SAT-I Performs a useful function

1
SAT-I Performs a useful function

• UC receives 90,000 (mostly UC-eligible)
  applicants/year, most of whom cannot be admitted
  to their first-choice campus, but will be
  accommodated in the UC system
• 2 standardized tests to assess academic
  preparation and predict success at UC
• Regardless of what it is assumed to measure,
  SAT-I for 40 years has proven predictive of UC
  GPAs in all years throughout college,and also of
  chances of timely graduation
• A little redundancy is good

2
Confused reasons for dumping SAT-I (on which its
critics disagree)

• It is not a significantly worse predictor than
  SAT-II
• It is not underestimating preparation of
  under-represented minorities, relative to any
  other academic measures

3
Geiser/Studley sample underestimates SAT-I
predictive power in several serious ways

• 1) Their sample consists only of UC students
  enrolled under current policy including SAT-I,
  and II, and High School grades (no correction was
  attempted for this restricted range
  problem--footnote 8)
• Thus they missed the real correlation that would
  be present if they included significant numbers
  of students with low SAT-Is

4

• 2) The Geiser/Studley report was further
  compromised by admissions decisions which used
  SAT-I as a compensating factor for lower HS
  grades
• For example students in the study with weaker
  high-school grades tended to have higher SAT-Is,
  which was the reason they qualified for
  admission.
• So a spurious anti-correlation between SAT-I and
  high school grades was artificially injected,
  which does not in fact exist

5

• 3) Studies have shown that students entering with
  higher SAT-Is (and SAT-IIs) self-select tougher
  majors, heavier course loads at UC
• Geiser/Studley did not account for the intrinsic
  differences among UC grades in different courses
  and majors, with widely varying grading standards

6
Under-represented minorities will fare worse
without SAT-I

• Studies show that both SAT-I and -II predict
  higher success at UC for under-represented
  minorities than they actually obtain. Therefore
  these students will not benefit in admissions
  which transfer weight from SATs to high school
  grades.

7
Arbitrary distinction between achievement and
ability

• Cant define, let alone measure one independently
  of the other
• SAT-I materialverbal and math reasoning and
  reading comprehension, runs all through 7th-12th
  grade curriculum, even though no course is
  specifically dedicated to it
• This vague distinction is no basis for
  eliminating either SAT as unfair. Why not
  simply drop its analogies section?

8
Bad way to send a message to high schools and
students

• If the message is Work hard in jr. high and
  high school, it is already being sent, loudly
• If the message is UC looks at the entire
  academic record, find an easier, more efficient
  way to make this clear
• Middle of senior year is too late for feedback
  to high school students (dont confuse college
  admissions with proficiency/graduation testing)

9

• SAT-I is by far the most universal of our 3
  measures of academic preparation
• It is the only direct means of comparing
  preparation of UC students with the rest of the
  U.S. (and inside Calif.). Strong academics are
  same here as elsewhere
• Trying to remove UC from the academic competition
  with leading US universities does not seem
  feasible. All other universities will continue to
  measure student qualifications in part with SAT,
  a process which has served UC well. UC should not
  seek to seal itself off from comparison with
  them.
• Throwing away the best-established standardized
  test raises long term danger of eroding academic
  standards at UC, the foundation of its excellence

10
Other concerns about SAT are unpersuasive

• Expensive prep courses for affluent? Objective
  studies show they add small gains at most
• Poor schools wasting too much time drilling?
• Undue burden on students? Then why do most of
  them take more tests than minimum?
• Damaging to their self-esteem? Already in top
  12.5, no evidence they suffer from SAT-induced
  low self-esteem

Most would apply more strongly to Achievement
tests
11
UC must work very hard with College Board to keep
some version of SAT-I

• No other large universities, including CSU, are
  planning to drop SAT-I
• Developing, validating, and administering a new
  parallel test for UC only, that is accepted
  elsewhere, is highly impractical, if not
  impossible
• It is, by definition, impossible for College
  Board to create a very new and different test
  which still has generally accepted equivalency
  to SAT-I
• Even if a replacement eventually emerges, its
  statistical properties will probably be very
  similar to SAT-I

12
Current admissions system is not so broken that
any more major changes are urgently required

• If ACT is fixed, then no changes in
  requirements will be needed, since ACT is already
  accepted. No applicant is compelled to take
  SAT-I
• UC just this year made a major revision to the
  role of academics in admissions. Prudence
  dictates that we assess the consequences of these
  changes before making another radical change. To
  detect resulting drift in admissions standards,
  in presence of escalating grade inflation, we now
  need SAT-I more than before

13
Non-academic and/or subjective factors already
loom large in UC admissions

• It is almost impossible to get admissions
  officials to state clearly and explicitly how
  important non-academic factors have become in
  last few years (its holistic.)
• Even before comprehensive review was adopted this
  year, among UCLAs 6400 Academic Rank 2 and 3
  applications, 99.2 of those with high life
  challenges were admitted, but only 18.0 of
  those with low life challenges were admitted.