MIT reinstates ACT/SAT test requirement

Data10
Sat, 02 Apr 2022 20:09:40 +0000

MITChris:

There are other papers about essays, LORs, etc linked at annotation 10 We are reinstating our SAT/ACT requirement for future admissions cycles | MIT Admissions )

I appreciate providing such extensive references. That’s extremely rare among this type of college website publication. Website publications on other websites often read like marketing material. It’s great that MIT puts in extra effort and detail. The links contain much useful information that is interesting to discuss, but the conclusion from the papers are often nuanced without a simple overriding conclusion. Specific reference links are below, with comments:

Essay (https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.abi9031)
Finds that essay content is correlated with both income and SAT scores. It does not evaluate whether essay quality is correlated with income. For example, the study found that students who wrote about travel and China were more likely to be high income. It did not evaluate whether the high income students who wrote essays about travel and China wrote higher quality essays or were more likely to be admitted.

Grades (https://eportfolios.macaulay.cuny.edu/liufall2013/files/2013/10/New_Perspectives.pdf) – Finds that while both SAT and grades are both correlated with income, SAT was much more correlated with income than both grades and class rank within the evaluated sample.

Advanced Coursework – Discussed in more detail in posts above

LORs (Lost in Translation: Elite College Admission and High School Differences in Letters of Recommendation) – A PhD dissertation in which a computer evaluates LORs by measures such as word count and number of words in certain groupings, such as number of “subjectivity” or “positivity” words. The author finds that significant differences exist both between different school types and demographic groups. For example, the author found that typed LORs about females were significantly more likely to use “positivity” words while typed LORs from private HS were significantly less likely to use “positivity” words. Less clear is how the difference in number of “positivity” words influences chance of admission.

“Just About Every Other Factor” (Commentary: What's less fair than the SAT? You might be surprised) – LA Times opinion piece with significant errors. For example, it references the essay study linked above as evidence that high quality essay content was more correlated with income than scores, even though the referenced study does not evaluate quality of essay.

The combination of influences makes it difficult to draw a simple conclusion of how a test optional policy influences student body. Other studies/evaluations of test optional colleges have found that kids who are admitted test optional consistently average lower income and other markers of disadvantage that those that are admitted as test submitter (https://www.nacacnet.org/globalassets/documents/publications/research/defining-access-report-2018.pdf , https://web.archive.org/web/20200901071139/https://www.ithaca.edu/ir/docs/testoptionalpaper2.pdf, https://www.bates.edu/admission/files/2014/01/25th-Year-SAT-report-Stanford-6.3.11-wch.ppt ) , suggesting that that many disadvantaged kids do manage to be admitted without scores.

However, I understand that MIT is a unique school that has many differences from the average college and may show different patterns and have different needs. I also agree that SAT score can highlight some kids would not be identified otherwise, including some lower income kids. Some specific lower income kids would be admitted under a test considered system who would not be admitted under a test blind system.