I was literally just writing about a post about the mysterious absence of humanities and EBRW in this discussion, so thank you for raising this.
As a History major myself and the mother of an English major, I think humanities get short shrift. Being a truly good reader and writer is a critical skill and studies have shown a decline in standardized tests score in grade school students in this area. There are many jobs outside of STEM and not everyone needs calculus to thrive professionally (I’m living proof!). But the ability to read dense material, draw connections, relate it to other things you’ve learned or read, formulate an argument and articulate your position (verbally or in writing) is a critical skill in nearly every field (and as a voter, citizen, etc.)–and one that, as a society, seems to be waning. My husband is in Big Tech and had to provide a writing sample when he interviewed to demonstrate his ability to concisely present a cogent, persuasive and informative document.
I think essays are one of the most exposed areas for student cheating in the college admissions process. Parents can “help”, essay coaches can “advise”, and now with AI, students barely need to think about it. The SAT had an optional writing portion which meant that a student had to write–on the spot–about a topic. No chance to cheat or use AI.
@Aimlesscat1 said referenced the C5 contact who said that “honors classes are suspect in some areas of the country…” Some colleges (and many HS’s) use honors classes as part of a weighted GPA calculation, and yet, high grades in (some) honors classes don’t seem to necessarily translate into higher test scores, even though the material would (presumably) be taught at higher, college-prep level. Thus outcomes like the one I cited yesterday at SDSU where the average (weighted) GPA is a 3.9 and the average SAT is 1215. If honors courses are meaningful and factored in by AOs in the “rigor” calculation, why are we reluctant to want to back that up with a test score to show mastery of the material and that the course wasn’t fluff?
I can give you some examples, as someone who has worked with disadvantaged students.
Some students
have no computer and/or wifi at home
have 7 siblings below the age of 8 in a one bedroom apt
have parents who are alcoholics, drug abusers, or sex workers
are abused at home and move from couch to couch often, staying wherever they can
don’t have access to transportation to get to tests (many HSs post covid don’t offer SAT/ACT testing)
work full time jobs during HS to support their families
I am sure there are more examples, these are the more extreme examples that I have personally known to be present in my students’ situations.
After 800 posts I don’t understand why the elitism on this thread persists.
Please please posters…volunteer your time to help an underprivileged high school student. Scholarmatch, College Possible, College Greenlight, and many local college access orgs need more people to help. ScholarMatch is running info sessions this month and next: College Coach | ScholarMatch
I know that many posters on this thread also participate in giving advice to students who come to CC for advice. Others have the flag that show you are essay readers. These students really benefit from this.
But I have not seen other frequent posters on the high school threads even though they have a good understanding of holistic admissions (not calling anyone out, as I may have missed seeing them).
For those that haven’t yet, dip your toe in the water by volunteering here on CC, and if you enjoy it, consider working with an underprivileged high school student through an organization like the ones @Mwfan1921 mentioned.
Interestingly, while the UC system was settling the lawsuit by eliminating SAT/ACT, the state education system was moving toward replacing their standard 11th grade assessment with the SAT/ACT, as other states have done in order to universalize SAT/ACT testing for free to students in-school. I don’t know where that initiative is now, though. A fascinating example of left hand + right hand…
@Alqbamine32 — thanks for the kind words. Try to help wherever I can, and that job I got in 2009 when I couldn’t get one anywhere else included posting on CC as part of the description (I had to write draft posts for my interview!) so I do feel some sense of responsibility to this community even if I don’t have as much time now.
We do pay attention to verbal, but our research shows (for MIT, as always) that we have a wider interval that shows prep, and the verbal scores aren’t as skewed as the math scores. There is certainly quantitative chauvinism as well, but I think the difference in predictivity shows up, probably different across institutions and majors.
(There’s also more of an on-ramp to English at MIT than to math)
Local school districts also need volunteers to advise underprivileged students on the college process, so that may be another place to check- for example, the Houston public school EMERGE program sent 14 kids to Middlebury, so there are great success stories out there
While we’re on the subject of CBOs that do great work, let me drop a rec for BEAM, which was started by an MIT alum with Olympiad math background who took a sociology of math course during his graduate school, learned about the racial disparities in high level math for the first time, and dropped out of his PhD to found this program.
That may be true. But some may also support standardized tests because in the eyes of anxious consumers it lends greater transparency and objectivity to a very opaque process where both are lacking. We have seen examples in other human affairs where this scenario breeds distrust in the “system.”
