What was Wwanderer's SAT score?
- Thread starter Slinky Bender
- Start date
I suppose I should clarify that the post I made was completely ironic.
I doubt there are many UG'rs who feel as negatively about the SAT, especially in regards to its ability to make any meaningful determination about the abilities of the students taking it.
In my estimation, the SAT is serious bunk.
I doubt there are many UG'rs who feel as negatively about the SAT, especially in regards to its ability to make any meaningful determination about the abilities of the students taking it.
In my estimation, the SAT is serious bunk.
I'll tell you why I don't think the SATs are "serious bunk" - if what you are looking for is a predictor of how well someone is going to do in University, they have proven to be excellent*. That doesn't mean they are good "IQ tests", or anything else.
* I don't know recently, but last time I looked (a long time ago), the thesis had been independantly tested by more than one source.
* I don't know recently, but last time I looked (a long time ago), the thesis had been independantly tested by more than one source.
Actually, a source of great controversy, as I understand it. I think the College Board has always done its analysis only on freshman grades. In that context, SATs have been very predictive. Further out, we don't know. A recent study of UC system showed the SAT IIs--which are achievement tests -- had better validity with long-term scores than the traditional SAT I. See debate in University of California system.
Why do I feel self-conscious about posting to this thread?
As I am certain you understand, that does not imply that SAT scores have zero power to predict college success. In other words, the fact that there are other factors, and even other factors which are more important, does not mean that there is no correlation.
I have never paid much attention to this subject, but my impression is that it has been studied to death by people/groups with all sorts of axes to grind, for the validity of the tests, against them and perpendicular...maybe even some unbiased studies mixed in there somewhere...and that there is tons of controversy. However, I do not think that there is much controversy about the existence of some loose correlations of SAT score with later success, but I also don't think that such a correlation is at all surprising. Human ability to do things in any given sphere of activity (intellectual, athletic, artistic, ...) are all losely correlated, also probably between spheres to some extent. The SAT is a largely intellectual task, and doing well at it will be statistically correlated with the ability to do well on any vaguely similar sort of tasks. Success in college is also probably correlated with ability to play chess or do crossword puzzles or fill out a tax form or... But such correlations do not make all those things good measures to be used by admission offices. I suspect the single best thing about the SAT from an admissions point of view is that it is a relatively uniform indicator. Nothing else available to admissions officers (e.g, high school grades, letters of recommendation) is nearly so comparable for students coming from very different backgrounds, parts of the country and so forth. In other words, although the game may not be an entirely sensible one, the playing field is at least more nearly level than those for most other measures of high school achievement.
The only thing other than opinion I can add to this is that I once saw an internal Harvard study of the effectiveness of SAT scores as a predictor of success at that particular institution, as measured by grade average, class rank, probability of warning/suspension/expulsion for academic reasons and so forth. It concluded that the verbal section SAT score is a fairly good predictor (better than high school grades, if I recall correctly) but that the math score is not very useful. Perhaps surprisingly, this was true even for science and math majors.
-Ww
As I am certain you understand, that does not imply that SAT scores have zero power to predict college success. In other words, the fact that there are other factors, and even other factors which are more important, does not mean that there is no correlation.
I have never paid much attention to this subject, but my impression is that it has been studied to death by people/groups with all sorts of axes to grind, for the validity of the tests, against them and perpendicular...maybe even some unbiased studies mixed in there somewhere...and that there is tons of controversy. However, I do not think that there is much controversy about the existence of some loose correlations of SAT score with later success, but I also don't think that such a correlation is at all surprising. Human ability to do things in any given sphere of activity (intellectual, athletic, artistic, ...) are all losely correlated, also probably between spheres to some extent. The SAT is a largely intellectual task, and doing well at it will be statistically correlated with the ability to do well on any vaguely similar sort of tasks. Success in college is also probably correlated with ability to play chess or do crossword puzzles or fill out a tax form or... But such correlations do not make all those things good measures to be used by admission offices. I suspect the single best thing about the SAT from an admissions point of view is that it is a relatively uniform indicator. Nothing else available to admissions officers (e.g, high school grades, letters of recommendation) is nearly so comparable for students coming from very different backgrounds, parts of the country and so forth. In other words, although the game may not be an entirely sensible one, the playing field is at least more nearly level than those for most other measures of high school achievement.
The only thing other than opinion I can add to this is that I once saw an internal Harvard study of the effectiveness of SAT scores as a predictor of success at that particular institution, as measured by grade average, class rank, probability of warning/suspension/expulsion for academic reasons and so forth. It concluded that the verbal section SAT score is a fairly good predictor (better than high school grades, if I recall correctly) but that the math score is not very useful. Perhaps surprisingly, this was true even for science and math majors.
