So, does anyone have any information about how UC application readers will actually be evaluating candidates next year? In glancing at the waitlist threads for the various UCs, I see students reporting getting waitlisted at UCR, for example, with 3.9 GPA and 1070 SAT, 3.6 and 980, and so on and so on. I can imagine that there are enough students with 3.9 and above to fill all the UCs three times over–or more. I’m really not interested in the political debate right now, just want to know what guidance the UCs have given about how applicants will be evaluated next year in the absence of SAT/ACT data. The application essays are super short, and I’m told they don’t take letters of rec, so I’m not sure what they will have to go on besides GPA and, I suppose, the reputation of the school, but that’s correlated to wealth in an even worse way than the SATs, I would think. Does the 3.6 or 3.8 applicant with a great SAT just give up on the UCs entirely? Is it going to be even more random for those with 4.0s and higher? Throw in the multiple variables of second semester junior year GPA for 2021 high school grads, and I can’t imagine a worse year to be applying to the UCs.
I doubt the VPs of admission have put together information and training yet for the AOs and outside readers. I don’t know if all the UCs use outside readers, but UCLA uses several hundred. Some of their past training sessions are on youtube.
I am sure all of the admissions staffs will be busy learning a new system this summer.
Edited to add one of the UCLA training video links (not sure I can link to youtube so here is the link, but there should be no space between you and tube): https://www.you tube.com/watch?v=snNPFl1PJNE
The UC system is planning to be test optional for the next 2 years. The high scoring applicant you mentioned would still have an advantage. The current system is supposed to consider 14 factors in admission. The first 2 are GPA and scores. The other 12 include things like ECs/awards, special projects, rigor including number of AP classes, etc.
@bluebayou. . .
The following paragraph should have the following correction; I didn’t spend enough time editing:
I’m speaking more of 2023 & 2024. We’ll cross that bridge when we get to 2025. I agree with you that it’s going to be tough to devise a test that puts all students on an equal footing, unless their math questions have very basic addition, subtraction, multiplication and division. If that happens, the UC will be the laughing stock of America.
I’m not against quotas, even for those based on race, but as I stated earlier, a lot of the in-state students who grab E/CS slots are also of South and East Asian descent.
Let me add some clarifying notes:
And as far as going back to 90%+ California residents at the UCs, what would be the reasons why the proponents [of going back] would have wanted this? This was fought over vigorously [at Regents’ meetings in 2017?], and the only reason why they would have [wanted to go back][,][ would be to open up the better majors for CA students because we know that Internationals from especially South and East Asia have a very special gift for the E sciences as well as those from CA who are of like background. And this is not [stereo]typing them or other CA students [who are not South or East Asian, say, as to their inability in the E-sciences]. They [the former] just have the gift.
I’m not sure how. I said previously using the word, something to the effect that, “Unfortunately, Napolitano and the Regents enact things by considering the University as a gestalt, instead of considering each of the nine undergraduate institutions as being disparate and unique entities whose administration would be better served to enact whatever policies that would befit their universities, including going ACT/SAT optional.” I also noted that UCLA and UCB should be allowed to keep the tests – and I think they would have, but the others could be left to either keep them or not.
But since it was blanketed over all the campuses, I started to think what majors would be adversely affected. This is why I thought that both, or maybe all the UCs, would recommend the ACT and SAT be taken for E, just as they have for some of the SATII tests. Again, through 2024, and this recommendation could include other majors.
Sorry for being so wordy.
@bluebayou . . . by the way, I did read the article you linked and why you concluded that UC will probably end up with no testing requirements for 2025 and onward.
I agree, because a lot of the experts had their own ideas of how to implement a test that would put everyone on more equal footing and the earlier ones sounded like they were evaluating doctoral candidates. I had a tough time reading and recognizing the sociological, psychological, and whatever terms they used, so I had to look them up.
But the second academic was the toughest to understand for me. I had to read her writeup about five times: she’s the professor from SJSU with a doctorate in English. Her writeup was very intricate and she wanted the tests to enable the student with factors of evaluating the tests based on a person’s background.
