Stanford and Private School Admissions - A Mystery

Colleges and Universities A-Z Stanford University
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<p>Being complacent with SATII's and AP's is a very dangerous thought. Just think about it, how much is actually required to score an 800 on a math/physics/chem SATII? Or a 5 on the equivalent AP subjects? Not much. When a college like Stanford sees an 800 in Math SATII or a 5 on Calc BC/Physics B/Chem AP, it's almost a no-brainer.</p>

<p>The thing is though, while many of us might not find APs to be quite challenging there are still <em>plenty</em> of students who cannot handle the material and often drop out of the course. So, if this is happening now, just imagine if schools were to up the ante, it'd be disastrous. First and foremost the way high school kids are educated needs to be reformed to make sure that they're getting the best instructors possible who can really make tough material understandable to them and <em>then</em> the difficulty of the classes/standardized tests can be increased. But to do one without the other is a grave mistake.<br>
I mean, for example, only about 10% of students score a 5 on AP English Language. I find this to be one of the easiest APs out there and yet such a small percentage of students score well enough to get a 5. It's kind of ridiculous. Another example is calc BC. Although a lot of people relatively score a 5 on this test (almost half I believe) <em>soooo</em> many people drop out of this course or barely scrape by it's not even funny, at least from my high school (which is a pretty good school to begin with). I along with a lot of other people I know are easily able to maintain A averages, but the number of people who cannot handle it who originally thought they could is a bit unnerving (to be fair though, my teacher teaches us topics not on the exam and gives us problems much harder than those encountered on the actual AP test).
So in short, you can't throw American students into the deep end without first at least teaching them to tread.</p>

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<p>JHS, OK my comment about legacies being a waste is exaggerated and I see your point about some legacies being smart, etc. I think the book The Price of Admission had some definite issues about legacies. I do think it should be eliminated, judge students on their merits and not on whether their parents went to school here. I respectfully submit that personal views that you know XYZ who although a legacy was stronger than most or who was turned down, etc do not prove a thing. Since college admissions lack transparency legacy admits increase the opaqueness of the process. I think it is a deleterious factor.</p>

<p>To mathboy, etc, I doubt if a hyper strong math/sci kid is ever denied admission. Such a student will have olympiads, home science projects, teacher recs under his/her belt, he is often referred to as lopsided, and in fact contrary to roundedness colleges seek such kids. They want a well rounded class, not students and they are sensitive to this type of kid and contrary to what you think such kids stand out. They wire the school's computer system, work at labs etc etc.</p>

<p>As to your comment that students who ace SAT 2s and AP math may struggle with college math, that's where the SAT 1 comes in. High math ability correlates well with overall IQ which correlates well with SAT 1. So, if you get over 2300 and top scores in AP and SAT 2 math, it is clear you are going to be tops in math and science if you choose to go into it.</p>

<p>A personal example: my son initially chose two foreign languages in school (one ancient and one modern) and took broad courses in history, etc and only up to AP Calculus 1 (score of 5). And 770 Math SAT2. Doesn't look necessarily to be top in math, does he? No Olympiads, etc. Has 5s on Latin and French Lit and English Lit etc. He got into engineering at one of the ivies (granted they are not top engineering programs) but contrary to the possible expectation he would struggle in college math he is acing the math sequence. Why? The key is the SAT 1. He got 2350 one sitting.</p>

<p>The point of the story is that good college adcoms rely on MULTIPLE measures and usually get it right, better than the PRINCIPLE of the IIT which by the way largely measures cram school success.</p>

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<p>Random unrelated comment:</p>

<p>Why, oh why do you post like 3 posts in a row mathboy? Why not just put it all together or edit your first post? It's quite annoying.</p>

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<p>"The point of the story is that good college adcoms rely on MULTIPLE measures and usually get it right, better than the PRINCIPLE of the IIT which by the way largely measures cram school success."</p>