-Ww
Harvard has one of the four best math departments in the country.
Harvard math undergrad is ridiculously difficult (I've been a long time critic of their tendency to only encourage geniouses to study advanced mathematical concepts).
Here's a start.
http://www.fairtest.org/facts/satvalidity.html
Clicking around the site will give you more data.
It's admittedly an organization with an agenda, but they do tend to back up their claims with ETS's own numbers.
I'm claiming the test is bunk, not that it's random. Obviously someone scoring a 1500 on the SAT will (on the average) do better than someone scoring 800 their freshman year of college. That still does not make it (as it claims to be) a good predictor of freshman performance. If something largely fails at its sole reason for existence, I'll call it bunk.
Harvard math undergrad is ridiculously difficult (I've been a long time critic of their tendency to only encourage geniouses to study advanced mathematical concepts).
Here's a start.
http://www.fairtest.org/facts/satvalidity.html
Clicking around the site will give you more data.
It's admittedly an organization with an agenda, but they do tend to back up their claims with ETS's own numbers.
I'm claiming the test is bunk, not that it's random. Obviously someone scoring a 1500 on the SAT will (on the average) do better than someone scoring 800 their freshman year of college. That still does not make it (as it claims to be) a good predictor of freshman performance. If something largely fails at its sole reason for existence, I'll call it bunk.
It's really worse than bunk, though. It seriously stresses out and demoralizes kids. It also serves as a device of institutionalized racism and sexism, it's results being far less meaningful for women and minorities.
It's trash and the college admissions process would be better of without it.
Alas, it's also a tremendous money maker for its owners.
(Anyone else been to the palace that ETS calls home?)
It's trash and the college admissions process would be better of without it.
Alas, it's also a tremendous money maker for its owners.
(Anyone else been to the palace that ETS calls home?)
Re: Re: Why do I feel self-conscious about posting to this thread?
I am not sure I am parsing your questions correctly, but anyway in case I left you with an incorrect impression, I have never been a student at Harvard. As for Alum Fund contributions, coming from a rich/powerful/supportive will probably help you to get into any Ivy League school, but it is also far from the only way, nor is it the basis by which most of the students are admitted.
-Ww
I am not sure I am parsing your questions correctly, but anyway in case I left you with an incorrect impression, I have never been a student at Harvard. As for Alum Fund contributions, coming from a rich/powerful/supportive will probably help you to get into any Ivy League school, but it is also far from the only way, nor is it the basis by which most of the students are admitted.
-Ww
SATs are bad, but many alternatives are worse
Well, I am no fan of ETS (despite having gotten a good SAT score) and do not want to let the dynamics of the discussion back me into a position of defending them. I usually say that the E in ETS stands for "Evil". And yes, I have seen their palace.
Nevertheless, I think you may be overstating the case against the SATs. They almost certainly are racially and perhaps gender biased, but I think they are actually less biased than many of the other indicators used in the college admissions process and may make the overall outcome of that process less discriminatory than it otherwise would be. Keep in mind that most of the other measures are primarily based at least in part, and often entirely, on purely subjective judgments by teachers, guidance counselors, admissions officers themselves and so forth. Whether or not this is true today, it was definitely true in the past when SATs first became major factors in college admissions. Many schools only started admitting minorities in even small numbers because they could come up with no defensible reason to reject such applicants if their SAT scores were sufficiently high.
My point is that while SATs/ETS are pretty bad in lots of ways, you might not want to be so quick to throw them out unless you have something better, fairer, less stressful etc with which to replace them.
-Ww
PS - One type of student that tends to be helped by standardized tests (including SATs) are those who are smart but rebelious and independent thinkers. They have a shot at doing well on the tests but are often considered "too difficult" by teachers and other adults to get good grades, letters of recommendation and so forth. In my opinion, it is extremely important that at least some students of this type get into our colleges.
Well, I am no fan of ETS (despite having gotten a good SAT score) and do not want to let the dynamics of the discussion back me into a position of defending them. I usually say that the E in ETS stands for "Evil". And yes, I have seen their palace.
Nevertheless, I think you may be overstating the case against the SATs. They almost certainly are racially and perhaps gender biased, but I think they are actually less biased than many of the other indicators used in the college admissions process and may make the overall outcome of that process less discriminatory than it otherwise would be. Keep in mind that most of the other measures are primarily based at least in part, and often entirely, on purely subjective judgments by teachers, guidance counselors, admissions officers themselves and so forth. Whether or not this is true today, it was definitely true in the past when SATs first became major factors in college admissions. Many schools only started admitting minorities in even small numbers because they could come up with no defensible reason to reject such applicants if their SAT scores were sufficiently high.
