SAT Scores--Is Less More?

Colleges and Universities A-Z California Institute of Technology
41

<p>Let it be known to all that phuriku is "not convinced"! Summon the College Board statisticians to the College Confidential discussion boards to defend their honor!</p>

<p>While we're at it, maybe we can get George Bush on here to answer for directly causing most of the world's ills (including natural disasters), and some NASA scientists to counter my deeply-held suspicion that the moon landings happened on a Hollywood sound stage. If Neil Armstrong won't bring moon rocks to my house I won't be convinced! (kidding).</p>

<p>Seriously, the fact is if you're not willing to do the research to support your point on this, you're not going to get any traction (not least because I suspect that you have a horse in the race, so to speak). You have posited a theory that the College Board is unwilling to tell people the results or is actually lying about the data. Start the ball rolling, email them asking for the data and maybe an education reporter or two with your ideas, and maybe you'll get someplace.</p>

42

<p>I'm not saying that there is no AP-SAT correlation. I'm saying that it's a weaker one that everyone is saying it is... certainly not something that the CollegeBoard's enemies would profit from. (If you'll look back, I said something like R^2 = .65 or .7 rather than R^2 = .9)</p>

<p>In any case, my argument probably didn't go through as well as I planned it to. My arguments usually exceed more in essays than conversations -- something I need to improve on immensely. I may write something on this topic later so some clarity can be reached.</p>

<p>Joe: Maybe I will get some data if I bug CollegeBoard about it. I'm not convinced because you haven't provided any data either -- not that it's your job to. I'll post my findings here and let you all decide for yourselves. I'm not someone who's TOO skeptical (it's not like I believe 9/11 was a hoax set up by Dick Cheney, although I do know a few people who think that :/), so if I find a great enough correlation, I'll quit my adamancy.</p>

43

<p>ETS studies, measuring SAT against everything under the sun, number in the low thousands. They fill several shelves in any large education school library in the United States. Given enough patience one can troll through the list for studies related to AP. It is a waste of time when the conclusions can be inferred in advance.</p>

<p>Note, by the way, that the main factor against SAT-to-AP correlation is that people with low SAT's aren't counted. There is an excellent correlation between 400 math SAT and not taking AP Calculus BC. If such people were counted as a score of 0 or -1 on the AP, the correlation would improve further.</p>

44

<p>Fair enough--it would be great if what you wrote included research beyond chatting with 5 guys in your high school, though... I think that would make your argument "exceed" a lot more, whether it's in essay form or not.</p>

<p>By the way, NOTHING in the college admissions process that I've ever read about has an R^2 of 0.9, be that correlation of test scores with freshman grades, income with test scores, or one test with another. Therefore, if your plan is to show that the correlation isn't that high, I would be interested to see what you've found that DOES have that correlation.</p>

<p>But I agree with siserune--in my opinion this research would be close to a waste of time. However, if you would like to spend the time doing it on the off chance that something revolutionary might turn up (and of course much mundane research is pursued with that hope!) I'm sure no one has any objection.</p>

45

<p>I'm not talking about people with 400s. I'm talking about 600 and up. And I'll take your advice and head to the library.</p>

<p>And Joe, one last word. You may make fun of me, but I rather enjoy my skepticism. It brings about some interesting (albeit sometimes pointless) discussions. There are too many people in this world who'll just take anything that anyone else says for truth. In any case, it doesn't hurt to have opinions diverging from the norm -- even if everyone else at Caltech disagrees with me. :)</p>

<p>But I'll do some research and let you know my findings.</p>

<p>Edit:</p>

<p>I'm not that stupid to make a conclusion based on the results of 5 other people... I did take Statistics, you know. I was just bringing up an interesting point.</p>

<p>And you're absolutely right -- R^2 = .9 is extremely rare with test scores. I think that fits rather well with my theory that test scores don't show much of anything. So what R^2 would make a conclusive argument then? (SAT scores above 600 compared with AP scores.)</p>

46

<p>Nothing wrong with a skeptic! Like I said, revolutionary findings can come from seemingly mundane research (although of course we don't hear about the entirely mundane findings that come from mundane research).</p>

<p>However, useful skepticism is more than simply expressing doubt, as you do apparently appreciate--but I would heed siserune's implied advice that re-inventing the wheel on every issue is probably not an efficient use of time.</p>

47

<p>re: correlation, the point is that the SAT scores of AP test takers are already narrowed compared to the SAT's of the whole population, and this tends to weaken correlation. By the same token, SAT is correlated with salary at age 30, but the correlation is much weaker among Caltech graduates because they represent a much narrower slice of SAT.</p>

48

<p>
[quote]

Perhaps it's due to my school or something, but I did some research on SAT I math results compared to results of the AP Calculus BC test and found some surprising results.</p>

<p>Five juniors took the Calculus BC test at my school last year and I talked to all of them.</p>

<p>

[/quote]
</p>

<p>
[quote]
I'm not that stupid to make a conclusion based on the results of 5 other people...

