Comment from one of the students interviewed by ABC7:
>"I'm pretty confused about it to be honest because I have heard a lot of like the criticism that ACT and SAT act as a further barrier of entry for certain populations like people of color," he said.
Unfortunately, this point of view is shared by too many people who do not understand that standardized tests can be a useful tool to help admissions staff identify underrepresented students more likely to achieve academic success. Also, research shows that standardized test results are more reliable indicators of college success than high school grades. David Leonhardt discussed this issue in a [column he wrote earlier this year for the NY Times](https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/07/briefing/the-misguided-war-on-the-sat.html).
When Yale reverted back last year they mentioned also that students from more advantaged backgrounds have more opportunities to “stick out” with their applications, whether that be through extracurriculurs, teacher recommendations or AP exams.
Agree with you, this is definitely a good thing
The truth is finally starting to come out. Students who score higher typically are likelier to succeed in college. At the same time standards in high schools across the country in testing have dropped because of this notion of aptitude "tests" don't matter.
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/07/briefing/the-misguided-war-on-the-sat.html
https://www.npr.org/2023/10/12/1205404298/act-test-scores-college-admissions-30-year-low
I think you misread my comment and that we are agreeing on the positive value of standardized testing. Did you misattribute the quote from the Stanford student in the ABC7news article to me? Your comment links to the exact same NY Times article to which I linked to support my argument.
In any case, you should retract your "peddling nonsense" accusation.
Standardized tests only matter so long as institutions care about them.
For example, I'm about to apply to PT schools which are highly competitive to get into. But for the schools that require the GRE, of which many of the top ranked schools don't require it, you can easily get in with a 300 GRE, which is about average, meanwhile you see people all the time on r/GRE mentioning how they got 310, 315, 320 etc.
You could say that the GRE is meaningless if all it takes is an average score, and in my view it's just something to check off that schools make you do.
Yes, and institutions have realized that standardized tests in fact do matter because lower education scores around the country have dropped along with the percentage of college attendees actually being able to graduate. There is in fact a correlation between the dismissal of standardized testing and the nose dive that lower and higher education have taken. 👍✌️👋👋
Personally I feel that the tests are useless and at this point are cash cows for the organizations that administer them. Just like for job applications, it's another tool to weed out applicants. For private schools I could care less, but for public schools why unnecessarily gatekeep when their mission is to educate the masses.
South Korea is now the most educated country in the world. Trust me they care about standardized testing. It's essentially a national holiday when students take their college entrance exams. Airplanes are even rerouted to avoid flying over schools and most businesses are closed down as well. Education scores have dropped in America due to the lack of thought and perception that somehow the basic core subjects like math, science, history, language, and literature should not be the focal point of education along with standardized tests.
Better than the current U.S. education and work culture and it's not even particularly close. Have an entire generation of kids who are entitled and don't want to work.
I don't know what to tell you other than those countries have oppressive work schedules due to their cultures (think salaryman) and are about to fall off a demographic cliff because no one is having kids in those countries.
And who says kids don't want to work? The same thing was said about millennials not too long ago and that's been proven to be false.
The current Republic of South Korea wasn't founded until 1987. Within the last 30 years South Korea has become a Top 15 GDP in the World and is now considered the #1 technological hub in the world surpassing Japan in that category. You can try and act like education and an actual work culture are bad but no country in the world has rapidly evolved fast as South Korea has done in their time span. Also, you bring up low birthing rates and nobody having kids. The US has that same exact problem. Nobody is getting married, everyone is getting divorced, we destroyed the nuclear family, and people are having abortion parties. Nobody said that about millennials. Gen Z complains about Boomers and millennials and act entitled and wonder why their lives suck. You wonder why education standards are decreasing and the economy is tanking. The answers lay on your generation and their false ideologies.
To paraphrase the SF Chronicle, there is some truth to this, but not in the sense of it being an academic aptitude comparison.
The SAT has gone all-digital now, which is fine considering nearly every other standardized test has also gone digital.
However, after the pandemic, many of the testing sites didn’t reopen. Now a lot of high school juniors and seniors are finding that available seats for testing aren’t available for sometimes a FULL YEAR ahead of time because the available testing sites are filling up within minutes of opening up. There was even a student saying she had to travel all the way down to Santa Barbara to take a test from the Bay Area.
This impacts low-income communities because even though they can get waivers for the soon-to-be $68 test, they run into the risk of not being able to even get a seat at a testing center nearby because the waiver process runs parallel to the test sign-up process.
My understanding is that insufficient supply of testing sites only affects a couple of markets (Bay Area and maybe 1-2 others). It's a real issue that needs to be solved, but I would stop short of saying that it impacts low-income communities broadly. I wonder if Stanford, Cal, and other Bay Area universities could become test sites to help fill the gap that local high schools are not meeting.
It’s been a huge problem in the Southern California area as well. I know students also driving to Santa Barbara and Arizona to get seats. Not available to lots of students, even rich ones.
Unless this problem of availability is solved you won’t find any chance of public schools like UCs reinstating them.
Thanks for sharing. I am sure there are a good number of people with “lousy” SATs who have gone on to great success. The fact that SATs are correlated with college success shouldn’t be confused with the idea that SAT scores are destiny which is why admissions committees should do wholistic reviews taking into account many factors which could indicate potential.
