So many unweighted 4.0s.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Between MCPS absolutely ridiculous grading scale and the fact that they are not allowed to administer final exams, it’s a wonder those kids are prepared for college. And it’s absurd that MCPS students are compared to students from schools that have strict grading scales, no test retakes, homework graded for accuracy and no weighting for honors/AP classes.

Test retakes are why my oldest failed out of university. Smart young man with zero study skills or time management. I vividly recall him saying in 9th through 12th how such and such bad score didn't matter because he'd be able to retake it. How such and such missed assignment didn't matter because he'd turn it in later for full credit. He was sent off to university with the executive functions of a elementary student.

This is defrauding parents and I wish parents would call it out as a scam. But nobody wants to admit the As their kid has are fake.

His siblings were put in private school. Hard lesson. The oldest still hasn't gone back to finish college and probably never will.

+100

APS was absolutely ridiculous. My kids had classmates in middle school that didn't even start work or bother with until past deadlines because they knew they could turn it in late and still get an A...and if they weren't given an A they could keep correcting it until they reached an A.

My kids always did their work on time with no interference with us. But, post-Covid we saw our 8th grader start falling into the slack category.

He is now a Freshmen (older brother a Junior) and I was so pleased to be at a school where you need to be prepared for class. There may be a pop quiz. You are expected to contribute to discussions. You do not get credit for late assignments. They are understanding for true/legit reasons (which are very rare), but they hold the kids accountable. Not to mention the rigor is much greater.

They also run the high school like college from Day 1. The way the exam weeks are held. The percentage of grade from Final Exams, etc. The firstborn was really thrown back with Finals at midterms and how he needed to go back and study everything he had learned so far...and it was a considerate portion of his grade.

I have no doubt they will be 100% prepared for college. I have been told by a few profs I know and other adults that kids from children's school were always some of the best performers at the universities.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:At our MCPS school:

-no retakes
-deduction of 10% for late work
-semester grades not yearly grades (this is true of every MCPS school)

A 4.0 for a challenging schedule is rare at our school, as reflected in GPAs for college admissions contained on Naviance.

Please stop with spreading false information.

At our MCPS high school, late work not accepted. No retakes allowed. And grades are semesters.

OP IS GIVING COMPLETELY WRONG INFORMATION!

From what I understand, you can get a 79.5 for quarter 1 and 89.5 for quarter 2 and end up with an A for the semester. Your kid just doesn't know how to work the system.

It's called a rolling gradebook... look it up.

Is rolling gradebook popular among parents and students?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:At our MCPS school:

-no retakes
-deduction of 10% for late work
-semester grades not yearly grades (this is true of every MCPS school)

A 4.0 for a challenging schedule is rare at our school, as reflected in GPAs for college admissions contained on Naviance.

Please stop with spreading false information.

At our MCPS high school, late work not accepted. No retakes allowed. And grades are semesters.

OP IS GIVING COMPLETELY WRONG INFORMATION!

From what I understand, you can get a 79.5 for quarter 1 and 89.5 for quarter 2 and end up with an A for the semester. Your kid just doesn't know how to work the system.

It's called a rolling gradebook... look it up.

Is rolling gradebook popular among parents and students?

We like it in our family. With the rolling gradebook, one bad test score doesn't doom your grade for the quarter.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Despite 10 pages of concerns, highly selective colleges have no trouble choosing excellent kids and building a great class.

Their problem is the opposite: choosing whom to reject from the large number of qualified kids.

Your concern that these issues, whether real or imagined, are causing colleges to select kids that are unqualified and incapable is just not borne out by evidence.

You're completely speaking out of your A$$. How do you know this? Have there been studies? Has enough time passed for there to even been evidence to accrue?

No.
We don't have graduation rates of the test-optional and grade inflated Covid cohort.
We don't even have GPA data. We certainly don't have post-graduation employment data.

You are being all very authoritarian about total BS.

First, you can go ahead and use pejoratives, but it is best not to follow them up with a post that agrees with the premise you object to: that there is no evidence to support the claim.

