The title says it all. I personally feel like SAT is more an IQ test rather than a holistic examination that displays academic benchmarks. What do you think? Studies have also shown that SAT shows NO correlations between ones success and the scores they get.
If SAT measures nothing but how wel you do on this "standardized" test, then why do colleges use it?
Thoughts?
That could be said of classroom tests as well.
To answer the question, because GPA varies school to school so they need a nation way to measure students relative to one another.
Then I think ACT would be a better fit than SAT in terms of its content.
So they should stop accepting the SAT altogether, then?
Well you have the option of taking the SAT or ACT for most applications. Plus they are revising the SAT to make it more like the ACT.
I like the SAT simply because I did decent on it. I’m applying to mainly LACs though and a lot of them don’t weight the SAT as much. Especially test optional ones from what I’ve heard and looking at common data sets. With my GPA though I wish it mattered more. I’m not sure how useful SATs are honestly but they seem like a decent gauge of preparedness. In theory at least it seems smart to be able to gauge people from all different types and difficulties of high schools. It definitely doesn’t measure work ethic but it seems like math and reading comprehension are important skills for college work. Also I don’t understand the concept that SATs are unfair to low income students. I mean it makes sense they do worse overall but if they have a schools and parents that don’t help them reach academic standards of wealthy students it seems understandable. I’m low income and I did alright with very minimal free online prep(question of the day). I’m not saying low income students have the same opurntunites but I think most colleges or at least selective ones recognize this.
Maybe they should dump the SAT in favor of some other IQ test.
“Holistic” is anti-academic. “Holistic” is a euphemism for admissions criteria opacity.
Don’t make sweeping statements like this unless u can point to the reports.
Also, define “success”
- Holistic in this context, refers to the contents which are being assessed on the SAT. Connecting the SAT to the real academic curricula that are taught in school, the 'opacity' as you have mentioned earlier, indeed exist, as if the college board has their own set of academic syllabus which is only designed for business purposes.
- http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/WhosCounting/story?id=98373 And more Type in 'SAT and success in college' in Google. Not hard.
- Success in my original context: everything that keeps you involved with the college and keeps you from dropping out. A Nobel Prize would be cool, though.
@leagueoflegions did you even read your article? It states that the correlation to success is artificially low because students end up at schools within narrow SAT ranges. It even has a soccer analogy and it’s an article defending the SAT. It points out shortcomings of GPA and ECs as well. Also I think holistic usually means we don’t have any score or GPA requirements so we can let hooked applicants in.
Keywords: elite schools
If you are still not satisfied: http://edsource.org/2014/high-school-grades-are-a-better-predictor-of-college-success-than-sat-act-study-says/58033#.VIJHAAAgLA
Wait what? What is it a keyword to?
To the article.
“If both sets of students were admitted to elite schools or both sets attended community colleges, there would be a considerably stronger correlation between SATs and college grades at these schools.”
But does that even happen realistically?
Now there’s two contrasting articles. I think it’s an interesting discussion though. I like Bates and am applying there so I get where they stand. Still most students at test optional schools end up submitting scores. Also I’m kind of confused how they would get scores from students who don’t submit. I mean maybe they are only looking at data of testers who submitted but it says they looked at data from over 30 test optional schools so I’m assuming this included test optional students.
My problem isn’t with the test scores (well, kind of), but rather the true functionality of the SAT. To me, it does not provide
- A national academic benchmark that supports the common core curricula throughout the country (because all the math content it has contains only geometry level or below)
- A fair environment to the unprivileged
But rather:
- An IQ-like exam that only assess a person’s ability to ace the exam
That’s the problem I personally have SAT. Don’t know why it is praised so badly these days.
And I think you’re missing the point. The writer is saying that within a school most students have similar test scores. The contrasts between elite and CC was extreme but there are definitely high stat students that go to lesser schools because of affordability. Anyone admitted into a truly elite school has great GPA and standardized test scores. That said I have a feeling that a student at a state school with say a 2250 SAT and a 3.2 GPA from high school might do better than a student with a 1500 SAT and a 3.8 GPA because they probably had pretty different course loads and might have came from much different schools. It could be a matter of work ethic and the first is just completely lazy but if it’s not if sat the first will do better.
Hmm I mean I still don’t get what the disadvantage is for underprivileged. I mean like you said the math is basic and the other parts are reading comprehension and grammar. If the math was harder it would favor those with more advanced math opportunities. it truly possible to craft an IQ test? I feel like anything can be studied for
I agree that adding science isn’t a bad idea like the ACT or requiring one science subject test but many schools do that already.