What it does do is remove an additional data point for the applicants to know if they should apply. (As a side note, given the extraordinary circ we are facing, I wouldn’t object to removing the subj tests for this one class, but it shouldn’t be removed permanently).
The process stinks, and the focus should be making it as transparent as possible - and the subj tests were just one more way to help kids figure out their odds and fit. I think what MIT/Caltech said about reaching other kids were simply excuses to allow more discretion with less transparency/accountability. The losers in this are the applicants who have one less objective piece to judge their own applications.
@jpm50
This 100% happens. I know a lot students who have gotten in on being recruited I am not saying these kids are stupid, by any stretch, but the ones I know freely admit that they got in b/c of their sport. It happens at almost all schools, but MIT is not being honest about it. Again, MIT can admit any cohort it pleases, but do everyone (alum, applicants, schools, etc) a favor and just be up front.
As MIT says, 70% of applicants are qualified, so it would not be surprising that an athlete who gets injured or quits can graduate from MIT. The vast majority of applicants can. Don’t confuse ability to succeed (finish MIT) with ability to be admitted - they are two extraordinarily different animals.
While for most applicants being an athlete is just like having another EC, correct. Most of those ECs truly don’t add up to much, unless they are v. v. special - the ones only a select group have. But for the seriously recruited athlete it is a huge benefit and bump. This is esp. true for certain sports. By the way, some MIT sports are Div 1 and in Div 3, some MIT teams are formidable (at or near the top) of Div 3. Sports are now serious business at MIT.
I would think most applicants for 2021 admissions to MIT/Caltech already have scored what they wanted to score on 2 SAT Subj tests a year or two ago. As has been stated, most of these kids do not need a lot of prep for those tests and probably took the tests in 9th or 10th grade.
I can understand that the admitted students apps are strong enough without these data points but still seems if the kids went through the time/money they should be courteous enough to consider…
Wow, dropping the subject tests, no AIME2 or USAMO this year, no states or national MAT, RSI and MITES cancelled already… Most math camps haven’t cancelled yet but it’s not looking promising…
Yes, many kids who were eyeing MIT are seeing some of their opportunities to shine melting away…
And to think I told my high school junior to get the subject tests out of the way early (8th and 10th grades). They weren’t any work but like @yearstogo implies it still grates a bit…
Many current HS juniors (Class of 2021) have not yet taken subject tests, and were planning to do so in May, June, and/or the fall.
There was already a significant movement towards greater access in college admissions with over 1K schools going test optional, and dropping subject tests (MIT is late to the game). That, coupled with the pandemic crisis, has created even a greater move towards test flexibility and decreasing requirements, and rightly so.
CAEngineer:
We may need to agree to disagree. Or to let MITChris weigh in.
A good friend of mine coached one of the MIT Div 1 sports teams for several years. What she told me about any admissions sports bump goes against what you’re saying.
I might be wrong but I do not think subject test scores are reported on the common data sets or counted for rankings. At least for the schools my D was interested I was not able to see that data the way I was able to see the SAT/ACT scores (percentiles etc.) How would you know if colleges already were “discounting” the SAT subject scores as they pleased?
I am sure many were. However, it is about eliminating an inconvenient data point for internal purposes. Schools get enormous numbers of applications. Many of the readers are recent college graduates, with limited experience. I was shocked to run into a neighbor’s daughter who was responsible for “first read” at a T10 for 2000 files (I believe that figure is accurate - going by memory and her parents’ description of her role). She was 23, one year out of college. Such readers cannot be relied upon to “get with the program” intuitively.
In practical terms, this means that admissions processes must formalize which institutional priority applicants should benefit from relaxed emphasis on the subject tests, and the schools would rather avoid the paper trail. Everyone can see all the data that was released in the recent Harvard litigation, from which experts were able to estimate the size of the preferences for various institutional priority groups. Better to have less data than more going forward, especially as for most successful applicants to MIT the subject tests scores provided vanishingly small incremental information for the decision to accept anyway. Again, just my opinion and guess as to the reasoning.
This is a common profile of full-time admissions officers (not talking about the director/vp levels). Part-time contract readers often have more experience than AOs.
Admissions jobs also have a high degree of turnover, including at the mid and senior levels…meaning institutional priorities, predictive analytic models and such tend to be dynamic and/or have short shelf lives.
Interesting to me how some people claim to “KNOW” what got a student admitted to MIT. That being a sport’s recruit got a less capable student in. You get a letter admitting you to MIT and it includes absoluely NO INFO on why you were admitted.
Read the MIT blog post regarding the dropping of the subject test requirement. It states that MIT does not need the subject tests to evaluate a student. They also say there that it isimpossible to know why a student was admitted.
I have personal experience w this and MIT does not really consider athletes as an added benefit. I know someone who had 36 ACT and 800s on all subject tests taken first try as well as 5s on most APs including BC calc, physics, chem, bio and I think more but regardless she was captain of lacrosse and All American for New England (great athlete and grade awards) and was in contact with the lacrosse coach in MIT for years of which the coach told her she would do her best to get her in because she was her top lacrosse recruit but she couldnt to much. In the end she was rejected even though academically she ‘fit’ and had sports to help. The coach told her admissions did not really even consider her input and this shows how little an impact this has.