<p>It's interesting to see how much the "race unknown" figure in the student demographics varies from college to college. Harvard's figure is quite high.</p>
<p>Another interesting bit of trivia I came across while browsing, which earns three cheers for Muhlenberg College. Their SAT scores include this footnote:</p>
<p>
[quote]
Muhlenberg has an SAT-optional policy; however, our SAT profile includes scores from all students.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>I note that they report these same deflated figures to USNews. In a culture where some schools seem to try to game the system, this is really laudable. </p>
<p>The footnote also points up a very useful feature of the U-CAN format: it customizable so that information like this--information that effectively says, "be careful when you compare data points," can be included.</p>
<p>
[quote]
however, our SAT profile includes scores from all students.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>That's the Common Data Set rule. </p>
<p>
</p>
<p><a href="http://www.commondataset.org/docs/0708/CDS2007_2008.htm%5B/url%5D">http://www.commondataset.org/docs/0708/CDS2007_2008.htm</a> </p>
<p>It's commendable to get that right, because some colleges get that wrong (notably, MIT until now), but it's not remarkable to get that right. That's just reading the directions.</p>
<p>I think I was reading something into that footnote that wasn't there, namely, "[We require SATs from all students who have taken the exam for institutional research purposes and] our profile includes these scores, too." I do wonder which of the SAT-optional colleges that collect scores from non-submitters after admission are scrupulous enough to adhere to the letter of the CDS guidelines and report these.</p>
<p>Business Week: "A New Tool for the College-Bound: Call it Accountability 101. A new Web site set up by a group of colleges and universities says it's offering unvarnished information about member schools."</p>
<p>MM88 does make a good point about Muhlenberg precisely because with so many different SAT optional policies out there, etc, while we might indeed wonder "which of the SAT-optional colleges that collect scores from non-submitters after admission are scrupulous enough to adhere to the letter of the CDS guidelines and report these" we also would want to know what their policy is regarding the SAT "option". The footnote on the Dickinson page is interesting in this regard: "* SAT scores are optional at Dickinson for all but merit scholarship applicants." of Of course, I am partial to asterisks, but the footnotes do help to customize the template. Another example, on both the Muhlenberg and Dickinson pages the footnote informs the reader about the prevalence of Bachelors degrees awarded in double majors.</p>
<p><a href="http://members.ucan-network.org/dickinson%5B/url%5D">http://members.ucan-network.org/dickinson</a></p>
<p>I've had a look at the profiles for a couple dozen schools and my impression is quite positive.</p>
<p>The pluses are the customizable format, many links to the schools' own websites, easy to read graphic presentation, and provision of some data, like tuition and fee history and detailed breakdown of class sizes, that is not part of the standard package elsewhere.</p>
<p>Minuses include the relative difficulty of comparing institutions (some data points are not reported as percentages, there's no way to search or sort profiles, and if you print out the .pdfs so that they fill a page, they're nearly illegible). There's also little or no information on financial resources, ED/EA statistics, or class ranks. </p>
<p>Once a student has narrowed her list, U-CAN is just about unbeatable. It seems to me somewhat less useful for students still at the compiling-the-list-of-possibilities stage.</p>
<p>Just checked 2 instate schools from a list, the site seems like a nice starting point for students and parents to get a quick handle on some issues they may not even know to consider.</p>
<p>I stumbled across UCan completely by accident; son's college has a little "UCan" logo at the top of their website's home page. It looks excellent to me. I hated trying to figure out how to navigate every college's website, and they all listed different info in different places. This will make it easy to compare schools.</p>
<p>I find the tools to be attractive and useful in a generic way. All in all, it's a very positive development. </p>
<p>Of course, I'd love to see three features added:</p>
<ol>
<li><p>A clear identification of the year of the listed statistics. </p></li>
<li><p>A PROMINENTLY displayed link to the Common Data Set and IR department of EACH school. </p></li>
<li><p>Clear explanations about data that might be reported differently according to the audience.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>The Yale page is now up and there is a long list of coming attraction soon to be posted profiles still in the offing:</p>
<p><a href="http://www.ucan-network.org/comingsoon.asp%5B/url%5D">http://www.ucan-network.org/comingsoon.asp</a></p>
<p>Most looked at colleges since U-CAN went live include Johns Hopkins, Bucknell, Duke, Swarthmore, Union College, Layfayette, Carlton, and Adelphi.</p>
<p>It is interesting to hit the "what makes us special" feature and see where it takes you - for example, the Yale profile takes you to the undergraduate admissions main page while the Conn College profile takes you to their "what makes us different" "Diversity" webpage.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.conncoll.edu/admission/1080.htm%5B/url%5D">http://www.conncoll.edu/admission/1080.htm</a></p>
<p>FWIW, I haven't noticed all that many colleges sporting the U-CAN logo on their website home pages.</p>
<p>Also, in the FWIW department, most colleges have opted to post SAT ranges rather than the ACT - Clark University is one of the few that I noticed chose to post ranges for the ACT. The U-CAN template only allows for one or the other.</p>
<p><a href="http://members.ucan-network.org/clarku%5B/url%5D">http://members.ucan-network.org/clarku</a></p>
<p>
[quote]
The U-CAN template only allows for one or the other.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Why throw away information? The College Board College QuickFinder usually shows both. </p>
<p>I use the CB quick finder college search tool often and, frankly, so far, for all its good points, my search habits have not changed all that much since the advent of U-CAN. So, I certainly agree that the CB's comprehensive "at a glance" format - replete with links to college websites - is a great front-line resource. It works well for me.</p>
<p>Back to U-CAN - it's not quite "throwing away information" when it is readily available elsewhere for free - and, of course,this point is important since the site proposes to be a one-stop, apples to apples, resource. Of course, colleges do want parents and students to take the time to visit and investigate their respective websites for any and all additional information they might need or want, and so it is important to remember that it is entirely up to the college to supply the information included in the U-CAN profiles. As mentioned in earlier posts, participating IHE's are told that they may supplement test score information with footnotes and many have done just that - mostly to supply information regarding SAT optional and SAT subject testing policies. In any case, from what I have seen so far (and I have not made any kind of exhaustive search of the site), not that many colleges have made use of the footnote feature to supplement information about the SAT with additional information about the ACT. </p>
<pre><code>
[quote]
* Is there an option to display ACT rather than SAT scores? You will have the option to report either your SAT or ACT scores, but not both. You also may add a brief description in this section, and some institutions have used that text for information on the test scores not displayed.
[/quote]
</code></pre>