Not one elite college I am aware of has said they have a problem caused by grade inflation (OR test optional even though that was not part of the thread!). In fact, most of them are doing just fine in admissions, taking pretty much the same kind of kids, and not reporting spiked first year dropout rates.

If you want to wait a few years for employment data and 4 year graduation rates and come back and mea culpa, that's fine. I can wait. But we agree there is no evidence to support your claim, other than your random speculation which is likely driven by ideology.

MIT did.

Wrong and untrue. They simply went back to using test scores after Covid. They never said they were unable to admit an MIT quality cohort without them.

But again, this thread, and the post above, was not about TO, but about GPA, so it is irrelevant anyway. They definitely never said grade inflation was causing them to have a poor class.

MIT did say that grades alone were not sufficiently predictive of success after admission.

https://mitadmissions.org/blogs/entry/we-are-reinstating-our-sat-act-requirement-for-future-admissions-cycles/

“Our research shows this predictive validity holds even when you control for socioeconomic factors that correlate with testing. It also shows that good grades in high school do not themselves necessarily translate to academic success at MIT if you cannot account for testing.”

They also noted the impact of the pandemic on student preparation:

“The pandemic has only made this more clear, because classroom work and assessment have been just as disrupted as access to the tests, if not more so, and for longer periods of time, disproportionately affecting the most socioeconomically disadvantaged students. We know that the pandemic’s effects on grades and courses will linger for years, but the tests can give students a more recent opportunity to show that they have made up lost ground.⁠”

MIT is one of the very few - if not the only T25 - that went back to requiring the SAT after TO. It's a niche tech school that doesn't attract a wide swath of applicants, and it has board members aligned with the College Board. An outlier. Thousands of colleges - including HYPS and the other Ivies - are test optional. It's not going away.

I agree. I would never use MIT (or Georgetown) as an example of anything. Those two have always been outliers - requiring their own application, Georgetown's past fixation on subject tests, etc.

You forgot Florida, Georgia, and Purdue.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Between MCPS absolutely ridiculous grading scale and the fact that they are not allowed to administer final exams, it’s a wonder those kids are prepared for college. And it’s absurd that MCPS students are compared to students from schools that have strict grading scales, no test retakes, homework graded for accuracy and no weighting for honors/AP classes.

But amazingly, they are. Ask the ones in college now. At least the students hat took college-bound classes (AP/IB etc) feel that they are more than adequately prepared for their classes, even if they received As for an 89.5 in high school - or, horrors, a B for a 79.5.

That's the thing, and my DCs didn't even have the unweighted 4.0s, yet both are in college with an MCPS education, feeling better prepared than peers. Oldest was recruited to work in the campus writing center, she sees how younger students cope as they hit their research papers and portfolio requirements. Youngest is the only freshman in one of his math courses, covering material I didn't see until grad school.

This board is so obsessed with finding a number on a scrap of paper that settles things once and for all, but it can't be done.

Why so defensive? Great your kid managed to get something out of MCPS. When did they graduate? That makes a big difference as well because things are getting progressively worse. Also it depends what institution they are in...doubtful it is a top school based on your statements.

Defensive, how? just agreeing, and satisfied with MCPS and the grading policy--parent of 2019 and 2022 grads. Yes, in the past (eg when my parents were in HS) grades were used to pit individuals against each other. The current thinking is instead grades indicate degree of mastery by the end of the course.

In other words...equity. Equity in terms of academics is destroying public school outcomes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Between MCPS absolutely ridiculous grading scale and the fact that they are not allowed to administer final exams, it’s a wonder those kids are prepared for college. And it’s absurd that MCPS students are compared to students from schools that have strict grading scales, no test retakes, homework graded for accuracy and no weighting for honors/AP classes.

But amazingly, they are. Ask the ones in college now. At least the students hat took college-bound classes (AP/IB etc) feel that they are more than adequately prepared for their classes, even if they received As for an 89.5 in high school - or, horrors, a B for a 79.5.