<p>You have to remember that we are not bolstering the IIT-JEE system, rather that the test we take should be more of high-school rather than middle school level. Secondly, none of those multiple measures really show a rigorous "High-school" level ability. I know a whole lot of people who ace the SAT and SAT math without being strong in math (and me being one of them). Similarly, I know a whole lot of people who ace SAT physics/AP physics (5 and 800's) without understanding the vector nature of momentum, torque, angular momentum, force etc...</p>

<p>"To mathboy, etc, I doubt if a hyper strong math/sci kid is ever denied admission. Such a student will have olympiads, home science projects, teacher recs under his/her belt, he is often referred to as lopsided, and in fact contrary to roundedness colleges seek such kids."</p>

<p>Maybe, but maybe not... In fact many people are unable to do Olympiads because of money or school factor, and because the fact that Olympiads (especially the math one) focus on subjects marginally required for college math (combinatorics). There's two ways to remediate this situation: teach more subjects that require sharper problem solving (combinatorics etc..) or use another measure of achievement. Either way is fine for me. In other words, change the educational system and modify olympiad level test for a more standard one. See my post above on my argument for a more "standard" test that is MANDATORY rather than using the optional and rarely tested olympiad test as a measure.</p>

<p>"The thing is though, while many of us might not find APs to be quite challenging there are still <em>plenty</em> of students who cannot handle the material and often drop out of the course. So, if this is happening now, just imagine if schools were to up the ante, it'd be disastrous. First and foremost the way high school kids are educated needs to be reformed to make sure that they're getting the best instructors possible who can really make tough material understandable to them and <em>then</em> the difficulty of the classes/standardized tests can be increased. But to do one without the other is a grave mistake."</p>

<p>Yes, it is true, and quite sad. But the problem is not the test, but rather the underachieving educational system. If people abroad in 3rd-world countries with not enough food for their daily satisfaction can do it, why not us?</p>

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<p>Yes, it is true, and quite sad. But the problem is not the test, but rather the underachieving educational system.</p>

<p>That was exactly the point of my post, faraday...You can't increase the rigor of the SAT/APs/etc to the level you described without first fixing our broken educational system. It wouldn't be fair to the students.</p>

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<p>"You can't increase the rigor of the SAT/APs/etc to the level you described without first fixing our broken educational system."</p>

<p>Here's the other thing that needs to be fixed. Grade-inflation. Why don't we lower the failing grade to 40%? Then we can really test wide range of abilities by using tests that actually challenge students. Current tests are mostly about plug-and-chug in the sciences. The problem is that so many people believe they "deserve" to get that A because they studied X hrs for a subject. Not everyone should be able to ace a class at their will. Otherwise, we will have a very hard time differentiating the strong students from the pseudo-intellectuals. For example, at my school almost half of the students are enrolled in the supposed "college-level" AP, and 1/4 take at least 4-5 AP classes. The result, due to parent complaints, is that AP classes standard went down a whole lot, to my dismay (I actually enrolled because I wanted to learn sth). Or on the other hand, we could curve grades like what is done in college. People will be more used to take tests that will challenge you.</p>

<p>Secondly, having a grade-deflated system will soften the shock when you go to college. You must learn to fail somewhere in your life, and often, it will happen in the US in college, because students have been babysitted in their thinking that getting an A is easy (from high school). Heck, even I would have a shock in college, because I got so used to ace my math/science subjects without having to think.</p>

<p>Let me give another example. In a math class, the Calc teacher can't really allow himself to make us do delta-epsilon proofs because otherwise, many people would have a 50 and fail. Therefore, most problems become plug-and-chug rather than proofs, the latter being more what math is about. If the failing grade was lowered, the test can become significantly improved to challenge and force students to study more rigorous subjects (proof-writing, thinking), thus separating the pseudo-intellectuals from the really strong students. As it is done now, everyone who is careful enough to compute derivatives and integrals quickly in our math class can score an A on our Calc tests.</p>

<p>PS: my message is that I want students to study sth more worthy than plug-and-chug type of thinking, whether in math or science. I mean, even in the humanities, people learn "essay templates" to do well. You don't believe me? Some Testmaster thing actually designed a template for the SAT essay that guarantees a 10 or above.</p>

