@austinmshauri - I am sure you ok college board/ACT reporting on the score this student took x amount of time to finish the test right? I have nothing against people truly need accommodations but it seems like its being abused and misused by rich and famous and it must be addressed immediately.
@Grainraiser @momofsenior1 My own take is that holistic admissions means that private institutions can admit whoever they want for any reason, no reason or bad reasons. A student getting expelled or having their degree revoked would be something between them and the school.
I know that none of the schools themselves have been implicated in this fraud/scam (although some of their employees are), but at the very least, it seems that they were guilty of gross negligence. They waived recruited athletes through admissions who were not athletes at all. No attempt to verify information. Nobody asking any questions. All it took was a note from the coach and minimum academic standards (which were also obtained through fraud), and it’s “Welcome to Georgetown or USC or Yale or wherever.”
Regarding accommodations and expensive private schools - I wonder if it really is a matter of the schools having the culture where everyone tries to get a hand up, or if it’s more likely parents are sending their kids to those schools because they are known to be effective at teaching kids with these needs. We see this type of effect at the public magnet school my daughter attends. They are one of the highest performing schools in the district, with 60% of the students from in-district, and 40% outside. There will be 84 spots for new 6th graders next year, and a smattering of spots for 7th-11th grades (with move availability in 9th grade as some 8th graders will choose to return to the home schools). Last year there were about 10 applicants per spot, in our lottery system. Some of these families want their kids to attend this school not because of their interests (it is a STEM school), but because they hope the “smarts” will rub off on their kids. Some hope their kids will benefit from being around the kids who are truly motivated. While we are a high performing school, we also have a high percentage of special-ed students, precisely because their parents want their child in that environment - kids who don’t benefit from the accelerated classes that are offered to the top students.
The other piece of the discussion of accommodations that bothers be is the way accommodations seem to be viewed. I don’t know about the ACT, but I recall reading that for the SAT extra time doesn’t ultimately make much difference for most students. If helps those with LD because they do process more slowly, but they still need to understand how to solve the problems or answer the questions. This is also why the increased scores don’t raise a red flag - a student who didn’t have enough time during a regular testing because of a processing disorder may see a huge increase with extra time precisely because they now have enough time. Yes, these students may end up struggling with this their entire life, and will have to work longer and harder to get the grades in college, and perhaps in their jobs later in life, but it doesn’t mean they aren’t capable. The point of that college degree is to get into a field where they earn a salary, and are paid for the work, not for the time required to complete it. And yes, there ARE accommodations in college, and in “real life.”
Mathew Martoma and Adam Wheeler will beg to differ.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathew_Martoma
http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2010/05/30/this_cant_be_our_adam_wheeler/
Regardless, most, if not all, colleges will have something in the T&C that say something like:
https://web.stanford.edu/dept/registrar/bulletin0910/68887.htm
@LisaNCState. Maybe I didn’t make that clear but yes that is what I am saying. I agree with you on that. Trust me most kids that don’t need it would just leave the testing center but that also could be a big distraction for the kids that actually have /need accommodations. Also your comments about 6 hours or 2 days of accommodations not needed is not correct. There are plenty of legitimate students that need this type of accommodations. You are thinking the students you know, not the ones that have severe brain processing issues or other more serious disabilities. Some use the computer to type their written portion instead of handwriting it due to muscle fatigue etc. It not “just” kids trying to take advantage of the system.
@Knowsstuff - my heart bleeds for people who truly need accommodations but now we are the point we need to question everything … sorry state we are in now with this cutthroat competition … My suggestions ACT/SAT should report how long kid took to finish the test … that should be no brainer and let college decide holistically its worth admitting this kid or not!
Some of these parents may be subject to a 200% penalty (self-dealing) for having their own family foundation make the payment to Key Worldwide Foundation. Lots of interesting tax implications. KWF assets were seized ($5M).