That's the thing, and my DCs didn't even have the unweighted 4.0s, yet both are in college with an MCPS education, feeling better prepared than peers. Oldest was recruited to work in the campus writing center, she sees how younger students cope as they hit their research papers and portfolio requirements. Youngest is the only freshman in one of his math courses, covering material I didn't see until grad school.

This board is so obsessed with finding a number on a scrap of paper that settles things once and for all, but it can't be done.

Why so defensive? Great your kid managed to get something out of MCPS. When did they graduate? That makes a big difference as well because things are getting progressively worse. Also it depends what institution they are in...doubtful it is a top school based on your statements.

Defensive, how? just agreeing, and satisfied with MCPS and the grading policy--parent of 2019 and 2022 grads. Yes, in the past (eg when my parents were in HS) grades were used to pit individuals against each other. The current thinking is instead grades indicate degree of mastery by the end of the course.

Define "degree of mastery." That is very subjective and from what we have seen, the bar has been set VERY VERY low.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Between MCPS absolutely ridiculous grading scale and the fact that they are not allowed to administer final exams, it’s a wonder those kids are prepared for college. And it’s absurd that MCPS students are compared to students from schools that have strict grading scales, no test retakes, homework graded for accuracy and no weighting for honors/AP classes.

But amazingly, they are. Ask the ones in college now. At least the students hat took college-bound classes (AP/IB etc) feel that they are more than adequately prepared for their classes, even if they received As for an 89.5 in high school - or, horrors, a B for a 79.5.

That's the thing, and my DCs didn't even have the unweighted 4.0s, yet both are in college with an MCPS education, feeling better prepared than peers. Oldest was recruited to work in the campus writing center, she sees how younger students cope as they hit their research papers and portfolio requirements. Youngest is the only freshman in one of his math courses, covering material I didn't see until grad school.

This board is so obsessed with finding a number on a scrap of paper that settles things once and for all, but it can't be done.

Why so defensive? Great your kid managed to get something out of MCPS. When did they graduate? That makes a big difference as well because things are getting progressively worse. Also it depends what institution they are in...doubtful it is a top school based on your statements.

+1. Emphasis on worse

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Between MCPS absolutely ridiculous grading scale and the fact that they are not allowed to administer final exams, it’s a wonder those kids are prepared for college. And it’s absurd that MCPS students are compared to students from schools that have strict grading scales, no test retakes, homework graded for accuracy and no weighting for honors/AP classes.

But amazingly, they are. Ask the ones in college now. At least the students hat took college-bound classes (AP/IB etc) feel that they are more than adequately prepared for their classes, even if they received As for an 89.5 in high school - or, horrors, a B for a 79.5.

That's the thing, and my DCs didn't even have the unweighted 4.0s, yet both are in college with an MCPS education, feeling better prepared than peers. Oldest was recruited to work in the campus writing center, she sees how younger students cope as they hit their research papers and portfolio requirements. Youngest is the only freshman in one of his math courses, covering material I didn't see until grad school.

This board is so obsessed with finding a number on a scrap of paper that settles things once and for all, but it can't be done.

Why so defensive? Great your kid managed to get something out of MCPS. When did they graduate? That makes a big difference as well because things are getting progressively worse. Also it depends what institution they are in...doubtful it is a top school based on your statements.

Defensive, how? just agreeing, and satisfied with MCPS and the grading policy--parent of 2019 and 2022 grads. Yes, in the past (eg when my parents were in HS) grades were used to pit individuals against each other. The current thinking is instead grades indicate degree of mastery by the end of the course.

In other words...equity. Equity in terms of academics is destroying public school outcomes.

Ain't that the truth.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Between MCPS absolutely ridiculous grading scale and the fact that they are not allowed to administer final exams, it’s a wonder those kids are prepared for college. And it’s absurd that MCPS students are compared to students from schools that have strict grading scales, no test retakes, homework graded for accuracy and no weighting for honors/AP classes.