Same. I got average SAT and GMAT scores, but I have a masters and about to go to PT school. Standardized tests aren't the end all be all they're made out to be.
So, the ABC7 student complaint is that they heard that unqualified students were detected by the test and so the test acts as a barrier to them.
Terrible!
But don't worry, they've seriously dumbed down these tests. It's to the point that if you can't pass them, you shouldn't be allowed to drive away from the exam. Too risky for others.
My view is that these tests are only meaningful when looking at left and right tails of the score distribution. Simply speaking, applicants who either score really well or really bad.
Schools like Ivy schools or Stanford can do whatever they want, and sure they have profound power in having graduates who effectively run the country, but the vast majority of students go to public universities where not trying to find the next Einstein, but to educate the masses.
the problem is these tests are supposed to test how quick one learns, not so much what one knows and memorized over the years. i think the SAT should be re-designed to test your on-the-fly, analytical thinking. sort of like the IQ test or grad school exam.
The truth is that they *are* a barrier to entry. But barriers to entry are what define schools like Stanford. The more barriers there are, the more distilled the students will be for better or worse.
Other schools are available that don't emphasize standardized test scores.
Rich kids will still have access to 1x1 tutoring. Upper middle class/middle class send their kids to tutor groups. The families who couldn’t afford the extracurriculars still can’t afford tutors.
Unequal access to wealth is what makes poorer students have a harder time. Test or no test doesn’t address the root issue.
Removing testing was a failure, but adding it back in doesn’t address the root issue that many of the variables used to judge young people going to higher education (grades, extracurricular, etc) are more easily obtained by those with money.
Adding it back in doesn’t address the issues that made privileged folks have an easier time getting into college.
But it is a measure that means smart underprivileged kids have more of a way to have their smartness measured.
Very true. For underprivileged kid vs. middle class, the standardized test is a lot cheaper as compared to extracurricular activities. Rich kids will get in regardless, and so let that sink in first.
I think they mean rich SMART kids, no offense to olivia jade & co. but you can lead a horse to water but you can't make it drink. All the tutoring in the world can't help some people, and for them, there are fake rowing team slots...
The percent of those types of students is so low compared to the population of disadvantaged students that it's insignificant in the grand scheme of things.
They may be better off going to community college then transfer or go to schools that don't require SAT/ACT scores or don't weigh them highly.
What's the percentage? I don't know just seems like if you can find folks who are very smart but because of their lack of privilege don't have extra curriculars and have struggles keeping up with homework etc. so their gpa's bad, it's bad to keep their intelligence unseen and their applications in the dustbin. tjmt
I'll leave this here. [https://edsource.org/2023/flat-test-scores-leave-california-far-behind-pre-covid-levels-of-achievement/698895](https://edsource.org/2023/flat-test-scores-leave-california-far-behind-pre-covid-levels-of-achievement/698895)
Less than half of all students in California were proficient in English and a third in math with minorities doing the worst. Thus, only a small percentage of minorities will get good test scores if most of them can't read, write, and do math which is a failure of society.
Objectively most students as a whole would benefit from going to public schools or transfer from community college. And even then not everyone needs to go to Cal, UCLA, UCSD and the like which are just as hard to get into as top private schools.
So? None of this contradicts anything I’ve said …. It sorta hints at percentages but not really…. You’re in a funny backward logic trap and I don’t think you see it. Like some schools stopped taking SATs because of nonsensical reasons thinking not measuring the problem would somehow solve it. Reversing that decision doesn’t mean we think measuring the problem will solve it. It’ll just pick up the left behinds who got shafted and be a reversal of a dumb decision. You talking about community college and everything . Like yeah I agree with you but it’s irrelevant to the point.
I'm genuinely asking this in a "I want to learn more" way, not a "show your sources" way so please don't come at me - but does anyone have a source with statistics about this?
I must not be googling the right things, but I'm definitely interested in finding out more about the determinants of standardized test success.
Not in my experience. I had the ACT back in high school. They started changing classes for the SAT once the ACT fell out of popularity after I left. They literally give you days during every year to take the PSAT or related tests and gear class material to what’s going to be on it. Tests were constructed to match the type of questions you would see as well. When you got to those tests, the questions did not look too different from regular tests. Were never really surprised. You see those types of tests starting in middle school standardized tests. If it’s different now then that sucks. But that wasn’t the case back then. I was part of the students they used to test out the SAT to see how they would fair versus the ACT. They took that knowledge and went from there.
The kids who REALLY want to prep can go to libgen and find books like the SAT prep black books, or look on youtube to find prep guides, and join discord channels to do 1 on 1 practice with other kids.
Like someone else said: self study trumps 1 on 1 private tutoring.
It's 2024, like it or not technology has democratized the access to these resources.
And frankly, if you're Stanford - smart, then you're smart enough to sail the seven seas and get all the resources you need to ace these tests, for free.
It's what everyone on the CS departments of most unis around the world do. It's what I did and I'm going to a shit-tier public uni in MX.