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<p>Omg the U.S. has so much grade inflation. I am getting 90% average in my super super hard public I.B. school in Canada and is ranked 9/300 (top 3%). Although in B.C., our A is from 86%~100%.</p>

<p>However, grade inflation is also evident in a lot of private schools in Canada though.</p>

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<p>"As to your comment that students who ace SAT 2s and AP math may struggle with college math, that's where the SAT 1 comes in. High math ability correlates well with overall IQ which correlates well with SAT 1. So, if you get over 2300 and top scores in AP and SAT 2 math, it is clear you are going to be tops in math and science if you choose to go into it."</p>

<p>With due respect, I do not believe the SAT I correlates with success. Let me take the math major, on which I can at least speak with some confidence. Mathematics in college is not about "IQ" -- it's abstract to the extreme if you go far enough. Perhaps a good tester can get through the lower division, but what really distinguishes a math major is the upper division work, and research work if applicable. It's no longer about "raw aptitude," and rather comes down to the ability of the student to think the abstract framework of the subject. </p>

<p>Another thing -- ramaswami -- your son may be brilliant even if he didn't get an 800 on all his SAT II's in science...because at some point, a high score is a high score. That's part of the issue - if the material is just not that hard, a slightly higher or lower scores only reflects how someone did on a given day. In fact, this is the argument we've all often given AGAINST having one test determine the future. I think a more rigorous curriculum/testing system COMPLEMENTING everything else in the American system is a great asset. And differences among scores actually will reflect something. Right now, a 5 on the AP's means nothing in many cases to our top schools.</p>

<p>And I don't think one fundamental point is being addressed -- if these scores DO mean so much, WHY do universities not take them to heart more seriously? So many have posted here saying "Stanford's process is good, and heeding the SAT is stupid." I agree with them! I think one thing which could happen is that AP material could be scored on an SAT scale, and the AP scores could have a bigger impact. Better yet if the AP material is made more serious, as in top high schools.</p>

<p>However, Hippo does raise a somewhat fair point, which is that it's best to raise the high school standards. You know what? If the testing policy of AP and SAT II are changed, I think the AP prep courses will up the level as well!!</p>

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<p>And faraday gives a good example of how calculus is watered down to an extreme in the AP curriculum. Honestly, if we made the calculus a little more like how real mathematics is going to be, and actually tested students on it, that's all it'd take!</p>

<p>Teach physics rigorously! It's really a simple solution, which is just to teach stuff in a rigorous fashion on AP type tests, and have colleges pay special attention to these scores.</p>

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<p>First, to mathboy, I never said SAT 1 equals success. Yes, math is about IQ since as you recognize it is about abstraction which is exactly what high IQ scores measure. I am a psychologist, so please trust me on this. It seems to me that you are all talking about math and physics possibly because you are inclined toward these subjects. Now, someone else will insist on strengthening history or Latin, etc. I have no objection to strengthening all the subject curriculums but if we did that the ones who turn in a strong performance in math may not do so in history and vice versa and you will have in principle the Indian system where the kids get separated by interest/ability at an early age. By keeping the subjects slightly less rigorous than you would like we can identify students who do well across the board, which in turn will correlate better with general intellectual ability, the g factor and then they can develop and accelerate their strengths in college.</p>

<p>Contrary to your assertion that you know a whole lot of students who aced the SAT 1 and SAT 2 and do not know much the facts disprove you: approximately 275 students got 2400 last year and 1581 got between 2350 and 2400, of which nearly 400 took the test overseas. Not too many American high schoolers come close to acing the SAT 1.</p>

<p>I respectfully submit that there are not that many students who get very high scores in SAT 1 and 2, and 5s in say 8 APs and near perfect GPAs in rigorous curriculums and strong teacher recs. Together these measure persistence on top of intelligence, on top of rigorous mastery of math or physics or what have you. The problem with even a much stronger math/science test is that it could still be prepped for over a short time. Classroom performance over the years and teacher recs, even in a slightly weaker curriculum will identify those who have drive and persistence. It is those with drive who will succeed, not merely those who ace strong tests.</p>

