Yes, they have. My point is that some truly forgive students who send a low score if the score would have kept them out - and test-optional was a possibility. In other words, there may be less strategery whether to send a borderline score or not. They don’t care.
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Agreed. I don’t think many AOs (and I’ve heard from a number of them) are making the inferences that posters on this thread have suggested e.g., assuming low scores if applying TO, forecasting where the final testing range might end up, etc.
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Correct—- so again, what would be the reason to actively tell students who are right around the prior year median, not to submit?
If they are most concerned with admitting the best fitting students, wouldn’t you want to know the test score?
If the AO is ignoring the fact that a score is low, it means they are just ignoring the scores altogether. “If you have a low score, we ignore the score and treat you the same as the high scores”— means they are totally ignoring the scores. So why not just go test blind?
Imagine they told students — “you can read your letters of recommendation in advance. Please only submit the great ones. Do not submit lukewarm letters of recommendation”
Or… “you can decide which grades to submit. Please only submit A’s and better. Do not submit any classes where you got less than an A”
Telling students, “only submit your score if you’re in the 98th percentile+, do NOT submit your score if you’re below the 97th percentile… even though half our students are below the 97th percentile” — the only logical reason for that policy is that the school is trying to manipulate their reported test scores.
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I believe enrollment management professionals when they say they don’t need test scores to adequately evaluate an applicant, and determine fit for said school. If the applicant submits a score they look at it, if no score they don’t use it (nor do they make judgments about what that score was).
This overstates the importance of scores in the process, at least at some schools. Have you heard from any AO that this is their process and thinking? Or are you just guessing?
I would vote for this too. Unfortunately, I am not in charge of any school’s test policy.
Most schools don’t do this. We know of some that do. Tulane has done this, and maybe that will change now that admissions has new leadership. We do know, from prior enrollment management leadership, that Tulane’s Trustees care about their USNWR ranking.
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There may be some schools that will manipulate test scores if they feel the student is a fit. But I don’t think you can say that for all schools. I mean, in the grand scheme of things, what % of kids are applying to Chicago?
I would hope you can trust the importance weighting in common data set. Maybe they’re accurate. Or not. They (Chicago) don’t seem to have one btw.
We do, however, see some schools report admission stats for both (with TO typically lower when this is reported) and we do see some auto merit scholarship grids that reward TO lower. That likely means that those who use a similar calc but don’t publish a table likely also reward less to TO.
Just so many reasons at one point below the median, to submit…imho. No matter how many AOs you know it’s never gonna be more than a small sampling of the overall. And while TO and even test blind is a trend, so are test required for this year. I guess I’m erring on the side of caution.
Good luck to OP.
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Neither. I’m referring to a poster above, who claimed that’s what they were told by an AO.
Again, my comments are entirely in reference to the schools that are doing this.
I have no opinion on test blind – We know testing is a very flawed measurement of academic potential. So if a school wants to stop using scores, I get it. On the other hand, if a school like MIT says that despite the flaws, it’s a valuable measure of collegiate success, I get that also.
I can also understand true Test optional, where the student decides whether the score is something they want the school to consider. In such cases, I would expect scores to carry little weight. But much like a student deciding which extracurriculars to include in their application, or whether to answer the optional supplemental essays, I can understand true test optional.
What is clearly just manipulating the reported scores – Is where a school says they are test optional, but actively tells students not to submit if they aren’t in the top 98th-99th percentile. Where a school routinely accepted 1350 SAT scores in 2019, to now tell students, “don’t submit unless you’re over 1500” – There is no basis for that, except for score manipulation. It’s basically saying, “we will still take that 1350 student, but we don’t want them to submit their score, because it will hurt our desire to increase our reported scores.”
As an example-- NYU is publicly bragging that this year, their median SAT score was 1550 – Over the top 99th percentile. NYU is an excellent school, but we are really expected to believe they are really drawing better test takers than Harvard? Prior to test optional, NYU’s median SAT was in the mid 1400’s. So they went from 95th percentile median to 99th percentile median.
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I agree. I also agree that AO’s are often primarily concerned with “taking who they want” and “don’t care” about scores in situations where (as @Mwfan1921 put it) “the student fits the school’s institutional priorities in some way(s).”
The caveat may be with regard to the mass of otherwise qualified similarly situated candidates. Within these groups, if students choose to submit then AO’s may favor the higher scorer unless there is something about the lower scorer that stands out. From a student’s perspective, that’s the danger of submitting a score that doesn’t really move the needle as compared to the rest of the application.
I agree with this 100%, and it seems to be the major disconnect many have here. When colleges say they don’t hold applying TO against students, they mean it. Many parents just don’t seem willing to accept this.
This presupposes that those “best fitting students” even apply. Trouble is, when tests are required, they often don’t apply.