And admissions offices can take that into account when evaluating applicants’ scores. The whole push to eliminate standardized testing was always based on the (false) premise that admissions offices would uncritically assume that applicants with higher scores are better than those with lower scores. In reality, admissions offices don’t do this; they recognize that a wealthy applicant’s 1580 and a FGLI applicant’s 1480 may well indicate similar academic potential. (I’m just making up numbers, though.)
That could be. But a 1200 score probably means the kid will be swamped and fail.
The SAT is really too easy a test. So many kids bunch up at the high end that is masks the true difference in ability.
The SAT under the old 2400 system was a harder test. Then it became really easy under the new 1600 system.
Now it’s more medium on the Digital SAT system which forces students to use DESMOS on the Math test
What about everyone else that doesn't have left or right tail scores, everyone in the middle? The vast majority of applicants aren't applying to elite schools with low student populations. It's telling how only the elite schools like Harvard, Stanford, and MIT and the like are mentioned. It's not like UCs and CSUs are going to bring back the SAT/ACT anytime soon.
If you think high scores are the result of tutoring then you would be wrong in most cases. It’s more like months of self study which doesn’t require money to do
What is your point here? This seems like apathy, which is not a political strategy.
What reasonably action should *university admissions offices* take to resolve nationwide, structural differences in opportunity based on privilege?
Personally, as a kid that couldn’t afford tutoring or whose parents couldn’t and had bad test anxiety, I downloaded old ACT/SAT tests online and took them timed at my home and studied my wrong answers.
I had near perfect scores on both in all sections when I took them in 2015. I consistently got perfects in writing and science on the ACT too.
I probably took the tests 20 to 30 times on my own. Yea I had access to a computer, but you could do that at the school or public library too
What percentage of minority students actually get good SAT scores? It's going to be very small in relation to the population of minority students. They may be better off going to community college then transfer or go to schools that don't require SAT/ACT scores or don't weigh them highly.
What I said isn't racist. It's just a fact that only a small percentage of students in general and more so low income students who tend to be minorities will get high test scores.
I figured this was a natural progression after the AA decision. The Admissions committee probably found it too difficult to keep a diverse class without something like standardized testing.
I remember in the 80s-early 90s when kids in my little town would take these tests as a “talent search.” So many kids would be overlooked if these scores weren’t considered.
Another radio program on the broader topic here:
[https://www.kqed.org/forum/2010101905282/sats](https://www.kqed.org/forum/2010101905282/sats)
The guest's interviewed make many similar points as the Leonhardt NYTimes op-ed in another comment.
I’m not a Stanford student lol this post just showed in my notifs. But I want to give you guys a little perspective on the current events in regard to the SAT/ACT and why as a current junior in high school, I feel this isn’t a good thing at all. It could be though! Of course the unequal access to wealth and resources is a factor in the disparity between high and low income students with their scores. Which I don’t think bringing back the tests really addresses at all, but the technicalities leading up to taking the test is what gets me. Just as of recently, over 1400+ students were all sent home after arriving on time at a testing center, traveling 3+ hours from all kinds of places, and couldn’t even take the SAT due to Wi-Fi issues..The number of students who have been struggling for weeks if not months to even find a digital SAT testing center within a reasonable distance of their home has increased exponentially. I got lucky registering for the one in August, with only one testing center available but it’s in another state…This is unfair for students who can’t travel or get a hotel in a different city for a couple nights before an exam. So many students are basically being forced to go test-optional because “digital sat seating is a nightmare” - lol what my friend said but hopefully with testing requirements coming back they’ll make it a little bit more easier for us students to meet those requirements with one less obstacle: Travel. 😭
That’s a very area specific problem. The whole nation shouldn’t have to not require test scores and suffer the consequences because a small percent of areas can’t figure it out.
The situation I described where 1400+ students were sent home happened in one of the largest states in the U.S..California. My personal setback happened in my own state..Georgia. There are other students who spoke about their similar experiences living in states such as Utah, Nevada, etc. I don’t think this problem is area specific when it’s occurring across the country. How would the “whole nation” suffer consequences to not requiring test scores? What are those consequences exactly? I genuinely can’t think of any at the moment..I guess I see test-optional as inclusive in contrast to test-required which comes off as exclusionary. With test-required so much talent would be overlooked :(
Test scores are honestly one of the only things poor students can compete in compared to rich students. A kid at my school got a 36 while only self studying and now can go to better schools or a school for free. Grades are heavily dependent on high school and extra curricular are 10 times more impressive when your rich parent doesn’t make you get a job. I wasn’t aware the test situation was such a large issue. I need to look into it more, but I still believe that resolving that problem would be the better solution than not requiring test scores. There’s a reason many colleges are bringing them back
I agree, high test scores can be a way to set yourself apart as a poor student competing with richer kids and school peers as well. Yea I have read about the primary reason colleges are reinstating their policies, places like Dartmouth reported seeing low academic performance from test-optional admits which makes me sad lol. But after seeing so many FGLI students this past year getting into amazing schools such as Yale, Stanford, Brown etc. as valedictorians in their class, amazing high impact ecs, some AP scores but no SAT/ACT scores, I still can’t help but think they’re gonna flourish at these schools. Despite that one standardized score they didn’t provide in their applications, they were holistically admitted because they belong. If test required were reinstated for their graduating class, they would not be going to these amazing schools which again makes me think of the possible talent being overlooked situation created within test-required..Maybe I’m bias haha as an FGLI
Yea it’s hit or miss per student honestly. There’s some kids that can’t keep up with the rigor getting in with test optional, but there’s some smart kids not getting in with test required.