She also wanted a quant section and a full written test. Obviously that’s going to work. Some others wanted an ongoing portfolio of achievement, which was mostly student generated, and that might be okay, but they’d probably have to have a stamp of approval from a faculty member.
They saved the last commentary parts for those who seemed more practical and less theoretical. And the last said he didn’t think UC would come up with a test which seemed to make sense in light of the others.
Hi @hebegebe. Sorry for the multi-day delay in my part 2 reply to your comment excerpted above. Lots of zooms, emails, conference calls from my CA-based friends in the past week celebrating the recent UC Regents decision.
RE: the second part of your email partially excerpted above, it bears noting that contemporary psychometricians who are asked to validate standardized tests for fairness have moved far beyond looking solely for evidence of explicit bias in the test questions themselves like the infamous “runner is to marathon as oarsman is to regatta” analogy question. Thus, your assertion that “[t]here is nothing on the test related to race” is largely irrelevant to modern efforts to examine standardized tests for possible bias against groups that would violate professional standards for “fairness in testing.”
Instead, such efforts focus on three areas of concern:
- Differential Prediction
- Differential Item Functioning or “DIF”
- Differential Test Context
Fuller explanation of these three factors are elaborated in the excellent May 2016 Saul Geiser report, “A Proposal to Eliminate the SAT in Berkeley Admissions” that @Data10 referenced in post #91 of this thread, available again here at https://cshe.berkeley.edu/sites/default/files/publications/rops.cshe_.4.16.geiser.satproposalberkeley.5.2.2016.pdf
I will address Differential Prediction in a subsequent reply to posts about predictive value of the SAT, and will focus on Differential Item Functioning or “DIF” as the most relevant to your comment and least understood manifestation of unwarranted racial advantage on the SAT and ACT. In short, the process of validating a norm-referenced test like the SAT or ACT “locks in” racial gap disparities through the selection process for questions. Stated otherwise, because norm-referenced tests must have reliability across different administrations and locations of the test using different test questions, new questions are selected on the basis of whether they produce the same group-based results performance-wise. I’ll quote from Geiser’s report on this since he does such a good job of explaining this somewhat difficult methodological point and its disparate impact on African Americans and Latinx in particular:
Quoted from May 2016 Geiser report (link above), from pp. 9-10:
Differential item functioning, or DIF, occurs “… when equally able test takers differ in their probabilities of answering a test item correctly as a function of group membership” (AERA/APA/NCME, 2014:51). There is clear evidence of DIF on the SAT. The most recent and authoritative work in this area is that by psychometricians Veronica Santelices and Mark Wilson of Berkeley’s graduate school of education. Based on analysis of several forms of the SAT offered in different years, they found that about 10% of all items exhibited large DIF for black examinees and 3% to 10% for Latino examinees, depending on the year and form; moderate-to-low levels of DIF were found for a substantially larger percentage of items for both subgroups (Santelices & Wilson, 2012:23).
…
Despite this, however, there are grounds for believing that norm-referenced exams like the SAT or ACT may unintentionally create DIF because of the way those tests are developed. Before any item is included in the SAT, it is reviewed for reliability, which is measured by the internal correlation between performance on that item and overall performance on the test among a reference population. If the correlation drops below 0.30, the item is typically flagged and excluded from the test. Santelices and Wilson’s main finding was that differential item functioning for black and Latino examinees was inversely related to item difficulty. Surprisingly, DIF was greater on easier rather than on more difficult SAT items.
UC Riverside scholar William C. Kidder, with Jay Rosner of the Princeton Review, argues that when the reference population is comprised disproportionately of non-minority examinees, the norming process will systematically tend to exclude items on which minority students perform well, and vice versa, even though the items seem unbiased on their face:
Such a bias tends to be obscured because Whites have historically scored higher on the SAT than African Americans and Chicanos. The entire score gap is usually attributed to differences in academic preparation, although a significant and unrecognized portion of the gap is an inevitable result of … the development process (Kidder and Rosner, 2002:159).
