I think timing is more of a coincidence and has nothing to do with TO. Maybe COVID highlighted certain inequalities, but the increase in Pell grants is due to changing institutional priorities (which include increased outreach into certain communities) and not being TO.
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This might warrant a new thread, but I don’t want you to feel like you’ve committed lots of time to this … but I’d be curious if there are any tactics you’ve observed that have helped your advisees get up to speed, or that have helped them compensate for having to start on their back foot.
Thank you. I re-read the post I referenced and understand the point more clearly. Appreciate the color.
I wish it were easier to find, as this is like looking for a needle in a haystack, but there were a lot of discussions back in olden times about which schools required all SAT/ACT scores to be reported. I wish I could find one specifically on the use of “should.” I vaguely recall that some colleges would, or might even now, state that applicants “should” submit all SAT scores so that the college has an opportunity to consider the applicant’s highest scores (as if the applicant is unaware), but that it isn’t a requirement.
Yup that’s tough in a world where people consider just about anything stated as being optional to be anything but.
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Where did I reference any such preclusion? I’m not entirely sure of your point relative to my post.
Then by all means, be suspicious and look for more information. But the truth is, it happens that bright, capable and prepared kids sometimes drop the ball on these tests, and some of those kids have a more persistent problem with them that doesn’t translate to their college performance. I have some close examples of kids who did very well in rigorous IP Diploma studies with lots of quantitative rigor whose SAT/ACT scores didn’t correlate well. One of those kids is in a tippy top STEM PhD program today at a university whose academic bona-fides are lauded on this forum by even the most discerning posters. In that case, there was plenty of other evidence to substantiate her abilities and preparedness and a college that I think you like a lot saw it too and made the wise decision to admit her.
My main point was in response to another post with several sweeping and conclusory claims about students with low scores. That post itself is almost an advertisement of the limits of standardized testing (assuming the poster’s claim to superior scores are accurate).
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So I think there are at least two possibilities.
One is it may just become clear 3 particularly good APs by junior year could be fine for many Yale applicants.
The other is just that competitive Yale applicants in high schools like that will have those 3 APs, and an ACT/SAT.
I note in our feederish HS, we have almost no APs, and I think our top applicants likely would usually have at most one AP (a Calc), and even then only if they were STEM focused.
But our top applicants already almost all had high SAT/ACT test scores, at least the ones competitive unhooked for Yale and the like. So, I doubt this is going to cause us to change our AP policy.
It does
I think part of what that is showing is a 1460 is a really high score anyway, and that the additional information in a 1560 is somewhat dubious.
But let’s say we are looking at four scenarios:
790 Math, 770 EBRW, AP US History 5
790 Math, 770 EBRW, AP US History 4
790 Math, 670 EBRW, AP US History 5
790 Math, 670 EBRW, AP US History 4
It is pretty easy to say the first dominates, and either of the second two dominates the last. But what would Yale prefer among just the second two? Would it even matter to them? Would it depend on other context, possibly including even things like stated interests?
I note this is not exactly new, and my understanding is text flexible always causes a lot of hyper anxious kids and parents to get really concerned about whether they have truly optimized. But from the college’s perspective, they like it because in fact they want to be flexible themselves.
Which is a very good reason to point out this has nothing to do with T/O and everything to do with deeper fundamentals (i.e., learning loss) + a bit of “back in my day”
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My kid loved APUSH (he had a great teacher), and told me that he considered majoring in history after that class. It was an easy 5 for him (while his high SAT friends didn’t feel the same way). But that was all about the content.
SAT EBRW was a puzzle for him… he was not sure what exactly did they want from him? He might have been able to crack that puzzle if it had come on the heels of an actual class. But it’s definitely not a subject / content based test like APUSH.
Of course, we’re in CA so he didn’t prep for the SAT and he didn’t get a chance to take PSAT either (rationing at our school).
I agree about the deeper fundamental trends for sure (and certainly do not blame TO), but worth pointing out that plenty of the teachers posting about this stuff are 20 year, even 30+ year veterans with more than experience to offer valid views. IMO at least.
ETA: meaning, it’s not just “get off my lawn” type stuff, rose colored glasses, etc.
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I agree. As I like to point out, these schools always had many more such applicants they could have admitted, they were just choosing not to admit most of them.
Which does not mean I think they are being misleading about their goals. It is just what they really want is more applicants like that who ALSO meet their contextual academic standards for such applicants. And test optional apparently did not really help that happen, which is not all that surprising to me.
