<p>There are a lot of factors you can isolate, and then make an announcement that being at a certain level increases success at college. In education, it has always been known that income and academic success have a very strong correlation, if not the strongest correlation. Certain ethnic groups have a greater success rate. But if you want to start stratifying the academic factors, from what I have read in the last 35 years, consistent high grades in rigorous course are the greatest predictor of success in college. THere are kids who do not score well on standard test regardless of positive economic, supportive families, tutoring, etc; and yet some of these kids are top students because their motivation, dedication, organizational skills, timemanaging skill, note taking, study skills are good. And they work at this. For colleges who want such kids, it is wise to waive the test scores, but then the adcoms of such schools will have to look at such files even more carefully, because they won't have that additional piece of info that may indicate how prepared that student really is. This is important when you don't know the highschool, and its standards. Unfortunately a kid in some schools that are terribly inadequate in teaching the academics, giving highly inflated grades, with low standards, where a kid can do well without the attributes that I listed above, is going to be in trouble at a rigorous college where those attributes make the big difference. There are certain schools where colleges know that there is a very small likelyhood that a kid would excell there without those important skills, so a kid who does well in that setting, but with low test scores is still a good catch with a high probability of doing well in college. It's assessing those study/organizational skills and academic motivation that is difficult without a certain amount of info, and the test scores do help in that regard.</p>
<p>I agree with posts # 18 and 19. I had a 1350 back in the day (when that was a decent score) and while I did graduate, early in fact, I was a terrible student. I had no drive or commitment; I was totally apathetic about school. The SAT told you I could do the work, but not whether I would.</p>
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For colleges who want such kids, it is wise to waive the test scores, but then the adcoms of such schools will have to look at such files even more carefully, because they won't have that additional piece of info that may indicate how prepared that student really is.
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<p>I'd agree with this completely. One of the most striking pieces of data on SATs I've seen was a large regression analysis that took into account tons of variables, including standardized test scores. </p>
<p>The amazing thing was once you controlled for ALL the variables, the intuitive academic rating assigned by the admissions readers still added considerably to the mix; that is, the academic rating increased fairly significantly the ability to predict first-year GPA. In other words, the adcoms were able to see things in the application that no metric could capture--maybe some of those seemingly intangible qualities that have been mentioned in many of the posts. I just remember thinking, "man these people are really good at what they do."</p>
<p>Work ethic, applied to reading widely and to thinking about math more than school assigns you to, can have a substantial effect on SAT I scores. Some kids have no work ethic for doing daily life things that are KNOWN to increase SAT I scores, especially reading unassigned books. So SAT I scores should not be taken to be completely uncorrelated with work ethic. </p>
<p>Individual anecdotes are cute, but it is interesting that the larger the study population is, over the larger range of college students, the more the SAT I shows up with some additional predictive power besides high school grades, especially if other student background factors are considered. Most colleges have "restriction in range" as to SAT I scores, losing higher-scoring students to better colleges, and of course not admitting the worst-scoring students either. There isn't ANY college that thinks it can serve up a better entering class by consciously choosing the lowest-scoring applicants it gets.</p>
<p>I must admit mixed feelings about SAT/ACT tests. On the one hand they do provide some comparison across programs and individuals, but on the other hand, if given too much weight, can adversely affect individual students who are otherwise excellent. I am thinking of a very perplexing situation for a young man I know who is applying to school this year. He has a 4.0/4.0 (unweighted), won many awards, 2nd in the entire state in a writing competition, has taken the toughest curriculum he can at his HS, has a tremendous work ethic, has excelled in summer academic programs for the gifted, has very good and passionate EC's, has no diagnosable LD's, and yet, even after coaching and prep classes and multiple retakes, barely cracks a 600 on any section of the SAT. His ACT score high point was a 26. I have no doubt that he will succeed in college and could at any college. It looks, however, that his choices will be limited by those scores. Perhaps Brown (his first choice) will see it differently, but I see super reach. School counselors are even concerned about him getting into Flagship state U.</p>
<p>idad, Then there is the situation, where students have a 3.8-4.0+, some have laundry list of AP classes to go with that gpa, but they can bearly crack 520 on each section of the SAT. When one sees a bunch of applicants from one high school in this catagory, one has to begin to rethink what the gpa means, and what is actually being taught in those classrooms.</p>
<p>"Plenty of kids from subpar high schools excel at selective schools, and the SAT is a way to show that they can."</p>
<p>S is a proof of that.</p>
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When one sees a bunch of applicants from one high school in this catagory, one has to begin to rethink what the gpa means, and what is actually being taught in those classrooms.