But amazingly, they are. Ask the ones in college now. At least the students hat took college-bound classes (AP/IB etc) feel that they are more than adequately prepared for their classes, even if they received As for an 89.5 in high school - or, horrors, a B for a 79.5.

That's the thing, and my DCs didn't even have the unweighted 4.0s, yet both are in college with an MCPS education, feeling better prepared than peers. Oldest was recruited to work in the campus writing center, she sees how younger students cope as they hit their research papers and portfolio requirements. Youngest is the only freshman in one of his math courses, covering material I didn't see until grad school.

This board is so obsessed with finding a number on a scrap of paper that settles things once and for all, but it can't be done.

Why so defensive? Great your kid managed to get something out of MCPS. When did they graduate? That makes a big difference as well because things are getting progressively worse. Also it depends what institution they are in...doubtful it is a top school based on your statements.

Defensive, how? just agreeing, and satisfied with MCPS and the grading policy--parent of 2019 and 2022 grads. Yes, in the past (eg when my parents were in HS) grades were used to pit individuals against each other. The current thinking is instead grades indicate degree of mastery by the end of the course.

In other words...equity. Equity in terms of academics is destroying public school outcomes.

Fox news has entered the chat room.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Between MCPS absolutely ridiculous grading scale and the fact that they are not allowed to administer final exams, it’s a wonder those kids are prepared for college. And it’s absurd that MCPS students are compared to students from schools that have strict grading scales, no test retakes, homework graded for accuracy and no weighting for honors/AP classes.

Test retakes are why my oldest failed out of university. Smart young man with zero study skills or time management. I vividly recall him saying in 9th through 12th how such and such bad score didn't matter because he'd be able to retake it. How such and such missed assignment didn't matter because he'd turn it in later for full credit. He was sent off to university with the executive functions of a elementary student.

This is defrauding parents and I wish parents would call it out as a scam. But nobody wants to admit the As their kid has are fake.

His siblings were put in private school. Hard lesson. The oldest still hasn't gone back to finish college and probably never will.

+100

APS was absolutely ridiculous. My kids had classmates in middle school that didn't even start work or bother with until past deadlines because they knew they could turn it in late and still get an A...and if they weren't given an A they could keep correcting it until they reached an A.

My kids always did their work on time with no interference with us. But, post-Covid we saw our 8th grader start falling into the slack category.

He is now a Freshmen (older brother a Junior) and I was so pleased to be at a school where you need to be prepared for class. There may be a pop quiz. You are expected to contribute to discussions. You do not get credit for late assignments. They are understanding for true/legit reasons (which are very rare), but they hold the kids accountable. Not to mention the rigor is much greater.

They also run the high school like college from Day 1. The way the exam weeks are held. The percentage of grade from Final Exams, etc. The firstborn was really thrown back with Finals at midterms and how he needed to go back and study everything he had learned so far...and it was a considerate portion of his grade.

I have no doubt they will be 100% prepared for college. I have been told by a few profs I know and other adults that kids from children's school were always some of the best performers at the universities.

If you have a kid that is willing to do the bare minimum it could be an issue. My kid would never want to waste time taking a retake. They were too busy with other things. I think they used to option once or twice in the 4 years. I guess I would have had to look at private options if I saw it happening. DC is at a top college and doing fine.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:When I was in high school in another country, we sat nationwide exams in all our subjects. The school newsletter said that the 91% I got in English was the highest grade for any student in any subject for my entire school. I have to laugh that it wouldn't even be an A in many US schools.

This is what my parents describe in their home country. Very few kids could go to college, and those who could were relentlessly sorted by score.

When I was a kid there was a board game called "head of the class. By answering question your game piece could end up in the upper right corner of the grid of desks, or in the back corner with a dunces cap. Completely antiquated even then, no classroom I had was structured that way. Time marches on.

Oh God! I had that game!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Despite 10 pages of concerns, highly selective colleges have no trouble choosing excellent kids and building a great class.

Their problem is the opposite: choosing whom to reject from the large number of qualified kids.

