NYT: College Panel Calls for Less Focus on SATs

<p>I read the article in the Times today. First it's important to realize that the college admissions process is self-serving to the colleges.All of these schools have the ability to use the "holistic" approach to their admissions, but fail to do so because of time constraints.Schools that "superscore" the SATS. try to compare the ACT with SAT and 2 subject tests, are simply making their own rules in order to enhance their standing in the ratings game. After all, the ratings are heavily based on the quality of student that goes there, not any objective measurement of quality.Nothing is keeping these people from refusing to submit this information to USNWP. Proposing another type of test to evaluate college student is simply their way of wresting control from the college board.</p>

<p>I find it utterly hilarious that William R. Fitzsimmons III, Dean of Admissions at Harvard College, is calling for a de-emphasis on SAT scores. No, just no.</p>

<p>These panel members are insane, put less emphasis on the SAT? The only thing thats keeping the pompous rich kid with no common sense with a 5.0 GPA from getting into a good college is the SAT. No, i don't believe that the SAT is a accurate measure of ones intelligence, but lets not kid ourselves- You have to have a good arsenal of common sense and logic to do well. I come from a low income family, and i don't see how i'm at a disadvantage when it comes to SAT testing since i do fairly well on it. Relying on the rigor of secondary school course and GPA is ridiculous, i know a handful of schools that are well known for inflating its students grades, and as Ashraf mentioned , there's plenty of "Ass kissing" . GPA is ********, if anything, i would say take out the damn GPA because all we're really doing in class is to prep for a damn standardized test. Take away the test, and you will have no objective way of comparison.</p>

<p>The SAT is a part of the holistic admissions process. Some students do better in classes, some on tests, some on ECs. That's why schools look at all of these aspects of a person when evaluating them. I think the current system is actually fairly good, it just needs to be more about fit than prestige. Schools can and do put different weight on different aspects of the application depending on how their school chooses to conduct itself. If, for instance, a student didn't get into a school which placed a lot of emphasis on test scores, they probably wouldn't be a good fit there anyway and would be happier at the grades-and-ECs based school anyways (this is just a random example).</p>

<p>I am surprised everyone is so anti-SAT II's. Personally, my teaching has been terrible, but I was still able to look at a book and make up for what I had missed. They're not as intense as the APs, but still a good indicator whether your GPA has been all brown-nosing or all effort. </p>

<p>Also, whatever anyone wants to say, there will never be any "perfect" system to "end all barriers"</p>

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<p>Not quite as hilarious as when the Dean of Admissions at MIT called for a kinder, gentler admissions process that encouraged students to go out and smell the flowers and write poetry instead striving for higher achievements. And to show they were serious about reducing the pressure on MIT applicants she took the bold step of reducing the number of blanks to be filled in in the Honors & Awards section of the app. Now THAT was hilarious.</p>

<p>For those of you who know a little bit of Chinese history, in the early 1970's, Chairman Mao (the President of the country) ordered that there would be no college entrance exam and panels of peasants and factory workers would select young men and women to go to college. It sounds crazy, but it was true.</p>

<p>UChicago has made a concerted effort to de-emphasize standardized test scores for the past few years. They do not list them as very important or even important, but just as "considered." They also do not require any SAT II's. They do know how to evaluate high school curricula and submitted essays and recommendations. Even so, their SAT scores are right there at the top (though one could argue if they were more strongly weighted, they would be even higher), which indicates that top students evaluated in regard to strength of curriculum, recommendations, and essays also tend to get high test scores, which for most may make the issue and the tests irrelevant.</p>

<p>I think standardized test scores are a lot less important in the admissions process than people think.</p>

<p>"Not going to Harvard is hardly the end of the world. There are many more chances for poor high ability kids to rise to the top schools. Transfer and grad school come to mind to start."</p>

<p>OR not eve going to a top school and being successful anyway.</p>

<p>Not to pick a fight with idad, but in spite of what the U of C says, the Naviance grids I've seen show them weighting the SAT MORE heavily than peer schools with some consistency. I always attributed to this to smaller populations of African-Americans, recruited athletes, and legacies compared to their peers. But still. I say this with some investment in the place with degrees and a current paycheck. In my experience, the U of C admissions office is more dishonest than most.
Completely based on the experience of anecdotes, I've found that the top SAT scorers more often than not surprised the teachers at their high schools. These were the quirky, less eager to please personalities, and almost never the teachers' pets. I always felt that acknowledgment of their worth was a thumb in the eye of the establishment.
I agree that the SAT should probably be less important. But I don't look forward to an Asian type SAT Subject Test system where cram tests rule.</p>

<p>collegeboard's not gonna let their little baby out of sight that easily. It'll be hard to convince people SAT scores don't really matter.</p>

<p>
[quote]
I agree that the SAT should probably be less important. But I don't look forward to an Asian type SAT Subject Test system where cram tests rule.

