Yet test required didn’t result in more FGLI admits either, even in the face of a stated desire to increase this population and related outreach methods for at least a decade prior to covid.
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Yeah, I wonder what can of worms this will open. At my daughter’s school, for example, APs are restricted to junior and senior year, with a max of 3 per year. That means the max # of AP test scores a student could submit would be 3. That would likely feel very uncompetitive to ambitious students and I wonder if there would be an increase in self-study (although finding a place to take self-studied exams is pretty problematic, too, and sometimes impossible).
But what if the reason for not submitting score is because the tests were never taken in the first place, rather than trying to cover up a low score? AP tests are not required at most schools and can actually be pretty cost-prohibitive for some families, so students forgo the tests. I guess in that case, they just need to take the SAT/ACT, but this “test flexible” policy still seems to leave opportunities pretty unevenly distributed to me.
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On the podcast while they don’t say “must”, they also say if they see AP classes taken but no scores submitted, they will question why, and then they go on to say that there is space for an explanation, and give some examples. I do think cherry picking AP scores comes with not an insignificant risk. The corollary that they don’t address is if the student has AP scores but chooses not to submit SAT/ACT scores whether that will raise the same questions.
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Having the test scores would not preclude such individuals from making that case in their application, but I too would be a little suspicious of a high GPA student that did not have comparable standardized test score.
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This is an interesting point. Could the AP score policy drive a race for more AP scores, not only among those seeking to avoid submitting SAT/ACT, but also for those with good SAT/ACTs? I don’t think the policy should drive a race for more APs considering that Yale is looking for some academic competence level, but it doesn’t take much for admissions myths to spread.
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To me, it sounds like Yale and Dartmouth believe what he is saying (“without the test scores, there’s a tremendous amount of uncertainty about whether that student is really at the level that [highly selective colleges] require”) is very much an “it depends” sort of question, not a universal.
That was part of the point of the baseball analogy, and they go into that same subject in various ways in other conversations. But overall, it appears to me there is no one set of evidence they are looking for out of all applicants. Instead, they understand there are different types of students they want to admit (the knuckleballers and fastballers and such), and they also understand different evidence is available about different applicants.
But, SOME combination of evidence has to make them confident this applicant is going to thrive at their college, in both what the applicant says they want to do and also in the whole variety of courses they are expected to take.
And they are saying test scores–in Yale’s case, including APs and IBs–are useful in enough such cases that they want some sort of test scores available to consider in all cases. But they definitely did not imply they were going to require all future admits to have high test scores, just the opposite they want to use that information very conditionally and contextually.
So, I don’t know if something this complicated can really be reduced to a simple statement, and I definitely do not think that particular statement works because it seems obvious it would need further qualification to track the in-depth information we have gotten from Yale and Dartmouth.
We tell students they should — as in “must” — submit any scores for any AP tests they took (though some other comments in this and the SAT thread are making me wonder if we should change that to “shall” or “must”).
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Here you go. More about free speech from the professor. If one thinks there is free speech … then arguing is moot.
Yes, I would suggest you do that. Any additional clarity would be appreciated by your applicants.
The least, or the most?
I agree it is not very clear yet. I personally think it is not intended to be discretionary, but I also do not know what they intend to do about it.
They are definitely not doing that yet. It seems more like they are just going to try to make it clear that more APs is neither required nor better than a few that cover a decent range. We’ll have to see if people are willing to listen . . . .
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I’m guessing it depends. Just as one data point, my kid had 5 across the board on his APs including the hard ones and thought those tests were all very straightforward, but 1460 SAT (you can blame this on the EBRW… his math was 780). On the other hand his friends with SAT 1550-1580 did not necessarily get 5s on the APs they took and felt more challenged than my kid did. I think SAT EBRW is a bit different from a subject based AP test and might not correlate as well with those… but I would like to see actual data.
disagree. “Should” is rather clear. (If applicants can’t follow directions or choose to ignore them…). Or, perhaps MIT could change the language to something like "we expect students to submit all test scores…)
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This is true, but I actually think when looking at the enrollment cliff and the risks to schools, we are talking about both those 100 schools just under the very tops as well as the vast majority of open admit (or close to it) type schools. I believe we are going to see more consolidation than some are predicting, and the race to fill seats will be very real with very real consequences for a lot of schools.
