Educational Testing Service's new tool rates grad school applicants' personalities

DoveofPeace · 07-10-2009, 08:29 AM

Seems like the many students whose professors don't know them very well will be at a severe disadvantage.

"The Educational Testing Service wanted to help graduate school applicants prove they are more than a set of test scores. So it developed a tool to rate students across a broad sweep of traits -- creativity, teamwork, integrity -- that admission tests don't measure.

The Personal Potential Index, unveiled this week, looks suspiciously like another set of scores. An applicant's personality is distilled into six traits, and the applicant is rated on each of them by various professors and former supervisors on a scale of 1 to 5.

Officials with the nonprofit organization, based in Princeton, N.J., say the index marks the first large-scale attempt to codify the elusive, subjective attributes that make up a successful grad student. The goal is to raise the share of students who finish graduate school. Non-cognitive, or "soft," skills are considered crucial to success in higher education....

The index asks professors to log onto a Web site and rate a student on such skills as "Works well in group settings" and "Accepts feedback without getting defensive." The scale is tailored to force tough choices: Is the student in the top 1 percent of "truly exceptional" human beings, in the top 5 percent of outstanding scholars or merely above average?"
washingtonpost.com

Dave_Berry · 07-10-2009, 08:40 AM

The PPI's proposed benefits (from the PPI main page):

For Applicants
* Provide evidence of a broader range of capabilities
* Request and track evaluations easily

For Graduate and Professional Schools
* Identify applicants who are more likely to persist and succeed
* Increase the diversity of graduate programs

For Faculty and Other Evaluators
* Consistently evaluate students' attributes critical for grad school success
* Share their feedback quickly and easily with multiple institutions

psych_ · 07-10-2009, 09:02 AM

Okay, they already do pretty much this exact thing on recommendation forms...

mflevity · 07-10-2009, 10:29 AM

...Which are rarely taken very seriously because the rating system varies so much from one educator to the next. Quantifying something like creativity (Top 10% vs. Top 5%) is just about impossible, and I would hope that schools know it.

Thank goodness I'm done with the ETS for at least the next 3 years.

Dave_Berry · 07-10-2009, 10:38 AM

If one of their goals for this tool is to "Increase the diversity of graduate programs," then perhaps it must have been designed, in part, to complement the AA process.

belevitt · 07-10-2009, 11:41 AM

Is it possible that ETS is just trying to increase its market by taking customers away from those stupid sites where recommenders fill out the survey and upload their lors. Maybe ETS imagines itself as the sole provider of all admissions data in the future. Frankly, I think this would be a bad thing as ETS seems to already have way too much control of the admissions process.

Faline2 · 07-10-2009, 04:44 PM

UGH. At least when your chemistry teacher decides that you are or you are not among the top 1% or 10% of all students she has ever taught, you know that teacher ratings are random and unreliable, and likely meant to help you get into college rather than meant to be accurate.

In all honesty, few of my sons' teachers were excellent judges of character when faced with high schoolers in my opinion, and many were impressed/easily snowed with the most confidant social kids who were easy to chat with. It is known that introverts who will be high achievers are often not "teacher's pets" or able to bond as easily with teachers who are often extroverts by nature.

How many people really want to be judged or limited by their maturity level in high school at age 17? I meet persistent people all the time who woke up after first year of college was over and recovered their mojo. Just yesterday, a very humble man I met finally shared that his son is a doctor at the Mayo Clinic. He went to a really not highly selective college and it seems blew his first year of college due to immaturity. I doubt his high school teachers could predict his staying power and concentration when he was 17. This is particularly true of boys in my opinion....when their executive systems are not entirely built yet.

I fear that this system will only help students with exceptional early social acumen. Social acumen is something that is important but I believe many students develop more social IQ in college and in the work force.

Memories of the slickest talkers in my freshman class who were uber socially confidant and got elected to everything first semester in college and were sometimes later left behind in the dirt once the real deal education/exams/labs started!

My favorite story in this vein involved me bring thrilled to go on a date with a young man with very slick social skills who had worked in DC for one of our state's Senators. I was so impressed since this was far out of my life experience or reach, and called home awestruck that I was going out with a confidant person who had worked for a Senator the entire summer before college began. He was definitely the kind of person who could strike a pose and knew how to carry himself. The day that our first Survey of American Government exams were handed back to my surprise...the teacher had xeroxed my exam to pass out as the "example" of the answers he was looking for (I got it all right plus the extra credit)...and the Congressional Page next to me...had made a 33! And I had only studied our nation's government from afar and had zero social connections to that scene.

I always tell my sons to recognize that the quieter persons on their freshman hall may turn out to be the most fascinating, with the best careers, best family lives and to be the most loyal of friends once the season of Freshman Follies shakes out and talent emerges.

Momwaitingfornew · 07-10-2009, 05:28 PM

Faline2, this is for graduate school admissions, when the students are 21 or older and should be showing maturity as scholars if they hope to gain admittance to their dream program.

That doesn't mean that I agree with this. As others have noted, this approach is hardly standardized and is much less personal than letters of recommendation. When I first heard about this a few weeks ago, my first reaction was that ETS was just trying to find another way to make money. I hope graduate programs turn their collective backs on ETS's plan.

Faline2 · 07-10-2009, 05:34 PM

ah..should have actually read Dove of Peace's post with care. Sorry!

Still don't like it much as what makes for a great PhD in Molecular Bio is not what makes for a great Masters in Education student...I think references should be from professors in related fields without the standardization attempt by ETC.

go free enterprise! we shall see if the market "needs" this service.

kguo7 · 07-10-2009, 06:45 PM

"im in the top 1% in creativity. what about you?"

this is a joke.

openedskittles · 07-10-2009, 07:17 PM

^ I'm glad you asked. I'm actually in the top .5% *snicker snicker*

EvoViro · 07-10-2009, 07:36 PM

Tangentially, this reminds me of one of my favorite cynical quotes: "95% of the population is below average."

malan89 · 07-11-2009, 12:04 AM

People such as myself that are clearly in the top 1% of any measurable category of evaluation have absolutely nothing to worry about.

taxguy · 07-11-2009, 08:47 AM

FINALLY, ETS is trying to measure things that we professors knew for years! Most professors know that drive and determination, and time mannagement have a greater impact on college success than inate intellectual horsepower alone. I just question whether any test can measure these things.

Momwaitingfornew · 07-11-2009, 10:21 AM

Taxguy, it's not a test. From what I understand, the students name their recommenders, presumably when they take the GRE, although I'm sure students can add names later - for an extra fee. The professors then go online to rate the specific candidate so the profile accompanies the score reports.

More generally (not addressed specifically to Taxguy), if this is indeed how ETS expects this to work, then I see several problems. When a student takes the GRE, he/she probably hasn't yet asked specific profs to write LORs, although he will probably have an idea. But what if a prof later declines to fill out the online report? Will it seem as though he doesn't endorse the applicant, even though he just didn't feel like logging onto ETS? Or because the student decided on someone else? Also, a good LOR should address the questions on the survey. And then graduate admissions committees more likely will have to address "recommendation inflation." Since undergraduate institutions get copies of their students' GRE scores, could an attached questionnaire get an assistant professor called in to explain why his scores are consistently low, thus hampering grad school placement rates? (I would hope not, but with some of the jockeying for ranking places for undergrad, one never knows.) And lastly, does the student get to see the scores? Will he have the option of dropping one or more of those scores if he reapplies to grad school after a year of research?