University System of Maryland moves toward removing SAT/ACT requirement

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So, when applying to UMD a candidate can send the SAT score (if that's good enough) or not. The acceptance criteria don't take into consideration that score at all, right? If that's the case, how do they decide who's academically fit? High School grades?

Maybe middle school.

They know what they need to see and have realized that kids who prep for a 4 hour test and do well are not the kids who do well over the course of 4 years. Add in a good essay and extra curriculars and suddenly the standardized tests don't mean much.

Look up information about Wake Forest and why they don't use it.

Please, they have known the whole time that SAT does not measure anything except how much families can pay for prep courses and therefore tuition. You all get that college admissions are actually not a meritocracy?

There is a ton research out there showing that SAT scores predict college success; most times better than HS grades. When the UC system looked into it they found that standardized tests were the single best predictor of college performance. When you add parental education as a variable, HHI becomes significantly less predictive of standardized test scores. In other words, HHI is an inexact proxy for parental education. Free high quality prep is easily available. Asians prep the most, but both Hispanics and AA prep more than whites do, and there are many studies that show that on average prepping only raises scores 30-60 points.

Bottom line, standardized tests work as intended; they act as a relatively unbiased tool to measure college readiness. They’re almost certainly the most objective measurement currently used for college admissions. Unfortunately, that does not allow colleges to balance the demographics of their classes as they wish, thus they’re being phased out.

SAT/ACT are not an unbiased tool. Free prep tools are not the same as those that cost $100+/hour (some way more than that). And average prepping raises scores much more than 30-60 points, unless you are already at a 1500. My own kid did 4 hours of 1 on 1 test prep and raised their score 150 points to a 1500. And all future tests and prep tests had them score within 20 points of 1500. But those initial 4 hours cost me $500. And my kid had to have the time to work for another 3-4 hours outside of those 4 hours. And we continued doing "prep tests" with 1-2 hours of review in between to ensure that kid was going to score well on the ultimate real SAT. That is not available to lower income students, or students who have to work 10-20 hr/week in HS to help support their families.

Btw, if my kid had wanted to, we could have paid for another 10-20 hours of intensive one-on-one test prep and likely gotten to 1550/1560. I am certain that is not an option for majority of college bound students (maybe the top 10%).

Rich people hire tutors and consultants to boost GPA and ECs
They send their kids to private schools which are more advantageous admitting to colleges.
What's the point???
SAT is actually one of the most fair things.

I agree the emphasis on EC's is BS and discriminatory against low and middle-income students. You have low/middle-income students working part time jobs in high school instead of participating in $1k+ voluntourism trips in Africa or $1k+ per season sports.

Grades are different though, because students are actually being tested on material their teachers taught.

The AP tests are the fairest testing mechanism for academic achievement. I understand the ACT tries to test students on actual academic material rather than logic puzzles, but the scoring mechanism is terrible.

School grades(GPA) fluctuates a lot by schools and even by teachers at the same school.
Probably most unfair measure.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So, when applying to UMD a candidate can send the SAT score (if that's good enough) or not. The acceptance criteria don't take into consideration that score at all, right? If that's the case, how do they decide who's academically fit? High School grades?

Maybe middle school.

They know what they need to see and have realized that kids who prep for a 4 hour test and do well are not the kids who do well over the course of 4 years. Add in a good essay and extra curriculars and suddenly the standardized tests don't mean much.

Look up information about Wake Forest and why they don't use it.

Please, they have known the whole time that SAT does not measure anything except how much families can pay for prep courses and therefore tuition. You all get that college admissions are actually not a meritocracy?

There is a ton research out there showing that SAT scores predict college success; most times better than HS grades. When the UC system looked into it they found that standardized tests were the single best predictor of college performance. When you add parental education as a variable, HHI becomes significantly less predictive of standardized test scores. In other words, HHI is an inexact proxy for parental education. Free high quality prep is easily available. Asians prep the most, but both Hispanics and AA prep more than whites do, and there are many studies that show that on average prepping only raises scores 30-60 points.

Bottom line, standardized tests work as intended; they act as a relatively unbiased tool to measure college readiness. They’re almost certainly the most objective measurement currently used for college admissions. Unfortunately, that does not allow colleges to balance the demographics of their classes as they wish, thus they’re being phased out.

Source? And please don't cite the college board or test prep organizations.