One of of the goals of a TO policy is to encourage those “best fitting students” to apply even when they might otherwise be discouraged because of the testing requirement. TO is a message from colleges that standardized test scores are not nearly as important as we’ve been lead to believe, and that many students can demonstrate that they are a perfect fit without the scores.
This gets thrown out a lot, but frankly I think that at least with the vast majority of schools it may be closer to myth or urban legend. If not, then which are the colleges that actively tell all students not to submit unless applicants are over the median, or over 1500, or whatever? Can you provide any evidence of this beyond anecdote? It is easy to see why AO might advise a particular student against submitting particular score (when students from the admitted students from the applicants high school generally have much higher scores, for example), but this may have less to do with manipulation and more to do with an honest assessment of the student’s chances compared to that student’s relevant cohort.
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The admissions office is admitting a set number of students. They aren’t going to admit more students if they get more good applications. So really, there is no reason for an Admissions Officer to give advice on whether to submit test scores. If they plan on admitting 5,000 students out of 25,000 applicants… If they “help” all their applicants by giving them advice on improving their application… they are still only going to admit 5,000 out of 25,000.
Yes, a school guidance counselor had incentive to give advice that will help improve a student’s chances. But that’s not true of an AO.
Now, there is a caveat – There may be individual cases where a school has certain motives to discourage score submission. Say there is a recruited athlete to an Ivy League School. Imagine this student has a 3.7 GPA – far below the Ivy League standard, but nothing shocking. But they have a 1050 SAT… I can see the school telling this individual, “we are recruiting you, we want you to play basketball here at Harvard… but… maybe don’t submit that SAT score…”
But for a semi-selective non-elite school to tell their entire applicant pool, “you should not submit your score if it’s below 1500/last year’s median, etc” – there is truly no “good” reason for schools to give that advice.
Yes, it’s anecdotal that it’s happening. But there are a lot of such anecdotal reports.
It’s certainly not true of every school. I heard the Director of Admissions at an Ivy League school basically say the opposite. Admittedly, I’m reading into tone… but the tone suggested that they would look down upon the failure to submit. (Something to the effect of, “If you don’t submit, we have less information to evaluate… and we know there must have been a reason for your failure to submit.” Maybe I’m reading too much into it, but my impression was, “failure to submit won’t doom you, but we will basically assume your score wasn’t so great if you don’t submit.”
In our experience last year with my daughter having a 32 SS and asking schools like Emory, W&M, Rice and W&L - couldn’t get an answer Even Pitt which has previously stated when not TO that merit went to those with a minimum 33 - they wouldn’t give an answer.
They said like the websites say - if you feel it would be additive to your application submit. If you want us to consider you without a test score that’s ok too.
So maybe a few schools are advising but I don’t think that the rule…more likely the exception. I think most won’t guide you.
My daughter submitted fo 20/21. Held back for Rice. Rejected but while we’ll never know, likely would have been the same result if submitted.
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In my experience thus far, that is also what I’m finding from most schools – They really won’t give any explicit guidance. Which makes sense.
One question and one comment:
My question: Could someone explain to me which is the more reliable test score figure to help gauge admissions chances: those for admitted students or those for enrolled students. I guess one is reported in the CDS and the other is not? However, what I am getting at is whether there is a meaningful hint in any spread between these two sets of numbers as to admission chances.
As for a comment, I find it remarkable that an AO at a “top school” that is TO will truly turn a blind eye if no standardized test scores are submitted. While covid is still very much around, I don’t think we are at 2020 standards, where there were no tests at all. Most of the country is open these days, and students do have the ability to test with the SAT or ACT AFAIK. If I were an AO, it would be human nature for me to wonder why a student didn’t submit their standardized test score.
Maybe a year ago, it would be different, and certainly, two years ago, it was about the only way to proceed. However, the cynic in me thinks it is a “selectivity booster” where colleges know that TO gives every incentive for high scorers to submit and lower scorers not to submit (much like someone referencing NYU’s apparently appalling boast of an SAT 1550 median upthread).
After the events of the last couple of years, IMHO, the only academically/intellectually pristine stands taken by colleges are either (a) the UC system, which will not consider standardized tests at all; or (b) MIT, which has now gone back to requiring the submission of standardized test scores.
With all due respect, in 2022, TO seems to be a cop-out.
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I also wonder at schools that are need aware, does this matter. Sure I’ll give the 1500 some $$ but maybe wont admit the non submitter who has need whereas I’ll let the full pay TO in
Like you I’ve seen admitted and enrolled stats. Usually enrolled is higher. If it’s a merit school and you need $, I’d match to enrolled. If it’s a no merit school and you are ok full pay, I’d use admitted.
That’s me.