I strongly urge everyone on this thread to read the May 2016 Geiser report, esp. pp. 9-10 if you haven’t already, as well as a subsequent report of his from December 2017 on “NORM-REFERENCED TESTS AND RACE-BLIND ADMISSIONS: The Case for Eliminating the SAT and ACT at the University of California” at https://cshe.berkeley.edu/sites/default/files/publications/2.rops.cshe.15.2017.geiser.testsrace-blind_admissions.12.18.2017.pdf
Without this background understanding grounded in research, one might be quick to disparage the UC Regents as a bunch of “politicos” or “SJW’s” or other pejorative/ad hominem of choice, which only degrades and polarizes the level of discussion on this important topic.
Most of the things you are citing rely on prior versions of the SAT and these are not really relevant to the current form of the SAT.
In any event, the SAT is not biased simply because particular groups of takers do better or more poorly on it. The test results are simply a reflection of the education a particular test taker has received up to that point (K-12). Yes, students from certain backgrounds tend to perform better or worse than others. That is a not a problem with the test - it’s a problem with K-12 education which desperately needs to be addressed to close those educational gaps.
Furthermore, eliminating the use of the SAT does little to make admissions more fair or provide more equal opportunities across groups of applicants. A standardized test score can often be the one thing that helps a student from a less advantaged background improve his/her chances of admission when competing with wealthier/more advantaged students who have better access to fancy extracurricular programs and better academic advising, etc. Eliminating the SAT only serves to make the admissions process less fair for disadvantaged groups, imo.
Those who seek to eliminate these exams are focusing on the symptom - not the actual problem - which is improving K-12 education.
Sorry, if posted already. From Forbes:
I have been thinking the same thing. I can see Michigan soon overtaking Berkeley for the top spot among public universities for undergraduate education. Their finances are in far better shape, their administration still seems to be competent, and they have loyal alumni.
I’m a CA resident who sent D18 to UMich. I’m betting on it. 
Hi @UCBUSCalum. Thanks for your reply and forgive my delayed reply. Lots of activity lately around UC Regents vote and deadlines for the Harvard admissions appeal.
I want to assure you that I have no desire to portray your comments as “politically correct” or “incorrect.” My simple motivation is to counter the model minority myth as it is commonly deployed and designed to disparage “non-model” minorities, typically African Americans.
I suspected you may not be aware of how this widely disseminated trope serves a racial wedge function, which is why I raised it not only for you but also for any others this board generally. I take you at your word that you learned of this term and only its seemingly complimentary “up-by-their-bootstraps” narrative through the PBS 5-part documentary on Asian Americans released earlier this month by producer Renee Tajima-Peña. You likely viewed Part 2, Episode 3: “Good Americans & Generation Rising.” This episode covers the model minority stereotype. You can watch it again at the link below beginning around the 15:36 mark, for the part you must have missed, where University of Minnesota historian Erika Lee (another Cal alum and Ph.D.!) explains the context and political use of the term:
“The idea that Asian Americans could become so successful without any government intervention or government help is used not only to de-legitimize the real claims of discrimination by African Americans, but also to create a wedge between these two groups. When Asian Americans overcome adversity, they are celebrated. But when African Americans demand equality, they are vilified.”
https://www.pbs.org/video/night-2-good-americans-generation-rising-eizfak/
I cannot speak to your friend’s anecdotal experience at a “low performing high school,” but if you are concerned about whether grade inflation necessitates standardized tests (a concern often forwarded without support by the College Board), this concern can be addressed by providing context for admissions officers by including class rank and/or data like means and standard deviations of grades in a school. See the work of Jesse Rothstein, UCB prof. of Public Policy. He spoke on the second faculty panel on “Research and Policy” at the public morning portion of the UC Regents board meeting available on youtube.