I found these:

https://www.forbes.com/sites/nickmorrison/2020/01/29/its-gpas-not-standardized-tests-that-predict-college-success/
"Grade point averages are a much better predictor of success at college than standardized tests, according to new research."

https://news.uchicago.edu/story/test-scores-dont-stack-gpas-predicting-college-success
"Students’ high-school grade point averages are five times stronger than their ACT scores at predicting college graduation, according to a new study from the University of Chicago Consortium on School Research."

Feel free to read the UC report. This was a massive data set, covering all types of students/schools in the UC system.

https://senate.universityofcalifornia.edu/_files/underreview/sttf-report.pdf

Here's a study by University of Minnesota researchers (again, a huge data set, 150K students) showing that the SAT helped in predicting college success and wasn't substantially effected by SES

https://experts.umn.edu/en/publications/the-role-of-socioeconomic-status-in-sat-grade-relationships-and-i

Here's another from the same researchers showing that the vast majority of the relationship between college performance and test scores was unrelated to SES.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/19210051/

Here's a study that shows that test prep by different groups/ses levels. One of the key findings:
"Black non-Hispanic students are more likely to participate in test prep, and there are also significant interaction effects of race and grade level on prep, with black 11th graders having the highest predicted probability of prep."

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/j.1573-7861.2012.01326.x


Grades are important obviously, but the data is clear that SAT/ACT scores are also important in determining who succeeds in college. MIT recently added test requirements back in because they were unable to select a class that would do as well at MIT without them.

And despite what you say, the UCs have completely eliminated SAT/ACT tests from the application process. If they were such good indicators, why would they do that?

Household income drives SAT/ ACT scores.

But most colleges are already test optional, so there's that.

Household income drives everything GPA, EC, essay, awards, etc.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Can we go back to removing most AP courses so kids can have less stressful high school years and take courses that interest them - instead of what looks good on a transcript.

And instead of getting rid of ACT and SAT scores - get rid of super scores and unlimited retakes that wealthy and upper middle class can afford to do.

Make Fall junior year the SAT test day and Spring Junior year the ACT test day Everyone gets one shot at both. Taken in your school on the same day. No retakes. You can submit either one to colleges.

This does nothing to solve the $$$ some pay for test prep.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So, when applying to UMD a candidate can send the SAT score (if that's good enough) or not. The acceptance criteria don't take into consideration that score at all, right? If that's the case, how do they decide who's academically fit? High School grades?

Maybe middle school.

They know what they need to see and have realized that kids who prep for a 4 hour test and do well are not the kids who do well over the course of 4 years. Add in a good essay and extra curriculars and suddenly the standardized tests don't mean much.

Look up information about Wake Forest and why they don't use it.

Please, they have known the whole time that SAT does not measure anything except how much families can pay for prep courses and therefore tuition. You all get that college admissions are actually not a meritocracy?

There is a ton research out there showing that SAT scores predict college success; most times better than HS grades. When the UC system looked into it they found that standardized tests were the single best predictor of college performance. When you add parental education as a variable, HHI becomes significantly less predictive of standardized test scores. In other words, HHI is an inexact proxy for parental education. Free high quality prep is easily available. Asians prep the most, but both Hispanics and AA prep more than whites do, and there are many studies that show that on average prepping only raises scores 30-60 points.

Bottom line, standardized tests work as intended; they act as a relatively unbiased tool to measure college readiness. They’re almost certainly the most objective measurement currently used for college admissions. Unfortunately, that does not allow colleges to balance the demographics of their classes as they wish, thus they’re being phased out.

Source? And please don't cite the college board or test prep organizations.

I found these:

https://www.forbes.com/sites/nickmorrison/2020/01/29/its-gpas-not-standardized-tests-that-predict-college-success/
"Grade point averages are a much better predictor of success at college than standardized tests, according to new research."

https://news.uchicago.edu/story/test-scores-dont-stack-gpas-predicting-college-success
"Students’ high-school grade point averages are five times stronger than their ACT scores at predicting college graduation, according to a new study from the University of Chicago Consortium on School Research."

Feel free to read the UC report. This was a massive data set, covering all types of students/schools in the UC system.

https://senate.universityofcalifornia.edu/_files/underreview/sttf-report.pdf

Here's a study by University of Minnesota researchers (again, a huge data set, 150K students) showing that the SAT helped in predicting college success and wasn't substantially effected by SES

https://experts.umn.edu/en/publications/the-role-of-socioeconomic-status-in-sat-grade-relationships-and-i

Here's another from the same researchers showing that the vast majority of the relationship between college performance and test scores was unrelated to SES.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/19210051/

Here's a study that shows that test prep by different groups/ses levels. One of the key findings:
"Black non-Hispanic students are more likely to participate in test prep, and there are also significant interaction effects of race and grade level on prep, with black 11th graders having the highest predicted probability of prep."