Your concern that these issues, whether real or imagined, are causing colleges to select kids that are unqualified and incapable is just not borne out by evidence.

You're completely speaking out of your A$$. How do you know this? Have there been studies? Has enough time passed for there to even been evidence to accrue?

No.
We don't have graduation rates of the test-optional and grade inflated Covid cohort.
We don't even have GPA data. We certainly don't have post-graduation employment data.

You are being all very authoritarian about total BS.

First, you can go ahead and use pejoratives, but it is best not to follow them up with a post that agrees with the premise you object to: that there is no evidence to support the claim.

Not one elite college I am aware of has said they have a problem caused by grade inflation (OR test optional even though that was not part of the thread!). In fact, most of them are doing just fine in admissions, taking pretty much the same kind of kids, and not reporting spiked first year dropout rates.

If you want to wait a few years for employment data and 4 year graduation rates and come back and mea culpa, that's fine. I can wait. But we agree there is no evidence to support your claim, other than your random speculation which is likely driven by ideology.

MIT did.

Wrong and untrue. They simply went back to using test scores after Covid. They never said they were unable to admit an MIT quality cohort without them.

But again, this thread, and the post above, was not about TO, but about GPA, so it is irrelevant anyway. They definitely never said grade inflation was causing them to have a poor class.

MIT did say that grades alone were not sufficiently predictive of success after admission.

https://mitadmissions.org/blogs/entry/we-are-reinstating-our-sat-act-requirement-for-future-admissions-cycles/

“Our research shows this predictive validity holds even when you control for socioeconomic factors that correlate with testing. It also shows that good grades in high school do not themselves necessarily translate to academic success at MIT if you cannot account for testing.”

They also noted the impact of the pandemic on student preparation:

“The pandemic has only made this more clear, because classroom work and assessment have been just as disrupted as access to the tests, if not more so, and for longer periods of time, disproportionately affecting the most socioeconomically disadvantaged students. We know that the pandemic’s effects on grades and courses will linger for years, but the tests can give students a more recent opportunity to show that they have made up lost ground.⁠”

MIT is one of the very few - if not the only T25 - that went back to requiring the SAT after TO. It's a niche tech school that doesn't attract a wide swath of applicants, and it has board members aligned with the College Board. An outlier. Thousands of colleges - including HYPS and the other Ivies - are test optional. It's not going away.

I agree. I would never use MIT (or Georgetown) as an example of anything. Those two have always been outliers - requiring their own application, Georgetown's past fixation on subject tests, etc.

You forgot Florida, Georgia, and Purdue.

Florida and Georgia state mandated.

Purdue has connections with College Board.

None are in T25 per PP's post so not worth mentioning. There will be SOME colleges that keep mandatory SAT/ACT, but nothing noteworthy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Despite 10 pages of concerns, highly selective colleges have no trouble choosing excellent kids and building a great class.

Their problem is the opposite: choosing whom to reject from the large number of qualified kids.

Your concern that these issues, whether real or imagined, are causing colleges to select kids that are unqualified and incapable is just not borne out by evidence.

You're completely speaking out of your A$$. How do you know this? Have there been studies? Has enough time passed for there to even been evidence to accrue?

No.
We don't have graduation rates of the test-optional and grade inflated Covid cohort.
We don't even have GPA data. We certainly don't have post-graduation employment data.

You are being all very authoritarian about total BS.

First, you can go ahead and use pejoratives, but it is best not to follow them up with a post that agrees with the premise you object to: that there is no evidence to support the claim.

Not one elite college I am aware of has said they have a problem caused by grade inflation (OR test optional even though that was not part of the thread!). In fact, most of them are doing just fine in admissions, taking pretty much the same kind of kids, and not reporting spiked first year dropout rates.

If you want to wait a few years for employment data and 4 year graduation rates and come back and mea culpa, that's fine. I can wait. But we agree there is no evidence to support your claim, other than your random speculation which is likely driven by ideology.

MIT did.

Wrong and untrue. They simply went back to using test scores after Covid. They never said they were unable to admit an MIT quality cohort without them.

