It's easy to underestimate how complex the University of California admissions process can be for students. While the UC system has a reputation for excellence even among the best public colleges, it's shocking to look over the actual requirements that students must meet to apply. Many parents and students I work with assume that the UC application is much like the application to Arizona State or University of New Mexico and are shocked to find out how detailed their child's submission needs to be to even be considered!
This last month, however, the UC Board of Regents took a massive step toward simplifying their application process by eliminating the requirement that students take the SAT Subject Exams. According to the San Francisco Chronicle:
"UC was the only public education system in the country that made students take two SAT subject tests. The result: 22,000 high school graduates in California were disqualified in 2007 from applying to the university who otherwise would have been eligible." - SFGate.com
The change in UC admissions policy will be effective for the graduating class of 2012, but already speaks volumes about the role that testing is going to play in the UC system far beyond the next few years.
First and foremost, it's clear that the UC's interest in testing has declined dramatically. While rumors swirled that the changes to the SAT made in 2005 were largely the result of the University of California's influence and sway, it appears that the Board of Regents has focused their attention on GPA and college prep courses rather than expanded testing requirements. If they've already forced the SAT to redesign the test to suit their needs, they don't seem to think more forced dealings with College Board were a worthwhile use of their time when it came to the Subject Tests.
Secondly, it's widely believed that the Subject Tests are actually better indicators of college success than the original ACT or SAT themselves. The fact that the UC system opted to drop these test doesn't bode well for the future of the ACT and SAT. I wouldn't be surprised to see the primary tests continue to decrease in importance over the next few years. The dropping of the Subject Tests means that the UC system might even go test-optional at some point!
All in all, I think it's a massive victory for proponents of a smart, balanced application process. Some observers like Thomas D. Elias are even arguing that the changes reflect "an affirmation of higher standards combined with greater opportunity for students who have dealt with hardships and received poor counseling in high school."
It's hard to see anything but good in that!
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Got something to say about the SAT Subject Tests? Miss them already? Let us know in the comments!
As you may recall, College Board announced over the summer that they would allow students to pick which SAT scores would be sent to colleges instead of forcing students to send a cumulative record their scores. I pointed out at the time that this policy change was a pretty cynical move on College Board's part, since they killed a program in 2002 that did the exact same thing because it "hurt more students than it helped."
At the start of 2009, several colleges weighed in on the issue as well, choosing to either accept or reject the College Board's plan. Some influential schools like Harvard accepted the new reporting standards, but others chose to reject it and have demanded that students send all of their scores. Stanford was especially public and vocal about rebuffing the Score Choice program. The Stanford Director of Admissions, Shawn Abbott noted:
"We want to discourage students from taking the SAT more than once or
twice, and believe that programs like Score Choice encourage applicants
with resources to take the SAT excessively to improve their scores. [...] I wouldn’t agree with the notion that Score Choice relieves pressure or
stress,” he said. “I would argue instead that such programs only
encourage students to take more tests to improve their scores at all
costs." - The Stanford DailyTo some degree, this development totally caught me by surprise.
The SAT Score Choice program is supposed to let students choose the score they want to send to the schools. If the program isn't universal, then they aren't really choosing anything! Instead, some schools are promising to ignore the scores they would probably chose to ignore anyway.
Look at Harvard's statement concerning Score Choice:
"Students applying to Harvard are free to use the College Board's new
Score Choice option and/or a similar option already offered by ACT.
Score Choice rests on the same principle that has supported our
admissions process for decades — that applicants should be free to
present their own best case. We have always counted an applicant's
highest test scores and have allowed students to decide whether they
wanted to send all their test scores." - Harvard's WebsiteIn short, they are accepting Score Choice because they already counted your highest scores and ONLY your highest scores. Stanford is rejecting Score Choice for the same reason that Harvard is accepting it. They already counted ALL your scores and want to continue counting all your scores.
How should you respond to all this? Take the ACT.
The ACT allows you to send your single highest score to any school in the country. It's a significantly shorter test than the SAT, clocking in at nearly an hour less with the optional essay. Students enjoy that the ACT is direct and to the point, lacking many of the "tricky" question types that make College Board and the SAT famous. And more importantly than anything else, the makers of the ACT aren't involved in the backroom shenanigans that surround all of this Score Choice nonsense.
So unless you fall into the small category of students who naturally test better on the SAT, now is the best time to avoid College Board (and the SAT) altogether.
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Still planning on taking the SAT? Tell us why in the comments...