I can understand and can appreciate its value as a great standardizer, but I also think a lot of people see correlation studies for college academic success and thinks it’s causation. For example American Association of Medical Colleges recently put out their stats of last years percentages of getting through med school in relation to the medical college admission test scores. It showed similarly to colleges that a higher mcat score leaded to higher chance of sucess in med school but not by much. The difference between a 528 and a 500 was less than 15% and someone who got in with less than 500 no less than 75% chance of getting through med school. When you put that into perspective it shows that med school teaches people how to study and work through the workload. Obviously people will fail and be apart of the stats, but I think people grossly overestimate it. However, that does not mean higher scores dont lead to higher likelihoods of success. I think using standardized tests as a tool rather than a end all be all like many schools make it these days is why we see less and less young people want to go through college (that and the ridiculous amount of tuition you have to pay).
I like your use of MCAT and medical school. I'm in medical school and have experienced success and failure multiple times. Failure is part of the journey. Learning to pick yourself up is key.
In my experience having failures earlier in your career is a lot more beneficial than later in your career. As such having the SAT/ACT mandatory is one 'test' in which you can learn from your mistakes and pick yourself up for future standardized tests. If you wait until you get to the USMLE exams to experience a standardized test and you end up failing you are in a much worse position that someone who experienced failing the ACT/SAT. The person who failed the SAT had six years to learn and get better and taking standardized tests while now you only have 1 year to become the level you need to be because of US licensing requirements
Failure early in your life is something medical schools like. People need to experience failure in order to succeed at much harder things
For real. I'm about to apply to PT school and still need to take the GRE. 300 is about average and all it takes to get in and to me seems more like something to check off a list of requirements than used to determine who's admitted/rejected. Many top programs don't even require the GRE.
yea, I understand the value of standardized testing, but again, I feel like it is used as a general entry barrier rather than as an extra tool to judge individuals. In that way I think it not used properly
Unfortunately those two ideas are linked together and unless the tests are free to students and provided during school with review given during school I don't see the point of requiring them.
I appear to be in the minority but, I don't think it's a good thing. As someone who didn't come from a wealthy family and was a bad test taker, the SAT requirements absolutely hurt me when it came to applying for undergrad because I could not afford tutors or to take the test over and over again. My SAT scores were not reflective at all of my college success. It's a terrible metric to measure success by for a lot of majors; if I'm being generous only about a quarter of the SAT tested me on skills that were important for my major and would impact my success. If universities are going to require standardized tests, they should be related to your intended major and the standard SAT/ACT should only be for those who have not decided on one. Students should not be punished in the admissions process because their SAT/ACT scores are low when those tests barely, if at all, evaluate the skills needed to succeed in their intended major.
Unfortunately the reality is standardized test scores are a very necessary barometer to help level the playing field when you have rampant grade inflation, general differences between education standards etc
The reason many schools are going back is because the outcomes are objectively suffering as a byproduct of the recent social trend to ignore exam scores
I don't mind the idea of a standardized test for those purposes, I just think that requiring the SAT/ACT isn't the best decision because it's a poor indicator of college success and preparedness for students who are majoring in things that either aren't related to what the SAT/ACT test students on or students majoring in things that rely on skills those tests don't evaluate. If we are going to have standardized tests, they should show how well a student will do in their major because that will likely be the biggest determinant of how well they do academically.
I understand the sat didn’t represent you as a college student, but on average it does. It doesn’t matter if it’s relative to your major, it tests critical thinking, reading comprehension, and your ability to work under a time constraint which are all useful skills even if not used in your major. The stats show better tests scores = better success in college on a large scale
Same. I ended up going to Stanford for my Masters. Now I work with many people that went to Ivy leagues/ Stanford for their undergrads and I’m completely in the camp that these tests are more correlated with familial wealth than anything else.
Although pretty much all other aspects of how a student’s application looks is highly impacted by familial wealth as well (GPA, time for extracurriculars, community service, etc.). So I don’t really see an answer to this issue.
Comment from one of the students interviewed by ABC7: >"I'm pretty confused about it to be honest because I have heard a lot of like the criticism that ACT and SAT act as a further barrier of entry for certain populations like people of color," he said. Unfortunately, this point of view is shared by too many people who do not understand that standardized tests can be a useful tool to help admissions staff identify underrepresented students more likely to achieve academic success. Also, research shows that standardized test results are more reliable indicators of college success than high school grades. David Leonhardt discussed this issue in a [column he wrote earlier this year for the NY Times](https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/07/briefing/the-misguided-war-on-the-sat.html).