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Well, a kid scoring 1400 is a school district where the average is 900 is a superstar…even if he did not have that awesome passion project of helping orphaned elephants in Thailand and a letter from senator Angus Young stating how wonderful he/she is.
The argument made by dean Coffin is that TO was hurting that 1400 kid from low SES background because he/she is looking at the 1550 score and deciding not to apply during TO season when ~50% of the TO kids from wealthier families are applying in spite of because they have those letters and ECs to carry them through.
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Thanks. My opinion, if we hark back to the days, not so long ago, when we were interpreting whether all SAT/ACT scores were required, I would say that “should” is still sufficiently ambiguous. Even “expect” all scores is not the same as using shall, must, require.
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The problem is, though, that (some) faculty complain about everything, all the time, and don’t want to countenance actual material learning loss from the pandemic. These are separate things: i.e., you could have students with the same potential to learn (intelligence and skills, if you like( who simply have a weaker conceptual foundation because of learning loss during the pandemic. Those would produce differences in the classroom likely irrespective of testing requirements (e.g. I would bet at Georgetown, which didn’t suspend the testing requirement even when the CollegeBoard recommended it, they are still seeing things in the classroom).
Faculty complaining about kids these days is standard; whether it has anything to attach itself to that the rest of society will treat with credence is what changes. You should view faculty dissent as ascriptive rather than descriptive.
Our research at MIT on testing was entirely unrelated to anything that happened to classes we admitted in 2020-2021 and 2021-2022, and entirely grounded upon decades of prior data that demonstrated the utility and validity of the tests. During our suspension of the requirement, we effectively required another form of testing that was more predictive than the SATs if students didn’t submit them (e.g. BC calc). As a first year advisor, what I notice in my students is not a diminution in their academic caliber, but rather their non-cognitive abilities to succeed in a structured learning environment. These things are recovering but were doubtlessly impacted, just like those of us who graduate into recessions are permanently downshifted on earning potential in the aggregate because of macroeconomic factors.
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The policy statement is: “Applicants reporting results from AP or IB exams should include scores from all subject exams completed prior to applying.”
I understand in certain circles, this is considered insufficiently clear because certain people may not want to actually do that for strategic reasons, and they need Yale to specifically tell them they simply cannot do it even if they really want to.
But I have to say by normal standards, I don’t really find that unclear. Should I submit all my scores? Yes, you should.
Yeah, I have to say to me it is a very open question whether, say, a Calc BC 5 scored as a HS junior is going to be more or less predictive of persistence in Yale’s STEM classes than say a 750 SAT Math score. And they didn’t get into details, but in one of the new Podcasts they did say they have internal data showing APs were just as predictive as SAT/ACT scores for their purposes, so that is why their policy is text flexible.
So . . . I don’t know, but Yale seems to think it can actually extract good information out of APs. I suspect, though, it will be a much more nuanced process than simply “3 AP 5s in any subject is what Yale wants to see” (or any other formula like that).
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In other news:
https://record.umich.edu/articles/u-m-formally-adopts-test-optional-admissions-policy/
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Yeah I think the latter is probably closer to what we’d do — “We do not expect or require any particular AP classes, or for you to take any tests, but if you do take any tests, we expect you to submit all test scores.” It’s hard because you don’t want people to panic or feel pressure to take classes or take tests (in some districts, the students have to self-pay for tests). In practice, what we do now is to email students after they apply asking for any missing scores if it’s relevant to the case.
As a former HLS researcher + frequent listener of Divided Argument, Strict Scrutiny, and Lawfare, I get where evergreen is coming from on should vs shall, but I do think most people understand the current language and sort of know that they’re ducking an expectation.
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