My point is that while SATs/ETS are pretty bad in lots of ways, you might not want to be so quick to throw them out unless you have something better, fairer, less stressful etc with which to replace them.
-Ww
PS - One type of student that tends to be helped by standardized tests (including SATs) are those who are smart but rebelious and independent thinkers. They have a shot at doing well on the tests but are often considered "too difficult" by teachers and other adults to get good grades, letters of recommendation and so forth. In my opinion, it is extremely important that at least some students of this type get into our colleges.
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The early SAT's were adopted from certain tests that were designed to flunk foriegners.
Look, I know several people that have or do work in admissions offices at super competative universities. The MIT's, Harvards, Stanfords, etc. of the world place almost no emphasis (if any at all) on SAT score when they are performing their calculus of student worth. That's because they know it's bunk. (Don't you think that the top schools would have the top admissions officers?). ETS had to completely redesign the thing because it was about to lose its biggest source of revenue (the UC system was considering dropping it). Over the past years, ETS has been forced to admit that it isn't a test of aptitude.
Ultimately, what the test does measure extremely well is household income. I don't remember, but I think the r squared was something like .6 for the middle 80% of scores plotted linearly* against household income.
Now, why do you think it would be, that a test with terrible predictive qualities for academic success, that has been shown to be biased against women and minorities, that you can significantly increase your score on by taking a four week class, and that ultimately proves to be an excellent measure for a family's household income, that college admissions officers pretty much agree is useless, why would you think that such a test is still being used?
* - I had never seen a higher linear fit for a social phenomenon. The study really blew my mind, and this was well before I had come to despise the SAT's.
Look, I know several people that have or do work in admissions offices at super competative universities. The MIT's, Harvards, Stanfords, etc. of the world place almost no emphasis (if any at all) on SAT score when they are performing their calculus of student worth. That's because they know it's bunk. (Don't you think that the top schools would have the top admissions officers?). ETS had to completely redesign the thing because it was about to lose its biggest source of revenue (the UC system was considering dropping it). Over the past years, ETS has been forced to admit that it isn't a test of aptitude.
Ultimately, what the test does measure extremely well is household income. I don't remember, but I think the r squared was something like .6 for the middle 80% of scores plotted linearly* against household income.
Now, why do you think it would be, that a test with terrible predictive qualities for academic success, that has been shown to be biased against women and minorities, that you can significantly increase your score on by taking a four week class, and that ultimately proves to be an excellent measure for a family's household income, that college admissions officers pretty much agree is useless, why would you think that such a test is still being used?
* - I had never seen a higher linear fit for a social phenomenon. The study really blew my mind, and this was well before I had come to despise the SAT's.
As I have said, I do not want to defend the SATs. The Evil Testing Services's own studies indicate that parental income is one of the best, the single best in some studies, predictor of a student's SAT scores, as you note*. (Note, of course, that all of these correlations have lots of scattered; there are plenty of poor kids who get 1600s too.)
The top schools, and I also have personal knowledge of two of those you mention, use no single set of (or weighting of) admission criteria to pick their classes, for the simple reason that they are trying to get a student body with a diverse set of talents and strengths. Being very very strong in any one way (including top SAT scores) or too weak in any one area (including SAT scores) will usually get you accepted or rejected, respectively, by the most selective places. I believe that you are correct that most places are putting less and less emphasis on SAT scores as time passes.
However, don't tell me what is so bad about the SATs as an admission criterion; instead tell what you think the really good alternate criteria are, the ones which most fairly and accurately allow the admission office to choose the applicants who most deserve/merit an offer.
-Ww
*If you ever get the chance to discuss the tests with an ETS representative of some sort, be sure to bring this correlation up; it makes them squirm big time.
The top schools, and I also have personal knowledge of two of those you mention, use no single set of (or weighting of) admission criteria to pick their classes, for the simple reason that they are trying to get a student body with a diverse set of talents and strengths. Being very very strong in any one way (including top SAT scores) or too weak in any one area (including SAT scores) will usually get you accepted or rejected, respectively, by the most selective places. I believe that you are correct that most places are putting less and less emphasis on SAT scores as time passes.
However, don't tell me what is so bad about the SATs as an admission criterion; instead tell what you think the really good alternate criteria are, the ones which most fairly and accurately allow the admission office to choose the applicants who most deserve/merit an offer.
-Ww
*If you ever get the chance to discuss the tests with an ETS representative of some sort, be sure to bring this correlation up; it makes them squirm big time.
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