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University of California Will Stop Using SAT, ACT

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Re: University of California Will Stop Using SAT, ACT

#251

I would prefer if schools just gave as concrete as possible feedback for why individual applicants are or are not admitted. i.e. Congrats, you got accepted. Your GPA ranked in the top $X percentile of our admitted class and your engagement in robotics was astonishing. or You were not admitted because while your GPA was excellent, we did not see sufficient community engagement in your extracuriculars.

There's no point in feedback since you can't go back in time to fix those issues. You should already be able to guess from looking at the profiles of students who got in and those that didn't.

Re: University of California Will Stop Using SAT, ACT

#252
post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The reality is that a SAT scores correlate with wealth. Everything good correlates with wealth. Wealth is quite literally the ability to make things happen . The relevant question is, do SAT scores correlate with wealth more or less than whatever holistic criteria the UCs will be switching to? And if they correlate more, is it because the holistic criteria are actually fairer or because the UCs are Goodharting on h…

> The relevant question is, do SAT scores correlate with wealth more or less than whatever [...] Well, no, because the SAT correlates with wealth while plausibly having claim on being an objective measure. When little Johnny gets an internship as his daddy's company, that obviously correlates with wealth, and admissions committees can discount it. When little Susie is on a groundbreaking paper from mommy's lab, that…

I think you're overstating how easy it is to discount for wealth in those other scenarios. At least when it comes to high school research experience, it has rarely been the case IME that a student got such a position directly because of their family, and certainly it is very rare that a student explicitly works in a parent's lab.

Yes, some private high schools feed to quality summer research programs, but A) those schools give out more aid than you'd think and B) a number of public magnet schools have similar success in placing students with labs. I am sure that this does still correlate with wealth to some degree, but I don't think it does so in a way that the admissions committee can easily "see".

Beyond that, I think the vast majority of admissions committees (including all of the ivies) have little interest in discounting anything. I watched a lot of students that to be honest were just average get into very good schools, purely on good (inflated) grades from a name brand high school. The kids from my summer research cohort also got into very good schools for the most part, but those students were actually some combination of insanely smart and insanely dedicated.

It's a very hard problem for sure, I don't feel confident enough to say strongly that a particular set of metrics is obviously good or obviously bad. But I don't think removing standardized testing on the whole is likely to help with discounting for wealth (and I also don't think they really want to).

FWIW I think SAT/ACT are bad indicators for the "elite" schools because they just saturate and stop having much value in splitting the applicant pool. Especially the math section, it becomes a matter moreso of making a careless mistake or two.

Re: University of California Will Stop Using SAT, ACT

#253
post #3

I know some people protest measures that are considered more "objective" over measures that are more "holistic", whether this is in school admittance, performance evaluation, promotion consideration, interviewing, determining welfare benefits, choosing who makes the rules and governs. However it has been my experience that whenever an explicit test or hierarchy is removed another shadow one builds up that is more sub…

Yes exactly. This is why every tech company should apply this type of standardized testing to software engineers as well. We can test for specific types of algorithms and have them regurgitate them on whiteboards, making it easy to compare each candidate on highly relevant skills they will be using on the job. It's not perfect because there's still rampant ageism in our industry but it's better than letting ourselves…

Obviously we shouldn't throw away the kinds of tests that I score highly on. Only the bad tests that reject my genius.

Re: University of California Will Stop Using SAT, ACT

#254

I can't help but wonder at the motivations for these changes, at UC and other schools. It seems to be a combination of equity (it favors rich kids), effectiveness (it's not that predictive) and risk aversion (can't prove racist admissions if there's no standardized comparison). And yet... I wonder if we're throwing out the baby with the bathwater. Standardized tests _seem_ like they could be such a such a powerful fo…

I think the problem with standardized tests is that they're standardized; you can prepare for them. It reduces both the effectiveness and the equity, because preparation for the tests is something that rich kids will have better time and access to.

Academic performance is not academics.

Re: University of California Will Stop Using SAT, ACT

#255

I can't help but wonder at the motivations for these changes, at UC and other schools. It seems to be a combination of equity (it favors rich kids), effectiveness (it's not that predictive) and risk aversion (can't prove racist admissions if there's no standardized comparison). And yet... I wonder if we're throwing out the baby with the bathwater. Standardized tests _seem_ like they could be such a such a powerful fo…

I think the problem with standardized tests is that they're standardized; you can prepare for them. It reduces both the effectiveness and the equity, because preparation for the tests is something that rich kids will have better time and access to.

Except that SAT test prep has a very small impact on scores. And the fact that there is an enormous amount of free resources. What

Re: University of California Will Stop Using SAT, ACT

#256
I hope they don’t replace one standardized test with another standardized test. Although, that’s exactly what may happen. It is not far fetched to create a more personalized project based testing that factors in race, ethnicity, socio economic status, gender, etc.

Also, if all colleges are created equally, endowed similarly, we may not need a test and follow the K12 model of going to your local college because it is as good as any other college. It is about time we solve education along with healthcare and create equity in the system.

Re: University of California Will Stop Using SAT, ACT

#257

I can't help but wonder at the motivations for these changes, at UC and other schools. It seems to be a combination of equity (it favors rich kids), effectiveness (it's not that predictive) and risk aversion (can't prove racist admissions if there's no standardized comparison). And yet... I wonder if we're throwing out the baby with the bathwater. Standardized tests _seem_ like they could be such a such a powerful fo…

Professionally edited essays, strong prep schools, and expensive extracurricular activities will definitely favors rich kids.

Re: University of California Will Stop Using SAT, ACT

#258

I can't help but wonder at the motivations for these changes, at UC and other schools. It seems to be a combination of equity (it favors rich kids), effectiveness (it's not that predictive) and risk aversion (can't prove racist admissions if there's no standardized comparison). And yet... I wonder if we're throwing out the baby with the bathwater. Standardized tests _seem_ like they could be such a such a powerful fo…

I think the problem with standardized tests is that they're standardized; you can prepare for them. It reduces both the effectiveness and the equity, because preparation for the tests is something that rich kids will have better time and access to.

I read an article, that I can't find now, that convincingly argues that the SAT is one of the most equalizing factors for privilege. Impressive extracurricular, recommendation letters, and even grades are easier to buy than a higher SAT score.

Prep helps, but prep has a limit. A Golf tutor, high tier equipment, admission to private school with a large golf team, etc. are more easily bought.

Re: University of California Will Stop Using SAT, ACT

#260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is in the context of a free education system, the only thing the poor students loose is a bit of time.

A year is A LOT of time, and you have to explain why you lost a year later on. Also, even in "free" education systems, some taxpayer is going to ask "why the hell am I paying for 2/3 of crappy students, can't you just raise the bar at the beginning, and only accept the top 1/3?"

It is not that they do not learn anything during that year. Also, many of them later got admitted to some 'easier' school and got their credits transferred.
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