Let's say you are throwing a party for your closest friends. You arrange for everything at your house, buy chips and drinks, and plan fun games, hoping to impress everyone who shows up. Soon after the party gets started, a friend of a friend corners you and promises that he can make your party "even better!" He tells you about new fun games that will make entertaining easy, chips and drinks that will dazzle the tastebuds of every guest, and new ways to arrange furniture that will "totally get you noticed."
You agree to try his stuff out. What do you have to lose? It's not like he can make the party worse...
So he moves in all kinds of new toys and proceeds to take over pretty much everything. Your food gets pushed to the back to make room for his dishes. Your games get put aside to focus on his activities. After a few hours of this you look around and realize that all the stuff your new friend supplied isn't supplementing your party, it's swallowing it whole. And worse, everyone seems to be having a terrible time!
And then you realize that while you wanted your party to be awesome, you never needed this guy. Sure, he's got charts and graphs showing that some people sort of like his fancy chips and neat toys, but you can easily look around and notice that you aren't throwing a better party than the ones you've thrown in the past. This guy just scammed you by promising to help when he had no intention of helping at all...
This week, the National Association of College Admissions Counselors came to the same stunning realization about standardized testing. They note:
Although many colleges find benefit in using admission tests in admission decisions, it is the view of the Commission that there may be more colleges and universities that could make appropriate admission decisions without requiring standardized admission tests such as the ACT and SAT. The Commission encourages institutions to consider dropping the admission test requirements if it is determined that the predictive utility of the test or the admission policies of the institution (such as open access) support that decision and if the institution believes that standardized test results would not be necessary for other reasons such as course placement, advising, or research.
Let's sum that up: The NACAC, a widely respected group of college admissions officers, is advising all colleges to drop the SAT and ACT unless they have a specific reason to continue to require them.
I can't tell you how big this announcement is for the world of college admissions. For the last few years, I've continually stated that I believe colleges will be able to move past the ACT and SAT and focus on the parts of the college application that have been proven to matter (GPA, Extracurriculars, etc). Even as the score optional movement has gained momentum and continued studies proved that the SAT is worse at predicting success than GPA, I never believed the NACAC would take such a strong stand against standardized testing.
Mark this day on your calendar. Whatever domination the SAT and ACT have had on the world of college admissions is starting to slip. The NACAC isn't the first to criticize the testing industry, but this report is a devastating blow to the belief that every college needs standardized testing.
Someone finally pointed out that the SAT and ACT are ruining the party...
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What do you think? Is this the beginning of the end for standardized testing? Let us know in the comments!
Earlier this month, the LA Times reported that The College Board will be launching a new PSAT in 2010 for 8th grade students. Currently only 10th and 11th grade students take the PSAT, a standardized test that has no real bearing on college admissions for the majority of students. The addition of the 8th Grade PSAT will bring the wonders of the SAT into the middle schools and junior highs of America for the first time.
To which I say "Blech!"
The public director of Fair Test sums up my feelings quite well:
"Now we're going to have a preadmission test to get ready for the
preadmission test? Get ready to get ready to get ready?" said Robert
Schaeffer, public education director of Cambridge, Mass.-based
FairTest, which is critical of standardized testing. "To believe you
need an eighth-grade test on top of the PSAT and SAT is just insane."
College Board is claiming that the new test will help to identify students who should focus on college preparatory classes during high school. I think it's far more likely that they want to compete with the ACT and generate additional revenue.
By their reasoning, students who will score well on the 8th Grade PSAT
will score well on the actual SAT and should be on a college bound
track. That relationship will probably hold up to scrutiny, but only because they are designing both exams. In addition, success on other standardized tests is plenty of notification already for parents and students to arrange for college prep classes.
ACT currently has a middle school test titled EXPLORE. I personally don't find the test to be particularly worthwhile, but it doesn't advertise itself as any sort of signal for future ability on the ACT. Instead, it's one of many diagnostic tests that administrators can give to help students understand their future choices by focusing on students interests, abilities, and values.
The new PSAT, however, is already being marketed in a way that makes parents and students who don't plan on taking the exam feel behind. It's not a diagnostic exam that will help students understand their choices. It's a marketing ploy designed by College Board to attach kids to the SAT brand while charging schools for tests that mean nothing.
Sound crazy? Here's what the LA Times says one administrator is already doing:
Cortines said he welcomes the new test, as it will focus families and
teachers on what students need to succeed. The deputy superintendent
said he has asked the board to budget $125,000 for eighth-grade PSAT
tests in the coming school year.
That's right. $125,000 of taxpayer money is going to go toward a test that is completely unproven to test anything. Just because College Board, a company that has no official relationship with colleges beyond supplying the SAT, says the test matters.
Blech.