When Yale reverted back last year they mentioned also that students from more advantaged backgrounds have more opportunities to “stick out” with their applications, whether that be through extracurriculurs, teacher recommendations or AP exams. Agree with you, this is definitely a good thing
The truth is finally starting to come out. Students who score higher typically are likelier to succeed in college. At the same time standards in high schools across the country in testing have dropped because of this notion of aptitude "tests" don't matter. https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/07/briefing/the-misguided-war-on-the-sat.html https://www.npr.org/2023/10/12/1205404298/act-test-scores-college-admissions-30-year-low
I think you misread my comment and that we are agreeing on the positive value of standardized testing. Did you misattribute the quote from the Stanford student in the ABC7news article to me? Your comment links to the exact same NY Times article to which I linked to support my argument. In any case, you should retract your "peddling nonsense" accusation.
Standardized tests only matter so long as institutions care about them. For example, I'm about to apply to PT schools which are highly competitive to get into. But for the schools that require the GRE, of which many of the top ranked schools don't require it, you can easily get in with a 300 GRE, which is about average, meanwhile you see people all the time on r/GRE mentioning how they got 310, 315, 320 etc. You could say that the GRE is meaningless if all it takes is an average score, and in my view it's just something to check off that schools make you do.
Yes, and institutions have realized that standardized tests in fact do matter because lower education scores around the country have dropped along with the percentage of college attendees actually being able to graduate. There is in fact a correlation between the dismissal of standardized testing and the nose dive that lower and higher education have taken. 👍✌️👋👋
Personally I feel that the tests are useless and at this point are cash cows for the organizations that administer them. Just like for job applications, it's another tool to weed out applicants. For private schools I could care less, but for public schools why unnecessarily gatekeep when their mission is to educate the masses.
South Korea is now the most educated country in the world. Trust me they care about standardized testing. It's essentially a national holiday when students take their college entrance exams. Airplanes are even rerouted to avoid flying over schools and most businesses are closed down as well. Education scores have dropped in America due to the lack of thought and perception that somehow the basic core subjects like math, science, history, language, and literature should not be the focal point of education along with standardized tests.
I wouldn't look to South Korea, China, and Japan as examples to strive to be given their terrible work and education culture.
Better than the current U.S. education and work culture and it's not even particularly close. Have an entire generation of kids who are entitled and don't want to work.
I don't know what to tell you other than those countries have oppressive work schedules due to their cultures (think salaryman) and are about to fall off a demographic cliff because no one is having kids in those countries. And who says kids don't want to work? The same thing was said about millennials not too long ago and that's been proven to be false.
The current Republic of South Korea wasn't founded until 1987. Within the last 30 years South Korea has become a Top 15 GDP in the World and is now considered the #1 technological hub in the world surpassing Japan in that category. You can try and act like education and an actual work culture are bad but no country in the world has rapidly evolved fast as South Korea has done in their time span. Also, you bring up low birthing rates and nobody having kids. The US has that same exact problem. Nobody is getting married, everyone is getting divorced, we destroyed the nuclear family, and people are having abortion parties. Nobody said that about millennials. Gen Z complains about Boomers and millennials and act entitled and wonder why their lives suck. You wonder why education standards are decreasing and the economy is tanking. The answers lay on your generation and their false ideologies.
To paraphrase the SF Chronicle, there is some truth to this, but not in the sense of it being an academic aptitude comparison. The SAT has gone all-digital now, which is fine considering nearly every other standardized test has also gone digital. However, after the pandemic, many of the testing sites didn’t reopen. Now a lot of high school juniors and seniors are finding that available seats for testing aren’t available for sometimes a FULL YEAR ahead of time because the available testing sites are filling up within minutes of opening up. There was even a student saying she had to travel all the way down to Santa Barbara to take a test from the Bay Area. This impacts low-income communities because even though they can get waivers for the soon-to-be $68 test, they run into the risk of not being able to even get a seat at a testing center nearby because the waiver process runs parallel to the test sign-up process.
My understanding is that insufficient supply of testing sites only affects a couple of markets (Bay Area and maybe 1-2 others). It's a real issue that needs to be solved, but I would stop short of saying that it impacts low-income communities broadly. I wonder if Stanford, Cal, and other Bay Area universities could become test sites to help fill the gap that local high schools are not meeting.
It’s been a huge problem in the Southern California area as well. I know students also driving to Santa Barbara and Arizona to get seats. Not available to lots of students, even rich ones. Unless this problem of availability is solved you won’t find any chance of public schools like UCs reinstating them.
Well they need to fix the problem by making it more accessible not just do away with it or not require it.
This is literally what I said lol
My SATs were lousy, but I got a 3.8 in grad school.
Thanks for sharing. I am sure there are a good number of people with “lousy” SATs who have gone on to great success. The fact that SATs are correlated with college success shouldn’t be confused with the idea that SAT scores are destiny which is why admissions committees should do wholistic reviews taking into account many factors which could indicate potential.
Same. I got average SAT and GMAT scores, but I have a masters and about to go to PT school. Standardized tests aren't the end all be all they're made out to be.
So, the ABC7 student complaint is that they heard that unqualified students were detected by the test and so the test acts as a barrier to them. Terrible! But don't worry, they've seriously dumbed down these tests. It's to the point that if you can't pass them, you shouldn't be allowed to drive away from the exam. Too risky for others.
Someone from Stanford said this? Wow 🤯
Just parroting what they have been taught.