True, but you may also look at it from a different angle. There are A LOT of kids in 1% households who, despite all the resources, couldn’t break the 1500 ceiling or even come close to a 1400. They can have all the shiny essays/ECs, but their SAT scores tell AOs something they otherwise would not have known.
Similarly, disadvantaged kids with marginal ECs can light up the eyes of AOs even when they “only” score a 1300 or 1400, or achieve significantly higher scores than their school averages. Without requiring SAT or any standardized test scores, the probability of false positive (admitted but couldn’t hack it, mainly for STEM) and false negative (dare not even apply) would both go up.
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What’s sad to me are the people who can’t get past their own cynicism about this. Like is it really that hard to believe that these colleges want to do better than they did prior to 2020?
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But weren’t they also complaining about the same thing back then? First, blaming it on TV addiction, then blaming it on iPhones and social media distraction, now blaming it on test optional policies. I think this complaint is as old as time, only the object of blame has changed.
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I wonder if this will impact the structure of US IB programs, many of which are elite and certainly competitive.
Indeed, at some schools the SL and HL classes are evenly spread over 2 years, with all exams in May senior year.
At other schools, SL exams are at the end of junior year, focusing senior year on the 3 HL classes + CAS TOK EE.
The latter program structure would see students able to provide SL scores when applying to Yale.
In any case I assume Yale will clarify what they mean wrt IB students- as well as all international students who typically applied with predicted A level (or bacc or…) results.
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For what is is worth, as an attorney I am well-aware of the legalistic distinction between should and must. And should is more ambiguous in cases where the person would really rather not, and wants to know what will happen to them if they don’t. And unfortunately, in a context like college admissions, that is really unclear. Like, Yale may not throw such an application in the trash, but might it view it less favorably? Is that what they mean, that you should do it if you don’t want to be viewed less favorably? Or something less? Or more?
It is just unfortunate to me it has come to this. In an alternative universe, Yale would say people should do it, and they would just do it. But I know that is not the world we live in.
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I think it’s important to be clear that Yale does state explicitly that test optional students have done less well. The exact quote (from the “how we got there” podcast in the series at 22:45) is: “During the past three years, students admitted with the SAT or ACT scores earned higher Yale GPAs than students admitted without. Now, students we admitted without any testing have done well at Yale but the difference in averages are statistically significant.” This seems like common sense in a world where test scores are an important predictor of college GPA (as both Yale and Dartmouth found) and given that test optional students will tend to have lower scores on average.
We don’t have enough information to know know whether the lower performance of test optional students was substantial enough to be noticeable in the classroom. Nor is Yale telling us whether the performance differences were limited to certain types of classes (e.g., STEM classes). But the performance difference is clearly one factor among several that Yale considered in making its decision. Others mentioned include stemming the flood of low-quality applications, alleviating students of the burden of making strategic decisions about submitting test scores, identifying underprivileged students who may be reluctant to submit their lower but actually impressive scores, and facilitating the work of AOs.
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Ugh. I think that Yale’s willingness to accept AP scores in lieu of the SAT/ACT is going to just put that much more pressure on high school students! With the AP exams, it’s a one shot exam, and it’s certainly possible for a student who has mastered the material to get a 4 rather than a 5, just because they happen to have trouble with one particular item on the test, or because one listening passage on a foreign language exam was drowned out by an announcement over the high school’s PA system. The student never gets another shot at that exam, but right now it doesn’t matter, since a 4 will get them credit at schools that take AP credit, and the elite schools probably won’t give credit even for a 5. OTOH, if they are now significant for admissions, it’s going to become that much more stressful for students.
With the SAT or ACT, the student can take the test again if they’re not happy with their first score. So now, we’re going to have students pushing to take more AP exams, and earlier in high school, and feel tremendous pressure to get a 5 on an AP exam. Way to go, Yale!
As for the argument that the reason to go back to requiring a standardized test score is that test-optional led to disadvantaged students choosing to not submit a standardized test score, when in fact their unsubmitted score might have actually helped their application: I cannot help but feel that it’s a fig leaf, covering the real reason to resume requiring a test score, which is to pare down the number of applications received! The number of applications received jumped dramatically after the school went test-optional. Class of '24 saw a total of about 35K applications, whereas class of '27 saw about 53K applications. Requiring a standardized test score should appropriately prune that number down nicely, reducing the load on the overburdened admissions committee.