@LisaNCState the testing companies stopped flagging accommodated testing in 2002. https://dralegal.org/case/breimhorst-v-ets/
@skieurope So do you think we will soon see retrospective auditing of recruited athletes leading to “rescinded” degrees? This seems unlikely apart from some kind of court order. Hidden stuff stays hidden.
So many posters on this site have alleged and flat out stated that an URM “stole” a spot. It seems that we weren’t the ones they should’ve been worried about.
I hope this scandal increases holistic admissions. Test scores don’t tell the entire picture.
@jym626 - alright this is the biggest loophole that the whole elephant can go by.
I can’t help but wonder how many of the papers these students wrote were their own work vs bought. If they’re ok faking scores or sports, why would they want to sit down and do their own work to produce papers?
@LisaNCState Relaxing the time limit to say 5 hours is reasonable too much extra admin involved in recording time taken for individual students. The real reason for relaxing the time is to stop the whole cottage industry around gaming the system. I say this as one of my kids was diagnosed with ADHD in 1st grade.
I’m not saying what they will or won’t do. It’s a developing story after all with more to come, I’m sure. My point was that universities can revoke degrees/rescind acceptances/require withdrawal for any number of reasons.
@ivygirl221, at a school like Harvard, definitely 10% and maybe as much as 20-30% of the class is filled based on pure unhooked merit.
Others have hooks (or just donated a pile of money).
But this is why I say you should focus on self-improvement, determine what is a good life and how to live it, and strive to achieve those goals without depending on the whims of others (rather than fixating on Ivies).
Clearly accommodations are abused by some, but disclosing accommodations punishes the wrong people. I don’t see it as being such a big issue for the elite colleges - they have the resources to help all students graduate, and they might see it as another way of increasing diversity among the student body. But the kids that will be hurt are those attending public institutions, where resources are scarce. Will they be rejected by such a public university because the school fears it will cost too much to accommodate them? The student who honestly scores 1500 on the SAT with accommodations to go along with a high GPA has shown they belong among the applicant pool at the elites, even if they will have to work a bit harder (and they’re probably willing to work a bit harder, because they’re used to doing so). Because Harvard, Yale, and the other elites value their graduation rates, the resources will be available to those students to help the succeed. Those same students might not do as well at StateU because of lack of resources.
If we want admissions to be need-blind, shouldn’t that “need” apply to needs other than just money?
Another way to say that is that there are no "spots. Saying “more holistic” is redundant. Private schools can already admit whoever they want and claim the benefits of their process is to society, whatever that process might be. This indictment is just opening up the sausage-making factory to public view.
@LisaNCState it is not easy to get accommodations from a psychologist. The professionals that I know are honest and will not “tweak” their reports. It takes many years of documentation to get extended time. You can’t just walk in junior year and claim to need it…
The problem with telling schools that kids get extra time is that it will flag LD students to colleges and I predict they will be less likely to see acceptances. Both of my kids have been granted extra time (the more typical 1.5) and have had their disabilities diagnosed by public institutions and it runs in my family. To be honest, my kids always found it grueling to sit for that long on SAT days (multiple day exams is extremely rare for the SAT). They hated getting extra time in elementary school because it meant they were segregated from the regular class. When my older D applied for schools, we looked for smaller classes, support systems, and more holistic admissions. She ended up graduating with honors and is successful in these early career days.
The red flag for the College Board should be these special test centers, where only one or two students is being tested on a non-test day. My Ds have to register early to find extra time seats at the normal test centers. There should be no proctors for hire. The problem is with the testing organizations–they were getting lazy, despite all the money they rake in. Thank goodness more and more schools are going test-optional. The thing to keep in mind about timed tests is that they are a deeply imperfect reflection of real life work experience–especially for college educated workers. I worked in finance and journalism and no one ever stood over me with a stop watch to determine if I got the work done in an extremely strict time-frame. Life is not a game show.
And it goes without saying that we’ve never photoshopped their faces on a stock photo athlete :))