<p>More often than you might think. Many rural and inner city schools offer very few APs. My daughter’s high school – considered one of the best in our state – had just two APs that students could take before senior year (bio and US history), and three senior year (calculus, French and Spanish). </p>
<p>Unless all the other selective schools change their policy, the majority of Harvard applicants will continue to take the SAT IIs because they will most likely apply to those selective schools in addition to Harvard.</p>
<p>Anecdote: About 20 years ago I interviewed a student applying early decision to Brown who went to a very remote rural high school. She heard of Brown through one of her teachers, an alum. She called me in tears when her application was deferred because she hadn’t taken the subject tests. She had never heard of them, and neither had her guidance counselor. She was a truly exceptional student, and Brown ended up accepting her early with the provision that she take those tests ASAP. </p>
<p>Not everyone (including high achieving students) will have taken multiple AP tests by college application time.</p>
<p>The historical reason is that the SAT (reasoning) was once billed as an “aptitude” test, although “aptitude” could not completely separated from the effects of schooling, while the achievement tests (now called SAT subject tests) were straightforwardly subject matter tests on high school level course material.</p>
<p>I think this is good. Primarily for financial reasons - part of the reason I didn’t apply to top schools was because my family could barely afford to pay for the SAT, much less 2 or 3 SAT subject tests (and the CSS Profile).</p>
<p>But also indirectly because of familiarity. I went to a mixed-income school where kids ranged from poor/working class to lower-middle class. Most students who went to college went to local public regional colleges or technical schools; very few went out of state to college (and when they did, it was usually to an HBCU). We simply were not familiar with the requirement for Subject Tests; I didn’t even know they existed until my senior year when I checked out the websites for Yale and Columbia and realized they wanted them. And at that point I just rolled my eyes and clicked out.</p>
<p>I already assumed that I wouldn’t be able to afford those schools. I had no idea how much financial aid they might have given me, had I been admitted (and I was competitive, especially as a young black woman). And now they wanted me to take 3 more expensive tests and pay to submit my family’s financial information? Nope. (IF I had known how much money was at stake, maybe I would have.)</p>
<p>I guess Harvard did not call the UC geniuses who created the 2005 moronic changes to the SAT for advice! Of course, the UC position turned out to be one that made Kerry look like a mild flip-flopper. They were first for the Subject tests and later … a lot less for it. Perhaps they realized what a joke it was to place much credit to tests that measure third grade reading levels like the Asian language tests. Or the mighty UC flagship realized that the Junior College across the Bay pretty much ignored the entire SAT2/SAT Subjects altogether. </p>
<p>In the end, does any of the announcements by schools about the “best” predictors make much sense, let alone a REAL difference? Nope! Admission at HYPS will remain HIGHLY dependent on the basic high GPA, high SAT, and high ranking coupled with very strong ECs. Feel free to add a little sprinkle of the AP/IB boondoggle, and perhaps a pinch of the manipulated science competition. </p>
<p>To be clear, the SAT Subject tests have lost much relevance at highly selective schools a LONG time ago for the basic reason that grabbing a handful of close to perfect scores became trivial for the most competitive students. The type of generous curves that afflicts Subject Tests and many APs has been the culprit. </p>
<p>“Since only the top schools require them, and anyone applying to those schools has taken multiple AP’s, the SAT II’s become simply a redundant test. How often does someone take an SAT II in a subject for which they haven’t taken an AP exam ?”</p>
<p>I believe the % of high schools offering AP classes is something like 46%. Whatever the number is, it’s sort of upper-middle-class-sheltered to think that all hs offer APs. </p>
<p>Decades ago, the students in “track one” all knew they had to take two subject tests to apply to the Ivies. And there were a lot fewer AP courses, so the number of kids who took AP tests was much lower. </p>
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<p>In glancing at some of the admission sites, the percentiles are stunning. The combined 75%tile at Yale for attending students was 1590. Wow! One way to make the SAT irrelevant is to rig it so that a lot of people get near perfect scores. I’m afraid we’re getting closer to that.</p>
<p>I’m not especially sympathetic to the ignorance problem. Many decades ago, I “sent away” for catalogues from the schools I thought I might attend. Today, all you have to do is click the mouse and read (although that wasn’t the case 15+ years ago).</p>
<p>I agree with xiggi that the cost of two subject test isn’t much…about $37. Generallly speaking, looking from outside the process, I think I’d tighten it up and make it a little more demanding to submit applications, but in an era where everyone has moved in the other direction, maybe that would be the equivalent of applicant pool suicide.</p>
<p>I am more sympathetic to the athlete admission issue. Its very important to have players who can make a tackle against Princeton, or sink a jumper against Yale in the last second, and if they’re otherwise admittable, no reason to let a subject test get in the way. Stanford has apparently figured this out a while ago. </p>
<p>Haven’t read the whole thread, but they are not “dropping” it, they are making it optional . I’d still recommend sending if they are decent scores.</p>
<p>Doubtful that UC and Harvard have changed their stances that the SAT subject tests are preferable to the SAT reasoning and ACT. But they are giving up their (futile) fight against the incumbency advantage of the SAT reasoning and ACT.</p>
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<p>Negligible to the typical forum demographic of the “middle class who won’t get any financial aid” perhaps.</p>