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<p>I would typically tend to agree with that. However, many kids taking the same courses score quite well on the SAT/ACT. Further, this young man has attended national summer programs attended by top performing kids from around the country and has excelled in highly competitive environments. It's a mystery to me.</p>
<p>idad, I was not referring to the young man that you were mentioning. I have seen good students that just cannot do well on a standardized test. I have also seen over and over again, where students graduate with very high gpas from less stellar high schools, but do not do as well as might be expected on the SATs (judging by gpa and classes taken). In fact, I think that many of them have an advantage over some students that graduate from better high schools, but cannot get into every AP class that they desire, and have a 3.4 rather than a 3.9. It really can hurt in the merit aid department, as well as in admissions at some schools. Today, when a middle class kid does not get the $12,000+ in merit aid, they may not be able to attend that 35,000+ school b/c the financial aid is just not there, and neither are the family resources.</p>
<p>I can tell you that my son was squeezed out of 2 schools this way. He made the SAT cut off for merit aid by a wide margin, but his gpa did not allow for merit aid at 2 schools. He was just unable to attend those schools for this very reason.</p>
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2nd in the entire state in a writing competition, has taken the toughest curriculum he can at his HS, has a tremendous work ethic, has excelled in summer academic programs for the gifted,
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<p>I don't know what the outcome will be--I'm lousy at predicting chances--but it would be interesting to hear what comes of this. And it would be interesting to meet the young man and ask him what he remembers about the experience of taking the SAT I. I'm wondering if this is a person who self-reports that he finishes each section of the SAT I, or one who runs out of time in each section? Usually young people with really strong reading ability (much stronger than expected in high school curricula, but not stronger than may be "natural" for students who received good reading instruction in elementary school and have read a lot since) find they can end all sections of the SAT I with extra time. I'm sure the typical level of reading ability found even among high school students with good grades makes the SAT I a test with some time pressure.</p>
<p>Funny, a couple of year's ago the whole California System was going to drop the requirement for taking the SAT's, unless the Collegeboard agreed to restructure the exam. Since over 12% of the SAT taking public was from CA, the Collegeboard quickly ageed to examine the SAT's.</p>
<p>CA felt that the SAT's were not a good predictor on how well a high school student would perform in college.</p>
<p>After an extensive revieew with input from the CA system among others, the SAT 's were revised to include the return of the written essay and a lessor dependence on branch is to tree as arm is to ______? </p>
<p>The jury is still out on the SAT new scores and the use of SAT's as a predictor of college performance.</p>
<p>idad's and northeastmom's examples are interesting: their two types look somewhat similar on paper (high GPA/low SAT), but are likely to perform very differently in college. </p>
<p>Often (though certainly not invariably) adcoms at selective colleges can be amazingly good at reading between or beyond the stats to distinguish these two types. An good, well-known illustration is the mimimal difference in academic performance between SAT-submitters and non-submitters (who have much lower SAT scores) at selective sat-optional colleges. Does the near equivalent academic performance mean that SAT scores are poor predictors of college performance? That's certainly not what I'd conclude. Instead, I think it means that admissions officers are good at identifying those high-GPA, low standardized test kids who are most likely to overperform what you'd predict from the SATs scores.</p>
