (not considering athletes) so it won’t really change anything. Even if they go back to test, they always could read test scores in someones individual contexts. What preferring/requiring tests may do, however, is cut make on the number of hail Mary apps.
Listen to the podcast and what the head of Yale Admissions says (particularly how they contextualize test scores). A 30 ACT from Exeter is not equal to a 30 from an inner city school where the average is 20.
We had mandatory interviewer training for Yale because of the SCOTUS case. The emphasis was that race by itself was a prohibited consideration (and we should not raise it or discuss it in isolation) but that race in the context of the achievements/growth was allowed as per Robert’s majority opinion. I think the schools will have plenty of “cover” in maintaining diversity using SES factors. If they believe testing is a valid indicator/predictor of college success, they are not going to throw that away. They will find other ways to maintain diversity.
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That all makes sense. But within the group of athletes is as far as they can possibly take it, comparison wise, as they don’t have an AI for the entire class/last year’s class/applicant pool.
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True, but individual school rules take priority over NCAA rules. So if a school requires test scores for all, athletes have to have them. Further, as others have noted, some TO schools/coaches require test scores from athletes. It’s incredibly dynamic too…the TO landscape is different this year than it was the first year of TO, for example.
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That may be true, but I still think schools will be loath to give up the flexibility of TO. Especially, since TO resulted in a significant uptick in applications from URM and lower SES students. Considering test scores within the context of someone’s background isn’t going to matter if they aren’t applying in the first place. I could be wrong, of course, but I will be surprised if these schools start requiring tests again anytime soon.
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State of Florida doesn’t care if NCAA waives it - still required for admission to Florida public schools.
NCAA Clearinghouse was always about the minimum requirements to play (and they were pretty minimum), not what any school could require. Many many coaches had higher gpa/score requirements because in some sports require a lot of missed classes. My daughter’s school rejected a student who then played at another school in our conference, so clearly passed the NCAA requirements.
The percentages of athletes accepted at Harvard should be compared to REA applicants, not the overall admissions rates, as most athletes getting a hook in admissions are applying early.
S24 is a recruited athlete at a HYP Ivy with a likely letter.
His Ivy has returned to the Academic Index, but it happened midway through his recruiting process. There was some definite scrambling by the coaches and committed athletes to make sure that the kids already verbally committed could somehow fit into the AI. (Either through test score or GPA, and it has to do with the entire recruiting class AI, not just individual - though there *may be individual minimums - I am not sure). Other ivies he was recruited by early on did NOT necessarily return to the AI, as far I can tell.
The following seems to apply to his specific school, and each Ivy league school makes its own “rules”: It seems that there definitely a minimum threshold for the athletes for admission, but past that minimum, it is a required group average AI for the incoming class of recruits(and it is different for every sport). So you could have a really good athletic recruit who may bring your class GPA average down, but can get another recruit who may not be as high of an athletic talent but has better grades/test scores to raise the AI of the incoming class. ( I realize some of you may already know all of this info, but this was all news to me!)
As for whether the athletes are qualified to be at the school or not, my son takes highest rigor at his college prep school, has above a 4.0 and has excellent but not ridiculously high test scores. Would he have gotten in without his hook? Probably not. (Also, we had a very truncated time period to study for his standardized tests, as we spent most of the summer assuming he didn’t need to submit test scores!! And he isn’t an awesome tester, so he could have used more prep). Would other kids have gotten in if they hadn’t won a national Robotics championship, or placed nationally in the AMC test, or come from an underrepresented area? Note that most high academic achieving athletes are NOT just athletes - if he did not pursue his sport, maybe he could have achieved more in other areas he is talented in, but being a nationally recognized musician or mathlete or debater involves a huge amount of time and preparation, just like sports.
As was pointed out in his likely letter, his university feels that a robust athletics program is to help students continue to develop leadership, discipline, and responsibility. They pointed out that they do not admit “athletes” just as they don’t admit “musicians” or “coders” or “community leaders” - but people of great promise. Does this mean that others who do not get admitted do NOT have great promise? Of course not. But, they have to decide who to admit somehow. I am not pointing this out to defend my kid’s admission based on sports, as I have another high achieving academic kid who would likely NOT get in, even if she has the rigor/ stats/ ECs; I see how this affects non-athletes as well, just based on the large number of qualified students applying vs. spots available.
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Thanks for your visibility into those three colleges. That makes me believe that all the Ivys require tests, as those three would not hold themselves to higher standards unless all colleges in the league were required to.
Yes, but I strongly suspect that when it comes to recruited athletes, the context doesn’t matter. Regardless of whether the 30 is from Exeter or a poor inner-city school, if it’s sufficient to meet the AI requirements, then it’s good enough.
I am currently volunteering for an organization that has a mission of taking talented low income students and getting them into colleges, sometimes the most selective ones at that. They are encouraging students to reveal their identity through their essays.
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Yeah, as long as they connect that discussion to anything generally considered in holistic review–and what isn’t?–it then becomes permissible for the college to consider that connection. So, it seems like a pretty good idea to incorporate such a connection somewhere in your essays, although of course in the end that still depends on your personal values.
The colleges themselves are doing that. Here’s uva (the wording has been remarkably similar across several schools)
What about your individual background, perspective, or experience will serve as a source of strength for you or those around you at UVA? Feel free to write about any past experience or part of your background that has shaped your perspective and will be a source of strength, including but not limited to those related to your community, upbringing, educational environment, race, gender, or other aspects of your background that are important to you.
I would not draw that conclusion - as I think was discussed in another thread, at least right now, the TO v. non-TO for athletes is very much school/team/coach/position-dependent, and the Ivy League is definitely not moving in lockstep. (I’m also not convinced that having a test score is a “higher standard,” but that’s a different discussion.)
I’m going to be vaguer than @SportyPrep (I appreciate their straightforwardness), but with a junior in the recruiting process actively talking to four Ivies, only one (not on @SportyPrep’s list of Harvard/Princeton/Penn) is requiring test scores; one on the list is not requiring scores; one not on the list is also not requiring scores; and one (Princeton, which is officially TO for 2025) is noncommittal.
I believe that it’s about hitting a minimum through GPA/rigor/otherwise, plus then some sort of “average” across all recruits, as @Turbotwins24 says. I do think all of this could change, of course, but that’s one student’s current state of play. It is definitely not the case (yet) that every school is thinking about this the same way.
I agree there’s not much consistency, sometimes not even within a school (eg different coaches from on one school having different test policies)…and changing all the time.
I was surprised that UVA was so direct about it - a few other schools that had this essay didn’t reference race specifically.