As for your good question, “how do you devise the test so that there is no cultural bias with the goal that everyone is in the same playing field and keep the integrity of the admission process?”, one thing you can definitely do is to eliminate a norm-referenced test that validates future questions by locking in by design, URM historic disadvantage. As explained in the lawsuit against the UC Regents and Janet Napolitano for their continued use of the SAT/ACT in UC admissions:
“If White students have higher overall scores than underrepresented minority
students on a given set of pre-test items, a facially neutral reliability analysis will tend to find strong positive correlations for items on which White students perform better, as opposed to “weakly positive or even negative correlations” for items on which underrepresented minority students perform better. Items that favor White students will thus be deemed reliable—resulting in their inclusion on the test—whereas those that favor underrepresented minority students will be deemed unreliable—resulting in their exclusion.”
See http://www.publiccounsel.org/tools/assets/files/1250.pdf, p. 40-41.
It would also be healthy to align any standardized test to K-12 standards, so that all testing reflects the curriculum high school students are required to learn.
For what it’s worth, the SAT explicitly purports to measure academic skills in accordance with the Common Core State Standards (hence College Board hiring CEO David Coleman, who had previously managed the drafting of the Common Core). As far as I am aware, California adopted CCSS.
Hi @amsunshine. Thanks for your post. Before I respond in substance, could you clarify what you mean by your first sentence so that I understand your point:
“Most of the things you are citing rely on prior versions of the SAT and these are not really relevant to the current form of the SAT.”
Are you saying that Differential Item Functioning is no longer relevant? Or something else? And if you could please cite your source (other than unsupported College Board statements) for why you think these critiques are no longer “relevant” to the revised SAT (post-2016)? Thanks in advance.
^The writing of the Redesigned SAT is believed to have been taken in-house by College Board rather than subcontracting that portion to ETS as had been the case for a long time prior. It’s a rather different test.
I’m saying that if you read the studies you cite, you will see they are relying on data from the unrevised SAT (Pre-2016.) The revised SAT, as pointed out by @evergreen5, above, the revised SAT endeavors to cover the Common Core standards that are supposed to be learned in CA high schools. (This is also why I feel the SAT has been “dumbed down” to a certain extent). Furthermore, the CB teamed up with Khan Academy to provide totally free test prep resources (and frankly, I feel this is the best test prep available for SAT). In any event, it will take a number of years to adequately assess whether the Common Core switch, along with the revised SAT and additional Khan Academy resources, provide new data regarding how well all different groups are learning. One can’t just flip a switch and expect that new curricula and a new testing format will generate instant improvement. It will take time to see how all of those things impact student learning and test outcomes. Referring back to historical test outcomes really isn’t relevant in the context of the current test.
I do feel, however, that most, if not all, of the discrepancies (historical or otherwise) in test outcomes between various groups are due not to test bias, but rather to failures of California k-12 schools.
Just do your homework & you don’t have to worry about the color of your skin 
There was an interview and Q&A with Janet Napolitano on KQED public radio’s Forum program this morning (https://www.kqed.org/forum) which touched on many of these issues. President Napolitano was asked both about Prop 209 and about how admissions would be undertaken without ACT/SAT results to help judge between the achievements in different schools. While she is going to step down in the near future, this is still a good guide to how the politicians in charge are thinking.
She stated explicitly that she disagreed with Prop 209 and believed that race and gender were an important consideration in admissions, and that recent events had demonstrated the importance of considering race. She also stated that she expected UC admissions to look at the relative performance of students within a school, in order to determine which of them should be admitted, but didn’t answer the question fully (which was how could the UCs ensure that they are admitting those students who are best able to succeed in college).
She made no mention of ever moving to a UC test to replace the SAT/ACT, and IMO her comments could be taken to imply that she favors some sort of explicit quotas or targets for race/gender/admissions by school (which would differ from the current mix of admissions) in order to achieve more representation from certain communities.
So she confirmed she’s a Racist & a Sexist - Got it
Just do your homework each night & you won’t have to worry about the color of your skin on your SAT.
https://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/infocenter/ca-hs-pipeline may be relevant to this part of the discussion.