<p>Also remember that there are wide variations in how GPA's are reported. I see many kids reporting on CC that at their schools AP's are weighed more than honors. Most kids who report weighing of GPA's say that an A is 5, B is 4, etc. Well at my son's school, AP and honors are weighed the same. In both types of classes, an A is a 5, but B is a 3.75, C is a 2.5. A "high GPA" may not be as high at a different school. In addition, there are subtractions (slight) to GPA for students who get below certain grades in non honors/AP. This is one reason why I agree that we still need SAT/ACT. A 4.5 GPA at two schools can mean a completely different set of grades. Although we may still need the SAT, unfortunately it will never be perfect at predicting success.</p>
<p>At my S's school there was/is no weighting at all. A is 4, B is 3, C is 2, 1, is D. One can be taking auto shop (not a bad course, S's HS requires a voc course, and he loved it) or AP Calc BC, and the grades affect GPA identically. AP, honors, regular, are all treated the same. No minus or plus grades.</p>
<p>Perfect, I agree with you. I do feel sorry for the student at a more rigorous hs, who does not test well. They may have a lower gpa, and a lower standardized test score. Even though the factors you explain should be in the profile that the hs sends to colleges, at the end of the day, at some colleges, gpas from all high schools are treated equally when awarding merit aid. I have a problem with that. Also, at some schools APs and regular prep classes are treated equally when awarding merit aid (no weighting of classes).</p>
<p>Some kids are great at taking standardized tests, some not; some kids excel at getting A's in high school, some not so much; some schools inflate, others are tough; rank is suspect at schools who do not weight AP's: a kid who takes a very easy courseload can get straight A's and be ahead of another student who took a more challenging path and end up higher. There are all kinds of variables that are advantageous to one type of student or another. GPA and/or testing do not tell the whole story. One thing I do not understand, though, is why a college would want LESS information on which to base its decision. If dropping the SAT requirement, thereby only recieving scores from those applicants who feel they did very well on it, did not have such a positive effect on a college's rankings, then I would be convinced they did not believe in the SAT. I suppose if a college drops the SAT and does not submit any of their (optional, probably high) SAT scores to the rankings people then they are sincere. Otherwise, one has to ask if they are simply trying to improve their rankings by only having higher scores to submit. I know Reed is an exception and there are probably others. Whether the school mentioned by the OP is one, I do not know. BTW, for all of those parents agonizing because their kid is a high gpa, low test score student, there is another parent agonizing over the reverse.</p>
<p>idad, As I am sure you know, at many colleges, gpas are recalculated to take out auto shop, physical education, basket weaving, etc.</p>
<p>Bessie, I think that you really got to the heart of the issues.</p>
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And at what level to you set the test? I'm sorry, but a kid who goes to public school in inner-city Washington doesn't have the same opportunities as the kid who goes to Andover Prep, but you want them to reach the same level of knowledge in order to proceed to college. Gee, that sounds fair. Or, do we set it to a minimum level? In that case, it doesn't really help to differentiate the top students.
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Good point. I'm in favor of retaining the SAT as a data point for college admissions. Certainly the small elite LACs can choose to use it or not, but they have the staff to look closely at the whole app and an SAT score isn't critically important. For the UCalifornia system, where admissions is done by the numbers, it's an important way to level the field a bit. An Andover graduate already has a huge advantage, in every measurable way (brains, skills, persistence, top teachers, sports achievements ... and the best available SAT prep). The adcoms know it. The inner-city kid who succeeds despite the disadvantage is a gem, and the adcoms know that too.</p>
<p>We have the same non-weighted GPA system as Idad. So, obstensibly, an all Honors/AP kid could have the same GPA as the kid in wood shop and level 2 English. I am always amazed when I hear of these kids here with GPAs of almost 5.</p>
<p>I have plenty of thoughts on that, but those are the facts.</p>