Test optional over

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Colleges can still admit students with low test scores even if they submit them!

Yes, as long as they admit non-URM at the same rate as URM students.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Brilliant.TO is another proxy for this by the way and should also be banned. No one in USA cant take an SAT these days. Shame on anyone applying to school TO but the essays are the worst.

I can see why the PP is opposed to essays. Clearly they didn't get ahead in life on the basis of sharp writing skills.

The PP is not opposed to essays - they are opposed to using essays as a proxy for racial information:

"For example, a school may not use students’ personal essays, writing samples, participation in extracurriculars, or other cues as a means of determining or predicting a student’s race and favoring or disfavoring such students."

High time. No more essays used to thinly disguise your race.

The Supreme Court didn't ban citing one's race in college essays.

Sure, but it won't help with admissions. So no point in writing another sob story essay about how racial discrimination has shaped your life.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Please tell me if I am reading this Valentine's Day letter from the US Department of Education correctly:

https://www.ed.gov/media/document/dear-colleague-letter-sffa-v-harvard-109506.pdf

Test-optional is over?

Also, it says the universities have 14 days to comply. How will this affect the current admissions cycle?

This is about TO as a proxy for race, which doesn’t mean tests will be reinstated as required.

TO can't be used as a proxy for race. Going TO doesn't tell admissions what race you are.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Colleges can still admit students with low test scores even if they submit them!

Exactly. It doesn't mean kids who aren't great test takers won't get into college.

LOL. Tell that to my 18yo self in 1991. You’re not competitive with low test scores.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Brilliant.TO is another proxy for this by the way and should also be banned. No one in USA cant take an SAT these days. Shame on anyone applying to school TO but the essays are the worst.

I can see why the PP is opposed to essays. Clearly they didn't get ahead in life on the basis of sharp writing skills.

DP, my kids are grest in writing.
Thus, even more I want esssy in SAT style.
Currently nobody even knows who actually wrote it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Will they get rid of legacy admissions as a proxy for selecting wealthy white students?

Well since the demographics attending college have changed significantly over the last 20 years, wouldn’t legacy benefit all races now? This isn’t the 1980s where legacy exclusively means wealthy Caucasian anymore.

Yep. At Stanford, for example, 40% legacy applicants are of color and 50% legacy admits are of color.

They're Asian.

I don’t know the percentage breakdowns, but in any case they’re not Caucasian.

[Anonymous]

I'll be curious to see how all of this affects HBCUs.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This is too bad. Creatives will be shut out of better colleges because many don’t process standardized tests well. One of mine tested high and another went TO. They both deserve a place at college, but the one kid isn’t inherently a better student than the other. The one who didn’t test well has more curiosity and is always leading interesting discussions on a myriad of topics.

Don't worry.
There are good colleges for the kid who got 1250 sat. The kid will be fine.

Elite colleges are for kids who got both.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'll be curious to see how all of this affects HBCUs.

Why do you think it would affect HBCUs? They already admit without regard to race. Do you think a bunch of whites and Asians will start submitting applications?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Colleges can still admit students with low test scores even if they submit them!

Yes, as long as they admit non-URM at the same rate as URM students.

and it's a solid evidence in there's a lawsuit like Harvard case.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is too bad. Creatives will be shut out of better colleges because many don’t process standardized tests well. One of mine tested high and another went TO. They both deserve a place at college, but the one kid isn’t inherently a better student than the other. The one who didn’t test well has more curiosity and is always leading interesting discussions on a myriad of topics.

Don't worry.
There are good colleges for the kid who got 1250 sat. The kid will be fine.

Elite colleges are for kids who got both.

You are so smug. Your kid who “got both” may not have the advantages you think he does in the real world.

Colleges like Bowdoin (which is a great college) have long disagreed with you that test scores are the most important factor. Their track record shows they know how to choose good students without test scores. FWIW, I believe they used to have kids submit graded work in lieu of test scores so they had a method and it clearly worked for them for many years. Not sure if it is the same now that more schools are test optional. I know you can’t comprehend it, but good schools actually do know what they are looking for and have a good track record of picking the right students. It’s not all about who has the highest scores.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Colleges can still admit students with low test scores even if they submit them!

As long as they are white, otherwise the Administration will sue them for admitting an “objectively worse” student (read as: Black).

Why did they admit someone with lower scores? Must be a proxy for race.

The administration couldn’t be clearer: admitting students of color to elite schools is going to be treated as prima facie evidence of unlawful discrimination against whites.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is too bad. Creatives will be shut out of better colleges because many don’t process standardized tests well. One of mine tested high and another went TO. They both deserve a place at college, but the one kid isn’t inherently a better student than the other. The one who didn’t test well has more curiosity and is always leading interesting discussions on a myriad of topics.

Don't worry.
There are good colleges for the kid who got 1250 sat. The kid will be fine.

Elite colleges are for kids who got both.

You are so smug. Your kid who “got both” may not have the advantages you think he does in the real world.

Colleges like Bowdoin (which is a great college) have long disagreed with you that test scores are the most important factor. Their track record shows they know how to choose good students without test scores. FWIW, I believe they used to have kids submit graded work in lieu of test scores so they had a method and it clearly worked for them for many years. Not sure if it is the same now that more schools are test optional. I know you can’t comprehend it, but good schools actually do know what they are looking for and have a good track record of picking the right students. It’s not all about who has the highest scores.

You speculate too much.
MIT disagrees. There's no need to take low scoring kids unless they really show something special such as
winning math Olympiad, national hacker championship, etc that everyone can agree.

[Anonymous]

There are a few long term TO schools and that is fine, they are quirky and look for something other than academics. But for the vast majority of academic mainstream schools the thought of making admissions decisions with localized GPAs, chatgpt essays and unverified activities is just asinine. They have to have an agenda to agree to this and it’s not the find the highest performing academics, which are potentially America’s GREATEST natural resource. They are being cast aside for all sorts of nonsense while other countries plot our demise.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Colleges can still admit students with low test scores even if they submit them!

Yes, as long as they admit non-URM at the same rate as URM students.

They aren’t allowed to ask anyone’s race or consider anyone’s race so how do they that, exactly.

“Admit at the same rate” is racial balancing, that’s a no-no.

The only way to not get into trouble as per the memo is just admit whites and Asians, all other admissions will be treated with suspicion.

But a college somehow has to do this without any data on the race of the applicant or any analysis whatsoever.