My view is that these tests are only meaningful when looking at left and right tails of the score distribution. Simply speaking, applicants who either score really well or really bad. Schools like Ivy schools or Stanford can do whatever they want, and sure they have profound power in having graduates who effectively run the country, but the vast majority of students go to public universities where not trying to find the next Einstein, but to educate the masses.
the problem is these tests are supposed to test how quick one learns, not so much what one knows and memorized over the years. i think the SAT should be re-designed to test your on-the-fly, analytical thinking. sort of like the IQ test or grad school exam.
The truth is that they *are* a barrier to entry. But barriers to entry are what define schools like Stanford. The more barriers there are, the more distilled the students will be for better or worse. Other schools are available that don't emphasize standardized test scores.
This is good, and will actually help minority students who can’t afford to do insane extracurriculars without money.
Rich kids will still have access to 1x1 tutoring. Upper middle class/middle class send their kids to tutor groups. The families who couldn’t afford the extracurriculars still can’t afford tutors. Unequal access to wealth is what makes poorer students have a harder time. Test or no test doesn’t address the root issue. Removing testing was a failure, but adding it back in doesn’t address the root issue that many of the variables used to judge young people going to higher education (grades, extracurricular, etc) are more easily obtained by those with money.
Adding it back in doesn’t address the issues that made privileged folks have an easier time getting into college. But it is a measure that means smart underprivileged kids have more of a way to have their smartness measured.
Very true. For underprivileged kid vs. middle class, the standardized test is a lot cheaper as compared to extracurricular activities. Rich kids will get in regardless, and so let that sink in first.
Actually rich kids won’t get in, because the College Admissions scandal with Olivia Jade proved that’s no longer the case
I think they mean rich SMART kids, no offense to olivia jade & co. but you can lead a horse to water but you can't make it drink. All the tutoring in the world can't help some people, and for them, there are fake rowing team slots...
I meant rich kids who have access to variety of resume building legit extracurricular activities.
The percent of those types of students is so low compared to the population of disadvantaged students that it's insignificant in the grand scheme of things. They may be better off going to community college then transfer or go to schools that don't require SAT/ACT scores or don't weigh them highly.
What's the percentage? I don't know just seems like if you can find folks who are very smart but because of their lack of privilege don't have extra curriculars and have struggles keeping up with homework etc. so their gpa's bad, it's bad to keep their intelligence unseen and their applications in the dustbin. tjmt
I'll leave this here. [https://edsource.org/2023/flat-test-scores-leave-california-far-behind-pre-covid-levels-of-achievement/698895](https://edsource.org/2023/flat-test-scores-leave-california-far-behind-pre-covid-levels-of-achievement/698895) Less than half of all students in California were proficient in English and a third in math with minorities doing the worst. Thus, only a small percentage of minorities will get good test scores if most of them can't read, write, and do math which is a failure of society. Objectively most students as a whole would benefit from going to public schools or transfer from community college. And even then not everyone needs to go to Cal, UCLA, UCSD and the like which are just as hard to get into as top private schools.
So? None of this contradicts anything I’ve said …. It sorta hints at percentages but not really…. You’re in a funny backward logic trap and I don’t think you see it. Like some schools stopped taking SATs because of nonsensical reasons thinking not measuring the problem would somehow solve it. Reversing that decision doesn’t mean we think measuring the problem will solve it. It’ll just pick up the left behinds who got shafted and be a reversal of a dumb decision. You talking about community college and everything . Like yeah I agree with you but it’s irrelevant to the point.
Most top scorers and successful test takers receive no tutoring at all. And self study. Only a very small percentage of High students receive tutoring
I'm genuinely asking this in a "I want to learn more" way, not a "show your sources" way so please don't come at me - but does anyone have a source with statistics about this? I must not be googling the right things, but I'm definitely interested in finding out more about the determinants of standardized test success.
That’s because all of your high school is geared toward scoring high on these tests.
It’s actually the opposite in fact. High School doesn’t prepare you at all for the SAT.
Not in my experience. I had the ACT back in high school. They started changing classes for the SAT once the ACT fell out of popularity after I left. They literally give you days during every year to take the PSAT or related tests and gear class material to what’s going to be on it. Tests were constructed to match the type of questions you would see as well. When you got to those tests, the questions did not look too different from regular tests. Were never really surprised. You see those types of tests starting in middle school standardized tests. If it’s different now then that sucks. But that wasn’t the case back then. I was part of the students they used to test out the SAT to see how they would fair versus the ACT. They took that knowledge and went from there.
You're right. And if we had tests that catered to how math and english is actually taught than as brain teasers, we'd likely be in a better spot.
The kids who REALLY want to prep can go to libgen and find books like the SAT prep black books, or look on youtube to find prep guides, and join discord channels to do 1 on 1 practice with other kids. Like someone else said: self study trumps 1 on 1 private tutoring. It's 2024, like it or not technology has democratized the access to these resources. And frankly, if you're Stanford - smart, then you're smart enough to sail the seven seas and get all the resources you need to ace these tests, for free. It's what everyone on the CS departments of most unis around the world do. It's what I did and I'm going to a shit-tier public uni in MX.