[/quote]
What exactly does that mean?</p>

<p>I've read for many, many years about college entrance in
Japan, Korea and China hinging solely on standardized tests, and those tending to be based on minutia, as often as not. I understand that Europe is similar in that regard, without, for whatever reason, the extent of the "cram school" culture. Maybe because there are more options into the middle class in Europe? I don't know. By all reports, admissions to the elite schools in the US have been more "holistic" for various reasons, and less test driven. Some of the "holistic" reasons, in my opinion, are suspect and open to debate.
The above are in broad strokes my understanding, and I am willing to be corrected if I'm wrong.</p>

<p>Hi, danas, </p>

<p>At home I have some books that include actual college entrance test batteries from Taiwan, China, and Japan (the last translated into Chinese). I think the test questions have good problem-solving emphasis and don't focus solely on minutiae. In the math sections they are more like good math competition problems in the United States than like state standards tests for K-12 school students. One can always disagree about what should be on a test, or whether or not a test should be a hurdle to jump to get into college, but the east Asian system (as I know most directly from my years in Taiwan) does guarantee that the students in the top colleges have a knowledge base going into college that is quite impressive, and some well-developed problem-solving skills. Demand for places in college and availability of privately funded colleges mean that today in the newly industrialized countries of east Asia, about as high a percentage of the population attends college as in the United States, so some college students are mediocre there too, but setting stringent entrance standards for the best colleges does tend to make secondary education aim for higher standards than are found in the United States.</p>

<p>Ted O'Neill (Chicago admissions dean) has made his dislike of the SAT well known.
[quote]
Ted O’Neill, Dean of College Admissions, wrote an op-ed about the reliance on SAT test scores in college admissions at schools across the country. The opinion piece was published in the Friday, Feb. 25 Chronicle of Higher Education. O’Neill argues that college admissions staff members do not view the test scores as “objective;” that students whose family incomes place them at a disadvantage typically do not have access to the kinds of resources students from high-income families have been able to acquire, such as SAT coaching; and that SAT test scores are poor measures of how well a student will do—academically, socially and emotionally—in the school he or she would attend. “Test scores do not predict such happiness and success; so why do so many of us require the scores? The simple bad reason is that standardized-test results make the task of selection easier, because they offer the illusion of precision when assessing qualities that we say we value but cannot actually name.” O’Neill also criticized the tests in an article that appeared in the Sunday, Feb. 27 Chicago Sun-Times.

[/quote]
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<p>He has maintained that UChicago makes little use of them in their admissions decisions. An interview about the SAT score reporting mess-up brought this respnse:
[quote]
Ted O'Neill, admissions dean at the University of Chicago, said the mistakes in the SAT scores made no difference to any of his institution's 35 affected applicants because "scores don't really matter very much, and in most cases, not at all."</p>

<p>"We have a lot of information about the kids that we think is more important," he said.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>As noted earlier, the fact that scores are high are likely more correlational than causal.</p>

<p>Thanks for your knowledge, token.
I wish I could agree with you, idad.</p>

<p>I really wish colleges that claim SAT scores are suspect because students from higher-income families are more likely to get high scores would analyze high school grades from the same point of view. Are high school grades really, truly any more "fair" from a socioeconomic point of view than test scores? Where is the evidence? Do the wealthier students in your community's high school have generally lower grades than the poor students in the same high school?</p>

<p>tokenadult, it is my understanding from Korean students that math instuction there (in HS) leans heavily on memorizing proofs. Korean students memorize these the same way that US students memorize basic math facts. This student's father, a professor in a scientific field, disliked this method of math instruction and worked at home with his kid in a more problem-solving mode.</p>

<p>i better sell my College Board stocks:p</p>