[/quote]
</p>

<p>Apparently you are. (Name-calling is fun).</p>

49

<p>According to USA Today, 24% of high schoolers took some kind of AP Exam last year, which is about 500,000 people. It wouldn't be too difficult to make somewhat accurate correlations with that amount of data.</p>

<p>neapolis: And apparently you can't read English. There's a difference between "reporting an interesting finding" and "making conclusions based on that interesting finding". When I was talking of the people I had experience with, I wasn't making any conclusions -- I was making an interesting, albeit obviously unpopular, hypothesis from empirical observations.</p>

<p>Joe and siserune: I wasn't trying to 'reinvent the wheel' with my arguments. I simply got angry when another person wouldn't admit that there is a possibility that there's not such a strong correlation between SATs and APs. Of course, I was pretty adamant as well, so I shouldn't criticize based on that point.</p>

<p>Anyway, I'm going to try to head toward my Partial Differential Equations homework... where HAS the night gone? (Oh... into this discussion. -_-)</p>

50

<p>The SAT generally detects whether one has either
(i) innate skill at detecting multiple choice tricks, or
(ii) the persistence to sit down on your chair and learn this (simple, tedious) skill. </p>

<p>I am not innately very good at this, but for the SAT and the GRE, I practiced and learned this silly skill and did well enough. Certainly, anyone intelligent enough to do well in calculus or learn PDEs is intelligent enough to learn the format and the tricks.</p>

<p>I don't have a great amount of sympathy for the argument that the format is uncomfortable for you. Lots of intellectual endeavors you try will be uncomfortable, and the successful student will adjust to handle them. The SAT is basically a hoop -- a test to see whether you can adjust yourself to an uncomfortable, arbitrary challenge. </p>

<p>There are certainly students whose passion and drive overcomes a bottom-quartile test score. They're good enough that they can afford to spit on the hoop. Others just train hard and jump through it, even if it's not your natural talent. The latter route is safer, but the former is not totally without merit.</p>

<p>One thing I encourage is (as we talked about before), don't make this silliness your personal crusade. It's easy and tempting to rant about something that bothers you (and which was unfair to you) -- trust me, I know this well. But in general, one's success at Caltech will almost certainly vary inversely with how much one thinks about the SAT (and it doesn't matter what kind of thinking, whether relishing your 1600 or ranting about that evil section). So forget this nonsense and start on being a real scientist.</p>

51

<p>As always, Ben's spot on as far as I'm concerned. Every line of that post is pure unadulterated truth, from the lack of sympathy to the hoops to the recommendation to forget about it. (I only think about testing so much because I have been a partner in a company that deals with that issue for the last 6 years.)</p>

<p>One other general thought I'll add is that the ability to do algebra and so on quickly and accurately under pressure is nothing to sneeze at. I have no idea how many times I was up until all hours with a set trying to find what turned out to be a sign error or a variable in the denominator that should've been in the numerator, etc. This probably applies more to things like engineering (which is what I and 50% of Caltech students do) than pure math, though.</p>

52

<p>That's happened to me too. I once had to calculate the exterior derivative of a differential form for a timed test, and a dropped factor of three did me in.</p>

53

<p>"I don't have a great amount of sympathy for the argument that the format is uncomfortable for you. Lots of intellectual endeavors you try will be uncomfortable, and the successful student will adjust to handle them. The SAT is basically a hoop -- a test to see whether you can adjust yourself to an uncomfortable, arbitrary challenge."</p>

<p>Yes, but so isn't all tests? The Putnam itself is like this and one could just study hard, learn the material, and 'hack' his way to victory. The problem is that the SAT is required and of so much more importance than the Putnam.</p>

<p>The way you study for this test is moreover just by taking more standardized tests or practicing old standardized tests... which I see as a total waste of time.</p>

<p>"One other general thought I'll add is that the ability to do algebra and so on quickly and accurately under pressure is nothing to sneeze at. I have no idea how many times I was up until all hours with a set trying to find what turned out to be a sign error or a variable in the denominator that should've been in the numerator, etc."</p>

<p>That's a job for the TI-89... which is ironically allowed on the SAT. Perhaps that's what killed my performance anyhow. On the ACT, I did fine, but TI-89s are banned on that test, even though it covers more subject material.</p>