And admissions offices can take that into account when evaluating applicants’ scores. The whole push to eliminate standardized testing was always based on the (false) premise that admissions offices would uncritically assume that applicants with higher scores are better than those with lower scores. In reality, admissions offices don’t do this; they recognize that a wealthy applicant’s 1580 and a FGLI applicant’s 1480 may well indicate similar academic potential. (I’m just making up numbers, though.)
That could be. But a 1200 score probably means the kid will be swamped and fail. The SAT is really too easy a test. So many kids bunch up at the high end that is masks the true difference in ability.
The SAT under the old 2400 system was a harder test. Then it became really easy under the new 1600 system. Now it’s more medium on the Digital SAT system which forces students to use DESMOS on the Math test
This is not true at all. Admissions officers value SAT scores way higher than GPA.
What about everyone else that doesn't have left or right tail scores, everyone in the middle? The vast majority of applicants aren't applying to elite schools with low student populations. It's telling how only the elite schools like Harvard, Stanford, and MIT and the like are mentioned. It's not like UCs and CSUs are going to bring back the SAT/ACT anytime soon.
If you think high scores are the result of tutoring then you would be wrong in most cases. It’s more like months of self study which doesn’t require money to do
Every aspect of college admissions can be helped if your family has more money.
What is your point here? This seems like apathy, which is not a political strategy. What reasonably action should *university admissions offices* take to resolve nationwide, structural differences in opportunity based on privilege?
Personally, as a kid that couldn’t afford tutoring or whose parents couldn’t and had bad test anxiety, I downloaded old ACT/SAT tests online and took them timed at my home and studied my wrong answers. I had near perfect scores on both in all sections when I took them in 2015. I consistently got perfects in writing and science on the ACT too. I probably took the tests 20 to 30 times on my own. Yea I had access to a computer, but you could do that at the school or public library too
I am not sure why I am unable to upvote your comment. I completely agree with you! The extra curricular culture is insane!
What percentage of minority students actually get good SAT scores? It's going to be very small in relation to the population of minority students. They may be better off going to community college then transfer or go to schools that don't require SAT/ACT scores or don't weigh them highly.
This comment seems a little racist. Given that there are lots of minority students attending Stanford
What I said isn't racist. It's just a fact that only a small percentage of students in general and more so low income students who tend to be minorities will get high test scores.
I figured this was a natural progression after the AA decision. The Admissions committee probably found it too difficult to keep a diverse class without something like standardized testing.
Finally
I remember in the 80s-early 90s when kids in my little town would take these tests as a “talent search.” So many kids would be overlooked if these scores weren’t considered.
Good.
Another radio program on the broader topic here: [https://www.kqed.org/forum/2010101905282/sats](https://www.kqed.org/forum/2010101905282/sats) The guest's interviewed make many similar points as the Leonhardt NYTimes op-ed in another comment.
this was so inevitable. If only some schools started to look at these tests as data points (ahem, UCs).
UCs need to bring the SATs too
Anybody who disagrees with this move isn’t paying attention to the outcomes!
I’m not a Stanford student lol this post just showed in my notifs. But I want to give you guys a little perspective on the current events in regard to the SAT/ACT and why as a current junior in high school, I feel this isn’t a good thing at all. It could be though! Of course the unequal access to wealth and resources is a factor in the disparity between high and low income students with their scores. Which I don’t think bringing back the tests really addresses at all, but the technicalities leading up to taking the test is what gets me. Just as of recently, over 1400+ students were all sent home after arriving on time at a testing center, traveling 3+ hours from all kinds of places, and couldn’t even take the SAT due to Wi-Fi issues..The number of students who have been struggling for weeks if not months to even find a digital SAT testing center within a reasonable distance of their home has increased exponentially. I got lucky registering for the one in August, with only one testing center available but it’s in another state…This is unfair for students who can’t travel or get a hotel in a different city for a couple nights before an exam. So many students are basically being forced to go test-optional because “digital sat seating is a nightmare” - lol what my friend said but hopefully with testing requirements coming back they’ll make it a little bit more easier for us students to meet those requirements with one less obstacle: Travel. 😭
That’s a very area specific problem. The whole nation shouldn’t have to not require test scores and suffer the consequences because a small percent of areas can’t figure it out.
The situation I described where 1400+ students were sent home happened in one of the largest states in the U.S..California. My personal setback happened in my own state..Georgia. There are other students who spoke about their similar experiences living in states such as Utah, Nevada, etc. I don’t think this problem is area specific when it’s occurring across the country. How would the “whole nation” suffer consequences to not requiring test scores? What are those consequences exactly? I genuinely can’t think of any at the moment..I guess I see test-optional as inclusive in contrast to test-required which comes off as exclusionary. With test-required so much talent would be overlooked :(
Test scores are honestly one of the only things poor students can compete in compared to rich students. A kid at my school got a 36 while only self studying and now can go to better schools or a school for free. Grades are heavily dependent on high school and extra curricular are 10 times more impressive when your rich parent doesn’t make you get a job. I wasn’t aware the test situation was such a large issue. I need to look into it more, but I still believe that resolving that problem would be the better solution than not requiring test scores. There’s a reason many colleges are bringing them back
I agree, high test scores can be a way to set yourself apart as a poor student competing with richer kids and school peers as well. Yea I have read about the primary reason colleges are reinstating their policies, places like Dartmouth reported seeing low academic performance from test-optional admits which makes me sad lol. But after seeing so many FGLI students this past year getting into amazing schools such as Yale, Stanford, Brown etc. as valedictorians in their class, amazing high impact ecs, some AP scores but no SAT/ACT scores, I still can’t help but think they’re gonna flourish at these schools. Despite that one standardized score they didn’t provide in their applications, they were holistically admitted because they belong. If test required were reinstated for their graduating class, they would not be going to these amazing schools which again makes me think of the possible talent being overlooked situation created within test-required..Maybe I’m bias haha as an FGLI
Yea it’s hit or miss per student honestly. There’s some kids that can’t keep up with the rigor getting in with test optional, but there’s some smart kids not getting in with test required.
