Well, to really game the system, I imagine someone can take it twice and get (800, 0 and 0,800) to superscore 1600. Taking a test for 90 minutes is much easier than full concentration for 3 hours. Not to mention once upon a time, the same booklet was used and apparently some kids will flip the pages back… But I don’t know if the test is still administered that way.
Yes they are. I stand corrected, Hamilton was test flexible prior. But Hamilton does require standardized testing for those who took it to be submitted upon enrollment. I’m not sure on Wes.
1 Like
I picked a school - it can be any LAC that is TO or was before COVID.
If they weren’t before Covid, then it’s different and my “choice” of a school was the wrong choice. I should have said Bates or Colby. There is no ax against any school. And I don’t recall ever making a snide comment about Vassar. You must have me confused with someone else. There have been debates with Vassar alums and discussions about city access vs. other schools, etc. but nothing snide to set the record straight.
If one stays after Covid when another requires a test - there will be that delta - those who applied TO did so for a reason - which I would surmise was they didn’t have the score reflective of that overall school.
So whatever schools were TO before COVID - those are who I am talking about.
So I can’t find a list - I know Bates is long TO. It looks like Bucknell in 2018. Colby as well.
There’s no ax to grind and no one said they don’t have smart kids at Vassar or anywhere else.
Having “x” test score doesn’t make you smart or not.
I said that kids who are applying TO are not as statistically at the same level. And that’s my belief - otherwise they’d have submitted a test.
Here’s a list of all by dates they went TO. Scroll to the bottom for older but it’s mostly lesser pedigree schools (who also have smart kids by the way).
1 Like
Do not forget ACT may be better for her. Have her take the diagnostic test. My kid waa predicted for about 1350, based on psat. Took an act diagnostic, said that it suited them better, self prepped, got a 36.
3 Likes
It is, I personally know numerous (maybe even majority) of kids that flipped back. Not me, I have the moral inability to lie 
2 Likes
I found out these things late. Apparently, a few kid I know had dictionaries in the car when vocab was still being tested on the SAT… And there was a 15 min break in between some sections.
1 Like
Yes and the bathroom breaks….I’ve seen unremarkable amounts of cheating. I got a 35 on the ACT so it didn’t upset me that much, although it’s frustrating when a kid gets the same score as me through cheating!
Some kid cheated off me on the ACT and got a 34 or 35 too- because my friend knew who he was and asked him after about it. Ugh.
I didn’t study for it, but if I did, I’d be so pissed.
1 Like
I think you missed my point - I didn’t say there aren’t kids who may prefer one vs. the other. In other words, I didn’t say that a kid who applies to Bowdoin will definitely apply to Harvard.
What I said was - there will be some kids who apply to Bowdoin that would also apply to Harvard but their 1200 SAT or 28 ACT creates a situation where they don’t because they know they can’t get in.
I didn’t say this is a 100% scenario but noted that it’s a very common scenario - forgetting the specific school names (I shouldn’t have used because people think you are shooting at thier school).
The names, frankly don’t matter. I made the comment above that someone may apply to Alabama instead of Florida because even if they want to go to Florida and grade and rigor wise they are there but they have a 24 ACT or 1100 SAT and know it’s not going to happen.
Everyone is taking offense at school names. It’s not about schools - I put in as a stand in.
It’s about the concept that students will not even apply to schools that require a test - if their test score isn’t in the hemisphere. That’s it.
Honestly, it’s a very benign statement and example - that I’m sure plays out in real life.
Is that true? I haven’t heard AOs directly say that, but have heard it’s really hard to find these students.
One issue is that even with strong relative scores, let’s just say 1350-1400, some of these students won’t apply to a test required school when they see the test score range. Some counselors may also be encouraging that or otherwise support that decision.
Another issue is that the disadvantaged students with high scores can also apply to the test optional/test blind schools with those scores, so lots of competition for these students.
I get the desire to decrease apps. I get what their internal data show them. Time will tell if they increase the proportion of pell Grant students….and more limited income students have to start taking the tests.
I note I also have access to SCOIR data for my feederish HS, and one thing that became apparent to me is very few people ended up with the GPAs apparently necessary for, say Harvard, but without a high enough high test score as well. In fact the opposite scenario–high enough test score but not high enough grades–was notably more common.
This again supports what Dartmouth and Yale have said they are seeing with kids from high schools like ours. And certainly here, the 1200 test scorer with the grades for Harvard et al is very far from common.
