Interesting opinion article on admissions policy

interesteddad
Thu, 03 Feb 2005 02:19:50 +0000

But comparing schools with similar median SATs doesn’t completely do it, for, as the CollegeBoard’s own numbers suggest, a 1400 SAT (in aggregate, not for any individual student) is just a 1200 plus $100,000 in average annual family income.




Right. That was my point. Assuming that neither admissions office makes any affirmative action effort, a school with a median SAT of 1400 is going to have a wealthier (and preppier) student body than an otherwise identical school with a 1200 median SAT.

I think the underlying goal here is to discern the objectives of the college, its efforts to enroll a diverse student body, and the overall “campus culture”. After all, if the goal were simply to find the poorest student body, then the list would start and end with academically non-rigorous community colleges.

I suppose it could be reasonably argued that enrolling a class with a median SAT of 1400 is a decision to enroll an elite (i.e. wealthy) student body and that a college should lower its SAT standards. I don’t have a problem with that viewpoint.

I’m just saying that it is probably unrealistic to expect two colleges with equally aggressive diversity efforts, one with a 1400 median SAT and the other with a 1200, to enroll the same percentage of low income students. The pool of low income students with 1400 SATs is certainly smaller than the pool with 1200 SATs.

It is quite possible that the combination of higher diversity and lower “stats” may indeed be a more attractive option. I’m only suggesting that shoppers understand some of the practicaly realities of aggressive diversity efforts. Use a little common sense in evaluating the numbers.