I brought up the non-math part of the SAT at the end of post #800, but it seems that there was no response to that part of the post.
Perhaps it may be due to the math section being more obviously applicable or inapplicable, depending on the student’s college path. But reading and writing skills are more broadly applicable (even in math heavy subjects), although they are harder to proxy with an SAT-like standardized test. Attempts to proxy that in the SAT have resulted in gaming, such as vocabulary focused prep for older vocabulary heavy SATs, and test prep companies finding ways to game the 2004-2016 writing sample section.
Maybe, but I’m not sure the tests really create much “transparency” or “objectivity” for those anxious consumers. Rather, the tests themselves increase confusion and frustration, and breed plenty of distrust in the system, especially if they are to be used in “context” as some suggest. This thread is proof that even among well informed consumers, the opinions on how the tests should be used is very different than how they are actually used.
If you don’t beleive me, try to explain to an anxious parent from the Bay Area why their kid’s 1510 counts less than a 1400 from a kid at a rural school in Kentucky. Explain to them how that that is objective or transparent. Or try explaining to the under-resourced kid in 1400 from a challenging background that she should ignore the data and apply anyway because, in context, her score is great. Or why a kid with perfect grades and a 1450 gets in while a kid from the same school with perfect grades and a 1480 doesn’t.
The reality of the tests don’t line up with expectations about the tests. People don’t understand how they are used. They want the tests to mean something that they don’t. For many schools, using a measure that people misunderstand creates more problems that whatever utility requiring the tests provides.
Of course, but those factors disadvantage students from performing well in all parts of their school activities, they aren’t specifically locking out students from taking the SAT test. Having no computer and/or wifi at home is hugely problematic for researching and writing class papers, with far greater long term effects than whether they can spend a few hours to prep for a test. SAT/ACT testing used to be offered during the school day, and many states even made it compulsory, but “the war on the SAT” discussed in this thread is likely to discourage that in the future. I fully agree that more support should be offered to disadvantaged students to help them reach and demonstrate their potential, and volunteers are critical in doing that. Its very sad that some of the organizations instrumental in uplifting disadvantaged kids have found it increasingly difficult to attract volunteers in recent years.
Actually I think people understand quite well how various factors beyond test scores, including economic adversity, can impact an application; such an understanding is not limited to you.
They likely also understand how an opaque system can be used to deliberately disadvantage one set of applicants.
A more relevant example would be when 2 highly privileged applicants from the same school apply with different scores but equivalent ECs and grades, a not uncomon occurrence. Rather than just relying on the obvious difference of SES privilege we do need to acknowledge that sometimes there is no difference in privilege that explains away a score.
The response from industry to Caltech has not been kind, as in they would rather hire from GeorgiaTech and MIT where they know the students were vetted. Don’t shoot the messenger.
When @BUMD mentioned tests and “anxious consumers” I read that to mean professional licensing tests. Not the SAT/ACT (because I don’t see how consumers would be involved, but maybe @BUMD can clarify)
Out of curiousity: what are your thoughts on standardized tests beyond the high school level?
I think it might surprise you and perhaps others on this thread to know (given my position) that I’m actually completing my college counseling certification for the sole purpose of helping underserved kids (like I was)…and I’ve already had the chance to work with some some students.
We’re all entitled to use our experiences to inform our views. I said elsewhere in this thread that I was/am a first generation, lower income, Pell Grant recipient who worked through college, started out on probation, got my grades up, improved my study skills, transferred and carried an extra-heavy course load to avoid more debt and graduate on time. I know first hand what it takes to attend and graduate from college when the odds are stacked against you. I also know that trying to keep your head above water academically when you (or your family) is struggling financially, you’re carrying a heavy course load, you’re stressed about your next financial aid distribution and you literally can’t afford text books is incredibly difficult.
It’s possible to work with, advocate for–and be!–one of the underprivileged students you are referring to and still land differently on the testing issue than you do. The various posts pointing to elitism and “shutting people out” just aren’t true (at least not true for me, and I strongly suspect for most other posters). Shutting down discussion (as others have done on this post) by claiming elitism, racism and discrimination is a handy way to shut down a poster, but it doesn’t make it true.
Ultimately, I believe in helping a student find the right fit. That means factoring in a variety of variables (academic, economic, environmental, etc.) and could mean, as it did in my personal case, that the right fit immediately post HS wasn’t the right fit two years later when I found my academic sea legs. The great news is that students don’t have to end where they start.