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/j.1573-7861.2012.01326.x


Grades are important obviously, but the data is clear that SAT/ACT scores are also important in determining who succeeds in college. MIT recently added test requirements back in because they were unable to select a class that would do as well at MIT without them.

And despite what you say, the UCs have completely eliminated SAT/ACT tests from the application process. If they were such good indicators, why would they do that?

Because selecting the best students isn't their goal, I would assume

No, it's because schools have determined that there is more that goes into determining a good student than a test score.

[Anonymous]

I think some people are discounting how much from about a kid from their grades, when combined with other factors. They act like GPA is the sole determinant but it isn't. They can also use the following:

- rigor of courses
- how many kids took X course
- grade distribution for X course
- AP scores
- teacher recommendations
- competing time constraints

Not all classes (even APs) are viewed equally. Nor are the number of APs viewed equally. A kid with high grades but no extra curriculars/work (and work is a significant extra curricular) will not be viewed the same as one with a wealth of outside interests. Teachers will right exceptional letter for the best students.

I've also found that in the most rigorous APs, grade inflation is less common. There are a lot more Bs and Cs in the higher level math and sciences courses.

Admissions counselors get so much data from your kid's school. They can definitely tell the best students without relying on SAT/ACT scores.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So, when applying to UMD a candidate can send the SAT score (if that's good enough) or not. The acceptance criteria don't take into consideration that score at all, right? If that's the case, how do they decide who's academically fit? High School grades?

Maybe middle school.

They know what they need to see and have realized that kids who prep for a 4 hour test and do well are not the kids who do well over the course of 4 years. Add in a good essay and extra curriculars and suddenly the standardized tests don't mean much.

Look up information about Wake Forest and why they don't use it.

Please, they have known the whole time that SAT does not measure anything except how much families can pay for prep courses and therefore tuition. You all get that college admissions are actually not a meritocracy?

There is a ton research out there showing that SAT scores predict college success; most times better than HS grades. When the UC system looked into it they found that standardized tests were the single best predictor of college performance. When you add parental education as a variable, HHI becomes significantly less predictive of standardized test scores. In other words, HHI is an inexact proxy for parental education. Free high quality prep is easily available. Asians prep the most, but both Hispanics and AA prep more than whites do, and there are many studies that show that on average prepping only raises scores 30-60 points.

Bottom line, standardized tests work as intended; they act as a relatively unbiased tool to measure college readiness. They’re almost certainly the most objective measurement currently used for college admissions. Unfortunately, that does not allow colleges to balance the demographics of their classes as they wish, thus they’re being phased out.

SAT/ACT are not an unbiased tool. Free prep tools are not the same as those that cost $100+/hour (some way more than that). And average prepping raises scores much more than 30-60 points, unless you are already at a 1500. My own kid did 4 hours of 1 on 1 test prep and raised their score 150 points to a 1500. And all future tests and prep tests had them score within 20 points of 1500. But those initial 4 hours cost me $500. And my kid had to have the time to work for another 3-4 hours outside of those 4 hours. And we continued doing "prep tests" with 1-2 hours of review in between to ensure that kid was going to score well on the ultimate real SAT. That is not available to lower income students, or students who have to work 10-20 hr/week in HS to help support their families.

Btw, if my kid had wanted to, we could have paid for another 10-20 hours of intensive one-on-one test prep and likely gotten to 1550/1560. I am certain that is not an option for majority of college bound students (maybe the top 10%).

Rich people hire tutors and consultants to boost GPA and ECs
They send their kids to private schools which are more advantageous admitting to colleges.
What's the point???
SAT is actually one of the most fair things.

I agree the emphasis on EC's is BS and discriminatory against low and middle-income students. You have low/middle-income students working part time jobs in high school instead of participating in $1k+ voluntourism trips in Africa or $1k+ per season sports.

Grades are different though, because students are actually being tested on material their teachers taught.

The AP tests are the fairest testing mechanism for academic achievement. I understand the ACT tries to test students on actual academic material rather than logic puzzles, but the scoring mechanism is terrible.

School grades(GPA) fluctuates a lot by schools and even by teachers at the same school.
Probably most unfair measure.