But again, this thread, and the post above, was not about TO, but about GPA, so it is irrelevant anyway. They definitely never said grade inflation was causing them to have a poor class.

MIT did say that grades alone were not sufficiently predictive of success after admission.

https://mitadmissions.org/blogs/entry/we-are-reinstating-our-sat-act-requirement-for-future-admissions-cycles/

“Our research shows this predictive validity holds even when you control for socioeconomic factors that correlate with testing. It also shows that good grades in high school do not themselves necessarily translate to academic success at MIT if you cannot account for testing.”

They also noted the impact of the pandemic on student preparation:

“The pandemic has only made this more clear, because classroom work and assessment have been just as disrupted as access to the tests, if not more so, and for longer periods of time, disproportionately affecting the most socioeconomically disadvantaged students. We know that the pandemic’s effects on grades and courses will linger for years, but the tests can give students a more recent opportunity to show that they have made up lost ground.⁠”

MIT is one of the very few - if not the only T25 - that went back to requiring the SAT after TO. It's a niche tech school that doesn't attract a wide swath of applicants, and it has board members aligned with the College Board. An outlier. Thousands of colleges - including HYPS and the other Ivies - are test optional. It's not going away.

I agree. I would never use MIT (or Georgetown) as an example of anything. Those two have always been outliers - requiring their own application, Georgetown's past fixation on subject tests, etc.

You forgot Florida, Georgia, and Purdue.

Florida and Georgia state mandated.

Purdue has connections with College Board.

None are in T25 per PP's post so not worth mentioning. There will be SOME colleges that keep mandatory SAT/ACT, but nothing noteworthy.

MIT (T5) Georgetown (T25), Florida (T30), Purdue, Georgia Tech, Georgia (T50).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Despite 10 pages of concerns, highly selective colleges have no trouble choosing excellent kids and building a great class.

Their problem is the opposite: choosing whom to reject from the large number of qualified kids.

Your concern that these issues, whether real or imagined, are causing colleges to select kids that are unqualified and incapable is just not borne out by evidence.

You're completely speaking out of your A$$. How do you know this? Have there been studies? Has enough time passed for there to even been evidence to accrue?

No.
We don't have graduation rates of the test-optional and grade inflated Covid cohort.
We don't even have GPA data. We certainly don't have post-graduation employment data.

You are being all very authoritarian about total BS.

First, you can go ahead and use pejoratives, but it is best not to follow them up with a post that agrees with the premise you object to: that there is no evidence to support the claim.

Not one elite college I am aware of has said they have a problem caused by grade inflation (OR test optional even though that was not part of the thread!). In fact, most of them are doing just fine in admissions, taking pretty much the same kind of kids, and not reporting spiked first year dropout rates.

If you want to wait a few years for employment data and 4 year graduation rates and come back and mea culpa, that's fine. I can wait. But we agree there is no evidence to support your claim, other than your random speculation which is likely driven by ideology.

MIT did.

Wrong and untrue. They simply went back to using test scores after Covid. They never said they were unable to admit an MIT quality cohort without them.

But again, this thread, and the post above, was not about TO, but about GPA, so it is irrelevant anyway. They definitely never said grade inflation was causing them to have a poor class.

MIT did say that grades alone were not sufficiently predictive of success after admission.

https://mitadmissions.org/blogs/entry/we-are-reinstating-our-sat-act-requirement-for-future-admissions-cycles/

“Our research shows this predictive validity holds even when you control for socioeconomic factors that correlate with testing. It also shows that good grades in high school do not themselves necessarily translate to academic success at MIT if you cannot account for testing.”

They also noted the impact of the pandemic on student preparation:

“The pandemic has only made this more clear, because classroom work and assessment have been just as disrupted as access to the tests, if not more so, and for longer periods of time, disproportionately affecting the most socioeconomically disadvantaged students. We know that the pandemic’s effects on grades and courses will linger for years, but the tests can give students a more recent opportunity to show that they have made up lost ground.⁠”

MIT is one of the very few - if not the only T25 - that went back to requiring the SAT after TO. It's a niche tech school that doesn't attract a wide swath of applicants, and it has board members aligned with the College Board. An outlier. Thousands of colleges - including HYPS and the other Ivies - are test optional. It's not going away.

