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The SAT itself has been shown to be a poor measure of performance in college when compared to high school GPA or the challenge level of the coursework offered [

The SAT itself has been shown to be a poor measure of performance in college when compared to high school GPA or the challenge level of the coursework offered [1]. Instead of trying to turn students into numbers, we should demand college admissions employees do their jobs and actually look at the applications. [1] http://www.aei.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/What-Matters-Most-for-College-Completion.pdf http://www.aei.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/What-Matters-M...

knolax 7y ago
>actually look at the applications. So that they can infer the same "adverse conditions" and call it a holisitc process like they do now?
musicale 7y ago
That's crazy talk. ;-) Though from experience talking with people who work in admissions at "selective" schools, SAT scores and grades are mainly used to filter out the bottom 90% of non-preferred (e.g. not athletes, legacies/donors, or geographic/demographically desirable) applicants and the rest is extremely subjective and/or random, and is influenced by many non-academic factors such as whether you are too similar to some already-accepted applicant, etc.. If you are rejected it often has nothing to do with your qualifications so it should not be taken as a negative judgment of same; similarly, if you are accepted often it's often due semi-random factors that placed you ahead of students with better qualifications.
krapht 7y ago
I read the study you linked and it did not say that the SAT was a poor measure of performance? What it did say was that in isolation, the SAT score was worse than GPA, but the overall best predictor was a combination of SAT and GPA. I think this agrees with other studies about hiring, FWIW, where, as I understand, the best way to measure somebody's ability is a work-sample plus an IQ test. As someone who has been involved in hiring, we crudely approximate this by looking at work experience and how selective somebody's college education was.

knolax 7y ago

>actually look at the applications. So that they can infer the same "adverse conditions" and call it a holisitc process like they do now?

musicale 7y ago

That's crazy talk. ;-) Though from experience talking with people who work in admissions at "selective" schools, SAT scores and grades are mainly used to filter out the bottom 90% of non-preferred (e.g. not athletes, legacies/donors, or geographic/demographically desirable) applicants and the rest is extremely subjective and/or random, and is influenced by many non-academic factors such as whether you are too similar to some already-accepted applicant, etc.. If you are rejected it often has nothing to do with your qualifications so it should not be taken as a negative judgment of same; similarly, if you are accepted often it's often due semi-random factors that placed you ahead of students with better qualifications.

krapht 7y ago

I read the study you linked and it did not say that the SAT was a poor measure of performance? What it did say was that in isolation, the SAT score was worse than GPA, but the overall best predictor was a combination of SAT and GPA. I think this agrees with other studies about hiring, FWIW, where, as I understand, the best way to measure somebody's ability is a work-sample plus an IQ test. As someone who has been involved in hiring, we crudely approximate this by looking at work experience and how selective somebody's college education was.