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Test score range for admitted students should be a better indicator for admissions. However, it isn’t what’s reported in CDS. If one assumes that admitted students with higher test scores are more likely to have better options elsewhere, then it follows that the test score range for the admitted students should be higher than that for the enrolled students (which is in the CDS).
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I am also unsure whether or not all admissions offices are sincere in their reasons for going test optional or if they like the outcome of ever increasing median scores for the applicants who do submit.
However, perhaps admissions offices are concerned with equity issues that go beyond whether or not students can get access to the tests. While I think most students in the class of 2023 and 2024 should be able to resume taking standardized tests, a significant number of them will be going into those tests having had their schooling disrupted in 8th, 9th and 10th grades.
I know kids who basically lost 1-2 years of instruction right when they should have been building the skills and knowledge to help them perform well on standardized tests. This happened for students at all income levels. However wealthier families (and schools) were more likely to successfully compensate for the loss of instructional time through homeschooling, summer classes, tutors, switching schools to ones that could meet their needs better, and even moving to other towns and districts. But many kids really languished for months; some had no synchronous school at all for the better part of two years. Thus, I would not be shocked to see an increase in the wealth gap around standardized tests for the next couple of years. On the other hand, I suspect that the kids who were the most underserved during COVID would have been the least likely to apply to very selective colleges pre-COVID anyway. So perhaps, the impact on the scores of the “typical” applicant to those schools was not that large. But I still think that some colleges may mean more by equitable access than just ability to find an open test center.
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I agree that there are still equity issues affecting many kids who are applying for fall 2023.
Our large public HS didn’t have any instruction at all during spring of 9th grade (they pretty much just handed out weekly homework packets). In 10th grade, school was 100% online with limited instructional hours. Our son is very self directed and was able to perform well anyway, but a lot of kids in his grade didn’t get anything close to the academic preparation they would have had in pre-COVID years.
Our high school only had enough space to offer the PSAT to 1/3 of the junior class, and the seats were distributed by lottery, so our son didn’t get to take the PSAT. He went into his first SAT in the spring with no experience with this type of test. Many of his classmates had trouble getting signed up for the SAT this spring, or have had their test dates canceled.
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I have the same experience. Spring semester 9th grade, basically zero instruction just daily worksheets. Then the schedule for 10th grade was online with 4 classes in their entirety for each semester. So Geometry was Aug to Dec 2020 for D23 and then she did not have any math until Aug 2021. Take summer ‘learning loss’ and quadruple it basically. We were able to supplement but plenty of students in our affluent high school did not have the funds or did not do it. Not everyone has the ability to just pivot to a new way of learning on a dime either due to income or their basic personality type. Plenty of good parents I knew were basically stunned by the overnight change and could not seem to step up, let alone the children. My D23 will not go TO but plenty of kids still need that option.
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We have a rising high school freshman. His middle school principal told me that there was a significant drop in standardized test scores during COVID. He said that it had brought the entire average down and explained it like this. That if you were at a 6.8 grade level in 2019, that same score would put you at 7.3 in 2021. Basically, kids lost half of a year, and this was in a school system that did a pretty decent job remote and getting kids back in person
As other have pointed out, the waves of disruption caused by Covid haven’t entirely subsided yet.
More to your comment though, while Covid gave colleges a jumping off point, I don’t think it Covid is the reason many schools are sticking with it. Among other reasons, many AO’s seem to prefer TO at least in part because TO increases applications from students they have been trying to reach but who were put off and/or intimidated by the test requirement. They also like the fact that kids are given the opportunity to quit wasting their time cramming and fretting over these pointless tests. And many just don’t put as high a value on the importance of test scores as some parents think they do.
And while you may find it “remarkable,” many top schools seem to be capable of evaluating applicants without test scores. It is not a matter of turning “a blind eye” if no test score is submitted, but rather a matter of evaluating what is submitted.
I don’t see that is a cop-out, but rather welcome a sea-change in how colleges are approaching admissions, and many parents (as well as the college prep industry) are struggling to adjust.
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But for grade inflation, I would agree with you. As I said, TO is a cop out. Either get rid of it completely like UC has done if the issue is focused on the student (which is fine with me) or require it for all.
The midway position is odd IMHO. If a school like NYU is boasting about its “high” test scores, that is really repulsive, especially considering their pre-pandemic scores.
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As many have stated on this topic more eloquently - either require testing or don’t require testing. It’s this wishy washy in between stance that is frustrating to lots of folks. Students and parents alike want to know where to focus their finite time, money, energy and resources - whether the focus is on grades, or testing or extracurriculars or essays or all of the above, just be explicit and say what is required and then require it of everyone. But don’t say on one hand, test scores are “very important” per CDS and on other hand, don’t send test scores if they’re not competitive and it won’t hurt you. That’s just downright confusing.
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