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<p>Ramaswami -- I never made a claim as to how many students in a quantitative sense I know who aced the SAT I. Perhaps we have different definitions of "lot." I don't think this is the point, though -- the more fundamental issue is that we disagree to what extent the SAT I is a good test. Because until we get that straightened, it is somewhat immaterial to our discussion how many students get near perfect scores on the test. Really, I am not debating percentages, I'm debating how to best reflect to colleges the abilities and inclinations of our students.</p>

<p>Perhaps you suggest that schools take the scores we have today more at faith, and admit more based on scores. I.e., if you believe the number of high scorers is small enough to well distinguish students, perhaps there should be an exceptionally high correlation between the highest scores and admission -- which plenty have agreed is not the current state of affairs. </p>

<p>I respect that you are a psychologist, but I suggest that you also respect that I am talking of the math major from experience. And you should also respect that what you're stating: "High math ability correlates well with overall IQ which correlates well with SAT 1." may be highly unobvious and disputable to plenty of posters, myself included, and certainly unobvious, it seems, to admissions officers at a school like Stanford; in fact, it seems a bunch of them would disagree. You see, both the SAT's and math subject GRE test some degree of mastery of basics -- nothing more. I have it from my own professor that the most important skill in math research is arguably getting a good idea of what problems to try solving, what questions to ask. Being clever, he logically says, is only a matter of resolving certain intermediate difficulties quicker...and the type of cleverness required there is different anyway. I think it is dangerous to predict math ability through any measure but a test trial at the real stuff. Similarly for other fields. Math is only an example. I honestly think beyond a much lower threshold than a score of 2300, success in pure mathematics cannot be easily predicted. </p>

<p>As for AP courses and success "across the board" -- this is exactly what rewards a good "high school student" over someone actually really specially sharp at math and physics. When we have the CHOICE what AP's and subject tests to take, why not have the guys choosing to take them come from a slightly more selecti I personally know cases where students will be really really talented at math and physics, and not get recognized by the AP tests. A BUNCH of our class, as stated by our AP teacher, got 5's on AP Physics, and they all knew of the guys I'm talking of, who demonstrated so much more ability at doing physics than they did. OK, trust me not all these AP Physics students were up to handling, say EECS at Cal. Not a chance. Guys who thought AP Physics is a joke find Cal's EE courses even at lower division to be really hard...I'm sure same goes for Stanford.</p>

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<p>Oh and for the humanities and social sciences, I would, as faraday did, yield to those more knowledgeable than I to suggest what (if anything) they feel need be done about the current system. I am not there to speak for them.</p>

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<p>Sorry I my posts are fragmented, the "edit" function is kinda messed up for me! Please be patient with me to your best abilities. But one more addition:</p>

<p>"guys choosing to take them come from a slightly more selecti" -- this was incomplete, and should read "more self-selected bunch" or something along the lines.</p>

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<p>"correlate better with general intellectual ability, the g factor and then they can develop and accelerate their strengths in college."</p>

<p>I believe, Ramaswami, that your general point is that "general intellectual ability" ought to be measured.</p>

<p>Here is what I'd propose: AP's are, after all, a taste of COLLEGE LEVEL stuff, and I think I am quite reasonable in suggesting that they should reflect more about your success in a particular subject area. Perhaps if the SAT II's were more on the lines of the AP's, and honors courses were more like AP courses, we'd achieve our ends -- a generally good candidate for a top school would do great at this level (our current AP level), and someone who is REALLY gonna succeed at math in college will do well at a calculus course which includes proofs and an approach more akin to real mathematics. Similar comments go for physics.</p>

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<p>mathboy, </p>

<p>1.) You have to go back to your original topic, which is about the admission. Enough students at Stanford can score almost perfect at SAT when they were 8th graders. There is no need to prepare SAT for them. </p>