Admission counselors know this. They get data that gives them insight into this.

[Anonymous]

Sorry world top schools like MIT know it matters so they require it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:So, when applying to UMD a candidate can send the SAT score (if that's good enough) or not. The acceptance criteria don't take into consideration that score at all, right? If that's the case, how do they decide who's academically fit? High School grades?

Maybe middle school.

They know what they need to see and have realized that kids who prep for a 4 hour test and do well are not the kids who do well over the course of 4 years. Add in a good essay and extra curriculars and suddenly the standardized tests don't mean much.

Look up information about Wake Forest and why they don't use it.

Please, they have known the whole time that SAT does not measure anything except how much families can pay for prep courses and therefore tuition. You all get that college admissions are actually not a meritocracy?

There is a ton research out there showing that SAT scores predict college success; most times better than HS grades. When the UC system looked into it they found that standardized tests were the single best predictor of college performance. When you add parental education as a variable, HHI becomes significantly less predictive of standardized test scores. In other words, HHI is an inexact proxy for parental education. Free high quality prep is easily available. Asians prep the most, but both Hispanics and AA prep more than whites do, and there are many studies that show that on average prepping only raises scores 30-60 points.

Bottom line, standardized tests work as intended; they act as a relatively unbiased tool to measure college readiness. They’re almost certainly the most objective measurement currently used for college admissions. Unfortunately, that does not allow colleges to balance the demographics of their classes as they wish, thus they’re being phased out.

Source? And please don't cite the college board or test prep organizations.

I found these:

https://www.forbes.com/sites/nickmorrison/2020/01/29/its-gpas-not-standardized-tests-that-predict-college-success/
"Grade point averages are a much better predictor of success at college than standardized tests, according to new research."

https://news.uchicago.edu/story/test-scores-dont-stack-gpas-predicting-college-success
"Students’ high-school grade point averages are five times stronger than their ACT scores at predicting college graduation, according to a new study from the University of Chicago Consortium on School Research."

Feel free to read the UC report. This was a massive data set, covering all types of students/schools in the UC system.

https://senate.universityofcalifornia.edu/_files/underreview/sttf-report.pdf

Here's a study by University of Minnesota researchers (again, a huge data set, 150K students) showing that the SAT helped in predicting college success and wasn't substantially effected by SES

https://experts.umn.edu/en/publications/the-role-of-socioeconomic-status-in-sat-grade-relationships-and-i

Here's another from the same researchers showing that the vast majority of the relationship between college performance and test scores was unrelated to SES.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/19210051/

Here's a study that shows that test prep by different groups/ses levels. One of the key findings:
"Black non-Hispanic students are more likely to participate in test prep, and there are also significant interaction effects of race and grade level on prep, with black 11th graders having the highest predicted probability of prep."

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/j.1573-7861.2012.01326.x


Grades are important obviously, but the data is clear that SAT/ACT scores are also important in determining who succeeds in college. MIT recently added test requirements back in because they were unable to select a class that would do as well at MIT without them.

And despite what you say, the UCs have completely eliminated SAT/ACT tests from the application process. If they were such good indicators, why would they do that?

Household income drives SAT/ ACT scores.

But most colleges are already test optional, so there's that.

Household income drives everything GPA, EC, essay, awards, etc.

Or...intelligence drives household income?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Sorry world top schools like MIT know it matters so they require it.

So what if MIT requires it? Really, they have a freaking 6.7% acceptance rate. If they can’t figure out how to find good students without the SAT that’s unfortunate, but 99% of kids matriculating to college aren’t evening going to apply there and a vast majority of those that do won’t get in. So in reality, it matters very little what MIT does with standardized tests.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Sorry world top schools like MIT know it matters so they require it.

"World top" (huh?) schools like Harvard, Yale, Princeton, etc. are test optional.

MIT is just one school. A niche techie one at that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Sorry world top schools like MIT know it matters so they require it.

"World top" (huh?) schools like Harvard, Yale, Princeton, etc. are test optional.

MIT is just one school. A niche techie one at that.

Optional means they would gladly take it because it has value otherwise they would go Blind.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Sorry world top schools like MIT know it matters so they require it.

"World top" (huh?) schools like Harvard, Yale, Princeton, etc. are test optional.

MIT is just one school. A niche techie one at that.

Optional means they would gladly take it because it has value otherwise they would go Blind.

Optional is what MD Schools are doing to so what is your point. They're up there with "world top" schools like Harvard