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Why all kids should take the SAT: Student’s defense of standardized testing
By Rikki Schlott August 13, 2022 12:00pm Updated

It was less than five years ago that I spent a beautiful August afternoon in a poorly ventilated gymnasium full of hundreds of sweaty, nervous teenagers penciling in bubbles for the SAT.

But, as much as I hated taking that test, I hate the idea of doing away with standardized testing far more.

The pandemic spurred an explosion of testing-optional admissions policies at colleges and universities around the country (and rightfully so, as testing centers could easily double as super-spreaders). But what started as a pause is becoming more and more permanent. 75 percent of colleges aren’t requiring the SAT or ACT. Even Harvard officially called testing off until at least the class of 2030’s admission cycle.

The pandemic coincided with growing hostility towards standardized testing, underpinning concerns about demographic performance disparities in the quest for equity in admissions.

To be sure, the SAT and ACT are not perfect — a poor night’s sleep, a dead calculator, or a pencil-tapper at the next desk could all throw a test-taker off their game — but it represents a quantifiable measure of aptitude to be holistically weighed with more subjective measures, like essays, interviews and letters of recommendation.

Studies have consistently demonstrated that standardized testing is a good predictor of success on campus and over a lifetime, even after taking into account test-takers’ socioeconomic backgrounds. And because they’re also strongly correlated with IQ, test scores are the type of indicator admissions officers should be salivating over.

Removing this objectivity from the admissions process will spell disaster.

Without the SAT or ACT, GPAs are the only solid number colleges have to work with, but this measure is becoming increasingly meaningless. A study of more than 4 million seniors’ credentials found GPAs have been steadily on the rise for years. But just because grades are going up doesn’t mean kids are getting any smarter — in fact, standardized testing scores are on the decline.

While average GPAs rose from 3.22 to 3.39 over the past decade, ACT scores slumped from 21 to 20.3 over that same period.

“The key takeaway is that grade inflation is real, it’s systemic, and it really threatens the utility of school transcripts as a tool for determining what students know,” Dr. Edgar I. Sanchez, co-author of the study, told me. “When you eliminate testing, you’re taking away an objective measure, and you’re introducing more subjectivity into the college admissions process.”

In a world without testing, what’s to stop elite high schools from inflating students’ GPAs to compete for good college placement results? It’s actually a measurable phenomenon: A study of GPAs in North Carolina over a decade showed grade inflation in wealthier areas and stagnation elsewhere.

Amidst a backdrop of equity-based hysteria, MIT has emerged as a voice of reason.

Analysis of recent admissions cycles at MIT found that test scores were highly predictive of a student’s potential to succeed in college. Furthermore, SAT and ACT results also helped identify students from disadvantaged backgrounds with challenging circumstances who have the potential to shine on campus.

In March, an MIT advisory panel unanimously opted to reinstate standardized testing in their admissions process, declaring, “We believe a requirement is more equitable and transparent than a test-optional policy.” Now, more schools must follow suit in restoring objectivity to the admissions process.

There’s a lot more at stake here than which Ivy League school elite kids will go to get a gender studies degree. The demise of standardized testing actually has profound implications in the professional world. Now that movements are afoot to make the LSAT and the MCAT optional for law school and medical school admissions (and even supported by the American Bar Association), it begs an important question:

Do you want the lawyer defending you in court or the doctor performing your surgery to be where they are because they succeed in a high-pressure testing setting, or because someone wrote them a really nice letter of recommendation?

https://nypost.com/2022/08/13/why-all-students-should-take-the-sat/