I agree. I would never use MIT (or Georgetown) as an example of anything. Those two have always been outliers - requiring their own application, Georgetown's past fixation on subject tests, etc.

You forgot Florida, Georgia, and Purdue.

Florida and Georgia state mandated.

Purdue has connections with College Board.

None are in T25 per PP's post so not worth mentioning. There will be SOME colleges that keep mandatory SAT/ACT, but nothing noteworthy.

MIT (T5) Georgetown (T25), Florida (T30), Purdue, Georgia Tech, Georgia (T50).

My own kid applied to 4 of these schools.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Despite 10 pages of concerns, highly selective colleges have no trouble choosing excellent kids and building a great class.

Their problem is the opposite: choosing whom to reject from the large number of qualified kids.

Your concern that these issues, whether real or imagined, are causing colleges to select kids that are unqualified and incapable is just not borne out by evidence.

You're completely speaking out of your A$$. How do you know this? Have there been studies? Has enough time passed for there to even been evidence to accrue?

No.
We don't have graduation rates of the test-optional and grade inflated Covid cohort.
We don't even have GPA data. We certainly don't have post-graduation employment data.

You are being all very authoritarian about total BS.

First, you can go ahead and use pejoratives, but it is best not to follow them up with a post that agrees with the premise you object to: that there is no evidence to support the claim.

Not one elite college I am aware of has said they have a problem caused by grade inflation (OR test optional even though that was not part of the thread!). In fact, most of them are doing just fine in admissions, taking pretty much the same kind of kids, and not reporting spiked first year dropout rates.

If you want to wait a few years for employment data and 4 year graduation rates and come back and mea culpa, that's fine. I can wait. But we agree there is no evidence to support your claim, other than your random speculation which is likely driven by ideology.

MIT did.

Wrong and untrue. They simply went back to using test scores after Covid. They never said they were unable to admit an MIT quality cohort without them.

But again, this thread, and the post above, was not about TO, but about GPA, so it is irrelevant anyway. They definitely never said grade inflation was causing them to have a poor class.

MIT did say that grades alone were not sufficiently predictive of success after admission.

https://mitadmissions.org/blogs/entry/we-are-reinstating-our-sat-act-requirement-for-future-admissions-cycles/

“Our research shows this predictive validity holds even when you control for socioeconomic factors that correlate with testing. It also shows that good grades in high school do not themselves necessarily translate to academic success at MIT if you cannot account for testing.”

They also noted the impact of the pandemic on student preparation:

“The pandemic has only made this more clear, because classroom work and assessment have been just as disrupted as access to the tests, if not more so, and for longer periods of time, disproportionately affecting the most socioeconomically disadvantaged students. We know that the pandemic’s effects on grades and courses will linger for years, but the tests can give students a more recent opportunity to show that they have made up lost ground.⁠”

MIT is one of the very few - if not the only T25 - that went back to requiring the SAT after TO. It's a niche tech school that doesn't attract a wide swath of applicants, and it has board members aligned with the College Board. An outlier. Thousands of colleges - including HYPS and the other Ivies - are test optional. It's not going away.

I agree. I would never use MIT (or Georgetown) as an example of anything. Those two have always been outliers - requiring their own application, Georgetown's past fixation on subject tests, etc.

You forgot Florida, Georgia, and Purdue.

Florida and Georgia state mandated.

Purdue has connections with College Board.

None are in T25 per PP's post so not worth mentioning. There will be SOME colleges that keep mandatory SAT/ACT, but nothing noteworthy.

MIT (T5) Georgetown (T25), Florida (T30), Purdue, Georgia Tech, Georgia (T50).

My own kid applied to 4 of these schools.

What were your kid's SAT/ ACT scores?