<p>"But in general, one's success at Caltech will almost certainly vary inversely with how much one thinks about the SAT (and it doesn't matter what kind of thinking, whether relishing your 1600 or ranting about that evil section). So forget this nonsense and start on being a real scientist."</p>

<p>You're absolutely right. Right now, I'm just being sucked into an environment where the SAT apparently does matter, though... which is this forum. It'll be great to get away from high-school land and into a college where no one cares about your SATs (I only applied to schools where I thought this would be somewhat true), so I can focus on the things that matter.</p>

<p>Let's diverge from this subject matter, though, shall we?</p>

54

<p>
[quote]
Let's diverge from this subject matter, though, shall we?

[/quote]
</p>

<p>Yes, shortly. Let me just say that I understand where you're coming from. Especially:</p>

<p>
[quote]
The way you study for this test is moreover just by taking more standardized tests or practicing old standardized tests... which I see as a total waste of time.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>This is exactly the sort of preparation I meant. Yes, if the SAT were not required for admissions, this would be close to a total waste of time. But it is required, so doing what you need to do to prepare (even if that activity is intrinsically without merit) is the right thing for many people.</p>

<p>Nevertheless, it's hard for me to argue against your statement that I quoted because I agree so much with the spirit of it. The desire to focus on "real stuff" as early as possible and not spend time on bubbles -- that kind of idealism is commendable on the whole and shows that your heart is in the right place. I think one of the important things to learn is that sometimes swallowing this disdain for triviality is also important, and in the end you end up winning, because instead of raging against the system and letting it waste your time, you can beat it quickly and go on to do things that matter.</p>

<p>I hope your PDE homework got done alright :)</p>

55

<p>Actually, in my experience, relying too much on the calculator is one of the easiest ways to miss SAT questions. Every math question can be done without a calculator, let alone a TI-89, and often doing them on paper is both faster and less prone to errors.</p>

<p>The Putnam is a "contest" math test for current college students that more or less requires specialized knowledge and experience that not even all/most Caltech students have. The SAT only covers the ability to use material that EVERYONE should have had by high school. Therefore I'm not sure how it can be said in a college-admissions context that "The problem is that the SAT is required and of so much more importance than the Putnam." In fact, I think the statement is a bit ridiculous.</p>

56

<p>He was just saying, I think, that some kinds of tests (like the Putnam) for which many people need to be toolish to do well are optional; but the SAT is required. And it's not fair to have a test for which at least some people need to be a little toolish to do well.</p>

<p>I think it may be unwise to incentivize toolishness, in the grand scheme, but a little of it here and there is not a disaster, and it's good to do something like that occasionally to make you appreciate how nice real work is.</p>

57

<p>For those who were arguing about SAT/APO correlaions, the main study was done in the mid-late 90's that looked at PSAT M, V and M+V schools and correlations to AP scores in all course. They used data across a large sample and several years. The study also looked at corellations with number of years of course work (I think it was) and maybe class grades too. They published probability bands of exceeding a certain AP score,say a 3 at different PSAT levels. As one can imagine the M correlated pretty well with Physics and Calc scores. Surprise, surprise, Lit and History correlated to Verbal scores. Bio looked to correlate wit h M+V score etc. I used the study to track student scores on AP physics tests. I did find that virtually anyone with a psat >70 (SAT 700) Math could get a 5 rather easily whereas as there was a cutoff below which I never had a student get above a 4. I cannot remember the R^2 values in the study. I think if you go to the college board and search on research, perhaps in the AP section, you can still find the study. Mine is buried in a file somewhere</p>

58

<p>
[quote]
They published probability bands of exceeding a certain AP score,say a 3 at different PSAT levels.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>Thanks, oldolddad, I'm always interested in studies of correlations between one mental test and another. I'll have to hunt around and see if I can find a link to that study or a citation to where it may have been published.</p>

59

<p>The study document oldolddad referred to is available (except on back order) from the College Board for $15. </p>

<p><a href="http://store.collegeboard.com/productdetail.do?Itemkey=050481750%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://store.collegeboard.com/productdetail.do?Itemkey=050481750&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

60

<p>Phuriku, is your school private? If so, students there aren't earning 50% of the 5s in AP Physics C for the State of Indiana. </p>

<p>In 2006, 30 students in Indiana earned a score of 5 on the Physics C E&M exam; 24 of those attended public school. 72 students earned a 5 on the Physics C Mech exam; 65 of those attended public school. If your school is private and if all the remaining students receiving a 5 attended your school, which is doubtful, that's not 50% for either Physics C exam.</p>