My understanding — and I’m not deep in the details here — is that the universities have not found SBAC to be a well-aligned or predictive instrument, and before Covid, the momentum was toward replacing it with the SAT as the California state assessment exam.
But then the Board of Regents overrode the STTF study in order to settle a lawsuit, went test blind with some goal to ultimately align/improve the SBAC as an alternative, but ~no one thinks that will ever happen. IMHO, that is because no standardized test objected to on the grounds that the distribution of scores is unequal can overcome the substantive inequality closely linked to race in K12 education.
6 Likes
This was one of the arguments mentioned, but the UC study group also felt that using the SBAC for college admission would turn it into a high stakes test, reducing its usefulness for its primary purpose. You might want to look at the study if you’re curious, I posted this above but we’ve had a lot of discussion already since then 
https://regents.universityofcalifornia.edu/regmeet/nov21/b3attach2.pdf
1 Like
Maybe, but keep in mind the majority of high scoring students at under-resourced schools are themselves well-resourced. This is why Top 10 percent and other socioeconomic plans aimed to increase diversity (racial or economic) tend to not work. The same is true for testing.
To be clear, we do use testing to help identify well-prepared students from economically disadvantaged backgrounds. But it’s not quite so simple as the high achievers at a low income school; it might be one of the few low income students at a well resourced school, or something.
7 Likes
But your high school is of one demographic vs. overall society.
What Dartmouth put out may be the truth.
I’m not buying it but I’m not the audience.
btw - these schools want diverse and well rounded classes - so perhaps if everyone has a 1500+, they are then missing something in the class and that’s fair too.
In the end, as I wrote up thread - the schools can admit who they want - test or not - and I respect their right.
But I do think that TO schools (when others aren’t) are likely letting in students that would potentially be seen differently (and not as glowingly) in admission if they did submit a score.
But I also think someone mentioned self selection - that the kid with a 1200 is deselecting certain schools - never even doing the app.
Anyway - ok, time for others to chime in 
I’ll drop off because we have believe what we do - and that’s great to hear so many perspectives.
I understand what you are saying, but I think you are overstating the influence of TO policies on who decides to apply to those liberal arts colleges as well as who is admitted. I suspect that there still aren’t many 1200 SAT or 28 ACT students who are actually admitted to the TO optional but elite liberal arts colleges that you name; therefore it doesn’t matter if there are more lower scoring applicants as much as you are implying. Not that it doesn’t matter at all. It probably makes some difference in applicant pool and perhaps accepted student statistics when kids don’t have to submit a score until after enrolling. But at least if I look at the kids from my children’s schools who apply to Bowdoin, Bates and other elite liberal arts colleges, historically, they have been mostly indistinguishable than the kids who apply to Ivy League colleges. In some cases, it is the same students applying to both types of colleges, and in other cases, the individual kids just want a different type of college experience so they don’t apply to the bigger universities at all.
2 Likes
So Dartmouth suggested that with test scores available to consider, the admit rate of lower SES applicants in the 1450 to 1490 range could increase from 2% to 7.4%.
That’s a big multiple, but still a small percentage. Meaning Dartmouth isn’t running out of these applicants, it is just rejecting the vast majority.
1 Like
I wish I just said school A and B vs. giving a name…because the examples run far deeper than elite LACs vs. Ivy, etc.
My point was - the stud kid with the 28 will apply to any TO school if they have the grades / rigor and may wanted to apply to a school with a range of 33-35 but didn’t because they knew they couldn’t get in with a 28.
As more schools add test score requirements, more kids will “deselect” those schools from their application list - is all I was really trying to say. And so yes, those TO schools are letting in kids that those others, thought to be similar in perception, would not enroll.
I know you get it.
Thanks - I’m off this one
Right, our HS is very much not representative of high schools in general.
However, it is pretty representative of most of the sorts of kids Dartmouth and Yale and Vassar and such are admitting. Not all, but the majority.
So to the extent the question is whether Dartmouth is lying about what it sees when looking at kids like ours, the fact I am independently seeing consistent data is relevant.
But of course I can’t similarly assess what Dartmouth is saying about kids from very different high schools. Because those are very different high schools.
Not to pile on but I agree there are likely very few kids applying and getting into a top LAC with a 1200 SAT. The one kid we know who got into a top LAC (not one mentioned here yet) test optional had a score more like a 1400. That was probably below 25th percentile at the school she applied to and did not add to her application given she had A’s in very advanced math (beyond Calc BC) and science classes which showed her ability much better. So she went TO.
2 Likes