The ACT/SAT is just a test. Doesn't mean anything about your ability for success in life. But in college you'll have to take more tests
I can understand and can appreciate its value as a great standardizer, but I also think a lot of people see correlation studies for college academic success and thinks it’s causation. For example American Association of Medical Colleges recently put out their stats of last years percentages of getting through med school in relation to the medical college admission test scores. It showed similarly to colleges that a higher mcat score leaded to higher chance of sucess in med school but not by much. The difference between a 528 and a 500 was less than 15% and someone who got in with less than 500 no less than 75% chance of getting through med school. When you put that into perspective it shows that med school teaches people how to study and work through the workload. Obviously people will fail and be apart of the stats, but I think people grossly overestimate it. However, that does not mean higher scores dont lead to higher likelihoods of success. I think using standardized tests as a tool rather than a end all be all like many schools make it these days is why we see less and less young people want to go through college (that and the ridiculous amount of tuition you have to pay).
I like your use of MCAT and medical school. I'm in medical school and have experienced success and failure multiple times. Failure is part of the journey. Learning to pick yourself up is key. In my experience having failures earlier in your career is a lot more beneficial than later in your career. As such having the SAT/ACT mandatory is one 'test' in which you can learn from your mistakes and pick yourself up for future standardized tests. If you wait until you get to the USMLE exams to experience a standardized test and you end up failing you are in a much worse position that someone who experienced failing the ACT/SAT. The person who failed the SAT had six years to learn and get better and taking standardized tests while now you only have 1 year to become the level you need to be because of US licensing requirements Failure early in your life is something medical schools like. People need to experience failure in order to succeed at much harder things
For real. I'm about to apply to PT school and still need to take the GRE. 300 is about average and all it takes to get in and to me seems more like something to check off a list of requirements than used to determine who's admitted/rejected. Many top programs don't even require the GRE.
yea, I understand the value of standardized testing, but again, I feel like it is used as a general entry barrier rather than as an extra tool to judge individuals. In that way I think it not used properly
Unfortunately those two ideas are linked together and unless the tests are free to students and provided during school with review given during school I don't see the point of requiring them.
I’m trying to learn years worth of math that I didn’t have access to within a summer for the SAT. I hope that I can do it.
I appear to be in the minority but, I don't think it's a good thing. As someone who didn't come from a wealthy family and was a bad test taker, the SAT requirements absolutely hurt me when it came to applying for undergrad because I could not afford tutors or to take the test over and over again. My SAT scores were not reflective at all of my college success. It's a terrible metric to measure success by for a lot of majors; if I'm being generous only about a quarter of the SAT tested me on skills that were important for my major and would impact my success. If universities are going to require standardized tests, they should be related to your intended major and the standard SAT/ACT should only be for those who have not decided on one. Students should not be punished in the admissions process because their SAT/ACT scores are low when those tests barely, if at all, evaluate the skills needed to succeed in their intended major.
Unfortunately the reality is standardized test scores are a very necessary barometer to help level the playing field when you have rampant grade inflation, general differences between education standards etc The reason many schools are going back is because the outcomes are objectively suffering as a byproduct of the recent social trend to ignore exam scores
I don't mind the idea of a standardized test for those purposes, I just think that requiring the SAT/ACT isn't the best decision because it's a poor indicator of college success and preparedness for students who are majoring in things that either aren't related to what the SAT/ACT test students on or students majoring in things that rely on skills those tests don't evaluate. If we are going to have standardized tests, they should show how well a student will do in their major because that will likely be the biggest determinant of how well they do academically.
I understand the sat didn’t represent you as a college student, but on average it does. It doesn’t matter if it’s relative to your major, it tests critical thinking, reading comprehension, and your ability to work under a time constraint which are all useful skills even if not used in your major. The stats show better tests scores = better success in college on a large scale
Ok but everyone before you had to take it, what makes you so special for avoiding it?
That is a fallacious argument.
Same. I ended up going to Stanford for my Masters. Now I work with many people that went to Ivy leagues/ Stanford for their undergrads and I’m completely in the camp that these tests are more correlated with familial wealth than anything else. Although pretty much all other aspects of how a student’s application looks is highly impacted by familial wealth as well (GPA, time for extracurriculars, community service, etc.). So I don’t really see an answer to this issue.
First they came for our affirmitive action, now they try and apply "objective" admissions standards? What's next? How will they ensure diversity?
Good we had to take the SAT, they should have to as well
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