<p>Cost is not just the monetary cost that may be waived (if a low income student realizes that waivers are available). As noted in the post above yours and others, not all students may realize that SAT subject tests are required or desired by some highly selective colleges, so they may not know to take them until it is too late. At high schools where students routinely apply to such colleges, counselors remind students of them, but at other high schools, counselors may not even realize that SAT subject tests may be needed for some colleges.</p>
<p>College Board says “nearly 60%” of US high schools offer AP classes, but that includes some that may offer only one (like my rural HS did back in the day) and, of course, implies that more than 40% offer none. </p>
<p>IMO, the subject tests have outlived their intended utility and are sort of the College Board’s equivalent of your appendix – vestigial in function but revenue-generating for professionals. Kids in the areas most likely to be savvy about them are likely to be in heavy AP/IB/DE schools, so that the subject tests duplicate other forms of testing. Conversely, kids in the non-AP schools probably are also in environments where they are unlikely to know much about the subject tests or which schools use them in admissions. There, they are just another barrier to selective college admissions in a landscape already littered with them. </p>
<p>Fwiw, Harvard is at the antipodes of the UC system in terms of recruiting and admissions as their mission and raison d’être could not be more different at the undergraduate level. The deep holistic review on the East is hardly similar to the glorified paint-by-the-numbers approach on the West Coast! Different strokes for different schools!</p>
<p>It is hard to know what stance UC is adopting today as they have (as I wrote earlier) made John Kerry look an amateur flip flopper. Not only did UC rely on voodoo and mercenary econometrics "scientists"to support their educated opinions, but also changed their mind along the way. The sad reality is that it would not have been so bad if the damages had been confined to the utterly dysfunctional California education system, but the decisions based on Atkinson’s observation of his grandaughter (See <a href=“http://www.ucop.edu/news/sat/speech.html”>http://www.ucop.edu/news/sat/speech.html</a> or <a href=“http://www.rca.ucsd.edu/speeches/CollegeAdmissionsandtheSAT-APersonalPerspective1.pdf”>http://www.rca.ucsd.edu/speeches/CollegeAdmissionsandtheSAT-APersonalPerspective1.pdf</a>) brought us a decade of wasteful changes that are about to be mostly undone. In the meantime, an obscure SAT 2 Writing has been elevated to the overall SAT, extended the time of lengthy test, and served virtually NO purpose in admissions. And as it is now “known” (again according to UC “research”) is NOT helping predict undergraduate performance. </p>
<p>After all, how surprising can that be when acing the SAT Subject Test Level 2 in Math rewards the mastery of a graphic calculator more than anything else and that another asks native Chinese or Korean how to recognize that a mouse eats cheese and not meat! </p>
<p>While Atkinson declared that “We have also found that the SAT II is a better predictor of performance than the SAT I” here is what the UC “discovered” a few years later:</p>
<p>Isn’t it nice when time (a decade in this case) shows than a controversial opinion might turn out to be … right on th e money! And it is nice to see how well you remember that I derided both of the flipfloppers! </p>
<p>The worst part is that there are still people willing to listen to academic mercernaries who were hired by the University of California. But it could have been worse. After all, Weisbuch and Schaeffer were available! </p>
<p>while I have often criticized the morons that run California higher education, I’m not sure I concur with them flip-flopping this time. Instead, its pure spin.</p>
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<p>If I recall, the earlier study looked at Subject Tests by themselves as a predictor. Yudof was claiming that they add little/no additional benefit after GPA+SAT and SES is considered; and that is probably true. Thus, the comparison is not the same.</p>
<p>In ACT country, many students, even at top schools, do not take the SAT. Among those who take the SAT, there are many high ranking students who have never heard of SAT subject tests. Counselors never mention them. It is not about ability to pay for them. It is just signing up, prepping for, and taking another test. Why bother? I think that extra requirement does prevent some students from applying to certain schools. (not that Harvard needs any more applicants. . .) </p>
<p>BB, even the so-called studies weren’t self-serving garbage, it remains that the UC flip-flopped from wanting to abandon the SAT in favor of the SAT2s and later abandoning the latter. </p>
<p>Not really. They successfully lobbied the ETS to have what they considered at the time the most important SAT II/subject test moved into the SAT I/reasoning test.</p>
<p>^^
That is incorrect, UCB. And incorrect on many levels. Check the Atkinson speeches, the data of SATIi uses prior to 2005, and the narratives in 2004 about the attack on the regular SAT. </p>
<p>The demands of Atkinson were quite different, and the addition of the Writing test was a very surprising bonus for Gaston. On the way back to the East Coast, the champagne must have popped liberally. </p>
<p>What Atkinson said
Recently, I asked the Academic Senate of the University of California (UC) to consider two major changes in our admissions policies. First, I recommended that the University require only standardized tests that assess mastery of specific subject areas rather than undefined notions of “aptitude” or “intelligence.” To facilitate this change, I recommended that we no longer require the SAT I for students applying to UC. This recommendation has significant implications for the University of California since we are one of the principal users of the SAT.</p>
<p>Somehow I have the impression that UC , at one time, indeed wanted to de-emphasize SAT-1, and favor “more traditional”, “less aptitude oriented” achievement tests.</p>
<p>This reminds me of something one of my coworkers told me (likely almost a decade ago). When I mentioned to him
that I think I do not like the idea of forcing all students to take the standardized test like SAT-1 or 2. His reply was that if there are no such “objective” tests, the offsprings of those of us in public high schools would have even more troubles in knowing how to get into a college. The college can do anything they want. The history tells us that they do not have a good record of having the interests of us who are not on the top of the society in their mind.</p>