<p>2.) Don't confuse Stanford and Cal, a lot of APs do not even count towards credit at Stanford. Stanford does not care that much about those tests.</p>

<p>3.) If you really want to change the test system, go into teaching at high school when you graduate from Cal. You will see what is the best.</p>

<p>4.) Don't compare those foreign test systems with US education system, you don't know much about tehm. I personally went through everything, regardless what system you use, the goal is to select the best or the ones you want. Thery are different, not which one is better.</p>

<p>5.) You need to understand why Stanford rejects so many "good" students, because they are not the best in their categories. It is like a good private high school, it has different students, not necessary all super smart. One of Stanford's goals is to make everyone happy. Imagine that you never had "B" in your life and at Stanford you have all Ds. That is not what they want to see.</p>

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<p>ewho -- if you take a look at my threads, I'm actually against using the SAT as the means for admission. I've also acknowledged that Stanford wants a certain student body, and respected that in posts of mine before.</p>

<p>"Thery are different, not which one is better." Of course they're different. And my posts have dealt with the differences, and we're not deciding which is better here, we're deciding which elements of our system here can be improved. Please keep comments constructive. Teaching high school is not the only way one can comment intelligently; on the contrary, several of the questions I'm interested in require the perspective of students in college here. I welcome your own constructive comments, and those of others.</p>

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<p>Enough students at Stanford can score almost perfect at SAT when they were 8th graders. There is no need to prepare SAT for them.</p>

<p>Um.....I think not.</p>

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<p>mathboy, I am losing your arguments, please forgive me. Bluntly put, I don't care what your math prof said. And, no, I will not respect your experience as a math major. Math ability correlates well with high IQ, that is a fact, whether obvious or not to posters here, go read the journals on measurement, do a search on Psych Abstracts. IQ is all about abstraction. However flawed, the SAT reasoning test correlates well with major measures of g. Yes, contrary to your beliefs and that of other posters, the top schools do value high SATs. Look at the interquartile score range of the top 10 USNWR schools and you will see how valued they are.</p>

<p>There are not too many high scorers, let me define them as those scoring over 2200. Less than 15,000 I am sure. Now, see how many of them got 2250 and above in 3 SAT subject tests, you will whittle down the number to 10,000. See how many of these got 5s on 8 APs. The remaining, perhaps 6000 won't even fill all the Ivies if all were admitted.</p>

<p>In other words, no need to invent more tests, even with the current ones, using all of them, you can easily identify the top students, then throw in the GPA, factor in school and curriculum rigor, you can know the top scorers instantly. In fact, adcoms do calculate a score, I forget the name, I think it is called the Academic Index. I repeat, there are not enough high scorers as it is to fill the entire student body at the Ivies, do search posts by Sakky, I think he has said the same, no need to invent any more tests.</p>

<p>By the way, what is Cal, is it U of California or Caltech, please clarify. Also, your comment about Standard student body, no such thing exists. One other thing: in your comment about grade inflation, did you possibly mean raising the failure percent?</p>

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<p>Ramaswami, I unfortunately don't think you or I can exchange intelligent messages on the subject of the SAT any longer, if you're so quick to dismiss people who actually have experience in the field they're talking about. Your statistics do not have to mean anything, if they're not precise in what they're measuring, and I think a math professor with due respect has a much better idea of what "math ability" ought to mean. Maybe your correlation is true under a certain definition of "math ability," but certainly it's not obvious (and I would contend it's plainly untrue) if you consider what it takes to be a successful research mathematician. </p>

<p>It's like this - if John Conway proves "free will exists" under a certain definition of free will, we get some useful info. But this doesn't put all debate to rest instantly, because we were assuming a very specific definition of "free will." You may see some value to this line of reasoning, but if not, I suggest we continue this line of discussion only if it can really go somewhere beyond blind repetition of our respective points.</p>

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<p>I'm not saying your studies mean nothing - they could be valuable input. But what I'm saying is they don't seem to end the matter once and for all. And your definition of "math ability" may be highly different from mine, in which case we're not even disagreeing.</p>