Just because a student has had disadvantages that aren’t their fault and aren’t fair, doesn’t mean that–if they just were given the chance–that they will thrive in an environment where they feel under-prepared. If SATs provide ONE METRIC (not the only metric!) for helping a student assess fit, I think it’s important to factor it in to give them the best chance of having a positive and successful outcome at college. Graduating from college for many kids is hard enough without having to feel like they’re a fish out of water.
I feel a little uncomfortable re: the characterizations of “elitism” in your post and others. I do find hubris driven elitism nauseating, but that isn’t isolated to CC or “rich people”. There is a fair amount of “holier than thou” attitudes in a lot of these posts alongside those posts one may choose to characterize as tone deaf.
Growing up in bad/under resourced conditions is unfair, sometimes cruel, and often heartbreaking. But there are pathways that can work. Maybe not for everyone, but for the super majority. Some of the cases you cite are 6 sigma. Some can be ameliorated with paper practice tests or books that the schools can loan; by chromebooks they can lend and libraries that can stay open. Some however… well some are just heartbreaking. But prepping or not prepping for an SAT is not going to solve that kind of situation. Sadly. I’m not even sure getting into one college vs another will either.
Without getting into my background, I will say I feel some familiarity with some of these kinds of issues. Through the years I’ve worked with over a couple hundred kids, not with college apps or education, but other arenas, and each one needs something, whether rich or poor. Growing up can be tough sometimes regardless of scenario. “Privileged” kids still can experience cancer, still have to cope with physical limitations, still lose a parent, still have to endure abuse. I do hate that they get pejoratively labeled as “privileged” just because of things their parents did.
We don’t know what everyone here does “to do their part”. It would be nice if we toned down the rhetoric and the presuppositions. Not everything has to be a crusade.
That’s great. I just want to make it clear to folks that one does not need to have a college counseling certificate to volunteer to help underprivileged kids at the various orgs that people have posted on this thread.
Just to be clear, speaking for myself, I do not make those claims in order to shut down other posters. I make them because I believe it, and I feel alienated here at times and I want to be authentic in my responses. I often don’t read or post about race on College Confidential because I find the way that some posters discuss minority groups so incredibly painful and upsetting (and occasionally infuriating). Well, also I tend not to post on the subject because I am a rule follower, and it is against the terms of service. The idea of my posts being moderated is mortifying to my rule-following self. But my typical silence doesn’t mean I don’t perceive allusions to race sometimes on the site including on this thread. And I definitely appreciate it when someone else speaks up about those allusions because it makes me feel less alone. I guess that I think if someone says that they perceive a dog whistle, it is worth giving them the benefit of the doubt by believing they are being sincere. Maybe it is not a rhetorical strategy. Maybe they are really hearing the whistle. So try to listen too rather than believing that the person is trying to silence others or being overly sensitive on the subject.
The best we can do is go off of the CDS, where schools list, and rate the importance of, application variables. It will never be truly transparent for us, except for kids who are admitted by clearing defined auto-admit hurdles.
Why would there by any difference in hiring seen yet? Caltech went test blind less than 4 admission cycles ago…those students wouldn’t even be in the hiring pool as of yet.
The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine has “added youths in “high achieving schools” to their list of “at-risk” groups, along with kids living in poverty and foster care, recent immigrants and those with incarcerated parents.”
Emerging research is finding that students in “high-achieving schools” — public and private schools with high standardized test scores, varied extracurricular and academic offerings, and graduates who head off to top colleges — are experiencing higher rates of behavioral and mental health problems compared with national norms.
Last year, a report by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation came to a similar conclusion when it named the top environmental conditions harming adolescent wellness — among them were poverty, trauma, discrimination and “excessive pressure to excel,” often, but not exclusively, occurring in affluent communities. It may sound counterintuitive, even perverse, to put relatively affluent kids in the same category as our country’s most vulnerable youths. While the stressors are markedly different, researchers are finding that both are “at risk” for elevated levels of chronic stress that can affect health and well-being.
The pressure to excel on these students can obviously be intense, and that includes the SAT/ACT. These students have private tutors, take the tests multiple times, and the current state of test optional has led to uncertainty to what constitutes a good enough score for them, and if they can even go TO at some schools that allow it. In many ways, test optional is not working for this group of students.